Jedd Fisch, Pete Carroll meet in hallway of Washington facility

While he might not be attuned to the college game these days, Pete Carroll knows a bit about coaching winning football in the Pacific Northwest. And the former Seattle Seahawks head coach made a short drive to see a former assistant and who many are hoping is a new winner in the Seattle-Tacoma region: new Washington head coach Jedd Fisch.

Fisch spent a season on Carroll’s staff, in 2010, where he coached quarterback Russell Wilson. In the nearly decade and a half since, Carroll has won a Super Bowl and appeared in another and Fisch has orchestrated an ascension to one of the better jobs in the country.

The two managed to catch a moment in the halls of the Washington football facility shortly after Fisch was introduced this week.

Hallway run in….the Winningest coach in ⁦@Seahawks⁩ history, SB Champion, and 2x National Champion ⁦@PeteCarroll⁩! Thanks for your endless support and guidance!! pic.twitter.com/BG4KMJuMIF

— Jedd Fisch (@CoachJeddFisch) January 18, 2024

“Hallway run in….the Winningest coach in ⁦Seahawks history, SB Champion, and 2x National Champion ⁦
[Pete Carroll]! Thanks for your endless support and guidance!!” Fisch said on social media with a picture of the duo.

Fisch is planning a roster overhaul for the Huskies

New head coaches are typically challenged with roster and staff turnover upon their arrival to a new destination, but in today’s version of college football, roster turnover is more frequent than ever. Which led to Fisch being asked about what’s ahead of him in the next few weeks in terms of recruiting in his introductory press conference.

“Well it’s certainly an interesting situation here because I believe right now there’s 17 players in the portal from this roster. There’s nine players or 10 players that have declared for the NFL Draft, you probably have the most amount of players that are gonna get drafted in the NFL will probably come from the University of Washington, this year’s draft. So we know it’s gonna be a completely different team in 2024 than what the community saw in 2023,” Fisch explained.

DeBoer helped lead Washington to the national championship game this past season behind an undefeated regular season record and a roster littered with veteran talent.

Some of that talent will go to the NFL, some to other schools, and others can still decide to return to Washington under Fisch with their names currently in the transfer portal. All of that paired with Fisch being tasked with recruiting new players at the high school level and at the college level through the transfer puts quite a lot on his plate.

“It’s our job to be able to put together the best product and it’s out job to do everything we possibly can in what has become a very strange college football calendar,” Fisch said. “The transfer portal has closed, in regards to the next time it opens in April, the early signing date has almost caused 90% of the high school students to sign early. So the availability of scholarship players is gonna be interesting to say the least.”