Washington football: 3 New Year’s resolutions for 2022

Happy New Year, Husky fans! 2022 marks the start of a new era for Washington football under first-year head coach Kalen DeBoer.

Most of us probably wish that we could forget that the 2021 season, or even the entire Jimmy Lake experiment, ever happened. However, it’s done and it’s time to move on as the Washington football program looks to a fresh start.

The Washington Huskies will be a different team in 2022. Good or bad is yet to be seen but I don’t see how it can get any worse than what we witnessed last season.

If the Huskies want to improve, there are three crucial New Year’s resolutions that they have to adhere to.

Washington football has to win at least 6 games

Sure, six games aren’t ideal if Washington wants to get back on the top of the Pac-12, but it’s a reasonable amount of wins to expect under a new head coach. They were held back last season by Jimmy Lake (should have won four or five more games) but now have the opportunity to get back on track under Kalen DeBoer.

It’s still unknown how the Huskies will be affected by de-commits and the loss of players to the transfer portal. They already have a talented player base in the locker room and will be welcoming new additions in quarterback Michael Penix Jr. and wide receiver Denzel Boston, but it’s going to come down to coaching.

Stop the run

For the past two seasons, the Husky defense has had difficulty stopping the run. Last year they allowed an average of 193.5 yards per game and 4.7 yards per attempt. In Week 2, they let the Michigan Wolverines run all over them for a total of 393 yards and four touchdowns. They can’t afford to let this happen again.

The Huskies have to make the goal of allowing no more than 130 average rushing yards per game in 2022. While most of the issues came from the offensive side of the ball, the fact that the defensive line couldn’t contain the run did not help.

Get the ball to your wide receivers

For some reason last season, Washington was hesitant to get its wide receivers the ball. In part, I don’t blame them, considering Dylan Morris was the Huskies quarterback. However, the UW had one of their best wide receiver corps in a long time with Rome Odunze, Terrell Bynum, Jalen McMillan, Taj Davis, Ja’Lynn Polk, and Giles Jackson. They often wouldn’t get the receivers involved until it was too late in the game but nevertheless, the offense did well when taking shots down the field. Well, for the most part, *cough* Morris…

Bynum has since entered the transfer portal while Polk is looking to return from an injury.

The offense has to get creative under DeBoer and offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb. Get the ball in the hands of your playmakers and they will put in the work.