Using Winning Percentage and Streak, Husky Football Has No Pac-12 Equal

We take a different statistical view of the past conference race.

Author:
Dan Raley
Publish date:
Jan 3, 2023 5:00 PM EST

In this story:

It's not how you start, it's how you finish, right?

If that's the case, the totally rejuvenated University of Washington football team comes away from the 2022 season, from Kalen DeBoer's Husky debut, from its one-year makeover, as the Pac-12 entry with the best overall winning percentage, the longest win streak and by far the most momentum heading into this new year.

With USC giving away the Cotton Bowl in an overly generous manner to Two Lanes, oops, make that Tulane, the 11-2 Huskies emerge from the final standings with an overall .846 percentage of success compared to the 11-3 Trojans' .785 and to league-champion and 10-4 Utah's .714 percentage.

Now we're not suggesting they replay the Pac-12 title game or the Rose or Cotton bowls, only pointing out that DeBoer best be taken seriously moving forward.

He's probably here to stay in Montlake for some time and he has a long history of success at every level he's played or coached.

The last time DeBoer and his Huskies lost a football game was in early October, 45-38 at Arizona State, falling to a team on life support that would fire its head coach, finish 3-9 and consider an upset of UW its season highlight.

At the Alamo Bowl, media members kept asking the Husky coach and his players how that outcome possibly could have happened in the desert?

Yes, the Huskies made a few fateful mistakes in Tempe, such as a weird pick-six coming on a pass deflection off the back of the helmet for offensive guard Jaxson Kirkland that went straight into the hands of a Sun Devils defensive back, who scored untouched.

Yet DeBoer and his coaching staff were forced to use third-stringers in many places on defense for the longest periods of time in that game as the injury bug hit the UW particularly hard that week and replacement parts were sorely limited.

There really was no way of avoiding that calamity at all.

What's happened since is the Huskies captured seven games in a row to close out the season, a run that included a solid 27-20 victory over Texas in last week's Alamo Bowl.

Among the 131 FBS Division 1 teams, only defending national champion Georgia (14) and Troy (12) currently have longer winning streaks than the Huskies. Air Force (5) and Marshall (5) are the only other teams that come close to them for continued success.

No, Utah rightly won the Pac-12 title by playing by the existing standards, and USC advanced to the championship game using the same criteria. No arguments there. The Huskies couldn't qualify by the existing standards in place that everyone agreed to.

Yet the point of all this is Washington is a lot better than most people give it credit for — and the numbers bear that out.

THE REPACKAGED PAC-12

Washington 11-2, .846 (winning streak 7)

USC 11-3, .785 (losing streak 2)

Oregon State 10-3, .769 (winning streak 4)

Oregon 10-3, .769 (winning streak 1)

Utah 10-4, .714 (losing streak 1)

UCLA 9-4, .692 (losing streak 1)

Washington State 7-6, .538 (losing streak 2)

Arizona 5-7, .416 (winning streak 1)

California 4-8, .333 (losing streak 1)

Arizona State 3-9, 2-7 (losing streak 4)