Monday Dots: Huskies Prevail Over USC in Action-packed Shootout

Happy Monday Dawg fans, and welcome to today’s Dots.

• Saturday’s game played out how most expected - a back and forth score-fest from two of the country’s best offenses, each attacking shaky defenses. It felt like with such prolific offenses the game would swing on how many timely stops either D could come up with. And two huge plays that swung the game IMO were A) the ZTF strip fumble on Caleb Williams just before halftime that flipped UW from playing catchup and made USC do the chasing from that point on,,

• and B) the sack on Williams midway through the fourth quarter on 3rd and long that not only kept USC from potentially jumping past UW’s 3-pt lead with a TD — it took them out of FG range altogether. Those stops by the Husky D were even more dramatic, given that Williams was continually working his scrambling magic act, and made Husky defenders look downright silly more than once. No shame in that, the Heisman winner is truly special.

• This Husky team finds ways to win. Whether staring down a trap game upset or going toe-to-toe with the best in the conference. Kalen DeBoer is 20-2 since taking over a team that was reduced to a confounding farce under Jimmy Lake and John Donovan. The running game was working on Saturday so DeBoer and Grubb kept going at it and the story of the game was Dillon Johnson shredding the Trojan defense for 256 rushing yds, 9.8 avg, 4 TDs, and runs of 53, 52, 33, and 20 yards. Hot damn.
• The Athletic: “Dillon Johnson leads No. 5 Washington past No. 20 USC to remain unbeaten”
• Ethan Kilbreath, UW Daily: “Johnson scores four times as Huskies race past Trojans, improve to 9-0”

• Christian Caple: “The Day After: Thoughts and observations after Washington’s win at USC”
• Seattle Times: Relive all 7 TD’s UW scored against USC
• Dawgman has player quotes from after the game and their own podcast on “Breaking Down the History Made During Washington’s 52-42 Win at USC”

• The image on TV of Caleb Williams balling his eyes out in the arms of his family didn’t bring me any joy (maybe a little satisfaction), but does his post-game quote deserve to be placed on that shelf where we keep Todd Marinovich’s “All I saw was purple” quote? I’m leaning Yes.

• The loss to UW was the final straw for USC DC Alex Grinch who was fired yesterday.
• I was at the game on Saturday and Husky World was representing strong. Bow Down!

Go Dawgs!!