Washington Huskies Hire Former Tulane Football Star Quarterback as New Coach

The University of Washington football team announced that former Tulane Green Wave star J.P. Losman is their new assistant quarterbacks coach.

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Former Tulane Green Wave quarterback J.P. Losman is the last football player to be selected in the first round of the NFL draft out of the program.

After his professional football career, Losman headed back to college football, and after serving as the Oklahoma Sooners assistant director of player personnel since 2022, he is now headed to the Washington Huskies as their new assistant quarterbacks coach, ESPN’s Pete Thamel reported on Thursday.

Losman followed head coach Brett Venables from the Clemson Tigers, where he served under him as an offensive analyst from 2020 to 2021 after three seasons as a student coaching intern.

The former Green Wave quarterback was named second team All-Conference USA in 2003, the same year he set the third-best single-season passing record with 3,077 yards—one of the few records Michael Pratt, now with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, couldn’t break.

His career at Tulane led to a No. 22 overall selection by the Buffalo Bills in the 2004 NFL draft. Losman’s career lasted eight seasons with stops with the Bills, Oakland Raiders, Seattle Seahawks, and Miami Dolphins.

Intriguingly, it’s the destination that backup quarterback Kai Horton transferred to this offseason, making for an interesting connection with the program.

Perhaps Horton’s career may have somewhat of a revival under the tutelage of Losman.

There was a notable drought of outstanding quarterback play for the Green Wave after Losman. It led to the program stalling for years until Pratt came on the scene and changed school history with his four-year career.

While Pratt was a seventh-round selection in the 2024 NFL draft, he was the first quarterback taken since Losman, illustrating the lengthy wait for talent at the position.

Losman’s departure from the Sooners coincides with new offensive coordinator Ben Arbuckle bringing over a senior offensive analyst from the Washington State Cougars. John Kuceyeski will work with the quarterbacks for Oklahoma next season.

As more programs in college football inch closer to a professional model, they’d do well to consider the development trajectory at quarterback in the NFL, or the painful lack thereof.

Rookie quarterbacks are being thrust into starting roles early in their careers and are not being provided the tools to grow or succeed at the role. Many second-stint revivals of discarded quarterbacks give credence to the trend.

College football should consider having more personnel dedicated to shaping the most important role on the offense, as the Huskies are doing with the hiring of Losman.