Washington head coach Chris Petersen remains adamant that he doesn’t know who his starting quarterback will be this fall.
“The best quarterback’s going to win, there’s no question about it,” Petersen said in an interview with Steve Sandmeyer, Jason Churchill and Bill Swartz on 1090 AM in Seattle, via The News Tribune. “I’m really excited to see this competition. I think we’ve got some talent there. Some of it’s very young talent. I’m really anxious to see how that’s going to go. Everybody wants to talk about the quarterback and it’s an extremely important position, but I would say we’ve got that going across the board. There are no jobs that are secure and safe. There’s just not. That would be ridiculous to even make that statement. I don’t care if you have a guy that’s played for four years. We’re always trying – and we tell our team that – we’re trying to recruit young guys to beat you out, but it’s going to be hard to do if you’re doing everything that we’ve asked you to do, and you’ve been doing that for a long time. But if we don’t have good competition, then we’re not going to have the growth and improvement that we need.”
When Peterson was asked a similar question during an interview with KJR’s Dave Mahler last month, he wouldn’t even give an edge to incumbent starter Cyler Miles.
Miles finished last season with 2,397 passing yards, 17 touchdowns and four interceptions. Yet the Huskies offense finished 10th overall in total offense among the rest of the Pac-12 Conference and 11th in pass offense.
There is an obvious need for improvement on that side of the ball for Petersen’s squad.
It could come from true freshman Jake Browning, who is already on campus and will participate in spring practice.
Whatever direction Petersen finally decides to take, the Huskies must be better on offense for them to compete in the Pac-12. Otherwise, Washington will have trouble dethroning the Oregon Ducks as the top team in the North division.