After UW Fans Made Big Difference, Will They Show for Late Kickoff?
Ryan Grubb joked that his chair was well-cushioned.
That was his response after getting asked about his Husky Stadium game-day experience last Saturday against Michigan State.
Oh yeah, the University of Washington offensive coordinator acknowledged it was a little noisy at the clambake by the lake.
"You can feel it and you can sense it," Grubb said of the raucous 39-28 victory. "I thought it was just phenomenal what the crowd and the environment was for our kids, specifically on third downs for our defense. When you look at that, there's no way to say it doesn't impact the football game."
This is what the new Husky football staff envisioned it was getting from the fan base when it took over. These coaches just didn't know how long they would have to wait for nearly everyone to show up and turn Husky Stadium into a human wind tunnel.
They do now: three games.
Two movie trailers and a full feature showing.
Of course, they had to win over the skeptics for a new regime and the critics of a UW program that got run into the ground the season before.
Three games.
A ranked Big Ten team will do that for you. People felt compelled to be there. The results from beating said Midwest opponent now should equate to an additional 68,000-plus Saturday gathering for Stanford this weekend.
From Grubb's vantage point, what happened against Michigan State, was validation for what he heard could happen.
"Just things like that, when you know you'll have an advantage playing at home, that you know you're going to be able to count on a little bit, and just the energy our guys will have offensively, I mean, sometimes people are excited about it and they talk about it and then there's reality of doing it from my point of view, of somebody misfiring on the field because of what's going on out there and the whole sideline feeding off, it is exciting, so that was really good to see."
Two years ago, the Huskies played four regular-season and pandemic-limited games with no one but support staff and a smattering of media members in the stadium. That should never happen again in our lifetimes, right?
A year ago, the UW football team emerged from the COVID doldrums in far worse shape than it thought, offering a mundane product that greatly squandered the home-field edge by losing five of seven games at Husky Stadium and finishing a distasteful 4-8 that got people fired.
By now, the fan base should know that it matters, that it can make a notable difference in the outcome, that its deafening presence was a motivator for what happened for that 4:30 p.m. game against the Spartans
Yet on social-media, some grumblers have emerged this week, complaining about the later 7:30 p.m. kickoff for the Stanford game, bemoaning a start time that is certain to lead to chilly and uncomfortable conditions.
The only answer for that, as the Husky coaches will tell their players in their game preparations, is that sacrifices have to be made to be successful, to be a championship team, that they don't want to hear any excuses. Bring an extra blanket.
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