After back-to-back disappointing losses to Colorado in 2019 and 2021, Kalen DeBoer’s Huskies exorcized the demons of games past, demolishing the Buffaloes by a final score of 54-7. While the game was somewhat lightly attended, and the offense didn’t look totally in sync, it didn’t take much for the Huskies to skate by the now 1-10 Buffaloes.

After a hard-fought battle against the high-flying Oregon offense, the defense got a chance to get right against the lowly Colorado offense, and outside of one play they did just that. True freshman Jaivion Green got beat deep for a 69-yard touchdown pass, Colorado’s only score of the day, but as a whole, the defense allowed just 202 yards on the day.

On the offensive side for the Huskies, it was the Jalen McMillan and Wayne Taulapapa show all night long. Taulapapa finished his day with 107 yards and two touchdowns, his second-highest yardage total of the season. He was playing with a heavy heart, as the graduate transfer from the University of Virginia had “one of the hardest days of his life” on Monday, after receiving news that three of his Cavalier teammates were victims of a fatal shooting last Sunday night.

“I have such a great support system here and them being able to embrace me… just losing people that you’ve learned so much from, people that you love, people that you care about, especially younger brothers, it’s incredibly tough,” he said following the game. He called the first touchdown “amazing” and that there was a lot of “relief,” adding “I wanted to come out and not only represent myself but my family, and the families that have suffered.”

McMillan led all receivers with eight catches for 98 yards and a touchdown, and he also looked excellent as Washington’s punt returner. The Huskies tried the same double-reverse that McMillan scored on earlier in the season, and after the game, McMillan said the team “just detailed it up a little more so we could see it a little better.” He went on to say that offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb has the “weirdest plays” buried in his playbook, but added that “they’re awesome.”

While it wasn’t necessarily the most exciting game, the Huskies did everything they were supposed to against the one-win Buffaloes, and most importantly, with the Apple Cup on the horizon, as well as a hail mary’s shot at the Pac-12 championship, they escaped injury free.

After the game, Kalen DeBoer mentioned that he watched last year’s Apple Cup live, and that it’s one of the first things he mentioned to the team. He added that he knows how much the game means to alumni and Husky fans, calling it “one of the two games that Husky Nation circles on their calendar every year.” He’s already knocked it out of the park in his first year as head coach, and finishing it off with a 10th win and an Apple Cup victory would be an astounding turnaround for the program he inherited a year ago.