Category Archives: Huskies Football

Posts dealing with Huskies football

by | January 28, 2012 · 2:40 pm

UW Recruiting Insanity

Update: Follow our recruiting thread by clicking here.

I wrote earlier this month that things would get crazy before national signing day on February 1st, but I severely underestimated the situation.  The past month or so has been the craziest offseason stretch I’ve ever seen for the Huskies.  Since the Alamo Bowl, they’ve hired an entirely new defensive staff, added a few recruits, lost a few more, become players for several of the biggest recruits on the west coast, and pushed the entire California Golden Bear fanbase to the brink of insanity.  Here’s a recap and some recruiting updates.

In the article linked above, I said, “Who knows, the Huskies might hire Tosh Lupoi from Cal or Ed Orgeron from USC, considered the two best recruiters in the Pac-12 and they could bring 5 players with them.”  There were already rumblings that the Huskies were making a run at Lupoi, so this wasn’t any incredible prediction on my part.  Still, I never believed they would actually lure him away from Cal, his alma mater.  Nonetheless, they did, and everything immediately went crazy.  Cal’s recruiting class, which had been ranked at the top of the Pac-12 took an immediate hit.  They lost a couple of guys right away, most notably five star DT Ellis McCarthy to UCLA, and several more are still looking around.

One quick note.  Cal fans are understandably upset about Lupoi’s departure.  He was their golden boy, the guy who grew up miles from campus and had spent most of his adult life at Berkley.  In their idyllic dream, he was expected to work his way up the coaching ladder at Cal and eventually take over for Tedford as head coach.  It didn’t work that way, and no one can blame them for being disappointed and mad.  Since then, they’ve come up with lots of crazy theories and rumors, the craziest being that Sarkisian hired Tosh just to ruin Cal’s recruiting class.  That’s just crazy.  The UW staff probably doesn’t mind if that happens, but it would be shortsighted and dumb to hire anyone for that purpose.  They hired Tosh (and Eric Kiesau, Cal’s receivers coach and new UW offensive coordinator) because they are good coaches and recruiters.  This was about the Huskies, not about ruining Cal.  Besides, most of the players Cal is losing are going to other Pac-12 schools and not Washington, so it’s not like the Huskies won’t face them again.  Anyway, moving on. Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Filed under Huskies Football, UW Football Recruiting

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

by | January 22, 2012 · 12:38 pm

2012 UW Wide Receivers

Looking at the current roster, with minimal attention paid to the 2012 recruiting class.

Who They Lose

Jermaine Kearse

Devin Aguilar

Kearse had a very contentious career for a guy who is probably one of the five or so greatest receivers ever at UW.  He made play after play and caught a huge amount of touchdowns.  I can’t get the Husky record book to open right now, but he’s near the top in a number of categories.  The consistent issues with drops plagued Kearse.  More than a few had major effects on games and kept him from being a huge fan favorite.  He was never quite what he could have been because of the drops, but he is still a huge threat to replace.  Aguilar was a little more consistent but not quite the playmaking threat that Kearse was.  Still, he made a lot of catches at critical moments.  Replacing these two is a fairly tall order.  They both had flaws, but they are clearly one of the better WR combos the Huskies have ever had.

Who Is Back

Kasen Williams- Sophomore

James Johnson- Senior

Cody Bruns- Senior

Kevin Smith- Junior

The saving grace in an otherwise lackluster group is Williams.  It took him half the season to get going, but once he did, all the hype he brought with him seemed inadequate to the actual talent he possesses.  He looked faster than expected, and his overall athleticism is ridiculous.  His leap over a Cougar in the Apple Cup is already legendary.  I expect Kasen will take a huge jump forward this year and be one of the best receivers in a conference full of good ones. Continue reading →

6 Comments

Filed under Huskies Football, Huskies Position Overviews

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

by | January 19, 2012 · 1:45 pm

2012 UW Running Backs

Looking at the current roster, with minimal attention paid to the 2012 recruiting class.

Who They Lose

Only Chris Polk, maybe the best running back in UW history.  On a play-by-play basis, Napolean Kaufman and Corey Dillon and probably a few others may have been more dangerous, but no one was as consistently dominating, punishing and dependable as Polk.  He ran incredibly hard and was the perfect back to run behind a mediocre offensive line.  I wish we could have seen what he would have done with some better running room.

Sarkisian has said several times that no one has better embodied the type of program he wants to run than Polk.  He was mainly talking about his toughness and physicality, but I think it could be applied to Polk’s personality as well.  He’s known as a talker, a little bit brash, but a huge competitor, teammate and leader.  He will be sorely missed and remembered as a true Husky Legend.

Who Is Back

Jesse Callier- Junior

Bishop Sankey- Sophomore

FB Jonathan Amosa- Senior

FB Tim Tucker- Junior

There are other running backs on scholarship (see below), but Callier and Sankey are the two who received extensive playing time last year.  Callier has received a good number of carries the last two years, mostly as a change of pace to Polk.  He gets a lot of end-arounds and runs outside the tackles, and even runs the wildcat (WildDawg!) on occasion.  Callier has been solid, if mostly unexciting.  He doesn’t seem to quite have the electricity to make up for his apparent lack of physicality that keeps him from being more effective between the tackles.  That being said, his chances have been limited and I’ll be curious to see what he can do if he gets more regular carries this year.  He was a ridiculously productive high school player.  I’m skeptical he can be an above-average starter, but he’s an excellent back-up at worst.

Sankey, about whom much has already been written, mainly due to his spurning of the Cougars, received more carries as 2011 went along and made the most of them.  He seemed a bit more effective than Callier at running up the middle, and he showed a good burst of speed to match.  Out of the two, he seems more likely to grab hold of the primary job.  He did nothing to dampen my hopes for him and probably even raised them a few notches by forcing his way into some playing time. Continue reading →

1 Comment

Filed under Huskies Football, Huskies Position Overviews

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

by | January 19, 2012 · 1:32 am

Catching Up With The Dawgs

It’s been an interesting couple of weeks at Montlake for Sark and his football team.  Matthew wrote about the recruiting aspect a few weeks ago and that combined with all of the coaching news has made for an interesting month since the Alamo Bowl.  Tonight, I’ll take a look at most of the news (date-by-date fashion) and add a few thoughts to it.

December 14th, 2011 – What Happened: Demetrice Martin, who was the cornerback coach at UW, left to fill the same position at UCLA.  He was one of the top recruiters on the Husky staff and his loss was felt immediately in the recruiting realm.  Several commits flipped from UW to UCLA and a few other guys dropped the Huskies from their list.

Looking At It Now:  It doesn’t seem like a big deal now and, frankly, I think it might help the Huskies.  Martin was undoubtedly a good recruiter but I don’t know about his coaching.  Maybe we won’t see our corners lack confidence now?  Maybe they’ll play a little closer to the receiver.  None of the corners have developed under Martin (Q. Rich regressed significantly) and maybe they will under the new coach.  Maybe not, but I think it was time for a change at this coaching position anyway.

December 29th, 2011 – What Happened:  Kevaire Russel, one of the top recruits in the state, announces that he has verbally committed to Notre Dame over the hometown Huskies.  Message boards erupted (I’m talking about you Dawgman) in fury over how Sark can’t recruit.  It was a little shocking and interesting to see that the Huskies couldn’t keep a recruit at home.

Looking At It Now: It’s still a bit alarming that a lot of in-state recruits are turning elsewhere but it was never worth freaking out over.  The Huskies are still in on several big name guys and will probably end up with a very solid class.  I should have saved some of the comments from the Dawgman boards because it’s hilarious how blown out of proportion some were.

December 29th, 2011 –  What Happened:  The Huskies lost one of the most entertaining, frantic, fascinating football games I’ve ever seen.  The Alamo Bowl ended in with Baylor winning 67-56.  I still see that score and am astonished.  Both defenses were absolutely terrible and both offenses were phenomenal.  It’s a shame that a lot of the focus gets put on how horrible the defense was (which I admit, both were horrible) and not put on how good the offenses were.  Watching the national title week several weeks later, I couldn’t help think of how entertaining that game was.  By the way, the Dawgs and Baylor would score touchdowns on LSU and Alabama.

Looking At It Now:  You always want to win.  Let me start off by saying that.  A bowl win is nice because trophies are cool and you don’t want to have 67 points scored on you on national TV.  This game may be responsible for what all happened next and what happened next may be what takes the Dawgs back to the top of the Pac-12.

December 31st, 2011 – What Happened:  Sark fired Nick Holt, Mike Cox and Jeff Mills from his staff.  The Alamo Bowl seemed to be the final straw with the defense and Sark had enough.  It wasn’t much of a surprise and speculation quickly turned to candidates.

Looking At It Now:  It had to happen and it did.

January 2nd, 2012 – What Happened:  The Huskies hired away Justin Wilcox from the Tennessee Volunteers, he was their defensive coordinator.  He brought Peter Sirmon along with him and he will coach the linebackers.  This seemed to be Sark’s first choice and he made the move quickly.  People around the country were impressed by the hire of the up and coming DC and his right-hand recruiting man.

Looking At It Now:  When Sark gave Husky fans a day to speculate about who the new guy might be, Justin Wilcox was my top choice.  Needless to say, I was pleased with the hire.  Wilcox has an impressive resume and seems to know what he’s doing.  His players seemed to love him and he was successful at both of his stops.  He may leave for a head coaching gig soon, but that means that he’d have been successful.  I’m all for this hire and it seems like everyone else is too.

January 12th, 2012 – What Happened:  The Huskies hired Keith Heyward to be their new defensive backs coach.  He is a younger guy who had the same position at Oregon State.  There’s a theme to these hires and it’s that they’re all younger guys.  He was said to be one of the best recruiters on the OSU staff.  I don’t have any examples of his coaching ability.

Looking At It Now:  I don’t have a lot of basis for this but I think this might be the most underrated hire the Huskies made.  It seems like this one was forgotten after all of the news.  Heyward is well liked by recruits and may steal a few from Oregon State this year.  Again, I don’t know much about his coaching ability but he was loved at OSU and was said to be a good hire by many experts.

January 16th, 2012 – What Happened:  The Huskies hired Tosh Lupoi away from the California Golden Bears.  He was their defensive line coach and a pretty successful one.  He is said to be the best recruiter on the west coast and everyone was impressed with the hire.  Many Cal recruits were shocked and said to be opening their recruitment back up.

Looking At It Now:  Well, these last couple only happened a few days ago so there’s not a ton to add except for my opinion.  This is a great hire.  Lupoi probably can’t live up to the hype he has come with because I’ve never seen an assistant coach have so much hype aside from Ed Orgeron, who is the other top recruiting assistant in the Pac-12.  It was the best defensive-line coaching hire Sark could have realistically made.  It was the final piece of, what I consider, the best staff he could have put together.

January 16th 2012 – What Happened:  Nick Montana, the heralded quarterback, decided to transfer from the UW.  He came to the Huskies with much fanfare and didn’t perform very well in his only start (not that it was all his fault).  From what I saw he has a future as a college quarterback.  In fact, from what I saw he could start for Alabama or LSU and win a national championship.

Looking At It Now:  It was inevitable, really.  The guy wants to play and wasn’t going to have much of a chance here.  Watching his demeanor in practice, I was never a huge fan of his but he’s got talent and is a smart kid.  I hope he does well in the future.

January 17th – What Happened:  The Huskies offensive coordinator, Doug Nussmeier, left UW and took the same role at Alabama.  It’s hard to blame him, he’ll get to call his own plays for the defending national champions and he’ll get a raise.  Unfortunately for the Dawgs, Nussmeier was a great coach and they had to fill another position in their staff.  This was the date it became official, it was known quite sometime in advance.

Looking At It Now:  Nussmeier is a good coach and deserves a ton of credit for the progress Jake Locker and Keith Price made.  With that being said, everyone knows this is Sark’s offense.  He is the creative young mind and he has his system.  I would be surprised if the Huskies felt a huge impact by the loss of Nussmeier.  Best of luck to him at Alabama.

January 18th – What Happened:  The Huskies poached another Cal coach in Eric Kiesau to fill the role of offensive coordinator.  He’s another guy who’s said to be a good recruiter.  He was the wide receiver coach at Cal and will coach the quarterbacks here.  Cedric Dozier, another top recruit in Washington who committed to Cal, is said to be reconsidering because of this news.

Looking At It Now:  Another good hire, although I don’t really think it’s an upgrade from Nussmeier.  Time will tell what Kiesau will do on the recruiting trail and I’ll be interested to see if there’s any drop off in the development of the quarterbacks.  I would guess no, because of the presence of Sark.

Wow, a lot has happened.  When I put it all out like this I’m somewhat amazed.  So, where is the program now compared to about a month ago?  It’s hard to tell without a game being played, of course.  Everyone thinks the staff is better than it was.  The recruiting sure seems like it’s going to gain steam at some point in the next couple of weeks, if not days.  With all that in mind, I think the program is trending up.  These hires have given the Huskies some steam but, as we learned with Nick Holt, some hires aren’t as glamorous as they first seem.  Sark did the best that he could, but you just never know.

Two weeks until signing day!  I love that day.  For now, be careful out there in the snow.  It’s a little crazy out there.  Go Dawgs!

Oh, and Nick Holt Jr. transferred to Montana!

Andrew

 

 

 

 

5 Comments

Filed under Huskies Football, UW Football Recruiting

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

by | January 8, 2012 · 8:06 pm

UW Quarterbacks

I’m going to run through positional overviews for the Dawgs for next year, starting with quarterbacks.  I thought about waiting until the new recruits are in, but most of them will redshirt and, as I said in my last post, I don’t really know much about them anyway.  I’ll mention recruits if I think I have reason to, but the aim of these posts is to see what the Huskies have on hand for 2012.  Enjoy!

Who They Lose

No one.

Starter

Keith Price– Junior: Price just completed his first season as starter, and it’s hard to imagine what he could do for an encore.  His 2011 was arguably the best season by a Husky QB in history.  He set virtually every single-season record except for yardage, which Cody Pickett holds.  It did take Pickett a lot more attempts than Price, so I’d argue that Price’s season was better.  He showed a significantly stronger arm and better accuracy than most expected, and his impressive knowledge of the offense was a popular topic of conversation.

The lone drawback with Price is a lack of durability.  He only missed one game, and he probably could have gutted that one out, but he spent nearly the entire season with leg injuries that hampered his mobility.  The Alamo Bowl provided a glimpse of Price’s running ability, and if that can be a more permanent part of his game, he’s going to be incredibly scary.  It’s easy to say that he’ll put on 15 pounds this winter and be more durable, but I don’t know if he can even do that or how much it will help if he does.  Whether he can run free or not, another year to continue to mature and improve, coupled with the progression of Kasen Williams and Austin Seferian-Jenkins, should make Price into one of the premier college QBs in the country.  This position is in better hands than any other on the team.

Depth

Nick Montana– Sophomore

Derrick Brown– RS Freshman

Thomas Vincent- RS Freshman

Entering 2011, Montana and Price both had a shot at the starting job.  Price won it, of course, and when Montana filled in a few times later in the season, it was easy to see why.  Montana looked mostly overmatched, with arm strength and accuracy issues.  Starting him over Price against Oregon State, when Price was hobbled with bad knees, probably cost the Huskies the game.  It was easy and popular to say that Montana would never be an elite quarterback in the Pac-12, and many speculated that he would transfer now that Price has cemented himself into the position seemingly until Montana’s senior year.

No one will argue that Montana was unimpressive, and it’s hard to say what he’ll become.  It’s easy to forget that he was only a redshirt freshman, though.  He has plenty of time to improve, and most people who know think he will.  It’s possible that he transfers, but there’s been no indication that he is thinking about it.  I would expect that he’s here to stay, and I think he’ll be dramatically improved and serve as a solid backup in 2012.  Brown was a somewhat unheralded recruit in 2011, but he’s drawn some raves since stepping on campus.  He’s a big, athletic guy with possibly the strongest arm currently on campus.  Hopefully, he won’t be needed this year, but he shows a lot of potential.  Vincent is a walk on who will likely never see the field in his career, but he sounds like he has some genuine talent and athleticism, even if it’s only ever used to run the scout team.  He walked on with the Huskies over some lower level offers, which is always welcome.

Incoming Recruits

Jeff Lindquist and Cyler Miles

As I said, I won’t mention too many recruits, but these two are hard to pass up.  Both committed early to the UW, and both are ranked around 15th among quarterbacks in the nation, and that may be a little low with the way they’re playing in the postseason events.  Both are athletic guys with big arms.  Both won the MVP awards in national high school all star games last week.  It’s pretty rare to get two elite quarterbacks like this in the same class.  Both seem very solid in their commitments to the Huskies, but every school on the west coast will be coming hard at them this month.  Lindquist, from Mercer Island, seems certain to stick with the Dawgs.  Miles seems like more of a question, but only because he’s from Colorado.  He’s given no indication of looking elsewhere.  Right now, they are the gems of the UW recruiting class and should keep the Husky quarterback position in good hands for the next half a decade.

-Matthew

Leave a comment

Filed under Huskies Football, Huskies Position Overviews, Uncategorized

Tagged as , , , , , , , , ,

by | January 7, 2012 · 8:33 pm

What’s The Deal With Recruiting?

I’m usually kind of hesitant to write about recruiting, for a few reasons.  For one, I don’t really know anything about these players, how good they are or what they’re thinking, and neither do most other people, whatever they might tell you.  Outside of a few Youtube clips or maybe a single game here or there, I’ve never seen these guys play, and even if I have, I’m no talent scout.  A couple of years ago I went with Danny and Andrew to watch Bothell play O’Dea.  I could tell that Zach Fogerson was kind of special.  Michael Hartvigson and Colin Porter were huge and stood out.  I’ve also been to plenty of games where guys really stood out and weren’t anywhere close to being D-I recruits.  I can’t usually tell the difference.  If you’re relying on me for scouting, you’re in trouble.

The second reason I hesitate to write about recruiting is that it’s a pretty charged topic.  The management aspect of sports has grown almost as compelling as the game itself.  Prince Fielder and the Mariners roster construction  has received far more attention than the Mariners’ season, and that’s not just because the Mariners were terrible.  With fantasy sports becoming so popular, we like to play general manager.  That’s hard to do with college sports, and so we speculate on recruiting.

That’s not necessarily bad.  Continue reading →

4 Comments

Filed under Huskies Football, UW Football Recruiting

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

by | January 4, 2012 · 10:04 pm

Montlake’s Going Crazy!

The last week has been a wild one for University of Washington football.  Between the Alamo Bowl, coaching changes, and recruiting news, there have been no shortage of emotion swings.  I’m going to save the recruiting talk for a future post, but I want to offer some thoughts on the rest of the news.

Plenty has already been said on the Alamo Bowl, so I’ll keep it short, but it’s hard to ask for much more out of a bowl appearance.  Besides a win, that is.  Everyone expected a shootout, but this one went to a completely different level.  I’ve heard people say that the lack of defense was embarassing, and I suppose that it probably is.  I certainly wish the Huskies would have pulled out the win.  Still, I can’t get overly upset about it.  That was one of the craziest things we’ll ever get to see.  I talk a lot on here about how I increasingly watch sports for the chance to be amazed.  Winning is great, but I want to see great performances and events that surprise me.  The Alamo Bowl had both. Continue reading →

Leave a comment

Filed under Huskies Football, Uncategorized

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , ,

by | December 31, 2011 · 1:26 pm

Insightful Quick Hits About Your Local Teams

A Good Guys Post!! Stop everything and read!! This only happens every couple weeks!! The Good Guys are also busy guys, and the blog has been quiet lately, much like a friend that you have not spoken to in a while. The Good Guys are your friends, let’s catch up!

My mind is swirling with sports crap, which is not irregular by any means. I think I’ll just spew things out in a “local teams quick hits” format, and hopefully you love it. If you don’t love it, you’re just bitter, or grumpy, but I’m neither so don’t blame me.

MARINERS!
At this point, the off season is clearly hinging on Prince Fielder. The M’s have been quiet this winter, but when Prince signs, I’d imagine a couple moves will soon follow. I want Prince in Seattle, for a lot of reasons, but honestly if we don’t get him, I won’t be devastated. I’ve invested a good deal of time following the rumors, and I just want it to end. Assuming Prince signs elsewhere, the likelihood of the M’s contending for anything in the next 2 years seems bleak, but I’ve learned to not assume much in sports. Joey Votto could be available in a month for all we know. My point is, I don’t want to see a fire sale quite yet (felix), regardless of Prince.

HUSKIES FB!
Keith Price out-dueled RG3 in the Alamo Bowl, I can say that without hesitation. He is so smooth, poised, and likeable. I can’t wait to see what he does over the next 2 years. Of course, some of his performance is being overshadowed by what has to be the worst defensive performance any of us has seen. I knew our defense was bad, and this game was a recipe for disaster, but I can’t say I expected to see 777 yards given up, nor did I expect to lose by double digits, despite scoring 56 points. It is embarrassing on some levels, like something we are ashamed of is now out in the open. It’s like when a married couple is having some issues at home, but then they go to a restaurant and start throwing dishes. It’s like, well, I guess the whole town knows now. That made sense in my head.

HUSKIES BB!
The Huskies will win the Pac 12, you can put me on record for that. We all know the conference is down, and the Huskies record is not what we are used to seeing, but I think this is Romar’s most talented squad. On paper, we are loaded. I’m excited for the next couple months of Husky bball.

SEAHAWKS!
Depending on Sunday’s outcome against Arizona, the Hawks could draft as low as 19, or as high as 10 in 2012. Either way, ready yourself for a heavy dose of QB chatter for the next few months on sports radio. Common topics will include, “should the Hawks trade 3 1st rounders to get RG3?” “is mark sanchez a viable option?” “could kellen moore, ryan tannehill, or brandon weeden be the guy?” I love the chatter, I really do, but it gets old pretty quick. Nobody knows what will happen, but I do know the Seahawks look to have a promising future. I should also note that I have some crow to eat, because I said the 6-8 wins Seattle gets this year will be the most meaningless wins in team history, but 2-3 wins would mean a top tier QB in the draft. Well, I have flipped my stance on this, because the 7-8 wins are the result of a lot of things starting to click, and this trumps the high draft position we’d have if everything went wrong this year.

SONICS!
The NBA is back, and I can’t resist watching it. I loved the Sonics when they were here, probably more than any local team. Every so often there is some new arena story that pops up in a local paper, just to get my hopes up. A new one surfaced a couple weeks ago, about a possible arena in SoDo, headed by a San Francisco businessman that recently purchased a valuable piece of property south of Safeco Field, for $21.6 million. An unknown Bellevue investor is on this too apparently, and a proposal could come out in the months to come, in hopes of acquiring more land to build an arena, then lure NHL/NBA. In the mean time, Joe and I bought tickets to a Blazers game in February, against the Clippers. Should be fun, although I told Joe rooting for Portland would feel odd, especially if the NBA returned to Seattle someday, and I had to remember that one night I rooted for the Blazers. Yuck.

SOUNDERS!
I’m sure you all know the off season moves SSFC have been up to. No? Oh, well let me recap. We signed an Austrian keeper, Michael Gspurning, a Swedish defender, Adam Johansson, and now rumors have surfaced that the Sounders have agreed to terms with a 23 year old DANISH! midfielder, Christian Sivebaek.

T-BIRDS!
I went to a T-Birds came this past week, and saw a fight, 6,000 Kent Krazies, 2 zambonis, and at one point a hockey game broke out! T-Birds won 2-1 in a shootout, and I now follow some of their players on twitter. The players, by the way, are 15-20 years old, mainly Canadian, and all around good guys like us. As for the fight, here’s what Mitch Elliot tweeted that evening:

Mitch Elliot@melliot7
“Took more punches to the face then I had shifts tonight”

NORTHWEST EAGLES!
Last but not least, the NU Eagles Men’s basketball team is 15-0. Matthew and I are proud NU alums, and Andrew is currently attending. Matthew is the all time blocks leader at NU, and I hold the record for 8 consecutive triple-doubles. That was my test to see if you are still reading this. If you are, dang you have some serious spare time!

Finally, an Ichiro quote to wrap things up. This really should be how all posts conclude.

Nikkan Sports: There are some that think age may have played a part [in your rough season].

Ichiro: I admit that lately I find myself enjoying Enka music during Kohaku Uta Gassen. I am also more concerned about how young people are speaking and find that my skin is drier. So there are times where I feel like I am getting older.

HAPPY NEW YEAR.

-Dan

2 Comments

Filed under Huskies Basketball, Huskies Football, Mariners, Seahawks Football, Uncategorized