Washington Head Coach Jedd Fisch met with the media after Day 14 of spring football, held Wednesday. It was a cleanup/walkthrough style practice that the team would normally have ahead of a game, which is what the Huskies have on Friday. Their spring game, named ‘Dawgs After Dark’ starts at 6:30 pm PT at Husky Stadium.
Fisch spoke about his overall happiness with how spring football has gone, players that have stood out to him, he took questions about the House settlement and how they’re approaching it, as well as his hopes for Friday’s game and the unique reward that comes for those players that end up on the winning team.
Full quotes are below.
Opening Comments
“Other than the spring game, practices are done. Had a really good spring, happy with how things ended up. Happy with our team right now. For the most part we’re healthy, so looking forward to the Purple and Gold game when we’re in Purple and White. Should be a lot of fun there. Guys competed really well this spring. We got better as a team. We learned the offense and defense better. Now I’m looking forward to seeing how we perform on Friday night, what type of event we can have. Can we have a feel, like some pressure, some anxiety with people watching? How does that look? And then stay healthy and get into our offseason training.”
How are you going to divide the players for the game?
“Players were divided up equally and fairly in my opinion as the commissioner of the league. So we’ll have our starting left tackle with our second left guard, with our starting center, with our starting right tackle and our second guard – or something to that effect. So the team is split exactly in half. I took the depth chart as it was the last day of spring practice Monday and went through it and went boop, boop, boop…all the way across the board so we’re going to have an interesting game, interesting teams. Split up the coaches the same way. Think we’ll have a battle between Coach Dougherty’s team and Coach Walters’ team. Coach (Kevin) Cummings will be the playcaller for Coach Walters’ team. Coach (John) Richardson will be the playcaller for Coach Dougherty’s team. I think we should have a lot of fun there and really trying to make sure everybody gets in the game.”
Message to the fans ahead of Friday night’s spring game…
“I want it to be fantastic. I want it to be a great atmosphere. We’ve got a DJ, we’ve got activities, we’ve got the men’s and women’s soccer teams involved, we’ve got the gymnastics team involved. We’ve got all of our players playing that can play. And we would love to see a great atmosphere and a beautiful Friday night. Looks like it’s going to be 70 degrees and sunny in the afternoon, and we hope they all come out and why not have a great Friday night with our fans?”
Anything you learned from last year’s spring game?
“I loved the way our fans came out for the spring game. I just hope more come. I like the timing of our spring game. I think we got it done in an hour and 50 minutes that we wanted to get it done in. We’ve got to stay healthy. We were able to have 2-minute at both the half and the end of game. We were able to have some backed up, 4-minute, try to let the game play itself out. But we learned a lot in terms of penalties and discipline and some of those things we need to continue to improve upon. So we’ll see if it looks better this Friday.”
Who are a couple of players that have really made a move during this 14 spring practices so far?
“Certain guys…and I hate to do this because I’m sure I’m going to miss people…Armon Parker. Because we didn’t have a lot of Armon Parker. These last 4-5 practices he’s shown up. I think he’s going to be a big part of our defensive line rotation. Buddah (Al-Uqdah). Buddah has done a great job coming in here as a transfer linebacker. Excited about that. Chris Lawson and Raiden Vines-Bright have both done a really good job as freshmen wide receivers. I think there’s different…Carver Willis. Big get for us on the offensive line. He’s certainly shown to be everything we thought he was going to be, as has Geirean Hatchett, getting him back. We’ve got some players that have shown up. I’m excited about it and I really do believe that progress is clear.”
Rahshawn Clark and the spring he’s had…
“Rahshawn Clark has done a tremendous job. You could see with having Tacario Davis and (Ephesians) Prysock on the islands as the two corners, Rahshawn Clark is going to be a fantastic nickel for us. He’s making play after play right now, love to see what he’s doing for us both out on the perimeter and inside with Prysock being down. Rahshawn Clark, I’m proud of the way he’s playing and I think he’s going to be a really, really good player for us.”
On dealing with roster management now with the House settlement still unresolved…
“We’re in that final push right now. There’s still opportunities at this moment in time for our donors to continue to contribute to Montlake Futures as we’re still waiting for true clarity. We don’t want to pretend that it’s still not happening, so we’ve got to make sure we continue to be great in that aspect. We want our donors to continue to step up and help us, especially in this final push. I think there’s an opportunity at the spring game to give. I think there’s an opportunity to call Montlake Futures and give. And then when the House settlement does get passed, which I do believe will happen soon, hopefully there will be real clarity in terms of what it’s going to look like when the revenue share kicks in on July 1st. I do believe there will be a lot more equality within all the teams in a year from now. I do not think it’ll look like that this year because so many teams worked hard to front-load their deals. I do feel a year from now there will very close to a salary cap, and if that’s the case I think we should have good parity within all of college football, or at least the Power 4 (conferences).”
How do you communicate all that to the current players?
“I’ve explained it to them. We’ve been very clear in our beliefs in terms of number one, you come to the University of Washington and we’re going to be a full revenue share program with no questions, no ifs, ands, or buts. We’re going to be a program that is committed to football here at the University of Washington. (Athletic Director) Pat (Chun) has made that very clear, so our players know that. They know the maximum they can get, they’re going to get here at Washington. On top of that they know that while we’re in this either/or situation these final few weeks, there’s opportunities for them to continue to thrive through Montlake Futures and we’re going to do everything we possibly can to continue to build that up and give these kids a chance to make as much as they possibly can make knowing that really, they are the marketing arm of our program.”
What stands out the most about the spring that Demond Williams has had?
“He has certainly evolved as a leader. You can certainly feel and see him out there, the fact that it’s his team now. He’s not sitting back. He understands that it’s up to him if the offense is struggling to get the offense going. Truly up to him if the offense is having success, to keep the success going. In terms of Demond’s growth, he knows the offense better, he talks the offense very well, he can communicate to me what he saw, what he didn’t see, why he made a play, why he didn’t. But we’ve got 14 weeks that we’ve got to get really good together. I’m going to commit to seeing how good we can be as a quarterback-playcaller tandem. On the same token, I know he’s going to commit to see how good of a player he can be, so I’m excited about it.”
On the winning team getting a banquet…
“Yeah. Have a great dinner for the winners, rice and beans for the losers. I think I saw steak and shrimp and salmon on the menu. I saw some amazing desserts, dessert bar, ice cream sundaes, hot fudge sauce. Or rice and beans. So let’s see how competitive the boys can get and let’s see who wants to wins this game.”
So only rice and beans for the losers…
“Rice and beans. They were arguing for poultry; I said no.” (laughs)
Where will it be?
“I think we’ll do it in Club Husky. It’ll be fun. It’s always a fun way to end spring. These guys deserve it, they put a lot of time and effort in. It’s always good to play for something, so might as well play for that.”
How different does your OL look from this time last year?
“Last year we had to wear all black jerseys for the spring game because we didn’t have enough to be on both teams. If you guys remember we only had 7 offensive linemen that were able to participate in the spring game. We have 17 participating this year. One team has 9 players, one team has 8 players. One team is in purple, one team is in white. So the difference is even hard to describe because number one, they look better. Their size is better. They’re moving better. They are playing at a really high level as a group of five guys, knowing there’s a lot more to do. On the same token, there’s a strength in numbers. The fact we have a group that size allows us to do a lot more things with our offensive line.”
This post was originally published on this site be sure to check out more of their content.
