Washington Huskies Football: 8 Opponents We'd Love To See on Future Schedules
Steve Sarkisian's University of Washington Huskies football program is about to take off. Although the Huskies record has only been 5-7 in 2009 and then 7-6 in 2010, Sarkisian has been putting in place a successful program for years to come.
According to Rivals.com, the Washington Huskies had the 28th-best recruiting class in the country in 2010, Sarkisian's first year as a head coach, and this past offseason the 23rd-best recruits in the nation.
With the continued success of recruiting, the Huskies will eventually start to compete for a national championship. However, winning your conference does not guarantee you an opportunity to play for the national title.
Playing tough non-conference games and winning them is required if you expect to be considered one of the best two schools in the country and then be selected to play in the BCS National Championship Game.
Here are some non-conference schools that the Washington Huskies would benefit from playing.
8. San Diego State
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The Mountain West Conference has become a very competitive league with the addition of Boise State.
Every year San Diego State will play Boise State, requiring the Aztecs to continue to strive and get better. Boise State is bringing in better players and more TV deals to the conference. Athletes who normally would not go to San Diego State are now going because they can now have a chance to play on TV against Boise State.
Another great reason for Washington to play San Diego State is because of the travel situation. Relative to other non-conference programs that would be worth playing, San Diego State is right down the road.
7. Tennessee
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In 2012 the Washington Huskies will be traveling to Baton Rouge to play the LSU Tigers after LSU's visit to Seattle in 2009. Playing LSU, whether home or away, is good for the program; however, Washington would benefit from another SEC school coming to Seattle.
The University of Tennessee is a year or two behind Washington when it comes to rebuilding its program. Playing Washington will be just as beneficial for Tennessee as it is for the Huskies.
Sarkisian could easily get a home and home deal with Tennessee, which would bring an SEC school out west. This also would not be the first time Tennessee has played an away game against a Pac-12 school. In 2008 the Volunteers went west to play the UCLA Bruins, and in 2007 they traveled to Berkeley to play the Cal Golden Bears.
The only issue in playing Tennessee in Seattle would be if the new athletic director at Tennessee does not want to start his tenure in Knoxville off by signing a deal to go play a football game out on the West Coast.
6. Texas/5. Oklahoma
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The Washington Huskies will benefit from playing Texas and Oklahoma equally.
Both schools are in the Big 12 and are the powerhouses in the middle part of America. Playing either school home or away would help the Huskies not only in the BCS poll but also with recruiting.
Kids in Texas and Oklahoma play football more than in other parts of the country. Kids in Oklahoma and Texas are much closer to 10,000 hours of practice, which is the number of hours of practice one needs to become an expert in a particular skill.
Texas and Oklahoma’s talent pools are so great that they can’t play every star player immediately. If there are star players that won’t get early playing time with Texas or Oklahoma, they may opt to play elsewhere. If said players were to see Washington play either Texas or Oklahoma, the Huskies would be fresh on their mind when choosing where to go to school.
Washington had a home and home series with the Sooners in 2006 and 2008, but if the Huskies never play Texas or Oklahoma again, those states' star players may never think about playing for Washington.
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4. TCU
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Texas Christian University has come back to prominence in the college football world.
Making it to a BCS game the past two years, TCU is now considered one of the best football programs in the nation.
In the 2010 Fiesta Bowl TCU lost to Boise State, but in the 2011 Rose Bowl TCU beat a Big Ten co-champion, the University of Wisconsin.
TCU, located in Fort Worth, Texas, is also fairly close to Seattle. Traveling to TCU would not be the worst road trip Washington could take.
3. Notre Dame
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The University of Notre Dame is the go-to school if you want to play a important non-conference game. Being an independent school, Notre Dame has no limit to when and where it can play games. In the Pac-12 Washington only has three weeks of the season to schedule non-conference games.
Notre Dame is rich with tradition, and every time you play the Irish it is guaranteed to be on national television. If NBC is not airing the game, ESPN or some other national broadcasting station will.
Brian Kelly is currently on his way to bringing the Fighting Irish back to where Notre Dame once was as the most prestigious school in the country.
2. Nebraska
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Last season’s bowl game for the Washington Huskies was in the Holiday Bowl against the Nebraska Cornhuskers. Washington won the game 19-7.
A rematch is scheduled against the Huskers on Sept. 17th, 2011 in Lincoln, Nebraska—the team's third meeting in two years after Nebraska's visit to Washington on Sept. 18th, 2010. Getting a Big Ten school as widely known as Nebraska to come to Seattle and play Washington again would be a huge step in the right direction for the Huskies program.
For the same reasons as playing against Texas and Oklahoma, recruiting for the Huskies in the area of Nebraska will go up. I am not saying that every Nebraska high school football player is now going to the University of Washington, but players that won’t play for Nebraska may now consider going to Washington.
Having that snubbed-by-the-school-you-want-to-play-for mentality can be a great igniter in becoming a great player.
Rajon Rondo, now the Celtics' star point guard, wanted to play for the Louisville Cardinals. Rick Pitino choose Sebastian Telfair instead. Telfair eventually skipped college, and Rondo went to the University of Kentucky. Telfair was at one time Rondo’s backup for the Boston Celtics.
1. Boise State
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Boise State has become the best football program not in a BCS conference. Boise State's only real competition in the Mountain West is TCU, and that's only for 2011 before TCU moves to the Big East.
Only beating TCU will not get Boise State a high enough ranking in the final BCS poll, so playing tough road games against good teams is exactly what the Broncos are looking for.
If you are reading this thinking, “A home and home with Boise State would be great for Washington,” then get excited, because in 2013 Boise State will be the first opponent the Huskies will face in the new Husky Stadium. Then in 2015 Washington will travel to Boise, Idaho.
This is the best opponent Washington can play—definitely beatable and one of the closer schools to Seattle mentioned on this list.
Last year, when Boise State played Virginia Tech in the first game of the season, the nation was curious as to how well the Broncos could play against a top team in the nation. In 2013, not only will America be wondering the same thing, but it will also be curious as to how the new stadium will look for the Huskies.
It could be the most watched Washington football game ever.
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