Puppy Chow

by John Berkowitz on Nov 11, 2009 9:34 AM PST Comment 16 comments

I want to start off this morning by mentioning that "The Cassino" will be handling Husky basketball this season for the blog. I think he does a great job and most importantly since he is a basketball guy he brings more to the table on the subject than I do. I will be chipping in here and there throughout the basketball season as needed.

Recruiting

Next up is the story on Matt Mosley leaving the team yesterday. I don't really agree with leaving the team during the season but I can understand his frustration. He obviously had enough talent to contribute in some way but fell out of favor with the coaches. I am sure there are more than a couple other players in the same situation right now.

Rebuilding a football program under the 85 player limit rule is tough. Washington will bring in approximately 30 new players in 2010 so the coaches need to make room. Expect the Huskies to sign at least 25 or more frosh who will arrive in the fall. Two freshman who will arrive this spring (Cooper and Callier). You can also expect them to try to sign 3-5 JC players who will enter school for winter quarter. That would push the incoming numbers into the 30-32 range.

How does this all work since you can only for 25 players in each class?

Cooper, Callier, and whatever JC talent they sign will count against 2009. The Huskies also have committments from a couple of kids who may not qualify (Young and Davis). John Timu is guy they could end up defering enrollment on till winter quarter of 2011 because he is coming off knee surgery.

The Huskies currently have 22 commitments for the 2010 class so expect approximately 8-10 more players to be added before signing day if they can find the type of talent which fits there needs.

Condotta on Play Calling

Bob Condotta of the Seattle Times asked all the Pac 10 coaches in the weekly conference call if they call their own plays. Half of the coaches such as Steve Sarkisan do. Bob is one of the very best and I thought it was pretty creative on his part to ask the question since Husky fans are wondering if first year coach Steve Sarkisian may have a little too much on his plate during game day.

Sarkisian said he hasn't felt any extra time demands this year trying to handle both duties and thinks it has gone "extremely well.''

I hate to be critical but I don't think it has gone well at all to tell you the truth. I think it has contributed to three close losses against Notre Dame, ASU, and UCLA that could have been wins if managed more expertly.

Honestly things will get better for this program with the influx of new talent coming in and another full year of conditioning under Ivan Lewis. I also thing a 34 year old head coach in his first season has his own learning curve to deal with. I like what Sark brings tothe table and I think over time he will become a better game day coach. That being said in the off season he needs to take a closer look at how much he has on his plate.

Oregon State Perspective

Here is a link to an article in the Oregonian by Ken Goe who think the Beavers are getting the Huskies at the right time. Playing the Beavers in Novemeber is never a good thing for any team because as we all know Mike riley teams just keep getting better.

Washington on the other hand doesn't seem to be getting better right now. Last week they played down to the level of their opponent and lost by one point to UCLA. Teams that are getting better don't do that. We were hpoing for a resurgence after the bye week but the team looked just as tired as they did against Oregon.

Nicks, scratches, and injuries are starting to add up. If Washington has any chance of pulling off an upset on Saturday they need to hit the field fresh with lots of energy and gain some confidence early. This team hasn't had a lot of confidence since the punt block in the Oregon game.

Earlier this season, after Washington had hammered Idaho, upset USC and jumped into the national rankings, it looked like the Huskies might have turned the corner in coach Steve Sarkisian's first season.

It was a feel-good story, 0-12 in 2008 to contention in 2009.

Since, though, the Huskies have lost five of six. The victory came because of a fluky pick-six against Arizona that some believe should have been disallowed upon further review.

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make the grade

Things look very dismal right now but, and a big but

Give the Husky coaches an AAAAA+++++ in recruiting

with more good news coming. Ex: Hatchie

Keep the faith and remember in the new football world it is all about RECRUITING.

by Purpledawg on Nov 11, 2009 10:16 AM PST reply actions 0 recs

I’m not convinced Sark has to give up his play-calling duties, but he does need to re-examine his game management, and maybe rely even more on his assistants during games than he currently does, as well as re-think his processes and how he arrives at decisions.

I don’t think play-calling as a head coach is necessarily a bad distraction, but I do think it’s a real challenge for a guy that is in his first job as a head coach.

by kirkd on Nov 11, 2009 1:52 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

I agree with the play calling

I don’t like it when head coaches call plays. It rarely seems to work out well. Notre Dame does it, and I honestly think you could add another win or two to their schedule if he didn’t, as you could Washington. Weiss said that doing this adds about three hours of work a day, which I personally don’t agree with for a guy with a family. It also wouldn’t surprise me if he was worn out for game day and made dumb decisions just out of exhaustion. If this is as much of burden for Sark, he should stop.

But on the other hand, at least these coaches control their own career destiny.

by zeeehjee on Nov 11, 2009 2:19 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

Oregon State

They have a reputation of getting better as the season progresses. Do they really get better? I’m not sure I go along with that. I think what you are seeing is a deep roster coming into action. When you’ve got depth, you look and play better then your opponent that doesn’t have much depth and who is beatin’ up.

Maybe it’s a combination of both. Mike Riley is a helluva great football coach, but I doubt he is doing a better job coaching then most other Pac 10 coaches. I think his schemes make OSU look great, and I think his depth in mid and late November make OSU look good- especially when they play Washington that is depleated in the depth dept. and who is rattled and banged up by this time of year.

All I saw was purple

by crazidawg on Nov 11, 2009 4:36 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

Mike Riley is a helluva great football coach, but I doubt he is doing a better job coaching then most other Pac 10 coaches. I think his schemes make OSU look great…

Wait – if his schemes make OSU look great, isn’t that a big part of doing a better job of coaching?

by kirkd on Nov 11, 2009 5:30 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Why yes it does kirkd. He does a masterful job of finding kids that fit his system. Sort of how Oregon takes kids that fit Kelly’s system or Peterson who finds kids that fit BSU’s system. They’re all doing a great job and the scheme is running to perfection.

All I saw was purple

by crazidawg on Nov 11, 2009 7:45 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

I’d say he’s doing a better job than the bottom half of the PAC 10. And if we’re taking those goofy “star” rankings into consideration, he does better than most of his contemporaries in the top half of the PAC 10, doing “more” with “less” on what is becoming a somewhat annual basis.

Now if he could just START the season the same way he finishes, I’d be a very, very happy Beaver and we’d all have better Septembers.

by ArbyOSU on Nov 12, 2009 3:48 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

What's up with Riley's slow starts?

It’s always puzzled me how a coach could look so bad early in the season, yet look so good late in the season.

"Legends are made on the shores of Lake Washington"
"BOW DOWN TO WASHINGTON"

by Lear Pilot on Nov 12, 2009 7:36 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

I have no idea but they absolutely KILL me and just about every other Beaver fan.

by ArbyOSU on Nov 13, 2009 3:12 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

Makes you wonder if there’s some kind of complexity in what Riley’s staff does that just doesn’t click with the team until 4-5 games in to the season. Or maybe something about conditioning that doesn’t leave them as ready for the start of the season, but gets fixed with 4-5 games worth of playing?

It would be something not worth paying too much attention to except for the fact it’s happened so many years in a row now.

by kirkd on Nov 13, 2009 3:31 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

There’s obviously SOMETHING there that could use fixing. I mean, I’m happy with the whole body of work, but games like Stanford last year and both Arizona and Cinci (and UNLV to a lesser extent because we won) drive me NUTS.

by ArbyOSU on Nov 13, 2009 3:42 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

I’m curious – what do Beaver fans think is the ceiling for the football program? Obviously you guys would like to win the conference and go to a Rose Bowl, but is an undefeated season something you guys think is a reasonable expectation at some point? Do you see the current level of success being taken for granted at some point?

by kirkd on Nov 13, 2009 6:08 PM PST up reply actions 0 recs

3rd week into the season

Remembeer that week fellas? If I remember correctly we gave LSU everything they could handle, beat Idaho, stunned the hell out of TrojanNation, and were awarded a ranking in the top 25.

What happened?

I would suggest that we made a few ill-advised coaching decisions since that contributed to a few losses. But the real story is lack of depth. Let’s face it when critical members of the football team are slowed by nagging injuries or out of action for a week or two- it takes its toll.

Good teams can compete, but great teams go above and beyond and win with depth. That has killed us more then anything else this season.

I agree with coach Sark’s decision to build thru special teams. For one, special teams can set you up well in action. But what really sets it off is “player development”. You want to develope the talent in the program? Kids learn real fast how to play this game at this level by playing on special teams.

Our coaches are young and inexperienced to some degree, but they’re not the least bit content with losing. This is coach Sark’s first season as a head coach and I’m quite sure he wants to make it a rather lengthy career. Coaches aren’t ammune to making mistakes, after all they are human. What won’t kill you will only make you stronger- let’s not forget that. WOOF!!!

All I saw was purple

by crazidawg on Nov 11, 2009 7:42 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

History

Way back when I was a freshman, they hired a young assistant with no prior head coaching experience. During his first year, they only won 3 games and got blown out a few times. His second year, he started a number of young guys, and while they only won 3 games again, they were far more competitive losing by 5 at the OSU and playing tight games against several other teams. This feels like the same situation almost 50 years later. Of course the HC was Jim Owens and some of the young guys were named Schloredt, Fleming, Allen, Gegner, McKasson, Kinnune Bullard and McKeta and I got to go to 2 consecutive Rose Bowls. Sure hopes this time works out the same way.

by 61Dawg on Nov 11, 2009 8:55 PM PST reply actions 0 recs

If we could only be so lucky . . .

only time will tell.

"Legends are made on the shores of Lake Washington"
"BOW DOWN TO WASHINGTON"

by Lear Pilot on Nov 12, 2009 1:46 AM PST up reply actions 0 recs

yep, 3rd year is when you know what you got.

JO and DJ went to Rose in 3rd year. Lambo blew his RB bid in his 3rd year (1st eligible for bowl) by letting USC tie by scoring 21 in 4th qtr and then next week losing to the ducks by falling behind 24-0 at half, then after coming back, missing 2 FGs in last 3 minutes , 3 missed FGs overall that day. USC went that year 95 because of last to go rule. Coincidentally, Lambo’s 3rd year was the last time UW beat UCLA at Rose Bowl. Rick went to Holiday against Texas, but the trend was downward by then. Gilby never got nor deserved that 3rd year. Of course Ty we knew what we had in 3rd year too but didn’t make the change.

by prrbrr on Nov 12, 2009 9:56 AM PST reply actions 0 recs