SEATTLE — What began as a somewhat hollow mantra for a team just trying to win a single game has turned into the overwhelming belief of the University of Washington football team.
“Expect to win.”
New head coach Steve Sarkisian spoke those words to his players countless times during the nine months leading up to the 2009 opener, but only when the games began did the slogan carry some weight.
Not only have the Huskies been competitive with three teams currently ranked in the national Top 25 — UW beat No. 6 USC, lost by eight points to No. 10 LSU and took No. 25 Notre Dame to overtime — but they’ve also learned how to win games at the end. That was evident in Saturday’s comeback win over Arizona, a game UW trailed for 411/2 of the 60 minutes.
“After six games, sitting at 3-3, when you look at the quality of opponents we’ve played, I’m very proud of our football team,” Sarkisian said Monday, two days after the 36-33 win over Arizona moved UW back to .500 for the season. “We’ve really improved. We improved physically, we’ve improved mentally.”
It all began with Sarkisian’s mantra: “Expect to win.”
How three little words can turn a winless doormat into a team in contention for a bowl bid is the biggest mystery of the early Pac-10 season. Using a roster made up mostly of leftover players — 18 of the 22 starters from Saturday’s game played at least one game with the team in 2008 — the Huskies have a 3-3 record at the season’s midway point and, with a 2-1 conference record, sit one game back in the Pac-10 standings.
“It’s the thing that’s been playing in my head this whole season — the ‘expecting to win,’ and the ‘it’s going to happen sooner than you think,’” defensive tackle Cameron Elisara said Monday, referring to two phrases that Sarkisian used in his opening address with the team last December. “Guys are starting to see that the work we’ve been putting in is starting to pay off. We’ve already won three more games than we won last year.”
What’s most impressive is how they’ve done it. In five of their six games this season, the Huskies have found themselves on the verge of getting blown out. Yet only once — in a 34-14 loss at Stanford — did it actually happen. Every other game saw the Huskies stay mentally tough and push through the adversity.
“It’s a different attitude,” quarterback Jake Locker said Monday. “There is a feeling that we belong here, that the things that happen to us aren’t luck. It’s a product of the work that we put in and the effort we play with.”
That was the case Saturday, when the Huskies hung around in a game that looked, for almost the entire half, like a convincing Arizona victory. UW kept pushing, kept believing, and finally won the game after scoring twice in the final three minutes, including an interception return touchdown by linebacker Mason Foster that gave the Huskies their first lead of the fourth quarter.
It was the kind of effort that was missing in 2008.
“There were some games last year where we stuck in it, but then there was a breaking point where we wouldn’t have stuck with it and wouldn’t have gotten that pick,” Elisara said, referring to Foster’s interception. “This year, we’ve shown a lot of fight through all four quarters, and it’s starting to pay off.”
Through all the offseason hours the UW coaching staff put in teaching on-field principles, pushing players in the weight-room and the studying film, perhaps it was three little words that made the biggest difference.
When coming into a program that had lost 14 consecutive games, Sarkisian felt like his most important task was to restore the belief that the Huskies could win against every opponent they faced.
The players bought in from the outset, as was evident when sophomore cornerback Quinton Richardson said the week before the Sept. 19 USC game that he fully expected to beat the Trojans. The Huskies did, and the belief has only continued to intensify in the following weeks.
“To me winning is more mental than it almost is physical,” Sarkisian said Monday, when he was asked why it was so important to change the mindsets of his players heading into this season. “It’s about belief, and when you have belief, then comes your ability to make plays when opportunity strikes.”
The Huskies have certainly made the most of their opportunities, whether that means converting third downs (UW’s 53.5 percent conversion rate ranks fifth in the nation), creating turnovers (the Huskies have a plus-3 ratio and have scored defensive touchdowns in each of the past three games) or fighting their way back into games that appear to be getting out of hand.
“When you are doing things right and playing with great effort and believe you are going to make plays,” Sarkisian said, “I believe that’s why you are in place to make those plays to score those touchdowns to convert big third downs to score when you need to on the last drive of a half or a game. And I think that is continually showing up for us here.
“And in my opinion, it is only going to get better. And that’s how you become a great football team.”
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