Huskies Look for Better Outing After Heavily Panned Debut

Utah State comes to Montlake dealing with its own early season inadequacies.

The Husky offensive line didn't have its best day against Washington State in the Apple Cup. | Dave Sizer photo

Hey, the 19th-ranked University of Washington football team won its season opener in its annual state rivalry game, in the Apple Cup, against Washington State, by two touchdowns and no one came away happy.

Not the Associated Press voters who dropped the UW two spots in the poll.

Not UW defensive coordinator Ryan Walters, who said his players will sit if they can't stop drawing 15-yard flags.

Not offensive-line coach Michael Switzer, who used the words "disappointing" and "embarrassing" to describe his players' blocking efforts.

Even usually peppy Husky head coach Jedd Fisch sounded an ominous warning over red-zone failures and those aforementioned penalties.

"If we can do those two things, and focus on those things, we are excited on what can happen here this year," the UW leader said on Thursday. "If we can't, then it's going to be a longer year than we want."

Wow, all of those good feelings about a Husky team seemingly filled with an excess amount of talent and firepower lasted just one week.

But the Huskies are still 1-0 in the win-loss column as they head into Saturday's second game at home against Utah State. Kickoff is at 12:30 p.m.

What's clear are expectations always will be over the top as long as the UW is in the Big Ten, which is one of college football's ultimate challenges.

The Huskies saw the fireworks go off to signal an Apple Cup win, but no one was satisfied. | Dave Sizer photo

The good news is Fisch's players will play a Bronco Mendenhall-coached team that came out in its opener and fell on its face to a Big Sky team, losing to Idaho State 29-17 at home in Logan.

The 2021 Huskies know how that feels -- losing to an FCS opponent to open the season in front of the local fans, which is what they did to Montana.

Coaches don't survive those kind of outcomes. Just ask Jimmy Lake.

The other comforting scenario about this non-conference match-up is the UW has to feel as if it has gone back in time, in facing its second Pac-12 opponent in as many weeks.

It's old home week. It's almost as if these guys have retraced their steps three years after leaving the comfort of the Pac-12.

The red-zone failures against WSU were glaring, with the Huskies failing to score from inside the 1 and from inside the 5, with blocking ineptitude creating the first problem and a dropped pitch leading to the other.

Jedd Fisch and the Huskies were able to celebrate their Apple Cup win before hearing all the feedback. | Dave Sizer photo

"We were a disappointing 4-for-6 in the red zone," Fisch reminded. "That is not where we left off with last year's standard of scoring 93 percent of the time. ... We can't have that happen ever again, certainly not this week."

Against Utah State, the Huskies will break in their fourth starting running back over the past five games covering two seasons.

They will go from Adam Mohammed to Jonah Coleman to Quaid Carr to either Brian Bonner Jr. or Trey Cooley.

At such an important position, this sort of turnover makes it hard for anyone in Montlake to get comfortable or overconfident.

The Huskies push aside a lot of the angst over their opening performance by blocking with a voracity, running with authority and winning by more than two touchdowns over the visiting Aggies.