Washington football head coach Jimmy Lake has been named one of the six college football head coaches on the hot seat.
This comes as no surprise as the Washington Huskies have not met the expectations that came when Lake was hired as Chris Petersen’s successor.
Lake inherited a program that had gone 55-26 under Petersen, won two Pac-12 titles within a three-year period, as well as being ranked the number four seed in the 2016 College Football Playoff.
Lake led the Huskies to a 3-1 record in 2020 amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. The program was forced to cancel a number of games and basically had to forfeit the Pac-12 Championship game due to not having the minimum number of scholarship-athletes available.
While things weren’t perfect, they seemed promising.
However, as we take a look at how things have gone for the Washington football program in 2021, where did things go wrong?
Jimmy Lake is on the hot seat after barely two seasons with Washington Football
Despite the shock of Chris Petersen’s resignation following the 2019 season, the Washington Huskies seemed set for the future.
Here we are nearly two years later and the Huskies are 3-4 overall on the season and 1-2 against Pac-12 opponents.
Jimmy Lake has had plenty of opportunities this season to make adjustments and get this team on the winning track but instead, he has continued to make excuses.
Nothing has been done to improve the stalled offense and it seems to take one-half of each game for the coaches to realize they need to get the ball into their receivers’ hands.
The issues plaguing this team are rooted deep within the program.
Petersen stated that the reason for his resignation was due to anxiety and stress but it feels like the cause was deeper than that.
In the Spring, Washington lost several players to the transfer portal. If they don’t find a way to turn things around, they are at risk of losing even more players after the season.
The first steps to fixing this football program are simple: Fire Jimmy Lake and offensive coordinator John Donovan.