Coaches O’Leary and Diaco Discuss “The Conflict” at AAC Roundtable

from: www.ndfanclub.com/
Bob Diaco

Bob Diaco was asked incessantly about “The Conflict” rivalry game at AAC Football Kickoff in Newport, RI by many members of the media at the event.

Diaco gained some publicity this past spring, a lot of it negative, when he came up with the idea to create a rivalry game with the University of Central Florida complete with a trophy calling it “The Conflict”.

Critique ranged from the name being offensive to why in the world would you create a rivalry with a school who has no beef with you?

The two sat down in the panel of the rest of the Eastern Division coaches and both had an opportunity to address the topic.

Diaco stated that from his time as a player at the University of Iowa, his team played rivalry games for trophies.

Coach Diaco stated when the question was posed that the idea was born out of “respect” for what Coach O’Leary has built at UCF stating that it is the program that his UConn Huskies’ program is trying to “emulate”.

O’Leary’s response at the panel indicated that he was completely in sync with Diaco.

“I’m happy with it,” O’Leary said. “A trophy for a game is great, I hope they bring it down with them [when they play UCF this year]”.

He went on to say, “I think the people that complain are the people that complain about everything.”

Can we put this story to bed?