Husky Comeback Win Among Seven That Overcame 20-0 Deficit

Sometimes winning the hard way is the best way -- because you always remember what happened.

On Saturday afternoon at Maryland, a determined University of Washington football team for the seventh time in school history won a game in which it trailed by 20 points or more, this team roaring back to defeat the stunned Terrapins 24-20 in College Park.

When Jonah Coleman scored on a 1-yard run in the closing moments, the Huskies (4-1 overall 1-1, Big Ten) had finished up with an exhilarating 24-0 run to rescue what seemed like a certain loss and turn it into a most satisfying victory.

"It was an ubelievable game," UW coach Jedd Fisch said.

This sort of Montlake-related magic goes back 53 years, beginning with the Sonny Sixkiller era, when the games back then were always entertaining.

In 1972, Sixkiller and his swashbuckling teammates fell behind 21-0 at Purdue before pulling out a 22-21 win in West Lafayette, Indiana. Steve Wiezbowski kicked a 26-yard field goal with 2:04 left to pull it out.

The Huskies have done this sort of thing to California three times in a dozen years, first letting the Golden Bears take a 21-0 lead in 1981 before rallying for a 27-26 victory in Berkeley. Chuck Nelson's 21-yard field goal with 11 seconds left decided it.

Seven years later, the UW did it again to Cal, falling behind 27-3 before rushing back to pull out a 28-27 win. John McCallum's 25-yard field goal with two seconds on the clock rescued this one.

And in 1993, the Huskies trailed 20-0 and 23-3 before reversing course in Berkeley once again and shocking the Bears with a 24-23 setback. Tight end Mark Bruener's 7-yard TD catch from Damon Huard won this one with 1:04 left.

In 1989, the UW bell behind 21-0 to UCLA before changing up all of the momentum and emerging with a 28-27 victory at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena. Greg Lewis' 10-yard TD run with 1:02 left was the game-winner.

Before Saturday, the UW's most recent stirring comeback had helped ease the intrusion of the COVID pandemic and an empty Husky Stadium when Jimmy Lake's team overcame a 21-0 deficit and pulled out a late 24-21 win on a Cade Otton 16-yard touchdown pass from Dylan Morris with 36 seconds to go.

This time, Fisch's Huskies found themselves staring at a 20-0 obstacle with the third quarter winding down when everything changed.

Grady Gross kicked a field goal, Denzel Boston and Dezmen Roebuck caught touchdown passes and Coleman did his thing with a deciding TD plunge for his 11th six-pointer of the season.

The UW's home winning streak ended at 22 with the recent 24-6 loss to No. 1 Ohio State, but its ability to do the impossible is up to seven games -- and hopefully will never end.

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