Greg McElroy offers grade for Jedd Fisch in first year at Washington

Going into 2024, Jedd Fisch made the decision to leave the Arizona Wildcats, a program he had rebuilt, for the Washington Huskies. There, he inherited a team that had just played for a national championship, but was likely headed for a rebuild and went 6-7 in year one.

Now that the season is in the rearview mirror, analyst Greg McElroy broke down the first-season coaches on Always College Football. There, he broke down what Fisch did at Washington, giving him credit for dealing with a lot of changes, and then gave him a B- grade for the season.

“Jedd Fisch took over a Washington program that was on the heels of a national championship appearance,” Greg McElroy said. “It felt like an impossible situation. Kalen DeBoer leaves, takes the Alabama head job, Washington really only has one way to go. So, not only did they lose a ton of key players, Jedd Fisch takes over a job where you’re moving into the Big Ten. That’s impossible. Your coach just left for Alabama. That’s impossible. You just got to the national championship. That’s impossible. You lose a bunch of guys to the portal. That’s impossible. And you’re gonna have to go replace Rome Odunze, Michael Penix, and all the great players that comprised that national championship runner-up team.”

At Arizona, Jedd Fisch entered at a time when the program was struggling. There, he inherited a team that went 0-5 in the 2020 season. Over the course of three years, he took that program from one win, to five wins, to a 10-3 record in 2023. So, he has dealt with rebuilds before.

“So, he’s stepped into a really tough spot, but people looked at that and said, ‘hold on’ the spot he’s stepping into there at Washington is tough,” McElroy said. “But it’s probably not as hard as the spot that he stepped in at Arizona. Well, he goes and within a couple of years he takes it to 10 wins. Pretty impressive. So, you thought that it wouldn’t be as challenging in year one for Jedd Fisch in Seattle as it was in Tuscon.”

The biggest challenge for Jedd Fisch, as Greg McElroy saw it, was roster turnover. That included the Transfer Portal and graduation alike.

“But they lost quite a bit in the portal. They lost Parker Brailsford the center to Alabama. They lose Jabbar Muhammed to Oregon to become a starting corner for them. You lose Germie Bernard to Alabama, the wide receiver. They did go out in the portal and try to backfill some of those pieces. You go and get Demond Williams from Arizona, you get Will Rogers from Mississippi State to help bridge the gap. So, there were some positive pieces added in the portal. So, the net portal for Washington really wasn’t that bad,” McElroy said. “But the graduates from the year before, the guys who exhausted their eligibility or the guys who decided to declare early. That is where some of the biggest vacancies and the biggest challenges were felt.”

In the end, Washington went 6-7, including a bowl loss. It was a major step back from 14-1 and included bad losses to rivals Washington State and Oregon. They would also go 4-5 in Big Ten play, drawing three teams that went to the College Football Playoff.

“It led to a 6-7 year one record, which feels like a pretty significant drop from playing in the national championship game to finishing under .500. You have to also account for the fact this was a completely different team in a completely different league. They lost almost all their starters from 2023. They had very few guys that were there the year before — they did get a jump start with Demond Williams late in the season at quarterback by starting him down the stretch. He showed us some potential in the Sun Bowl against Louisville. I thought he had some positive moments against Oregon.”

Now that Jedd Fisch has had a season at Washington, he should have his feet under him. The roster is shaping out the way he wants it to look. Now, the task is to improve from here and win more games the way he was able to at Arizona.

“So, there were some things to like about Jedd Fisch’s first season,” McElroy said. “But the consistency wasn’t quite there and I do believe that second year and the third year will be much better indicators of long-term success he could have at Seattle. I’ll give his year one grade a B-.”