Playoff-bound Washington is just getting started
Before focusing on the immediate — Washington just won its way into the College Football Playoff — let’s consider the long-term implications. In only three seasons, Chris Petersen has reversed a decade and a half of futility. The Huskies are back. The rest of the Pac-12 should be very concerned.
This Washington team is well-drilled, as we’ve come to expect from Chris Petersen teams. It’s also talented — the Huskies weren’t operating at anything close to their full capacity on Friday night, but they easily beat Colorado 41-10 to win the Pac-12 championship. With a 12-1 regular season complete, Washington is one of the nation’s four best teams, based on the résumé or, if you’ve been watching for more than a half-hour or so, the eye test.
But in a larger sense, the Huskies might just be getting started.
On a mild early October evening in Oregon, Petersen took a couple of moments to talk before leaving town. Washington had just ended a 12-year losing streak to rival Oregon, and done it by hanging 70 points on the road, and as much as the story was how far the Ducks had fallen, it was also about how quickly the Huskies were rising.
A reporter noted that Washington’s players passed the eye test, that they looked like some of the elite teams in other parts of the country. Petersen agreed — but then said the program still had a long way to go and a lot more work to do to fill out the roster. If the goal is to get all the way back and then to stay there, he’s probably right. Another couple of years of recruiting feeding winning feeding recruiting, the cycle rolling ever faster — and, well, who knows what’s possible?
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But anything seems possible right now, too.
The gap between Washington and its Pac-12 North rivals seems pretty big. In the Pac-12, only USC, which handed Washington its only loss in early November, seems immediately capable of matching up with the Huskies.
And when it comes to the Playoff, well, never mind those questions about whether Washington can hang with Alabama.
First, can anybody? Second, we don’t know what the seeding will be come Sunday. And third, the old line, ‘Give Chris Petersen a month to prepare, and then watch out,’ is a little overcooked. In the Playoff, all the coaches know how to get their teams ready. But it’s certainly true that his teams routinely squeeze every ounce of talent, producing nearly flawless execution, and that they have often outperformed more talented teams.
But anyone trying to compare this Washington team in the Playoff to something like Boise State vs. Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl a decade ago is shorting the Huskies considerably. They’re a lot more talented than Petersen’s best Boise State teams. And while the building project is still underway, they’re already talented enough to match up to almost any team in college football.
“It’s real,” junior receiver Dante Pettis said that night in October, after beating down the Ducks. “It’s not just hype. It’s real.”
Seven games later, who’s arguing? Oh, other than some Big Ten fans who were hoping for a Colorado upset (and that if it occurred, the selection committee then wouldn’t think too much of the Buffaloes), but afterward were left trying to poke holes in a resume that stacks up favorably with any team’s this side of Bama.
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At halftime, the tweet from a hopeful Michigan fan suggested — he was grasping at straws — that Washington might not look like one of the four best teams. The reasoning: the Huskies were winning in lackluster fashion (remember, it was halftime) and hey, Colorado was playing its backup quarterback after an injury to Sefo Liufau.
Never mind the lack of self-awareness there — can you think of another team that pulled away, at home, after Liufau was injured? (Hint: The game was played in Ann Arbor.) Regardless of how it happened, Washington was beating the team ranked No. 8 by the College Football Playoff selection committee. Clashes of Top 10 teams are sometimes, you know, competitive.
But then the second half happened. Liufau came back and tried to play. The Huskies intercepted him three times in the second half. They won easily, and the statement was pretty hard to miss, even if it wasn’t really necessary. Really, the Huskies just needed to win.
Never mind what happens elsewhere this weekend. They’re in.
All of which means those who wanted (or needed) chaos this weekend have to hope something happens in the ACC championship, that Virginia Tech upsets Clemson. If it happens, it’s possible the Big Ten would get two teams into the four-team bracket. Ohio State is in, but could the Buckeyes be joined by either the Big Ten champion (Wisconsin or Penn State) or even by Michigan? Maybe. But those teams won’t find their way into the bracket instead of Washington.
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A few seconds after the final gun, the Fox TV cameras caught up with Huskies sophomore running back Myles Gaskin. The question was something about whether Washington deserved to be in the Playoff.
“That’s up to a whole bunch of people I don’t know,” Gaskin said. “I don’t care.”
It was last week’s answer. Somehow Gaskin didn’t get the memo: After you’ve completed the season, with no other obstacles remaining, that’s when you say, “Yeah, absolutely we earned it. We’ll see you there” — or something like it. But no matter. Petersen was asked the same question a little later. Do the Huskies deserve to be in the Playoff?
“I think there’s no doubt about that,” Petersen said.
There’s very little doubt about this, either: They might just be getting started.
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