UMass spent the first month of the season changing the narrative surrounding a program that for too long had grown accustomed to losing.
After the Minutemen’s first loss of the year, Joe Harasymiak believes it’s time for them to change the narrative again.
The Minutemen opened the season with four straight wins, including a victory over Power-4 Rutgers, before suffering a 38-14 loss at Eastern Michigan on Saturday.
Harasymiak isn’t surprised by the doubts caused by a MAC loss in front of a sold-out home crowd. Not only does he understand the reason for those doubts, in a way, he validated the thinking behind them.
“You beat Rutgers and then you look at the schedule and we can be real,” the UMass head coach acknowledged. “We had two FCS teams and a team that moved up.
“So, essentially that’s the narrative right now, right? ‘We haven’t played anyone.’”
For Harasymiak, there is only one way for the Minutemen to answer that.
“If you want the narrative to change, you got to change it,” he said.
They’ll have that opportunity Saturday when Miami-Ohio comes to McGuirk Alumni Stadium for UMass’ Homecoming game.
Harasymiak called the RedHawks the most talented team the Minutemen have faced this season. More importantly, Miami represents the type of established MAC program UMass is trying to prove it can compete with consistently.
“They’ve played for the MAC title the last three years,” Harasymiak said. “They’ve been to six straight bowl games.”
Miami enters the weekend having already faced a pair of Power-4 opponents in Pitt and Cincinnati along with Holy Cross, UConn and Bowling Green.
“I’m willing to say the most talented team that we’ve played so far as an overall product,” Harasymiak said. “They are really talented.”
That makes the matchup particularly timely for a UMass team trying to determine exactly where it stands. Some of the issues UMass had been able to overcome during those four wins proved costly against Eastern Michigan.
“I would say that the message from Sacred Heart through all the way, and I’ve said it in here, we have to chase the best version of ourselves because ultimately the waters are now deeper,” Harasymiak said. “There’s better teams, there’s better players, there’s better programs in general that have done it before.
“So, some of that stuff, yeah, it did catch up to us.”
UMass turned the ball over twice against the Eagles after committing just one turnover through its first four games. The Minutemen struggled to win individual matchups offensively and Harasymiak felt the defense was out of character as Eastern Michigan created communication problems and took advantage of missed tackles.
Harasymiak doesn’t view those problems as reasons to abandon what got UMass to 4-0. He does believe five games have provided enough information for the coaching staff to take a closer look at what best suits this team.
“We need to assess really after these first five weeks now, what can we do?” he said. “What do we do really well? What do we not do so well? And let’s ask our guys to compete in a way at the things they do well.”
The Minutemen also have to show how they respond to something they hadn’t experienced yet this year: losing.
“Just to be honest with you, the way it’s been going and the way that the outside world has kind of put them up as who they could be, I think they were a little rattled, a little shocked a little bit,” he said.
The response began with a stern team meeting Sunday. It continues through practice this week and ultimately will be measured by what happens against Miami.
One loss didn’t erase what the Minutemen accomplished during the first month of the season, but Harasymiak knows their next opportunity could say plenty about what comes next.
“We’re still in a very good spot,” he said. “We’re 1-1 in the league. We just got to take this week, respond this week.
“But it’s going to be maturity by them to handle that loss and move forward the right way and we’ll see how we do. So, it’ll be a big picture into kind of who we are.”
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