Explaining why Washington should have more hype entering 2024

The Washington Huskies have gone under the radar this offseason after coming up short in last year’s national championship game. Seeing major coaching staff and roster changes as they head into the Big Ten this upcoming season.

Former Arizona head coach Jedd Fisch now takes over the reins of a Washington program that will look to not fall off like the previous year’s national championship runner-up TCU. Which college football analyst Greg McElroy believes won’t happen in Seattle this upcoming season.

“A team that we’ve talked almost nothing about this year, and it’s kind of understandable,” McElroy admitted. “Because if you look at Washington, I’m not going to compare them to the TCU team the year before. That wouldn’t be fair, because Washington was able to navigate through what was an outrageously deep Pac-12.”

TCU’s run to the national championship during the 2022-2023 season was unexpected and filled with down-to-the-wire and comeback wins in the Big 12. Which ended with a lopsided championship loss to Georgia and was followed by a disappointing 5-7 finish this past season with just three conference wins.

But McElroy believes the Huskies are in a much different situation after their impressive run through last year’s Pac-12 Conference and their battle with Michigan in the national title game.

“But we are kind of throwing away Washington as if we threw away TCU last year. Washington still has a bunch of good players off last year’s team. Yes they lost their coach to Alabama, but Jedd Fisch did more with less at Arizona last year than just about anybody in the sport,” McElroy explained.

“And while you can look at what was lost, they still potentially have a really solid veteran quarterback back with Will Rogers,” McElroy added. “Yes, it’s a new league. Yes, it’s going to be difficult and a lot of people look back performance against Michigan and say, ‘Well, they’re just not cut out to play Big 10 football on a week to week basis.’ But I would remind you they were in the game against Michigan, very much in the game against Michigan until one third and long scramble, which really broke the game open.”

A few plays going different for Washington could have potentially changed the outcome of last season’s national championship game. And if Fisch can help re-establish that culture with a new-look roster in a new-look conference, the Huskies could potentially surprise in a season with mixed expectations.

“That Washington team was not far away from a national championship, they were not, maybe 15-20 minutes away from a national championship. So can they recreate some magic in the Big Ten?” McElroy asked. “I don’t know. All I know is that considering they were just that close to winning a nati’ last year, we’re not talking about them enough.”