SEATTLE — As the rest of the college football world watched television or tracked social media Sunday, the Washington Huskies were coming off the practice field.
They heard all the potential bowl game scenarios. UW is going to the Holiday Bowl. Or the Huskies are heading to San Antonio for the Alamo Bowl. Some players heard the Cotton Bowl was in play.
Then came the news. No. 11 UW (10-2) was going to the Fiesta Bowl to play No. 9 Penn State (10-2) on Dec. 30. And from that revelation came a reason to celebrate for the Huskies.
“I can’t tell you how excited and honored we are to come back here. There’s no better bowl. I’ve been to a bunch of them …,” Huskies coach Chris Petersen said. “When we heard today that we were coming back, there was a lot of jumping around and smiling faces, until we found out that it was James Franklin’s Penn State Nittany Lions.
“Then we said, ‘Uh-oh. Be careful what you wish for.’”
Penn State and UW will play for just the third time. The Huskies are 0-2 in those games, with the most recent meeting coming in 1983.
UW’s path to its first-ever Fiesta appearance was something of a mini-saga.
The Huskies, at minimum, were in play for the Alamo or Holiday because of the Pac-12 tie-ins for both games. But there was some chatter last Sunday about UW potentially sneaking into a New Year’s Six game.
Ranked No. 13 in the College Football Playoff standings, the Huskies needed some help to climb the rankings for a legitimate shot at a New Year’s Six appearance.
Everything started getting real Friday. UW needed Stanford and TCU — two teams ranked above the Huskies in the CFB rankings — to lose their respective conference title games.
Stanford fell first in a 31-28 loss to USC in the Pac-12 Championship. A day later, TCU was crushed in a 41-17 loss to Oklahoma in the Big 12 Championship.
Those losses opened the door for UW to reach a New Year’s Six game.
“I would hear in the locker room what everybody was thinking,” Huskies quarterback Jake Browning said of UW’s bowl fate. “But it changed so much, you don’t really know but I would definitely listen to what people had to say.”
The final CFP rankings, which were released Sunday morning, had the Huskies ranked 11th — the final position for a New Year’s Six berth.
Several publications projected UW would rise up the CFP poll and get the final spot. But it was under the assumption the Huskies would go to the Cotton Bowl.
Imagine the surprise when the discussion pivoted from the Cotton to the Fiesta.
UW and Penn State were initially penciled for the Cotton until Ohio State was left out of the CFP semifinal.
The argument was made by a few college football pundits that it would be stale to have the Buckeyes play in a third straight Fiesta.
So how’s this for a compromise? Penn State and UW go to the Fiesta while Ohio State faces USC in the Cotton.
“Especially this week, it’s kinda tough because there’s not a lot you can do,” UW linebacker Tevis Bartlett said. “Our body of work was already done … We want to play in the best bowl game that we can and I think this is a great opportunity to show what we can do.”
Hamden returns to Washington
Hours after the Huskies learned they would be in the Fiesta Bowl, the school announced former assistant Bush Hamdan would return as the team’s offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach.
Hamdan spent two seasons with the Huskies. He was an offensive quality control assistant in 2015 and was the team’s receivers/passing game coordinator in 2016. He left UW after last season to become the quarterbacks coach for the Atlanta Falcons.
Petersen said Hamdan will finish the NFL season with the Falcons.
Hamdan replaces former offensive coordinator Jonathan Smith, who left UW last week to become the head coach at Oregon State.
“I’ve had two years with Bush and there’s something to be said about being around each other,” Browning said. “Enough to know where you kind of know how the other person is.”
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