ASU Game Became Program Turning Point for DeBoer's Huskies

For all the genius moves and game-winning plays that mark his time as Washington football coach, Kalen DeBoer's finest moment might have been the message he delivered following a 45-38 loss to Arizona State in the desert.

Wearing a black Washington T-shirt and ultra serious look on his face, DeBoer sat down in a conference room, placed a bottle of water on the table, pulled the microphone close to him and launched into a message meant to guide his team out of the darkness.

He mentioned how for two weeks that his Huskies had dug themselves into a hole, been a step slow in making plays and committed a turnover that was the difference in the ASU game.

"I don't fault the guys for fighting all day, but it's one of those things in our program where its not going to be OK," DeBoer said. "It's all right to be upset and mad over what transpired today. The key is you can be upset, but we've got to make sure we move on because there's a lot of football left to be played."

In measured terms, the coach publicly laid out the terms for the twice-beaten Huskies moving forward once it left the desert (watch the above 2022 postgame video from Tempe).

"We' know we're a 4-2 football team and we're disappointed in what's happened in the last two weeks," DeBoer said. "But we've got to take the next jump from being not just OK or a good team, to being a good to a great team."

Twelve months later, the Huskies have followed his lead and become an exceptional group. Entering Saturday night's rematch with ASU, these guys have won 13 consecutive games, including all six this season, and climbed the AP rankings to the No. 5 slot.

DeBoer's desert diatribe was so different in tone from his predecessor, the fired Jimmy Lake who, when mired in a 2-4 start in 2021, used to always credit the opponent for its inspired play, even Montana maddeningly so, rather than sound any alarms about his team.

The tricky thing about taking over a college football program is how long do you wait before completely imposing your will?

At USC and Colorado, and even ASU, the new coaches gutted their inherited rosters, going for 70- to 80- percent forced personnel makeovers and instituted radical change that spared no one's feelings and showed one-way loyalty.

While DeBoer and his coaching staff came in and laid down rather rigorous expectations at the outset of their team takeover, only a dozen or so players entered the transfer portal, minimizing the locker-room upheaval.

However, DeBoer had to shake things up a bit with his mostly holdover talent, which had suffered through a disastrous 4-8 season in 2021,

Rome Odunze, the Huskies' All-America candidate at wide receiver, remembers that important juncture for his new coach and how it affected him.

"He always coaches us hard, always coaches us to a standard, but I feel like he kind of reinforced that after that Arizona State loss, for sure," Odunze said. "It speaks to the run that we had after that. He definitely inspires us and continues to do so, whether it's a win or a loss, but we definitely took a step after that."

To begin this week, DeBoer was asked about that difficult time for his team, that last loss for his Huskies, his impressionable words, and how his players responded to all of it.

Obviously, it's gone well, with this UW team following their coach's lead to elite status across the FBS landscape.

"I know that maybe that was the game that really made us who we are," DeBoer said. "At that time understanding we can bounce back and what it takes to bounce back."

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