Tag Archives: UW-Stanford recap

On Thursday night I wrote about what tonight’s game meant for the Washington football program.  A win, or even a respectable, hard-fought loss would have earned this team national respect and shown that the Dawgs are another step up Sark’s metaphorical mountain.  Well, instead of that happening, the Huskies took out their toboggans and sled down the mountain as if it were the historical December of 2008 (Ty’s last game as Husky head coach).

Being out of the game at halftime was a sight Husky fans have grown accustomed  to seeing but we thought it was behind us.  Tonight it wasn’t behind us and that’s a pretty disgusting and annoying feeling.  The defense didn’t move and the offense, while racking up quite a bit of yards, didn’t have the firepower to stay with a physically dominant Stanford team.  The Huskies will be elite again soon, we’ve seen flashes of it, but that doesn’t change how frustrating that game was.

There.  I’ve said it and it’s out my system.  As far as the Good Guys go, Dan and Joe are usually the emotional reactors.  They have no problem telling us about how much our teams sucked it up.  There’s value in that because without it, you get the Cougar syndrome (I’ve coined this phrase right now and I do apologize Cougar fans) and then, you justify your team keeping a coach for a 4th year even though he’d won 2 pac-10 games in his tenure.  Matthew and I usually take things a little differently then that and try to be a little more optimistic (as hard as that is with Seattle sports).  There’s value in that too, especially when talking about the Huskies this year.  It’s easy to get greedy, and start dreaming of Rose Bowls but the truth is this team is still only 3 seasons removed from 0-12 and has made steady progress each year.

Having said that, Dan was the one who sent me a text to remind just how far the Huskies have come in a short amount of time and how great this coaching staff has been for the program.  There is progress being made and there’s no reason to doubt that progress won’t continue, even after tonight’s debacle.

No, maybe the Huskies aren’t quite ready for a regular slot in prime-time.  They are a good football team, who clearly wasn’t at their best tonight, that is fun to watch and will continue to grow.  If they plan to continue to grow they have to forget about this game quickly.

Sark has a 24 hour-rule, where the team is allowed to think about the game for 24 hours afterwards whether it’s a win or a loss.  From what I can tell in his tenure, this rule has worked and the team has generally shown up to play the week after an ugly loss.  Maybe this week the 24 hour-rule should turn into a 2 hour-rule though.  And maybe this rule should go for fans this week too?  There is no point in dwelling on this game.  There may be a few teachable moments for the team, but mostly they got beat by a much better team tonight.  That might not be the case next year, but it is this year.  Because of that, it’s time to move on.  Once the team gets off that plane tonight I hope Keith Price is smiling, Sark is scheming up some more amazing offensive game-plans, Nick Holt is coaching instead of screaming, and our Dawgs are ready to beat the crap out of Arizona.

A few more thoughts after the jump and then the 2-hour rule (it might be 3 hour-rule by the time I’m done writing this) kicks in. Continue reading →