Road to 1991 Perfection: Baird's Bent, 'We Just Blew People Up'

For the former Husky defensive coordinator, he can't watch replays of those head-hunting players enough.

Before the holidays, Dick Baird watched the telecast of the 1992 Rose Bowl once more.

Washington 34, Michigan 14.

This outcome secured a national championship for that University of Washington football team.

The replay is like his favorite movie.

He's seen it a hundred times.

He'll watch it another hundred times. 

Whenever the game comes on, Baird gets excited all over again.

"Lambo's concept of putting eight guys on the line of scrimmage, nobody knew it," the former UW recruiting coordinator said, referring to late defensive coordinator Jim Lambright. "The kids would be frothing at the mouth when they go to the sideline."

Baird's intensity level goes up another notch as he describes the in-the-moment euphoria coming from the UW defensive guys.

"You get a kid on the phone and it's, 'They don't know what the hell we're doing! They don't know where we're coming from!' " Baird recited. "This is so cool!'

This is another in a series of vignettes about the UW's 1991 national title run, supplementing the conversation for the recently completed pandemic-influenced season. We're now in the aftermath of the Huskies' 12-0 season in this throwback replay.

Baird couldn't remember another defense that had as many violent hits as this one. Admittedly, they'd all be targeting calls today.

None of the linebackers could move their heads later from all the collisions. They had pinched nerves. All kinds of residue.

"We just blew people up," Baird said. "They would feed off each other and slap the hell out of each other."

Nothing could stop these Huskies and the momentum the program had from a national championship, Baird pointed out, except Pac-10 sanctions that came the following year.

Even then, with bowl games and scholarships taken away, the hits didn't stop coming right off.

"We defied them," Baird said. "We kept winning."

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