STORRS - Jason Candle arrives at UConn with something the program hasn’t always had in recent years: a little forward motion.
That matters to the new coach, but only up to a point. Candle made that clear Thursday during media day interviews at the Shenkman Training Center, where he kept steering the conversation back to the daily work instead of any glow from the recent past.
“It's critical,” Candle said. “Ultimately, we have to define that in realistic terms for this team.
Yesterday's home runs don't win today's games. Our successes, or this program's successes - or failures, either way - have no impact on what is going to go on here when this ball gets kicked off.”
That’s a different kind of handoff than the ones UConn football has lived through before. When Bob Diaco took over from Paul Pasqualoni in 2014, the job was about dragging the program back in the right direction. When Jim Mora replaced Edsall in 2021, the Huskies were a national punchline.
Those were ugly years, and the damage went far beyond the standings. UConn football became a symbol of what not to be, especially in the early years after conference independence.
But Mora changed the tone. A winning record and three bowl appearances in four years gave the Huskies something sturdier to stand on.
The program got coached. It recruited.
It used the transfer portal well. It made the most of the financial tools available in this new era and started beating teams it wasn’t expected to beat.
Now it’s Candle’s turn to keep that moving.
The 46-year-old, who won eight bowl games in 10 years at Toledo, was aggressively pursued by athletic director David Benedict for the UConn opening. He steps into a job that still carries weight beyond the football field, even if it sits in the shadow of UConn’s basketball power. In the long view, football still matters to what the university can become when realignment opens doors again.
“We've got to live in the silo of, we've got to put our best foot forward here and that starts with putting your energy in the right place every day and trying to make sure you're a good fundamental team,” Candle said. “Jim and his staff did a great job.
The success speaks for itself the last couple years. But even during the interview process, being able to come and watch full practice and watch guys run to the ball on defense - and some of the fundamental things that are critically important to successful football - they have.
We don't want to lose momentum from that standpoint. We've got to be able to figure out where we can plug and replace things and replace and what to enhance and make it better.
Ultimately, that's our job, to move the product forward.”
That job is already moving fast. Camp opens August 5, and the 2026 season starts Sept. 5 against Lafayette at Rentschler Field.
Candle knows the reality: his teams can have bad weeks, and they can have bad seasons. But over time, the expectation is that the program keeps climbing.
UConn has invested in football as much as it reasonably can without a conference home and the money that comes with one. The facilities are there.
The support is there. The athletic department also understands the stakes.
Football may sit below both basketball programs in the fan hierarchy, but it still shapes the school’s broader future.
For Candle, that means the focus stays narrow.
“This is very process-driven for me,” he said. “This is not a result-oriented thing.
You have to figure out how to stack good days. You have to be able to buy into putting your energy in the right place every day.
And if you can do that, you ultimately would have some blind faith and belief that you're going to go play well. That's kind of where we're at right now.”
He returned to that theme again later, making it plain that the work is about what happens in the next 24 hours, not what gets written on a wall.
“I don't want to paint of picture of, we're just trying to put goals on the wall and that's what we're trying to do. We're trying to be the best version of ourselves every day.
This is a very process-driven thing. If you can't live in the 24 hours that you're gifted, if you're lucky enough to get it, it's going to be really hard.
You've got to be able to see what's right in front of you. We've got a lot of tough tasks in front of us to worry about now, to even getting the season kicked off.
From there, if we do what we need to do each and every day, we feel like we'll be playing in the postseason, for sure.”
It has been a whirlwind seven months since Candle was introduced. He and his family moved from Ohio to Connecticut.
He’s learning the campus and the community. He’s also getting acquainted with the program’s history while trying to build a roster almost from scratch, with just one transfer portal window available for the first time.
UConn has more than 40 transfers, about 20 of them from Toledo, and roughly 90 new members in the program when you include commitments from the 2027 high school class. Candle even managed to steal a little time away from the grind.
“Playing bad golf, pulling kids around on the boat, doing normal life things, family time,” he said. “And you get back into the groove.
And to do it at a place for the first time, there's a lot of moving parts. But, fired up to get going and excited to see what our team is really made of.
… We've got a great staff, we've got great people in the building, and our kids have done everything we've asked them to do. So it's going to be a fun next four or five weeks.”
In Other News...
Former UConn QB Just Got A Real Break In Baltimore
A little more room opened up in Baltimores quarterback room, and it could matter for Joe Fagnano. The former UConn starter signed a multi-year deal with the Ravens earlier this offseason, and with the team trimming the competition around him, his path to sticking around looks a bit clearer as training camp competition continues to sort itself out.
Fagnano is still part of a crowded room that includes Lamar Jackson, Tyler Huntley and Skylar Thompson, so nothing is settled yet. But for a quarterback who spent seven college seasons and came through UConn with a strong final year, every roster move around him is worth watching, especially when it nudges him a step closer to a real opportunity. [Read more 🡒]
Alex Karaban Is Already Bringing A UConn Edge To Sacramento
Alex Karaban is already sounding like a pro who knows exactly what kind of habits travel well from Storrs to the next level. After being drafted by the Sacramento Kings, the former UConn forward talked about the importance of accountability and the influence Dan Hurley had on his development, while also stressing what it takes to help build a winning culture in a new locker room.
Karaban also used Summer League as an early test run for that mindset, and the results were encouraging even as he worked through the usual rookie adjustment period. He averaged 10 points, 3.8 rebounds and 1.4 assists per game, showing steady improvement as the games went on and giving Sacramento a glimpse of a player who already sounds comfortable carrying a UConn edge into his next stop. [Read more 🡒]
Two New Huskies Just Gave Jason Candle's Rebuild A Real Boost
The East-West Shrine Bowls 2027 Preseason Watchlist offered an early sign that UConns transfer haul could pay off in a hurry, with linebacker KVon Sherman and running back Kenji Christian both earning spots on the list. Both arrived from Toledo and are expected to be central pieces for Jason Candles team as it tries to turn a revamped roster into something more competitive this fall.
Sherman brings the kind of defensive presence that can steady a unit, while Christian adds a new layer to a backfield that has been thinned out by departures. The watchlist nod does not decide anything, of course, but it does underline how much attention these two newcomers are already drawing, and how much of UConns next step may hinge on them settling in quickly. [Read more 🡒]