Washington Football: Why Firing Sark Would Be Foolish

With the loss to Arizona, the calls to fire Coach Steve Sarkisian in the middle of the season have just started up. I understand the sentiment. The team has lost three straight, and stands at 3-4 with a game against top-10 Oregon State coming up next week. The team is in a bit of a crisis at the moment, and it’s frustrating to watch. Looking at his body of work as the head coach of the Huskies, Sark’s tenure can’t be called a success. Everything has always been predicated on the idea that he took a broken program and had turned it in the right direction. But now, in the middle of his fourth season, that is, in my opinion, no longer a valid way to evaluate things. These are Sark’s player, it is his program, and it is his responsibility to win games and improve.

Oct. 20, 2012; Tempe, AZ, USA; Washington Huskies head coach Steve Sarkisian (left) talks with Arizona Wildcats head coach Rich Rodriguez prior to the game at Arizona Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-US PRESSWIRE

After two straight seven win seasons, it’s looking like Washington may struggle to reach that number this year. So, it is fair to begin discussing whether or not Sark is the man to take this team back to winning Rose Bowls. It’s a conversations worth having. But, I believe that it is not realistic to call for his firing right now, in the middle of the season. Why?

Well, it wouldn’t do any good at all. I see no scenario in which replacing Sark with an interim coach somehow turns things around. Unless we see a complete and utter collapse in which the players are no longer listening to what the coaching staff has to say, and the team is losing to very bad teams, like Utah or Colorado, I just think it’s a pointless thing to do in the middle of the season. If, at the end of of 5-7 or 6-6 season, it is decided that Sark probably isn’t the coach to guide this team back to the top, that’s a whole different story. It’s a scenario that can be handled at the end of the year, when we actually know where the team stands.

But right now, when you consider that Washington’s loss to Arizona yesterday was the only loss to a team not ranked in the top-10 at some point this year, it seems more than a little rash to try and pull the trigger on a coaching change. It is frustrating to have to wait and see, but right now, that’s really the only reasonable option.

Of course, that’s just my opinion. Feel free to comment with your own opinion below. Just please keep things civil and respectful. As always, thanks for reading.