Trail blazed by Arizona is one UW would like to follow

Published 11:56 pm Friday, October 3, 2008

TUCSON, Ariz. — Four games into a dismal season, the Huskies need only look across the football field for proof that a turnaround is possible.

Arizona and its coach, Mike Stoops, know all too well what this season feels like for the Huskies. Just last year, the Wildcats stumbled out of the gate with a 2-6 record, and were coming off a disappointing loss to Stanford — their third straight — when it came time to face Washington.

Then the underdog Wildcats came to Seattle. Another loss would have Wildcat fans up in arms that Stoops, then in his fourth year, hadn’t turned things around.

Sound familiar?

Things looked bleak for Arizona, which trailed by 15 points in the fourth quarter, but the Wildcats fought back to win 48-41. That was the first of three straight victories that likely saved Stoops’ job, and now he has the Wildcats off to a 3-1 start. Fans in Arizona are excited, and less than a year after that 2-6 start had fans calling for Stoops’ job, the expectation is that the Wildcats will make their first bowl game since going 12-1 in 1998.

“We were in a little bit of disarray last year at this time and our kids pulled together and pulled that game out from being 15 down in the fourth quarter,” Stoops said. “Sometimes you think you’re down and out and your kids are very resilient. That’s what I found out with our team. Our team never quit on us. We didn’t play as good as we would have liked, but we always felt like we were getting better and close to becoming a good football team. You never lose hope of who you are.”

Today, the Huskies, who like Arizona last year are coming off a loss to Stanford, would love to demonstrate how resilient they are by returning the favor to the Wildcats. They’re hoping a road victory can be the launching point for a turnaround. One win certainly won’t save the Huskies’ season, but it would certainly be a step in the right direction.

“We’ve just got to keep fighting,” said quarterback Ronnie Fouch, who will make his first college start today. “We’ve got to put (the Stanford) loss behind us, and all we’re focused on now is Arizona and going out there and getting our first win, our first Pac-10 win, and getting things rolling from there. That’s our main focus right now.”

It should be noted that a UW turnaround seems less likely than the one Arizona pulled off last season. First off, the Wildcats had at least won a pair of games by the time they came to Seattle, and second, they had lost a few close games in that stretch. The 2008 Huskies, meanwhile, have been blown out twice and look to be worse than they were a year ago. Finally, winning a few games and finishing 5-7, as Arizona did last season, likely won’t be enough for UW coach Tyrone Willingham to keep his job.

Still, Washington players and coaches are clinging to the hope that, with eight games still on the schedule, better times are ahead.

“Not everybody has hung up our gloves yet,” defensive end Daniel Te’o-Nesheim said when asked about the team’s morale. “I know we’ve got a lot of fight in us.”

The Huskies — those who were around anyway — could benefit from some positive memories of Tucson. Two years ago, Washington left the desert with a 21-10 win. In 2005 the Huskies won at Arizona in what was one of just two wins in Willingham’s first season at Washington. That game also marked the last time the Huskies won a game when they were double-digit underdogs, something they are again today.

That 2005 season was also a bleak one for Washington, which was in the midst of a six-game losing streak when it went to Tucson.

“I don’t know if there is something special about their place, or if there is some memory that some of our guys pass on to each other,” Willingham said, “but usually teams have a tendency where there are certain places where they just seem to feel comfortable and they just seem to play well.”

If the Huskies hope to salvage a season that’s quickly slipping away from them, they’re going to need Tucson to be just such a place.

Contact Herald Writer John Boyle at jboyle@heraldnet.com. For more on UW athletics, check out the Huskies blog at heraldnet.com /huskiesblog.