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Bob Diaco says he doesn't need UCF's permission to call it a rival

Graham Watson
FILE- In this Nov. 1, 2014 file photo, Connecticut head coach Bob Diaco watches from the sideline during the first quarter of an NCAA college football game against Central Florida in East Hartford, Conn. Diaco is looking forward to the team's big rivalry game with UCF this fall, and he's put a countdown clock in the school's training facility right above the game trophy. UCF's coach, on the other hand, says he didn't know there was a trophy, or a rivalry. (AP Photo/Michael Dwyer, File)

UConn football coach Bob Diaco said Monday that he doesn’t need UCF’s permission to create a rivalry with the Knights.

No, he really did say that.

In true rivalry form, Diaco said he didn’t care whether UCF wanted to acknowledge the game as a rivalry and that he was calling it a rivalry and that was that.

"Why do I have to call their athletic department to say we've got them targeted as our rival, period," Diaco said on a Monday morning conference call. "What control over that would they have and what do I care what they think?... If they don't want to honor our rivalry, we're not their rival, that's on them. I don't control what they want. If they don't want to be a part of the trophy, I don't care about that, either.”

So this then becomes a philosophical question: Is it really a rivalry if the other teams doesn’t acknowledge it to be?

UConn football on Twitter last week posted a picture of a trophy UConn created for the newly established rivalry dubbed “The Civil Conflict.”

There was just one issue with the trophy, UCF didn’t know anything about it. The teams now play annually by virtue of being in the same conference, but UCF officials said they had no knowledge of a trophy being part of the contest. These teams have played twice in the history of the two programs and UConn conveniently only acknowledged they game it won in 2014 and not the 62-17 shellacking in 2013. Diaco said that game was omitted because he wasn’t the coach when it happened.

So what happens if UCF wins the Oct. 10 game this year? Does it get to have the trophy or will Diaco claim that because it didn’t want to participate in the rivalry that it doesn’t get to have the trophy? Does the trophy only acknowledge UConn victories?

I guess if you’re Diaco and you only win two games in 2014, you look for anything to motivate your team. I mean, he couldn’t very well establish a rivalry trophy with Stony Brook, the Huskies only other 2014 win, could he?

However, this seems like a sad and misguided attempt to create excitement around a UConn team that has failed to have a winning season since 2010.

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Graham Watson is the editor of Dr. Saturday on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email her at dr.saturday@ymail.com or follow her on Twitter!

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