This was the one opportunity that caught Paul Pasqualoni’s attention.

He was comfortable as the defensive coordinator for the Dallas Cowboys and enjoyed living in the Dallas suburb of Southlake, Texas.

A potential return to college football was not high on his list of priorities. And even if he wanted to leave for a head coaching job somewhere else, he admittedly would not know the first place to look.

‘I’m not the kind of guy that’s on the phone looking for the next job,’ Pasqualoni said. ‘I couldn’t tell you if one guy is moving to another job, or somebody else is moving around. I’m the worst guy in the world in knowing what’s going on from a job standpoint.’

But this opening was different than others. It was exactly what he had wanted and precisely the job he never thought would be there.

Randy Edsall, who built the Connecticut football team into a Big East champion, abruptly resigned and fled for Maryland to take over as the Terrapins’ head coach in early January. And if there was a place Pasqualoni felt he could fit in, it was Connecticut — his home state. So when Jeff Hathaway, the former UConn athletic director, called to offer the then 61-year-old the job, there was no way Pasqualoni could turn it down.

‘I will say this, if I was going to go back to college football, I thought it was going to have to be a place geographically where I would have a chance to fit in and know the territory,’ Pasqualoni said. ‘To be honest with you, I never expected the University of Connecticut job to be available.’

The opportunity to go home was the best possible scenario. He was raised in Cheshire, Conn., 53 miles southwest of the UConn campus in Storrs.

He knows the landscape of Connecticut football better than anyone, having been on the coaching staffs at Cheshire High School and Southern Connecticut before getting his first head coaching job at Western Connecticut in 1982.

Pasqualoni is no stranger to the Big East, either. He is the second-longest tenured head coach in Syracuse history after leading the Orange from 1991 through 2004. He was the architect of some of the best teams in program history, accumulating an overall record of 107-59-1 and leading the Orange to four Big East championships and nine bowl games.

But from 2002 to 2004, the team struggled, going 16-20 in those three seasons. Daryl Gross, who was one year into his tenure as Syracuse’s athletic director, fired Pasqualoni after the 2004 season, saying that he felt a change was in order.

He moved on to the NFL for the next six years, splitting time between the Cowboys and the Miami Dolphins.

Anyone who knows him, though, believes that it’s college football — not the NFL — where Pasqualoni belongs.

Donovin Darius was a free safety for Pasqualoni at Syracuse in the mid-1990s and was not surprised when his former head coach moved back to college. Darius said Pasqualoni’s strongest attributes apply more to the collegiate level, where players need to be developed. Many need a male role model in their life to give them structure, and Pasqualoni can be that person.

‘I think the development of players, especially at the college level where you have young high school kids coming from all across the country to come to the university, and you have a chance to be a part of giving them knowledge and direction, I think that was always his forte,’ Darius said. ‘I think that’s one of the reasons why he’s so successful in college.’

When Darius took custody of his two younger brothers during his junior year at Syracuse, he went to Pasqualoni to seek help. Pasqualoni made some calls to the SU administration, and soon after, Darius was permitted to move off campus and essentially be a father to his brothers.

Everything Pasqualoni did, Darius said, he did for his players. He not only demanded respect from them, but also demanded that his players respect each other.

And it all showed on the field when the Orange had some of its best seasons during Pasqualoni’s tenure. The team finished at .500 or better in all but one of the years with Paqualoni calling the shots, and the team won nine or more games six times.

As head coach, Pasqualoni made sure his players knew that letting their teammates down with sloppy play could not be tolerated. They fed off Pasqualoni’s leadership every step of the way.

‘When you have the leadership, who is demanding that respect from the players amongst themselves, it’ll be a great team,’ Darius said. ‘We were accountable for one another.

‘He put it on his shoulders, really. He knew that he was the head of the organization. The organization was going to rise and fall with his leadership.’

Pasqualoni’s win-first, respect-all reputation is why he had so many supporters throughout Connecticut. And it is part of the reason why he has the potential to be very successful leading the Huskies. Many Connecticut high school coaches have known Pasqualoni for years, especially since many played for him during one of his early coaching stops in the state.

One of those coaches is Mark Ecke, who played for Pasqualoni at Western Connecticut and is now the head coach at Cheshire High School. A member of the Connecticut High School Football Coaches’ Committee, Ecke was among a group of coaches who signed a letter that went directly to Hathaway in support of Pasqualoni.

‘We couldn’t be happier,’ Ecke said. ‘As Connecticut high school coaches, we’re ecstatic because we’ve got a Connecticut guy here, in our flagship program in the state of Connecticut. To say, ‘Hey, this is somebody that walked the same halls you did, that rode the same buses that you did years ago, and look where he is now.’ It’s really a great example, and they take a lot of pride in that.’

Ecke said that at UConn’s first game, there will be plenty of supporters from Cheshire cheering on Pasqualoni and the Huskies. The type of team they will be seeing, though, is still unknown.

Pasqualoni is taking over a team that is one year removed from its first-ever Bowl Championship Series berth after winning the Big East championship, but the 2011 squad looks very different than that from a season ago. With the Huskies featuring the most experience on defense, where they return nine of 11 starters, that unit will have to be the anchor as the offense continues to develop and find the right personnel.

UConn’s defensive players were exposed to Pasqualoni’s schemes shortly after he took the job. Cornerback Blidi Wreh-Wilson said knowing Pasqualoni had so much success at both the collegiate and professional levels made him and his teammates eager to learn his system.

It is a much more aggressive scheme with various disguises and not necessarily easy to pick up.   

‘When he came in, it looked like we were reading Spanish when we were looking at the playbook,’ Wilson said. ‘But I mean, we’re older guys, so we pick up on it.’

Another difficult transition for the Huskies will be the quarterback position.

During training camp, it was an open competition with four players: Michael Box, Johnny McEntee, Scott McCummings and Michael Nebrich. All vied for the starting spot now that Zach Frazer graduated, and the four have made just one collegiate start between them.

Under Edsall, UConn was predominantly a rushing team, with the departed Jordan Todman leading the Big East with 141.2 yards per game in 2010.

New offensive coordinator George DeLeone, who served in that same position for Pasqualoni at Syracuse in 13 of the 14 seasons he was there, still does not know the identity of his offense.

‘I’d love to have all the bells and whistles. I’d love to throw the ball down the field every play,’ DeLeone said. ‘I’d love to be exciting. … We have to do what’s best for our football team. We have to figure out what that is.’

What is best for the team is still uncertain, but it is clear that Pasqualoni was best for the program. And the allure that comes with his new head coaching job overshadows any possible frustration and growing pains that will come with year one.

Of all the possible jobs that could have opened up, this was the one where Pasqualoni felt he fit the most. The chance to go home was perfect.

Said Pasqualoni: ‘To say I’m excited is probably a little bit of an understatement.’

cjiseman@syr.edu

Published on August 31, 2011 at 12:00 pm

Contact Chris: cjiseman@syr.edu | @chris_iseman