Greg Schiano sure was honest.

As I wrote a few minutes ago, the Rutgers coach is not thrilled about a Dec. 19 bowl date. Of course he insisted that the game is still a reward, of course he said UCF – and its staunch run defense – makes a tough and worthy foe and of course he stressed the fact that his program never takes a bowl game for granted. But Schiano also candidly admitted both he and athletic director Tim Pernetti made lobbying phone calls today, trying to get a date further away – and outside Rutgers’ exam period. (Exams start next Wednesday, Dec. 16 and run through Dec. 23. Right smack in the middle of bowl week.)

“Yeah it is,” Schiano said when the first question tonight asked if the slot in the St. Petersburg Bowl was disappointing. ”Quite frankly it’s very disappointing. I cherish that time with the underclassmen to really bring them along. This date doesn’t work so well for that.”

“At the same time,” he said, ”We’re going to a bowl game for a fifth straight year. We need to take a deep breath and realize that. There’s a lot of football teams in this country that would like to go to five straight bowl games. Some would call it not at the level they expect. Well I apologize for that. The reality is five straight bowls is five straight bowls. We’re going to get to the top and this is part of the process.”

I asked him if the Big East was open to his requesting another slot and he said to ask the league.

“We all kid ourselves that we have more control than we do,” he said. “It’s going to be what it’s going to be. If we won more games, then it wouldn’t be that situation where you have to worry. Right now we are who we are. I’m not ashamed of who we are. We’re growing and we’re going to become great. But right now we’re not great. We gotta deal with it and we will.”

Here’s my full story with Greg Schiano in all his honesty.