Washington Football demotes Tristan Vizcaino, Van Soderberg promoted
By Bret Stuter
The Washington Football kicking game got a facelift against Oregon State. Kicker Tristan Vizcaino started and struggled. Kicker Van Soderberg ended and flourished
The Washington Football team has been incredible so far this year in the first five games. Well, almost the entire team. That kicking game, which was very suspect in the Colorado game, is once more a topic of discussion.
You will recall that kicker Tristan Vizcaino struggled mightily in the thin Colorado atmosphere. The kickoff specialist hit on just one of three field goal attempts. But he also missed an extra point. The production was so disappointing that we called out the poor performance.
Apparently, that poor performance caught the eye of head coach Chris Petersen as well. At least, that is the conclusion the day after the game. You see, the Huskies had just driven the ball in a close first half to the Oregon State 17. Then, Jake Browning suffered an eight yard loss after a quarterback sack. Tristan Vizcaino set up for a 42 yard field goal, and missed at 2:52 left in the first half. That kept the game at just a seven point lead for Washington. That didn’t sit well with Petersen.
The fork in the road
At that moment in time, Vizcaino stood at four of eight field goals, and 22 of 24 extra points for the season. That is 14 unscored points. That was all for Petersen.
The second half began with a touchdown drive from Washington. The extra point, however, was not up to Tristan Vizcaino, but rather to Van Soderberg. Van Soderberg is a redshirt freshman who is seeing action for the first time in his Husky’s career. He would go on to see action in six extra point situations, and he connected each time.
Next: 5 takeaways from Washington football victory over Oregon State
The decision to promote Van Soderberg is a good one. The team is working too hard to score points to miss the automatic point after. Now the tale rests on whether Van Soderberg can kick a game winning field goal. I think he can. We’ll find out. Coach Petersen doesn’t turn to freshmen often. But you can bet when he does, he will stick with him as long as he delivers.