Now that the 24-hour rule has been applied, I can talk about what happened yesterday at Husky Stadium.

It doesn’t matter, however; 24 hours hasn’t changed anything. This is still a nightmare.

I’ve seen some pretty ugly losses in my 60 years of life. But losing to an FCS opponent in Husky Stadium? Well, the Huskies went in to the Montana game having only lost once, and that was 100 years ago.

This loss was despicable.

Washington was a Top 20 team, touted one of the biggest and baddest O-Lines in the country, etc etc. Perhaps they read too many of their press clippings…

Guys like Phil Steele and Ryan Leaf thought very highly of this 2021 Husky team.

My coug neighbor, who expects to lose games, came out his house as I was walking today and said “What happened?”, I said, “I have no idea.”

The best receivers were out, but even that’s not enough to excuse what happened. Where was the O-line? Why was Montana getting into the backfield everytime the Huskies snapped the ball? Where was the toughness? The physicality? The effort?

How do you explain this away?

And with all due respect to Jimmy Lake, this stuff about Bobby Hauck and Montana being that good just doesn’t resonate with me. If his Huskies can’t get past an FCS opponent who doesn’t have half the talent that Washington has, how can they expect to win any games this year?

This is terrifying.

Some fans feel that if they go back and beat Michigan next weekend that will reconcile this — but let’s be honest: The odds of beating Michigan are very low. These guys are bruised emotionally, and it may take a few games before they regain their confidence.

The Huskies would have to run the table from here on out in order to earn back any national respect again after this loss.

I am just venting, of course. The 24-hour rule hasn’t made me any less disgusted with what I saw yesterday.

But, as I asked on the board: Does Washington want to be a football school or not?

Chris Petersen was a great hire, the best since Don James. But how hard did they fight to keep Pete Kwaitkowski in comparison with how hard they fought to keep Jimmy Lake?

Do Washington fans need to settle into some “grace period” for Jimmy Lake in which he takes his knocks as a head coach? He has yet to get any signature win at Washington.

It took Jonathan Smith a few years before he got that win last year against Oregon.

And another thing…

The Huskies need more speed at linebacker, we all know that. Dom Hampton isn’t playing much, why not try him there?  He’s an NFL linebacker waiting to happen. He’s 6-2, close to 230. Runs a 4.5, has a 38 inch vertical leap, and is freaky athletic.

Remember Keishawn Bierria? Washington has plenty of safeties to share a few — they need to get the athleticism and speed into the linebacker corps.

Is it time to have a discussion about the strength and conditioning program? Asking for a friend…

We all know that the most important coach, aside from the head coach, is the strength and conditioning coach. Those coaches are with the players more than the head coach or position coaches. But why does Stanford push Washington around year in and year out? Washington used to be known for their physicality. I like Tim Socha, but this is definitely a big concern.

Let it sink in: Montana was a smaller team, less talented, physically pushing Washington around. That makes me want to hurl — but I refuse to let football ruin my day.

All I know is something is fundamentally wrong, and we should have seen it coming after last year when the Huskies got abused again by Stanford.

Personally, I just wanted to hear Jimmy Lake say “I’m mad as hell, this is not acceptable, this is not Husky football. And I don’t care if we have to practice 24 hours a day, we are going to get this thing fixed.”

But he didn’t say that.

I would have loved it if he issued a one line statement and not even talked to the press.

I know a lot of people get tired of hearing about Coach James, but he tutored Nick Saban, and I will never forget when Washington was getting pushed around all over the field against Colorado at Husky Stadium, and after the game James said he was personally taking control of the defense, and Husky football was changed from that day on.

Nick Saban is similar to James in that, Alabama could beat a team by 40 points and Saban would still sit at the mic afterwards with a look of disdain saying, “We didn’t play as good as we should have. We made too many mistakes…”

I don’t know what went in the locker room during halftime yesterday, but if there weren’t chairs being thrown then something is wrong.

I turned to my husband in the second quarter, watching the o-line being beat, and said “I would love to see Jimmy pull the entire first string o-line off the field and put the second string in just to light a fire under their butts.”

Anyway, that’s my rant for the day.

I believe Lake will become a real good head coach, but Husky fans will need to accept the fact that this won’t happen over night. What I am a little tired of though, is Washington being a launching pad for first-time head coaches. Steve Sarkisian will probably have a great tenure at Texas, but Washington was his launching pad. I’ve always been a Jimmy Lake fan, but I know there is a learning curve for head coaches and he had no head coaching experience. He’s the only coach in the Pac-12 who had never been a head coach before.

So tighten up your chin straps, Husky fans. That’s the best advice I can give today.