He's done a pretty good job, too. While his overall record stands at 69-69, UConn is 60-45 since the move to the top division of college football. His teams have played in bowl games three times in the last five years and in 2007 the Huskies tied West Virginia for the Big East championship.

But this season is not Edsall's finest hour. Heading into Friday night's home game with West Virginia (5-2, 1-1 Big East), the Huskies are 3-4 and have lost their first two league games to Rutgers and Louisville. The latter was a 26-0 shutout loss that came on the heels of Edsall booting his starting quarterback, Cody Endres, off the team and going with former third-stringer Mike Box.

UConn's only wins this season have come against Texas Southern, Buffalo and Vanderbilt. There have been lopsided losses to Michigan and Temple, in addition to the shutout at Louisville.

All of this from a team that had 17 starters returning from an 8-5 team that beat South Carolina in a bowl game and lost its five games by a grand total of 15 points.

Needless to say, Edsall now has his detractors. They are out in full force.

Edsall's take on it all?

"People can have opinions, and I could make a statement [about his reaction to them]. But if I made this statement I would really be in trouble,'' Edsall said during his weekly press conference. "Now, if I was Geno [Auriemma, the ultra-successful UConn women's basketball coach] I could probably say it and get away with it.

"I think some of you might have already heard that statement. When you talk about opinions they're a lot like some other things.''

He did not go into detail about what part of the human anatomy that might be.

"People can have their own opinions and say what they want to say. This country has freedom of speech,'' Edsall said. "The people I have to worry about are these players and the people here at the university and myself.''

To say that this has been a trying season would be an understatement. The Huskies went through the first three games without Endres, who had been suspended by the school. But there was another quarterback with starting experience, although Zach Frazier played lukewarm at best.

Endres relieved Frazer and played well for a time, but then he was suspended again last week after reportedly failing another drug test. A former starting guard on the team, Eric Kuraczea, also quit the team.

Put that together with an average defense and generally mundane or poor special teams play and it all adds up to where the Huskies are now, which is struggling.

Many blame Edsall.

"I didn't get dumb overnight. I didn't get stupid overnight,'' he said. "Some years you have enough pieces for the puzzle. Some years you don't. And all you try to do is work each and every day to make these kids the best they can be in every aspect of their life.

"Sometimes you spoil people. And sometimes maybe the level of expectations are higher than what the people who made those expectations really know anything about. Believe me, if I worried about that I would never have been in this profession as long as I have and for as long as I want to be in it.''

If UConn struggles again Friday night against a West Virginia team it has never beaten, expect the complaints to continue, if not intensify. But Edsall seems secure in what he is doing, even if he might not be entirely secure in his job.

"I'm the same guy I was last year when we beat Notre Dame and South Carolina [and] when we won the Big East championship,'' Edsall said. "Like I said, I didn't get stupid overnight.

"In this profession you're nuts if you take any pats on the back. All those people that tell you how good you are, now those same people are telling you how bad you are and how you stink and all that stuff. '

Reach Dave Hickman at 304-348-1734 or dphickm...@aol.com.