Sarkisian sees what Huskies can be

A popular story about Steve Sarkisian: It seems that when he was a young assistant coach preparing for a football game against the University of Washington, he would find himself driving toward Husky Stadium, along Lake Washington and toward the picturesque setting where the home team played, toward a place whose beauty was upstaged only by the possibilities for a rebirth of unlimited success.

He drove along that lake and marveled at what could be again.

In late 2008, inheriting a program that just finished an 0-12 season, he was hired to lead such a reawakening.

His initial mindset: Overhaul the program, one attitude at a time.

“We were going to change the way we act, the way we walk, the way we talk, the way we dress, the way we think,” Sarkisian said. “It all had to start from within of changing the culture of how we did everything, and then we would focus on what happened on the field. I told the players that change was going to occur right away. It was going to be for some of them, but not for all of them.

“I went after this job when it opened as hard as I could. I knew it was a great opportunity. We just had to get back to a winning mentality, on the field and in the classroom and community. That competitive drive needed to be there on a daily basis. That was more important than anything.”

Sarkisian is in a fourth season as head coach and has delivered the Huskies to a third consecutive postseason game, today’s matchup against Boise State in the MAACO Bowl Las Vegas at Sam Boyd Stadium. It’s the next step in a journey whose goal is to again make Washington competing for Rose Bowl berths and national championships as common as rain showers in Seattle.

Translation: Since the days of Don James.

Yep. It always seems to come back to the Hall of Fame coach.

James led Washington from 1975 to 1992, winning nearly 73 percent of his games and four of six Rose Bowls berths. There was the national championship for a 12-0 season in 1991, a fairly large hurdle set for those who would come and try to scale it next.

Sarkisian is the fifth coach to accept such a challenge since James resigned amid what he felt were unfair sanctions against the program, the fifth to drive along that lake and toward the picturesque setting and dream about the possibilities.

It has been a slow but consistent journey under the eye of a former Brigham Young quarterback and Southern California assistant.

Should the Huskies win today, it will be the first time under Sarkisian they have posted eight wins in a season. His record at Washington is 26-24 with additional trips to the Holiday and Alamo bowls, an acceptable improvement for some who well remember 0-12 but not good enough for others who glance at Oregon’s program not 290 miles south of Seattle and wonder how the Ducks continue to be so much better on a national scale than their own.

A renovation of Husky Stadium in the range of $300 million is near complete, the sort of major commitment to facilities that are on par with a cartel mindset of the Bowl Championship Series.

Scott Woodward is the athletic director who understands how important such a thing is. He also seems convinced the fifth coach since James left is the one who can finally deliver on all the expectations.

“I thought (Sarkisian) was just a great fit from the beginning,” Woodward said. “Steve came from a great program at USC and understood big-time football. He has done exactly what I wanted – build the program back up, improve every year and continue to do so. I saw Steve as a guy who could rebuild in a solid way and not in some fly-by-night manner.

“We need to get back to our rightful place of competing for Rose Bowls and national championships. We have had a very storied program and I think that’s our rightful place if we do what we’re supposed to do. We always want to do better. Steve always wants to do better. But it has been that perfect incremental curve that’s going up each season.”

The reawakening continues today, but whether the beauty of where Steve Sarkisian coaches can be surpassed by the success of his team remains unknown.

Las Vegas Review-Journal sports columnist Ed Graney can be reached at egraney@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4618. He can be heard from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Friday on “Gridlock,” ESPN 1100 and 98.9 FM. Follow him on Twitter: @edgraney.