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Football: Army Head Coach Jeff Monken Gets Testy with Local Reporter

Do not cross this man after losses in Connecticut.

By Aman Kidwai
Danny Wild-USA TODAY Sports

After UConn's win over Army today, Desmond Connor of the Hartford Courant tweeted his displeasure at an occurrence in the visitor's post-game press conference.

After hours of wondering what Conner meant by the mysterious tweet, the Courant's Jeff Jacobs swooped in to clear it up:

Army coach Jeff Monken must not like crossing the state line into Connecticut. He lost his composure last year with a reporter after the loss at Yale. It wasn't a good look. On Saturday he turned snippy again. This time on Matt Zampini, a UConn student newspaper sports editor who was covering the opposing locker room for The Courant. When Zampini started to ask about how UConn, save two big plays, did a good job on defense, Monken said, "Thanks for reminding me."

OK, that's not so bad. Coaches interrupt reporters' questions all the time.

But he wasn't done.

When asked to evaluate his offense, Monken said, "Why don't you evaluate them? Doesn't that tell you the whole story? How many yards is that, mathematician? You got to add it up. You know we had a 56 and a 71. Do the math ... Next question."

In addition to working with the Courant, Matt Zampini is the sports editor for The Daily Campus, and his words have appeared on this website in both written and spoken form. Zampini is a diligent reporter who was just doing his job by asking a pretty innocuous question. Monken may have been better off with a more mature response, such as "your face!" or "I know you are but what am I?"

It is definitely poor form from the Army head coach. Losing is obviously not ideal, but a head coach has to be able to handle himself better than that.

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