Huskies’ ‘quarterbacks of the defense’

SEATTLE — Nine months is a long time with no one to flatten.

So when the University of Washington football team donned pads for the first time on Wednesday afternoon, middle linebacker Donald Butler was laying people out like his frustration had been building.

He blasted running back Chris Polk on the first snap of a running drill, then stuffed running back Johri Fogerson with a molar-jarring hit two snaps later.

“Whenever you go however-many-months without hitting anybody, as a linebacker, you get antsy,” Butler said this week. “I couldn’t wait to hit somebody.”

The way Butler was hitting people, it looked as if the senior and team leader had been spending every hour of his offseason preparing to get back on the field. But that’s only partially true.

Butler did take a couple days off in January, and he had a pretty good excuse. His mother got two tickets to President Obama’s inauguration speech, so the two of them flew out to Washington, D.C., and attended the event.

“It was crazy, really crowded,” Butler said. “It was good to be there, though. I’ll be able to tell my children and my grandchildren that I was there for a part of history.”

After sitting a few hundred yards away from the leader of the free world, Butler got back to the task at hand — that is, being the leader of the Huskies’ defense. Along with senior E.J. Savannah and junior Mason Foster, UW’s linebacking corps is the most experienced unit on the entire team.

“We know that we can all play, so now we want to take it to that next level,” Savannah said. “That’s the challenge: to see how good we can possibly get.”

While all three linebackers bring a wealth of experience — as does top reserve Trenton Tuiasosopo — it’s been a while since they played together. Savannah quit the team before the 2008 season, only to return last spring under the Huskies’ new coaching staff.

“It feels great,” the Bellevue High School product said. “This is my home, and it feels good being here.”

It didn’t take long for the linebacking trio to fall back into familiar patterns. They’ve been as inseparable as Peter, Paul and Mary since the time Savannah re-joined the team last spring.

“Words can’t describe how important it is to have that experience,” Butler said. “We’re all brothers. We eat together, we chill together, we do everything together.”

Said Savannah: “We feel like, if we have a good relationship off the field, then we’ll have a good relationship on the field.”

New defensive coordinator Nick Holt is happy to have so much experience at such an important position in his system.

“Whenever you have guys who have played a lot of football — they don’t have a lot of experience in this system, but they have experience at this level — it helps,” he said. “They’ve all been in battles, they’re all good athletes. It’s all good.”

Butler is the undisputed leader of the group, but both outside linebackers have made plenty of noise on the field. Savannah was among the top tacklers in the Pac-10 two years ago, while Foster led the conference with 105 tackles last season.

It’s the position around which the rest of the UW defense orbits.

“Guys look to us,” Butler said. “They say, ‘What are they doing right? How do I go out there and do the same thing?’ We’re the quarterbacks of the defense, and I take that personally.”

He’s already established himself as a team leader, and he’s been a part of United States history, so now Butler has just one more goal before the end of his senior season.

“A bowl game,” he said. “Seven wins and a bowl game. That’s all I want.”

Notes

Head coach Steve Sarkisian said that junior-college transfer Dominique Gaisie, a junior cornerback, probably won’t become eligible this season. Gaisie has been held out of practices this week because of an NCAA clearinghouse issue that has to do with his transfer from Mount San Antonio College. … Defensive end Daniel Te’o-Nesheim was one of 55 players named to the watch list of the Chuck Bednarik Award, which is given annually to the nation’s top defensive player. … Defensive end Darrion Jones (hand) and safety Nate Williams (knee) were held out of practice with what Sarkisian described as minor injuries.