Grading the Huskies’ rough road loss against No. 13 Indiana

There certainly was nothing fluky about Indiana’s 31-17 win over Washington on Saturday, with Indiana being the better team on offense, defense and special teams.

Here are the grades for the Huskies:

Offense

The Huskies had a season low in yards (318) and were held under 20 points for the second straight game.

The UW offensive line had a bad game. Quarterback Will Rogers was under pressure time and again, and the game’s first touchdown — a 67-yard interception return on an attempted backward pass — was caused by a defensive lineman deflecting the ball.

Jonah Coleman rushed for 104 yards, but 46 came on one carry. He rushed for 58 yards on his other 18 carries as he did not have many holes to run through.

Rogers was intercepted twice, once on the backward pass that wasn’t his fault and another time when he gave 6-foot-4 receiver Denzel Boston a chance to win a jump ball on a deep pass. It wasn’t Rogers’ best game, but the majority of the blame has to go to the offensive line.

Grade: D.

read more Indiana 31, Washington 17

More

Defense

The UW defense played fairly well in the first half, allowing just 10 points, and then it made an interception on the first play of the second half, setting up a UW touchdown that cut the deficit to 17-14.

At that point, the grade would have been good. The rest of the game was a fail for the UW defense, which could not stop Indiana from successfully running the football, beginning with a 14-play touchdown drive that allowed the Hoosiers to regain control and end with a 12-play drive that consumed the final 6 minutes, 6 seconds.

Indiana, playing with its backup quarterback, threw just five passes in its 36 second-half plays because Washington seemed helpless against the run. Indiana rushed for 188 yards, but it felt like 300.

Grade: D.

Special teams

The Huskies weren’t as bad as they have been the past few games, but that was a pretty low bar.

Kicker Grady Gross made both of his extra-point attempts and also converted a 23-yard field goal — kicks any college kicker would be expected to make but ones that might help his confidence after a rough stretch.

Punter Jack McCallister averaged 53.8 yards on four kicks. But one of his punts was returned 62 yards to the Indiana 14, setting up a fourth-quarter touchdown that pushed the Hoosiers’ lead to 31-14. That one play dropped the unit’s grade a lot.

Grade: D-plus.

Coaching

This is a tough one. Indiana dominated the game up front on both sides of the ball, and how much do you blame the coaching for that?

The Huskies never adjusted to Indiana’s running game in the second half, and you can make a good case that they should have dared Indiana to pass by bringing more and more players up to the line of scrimmage.

Maybe there should have been more adjustments on offense after it was clear the UW offensive line could not hold up against Indiana’s pass rush.

In any case, you can’t give a good grade to the coaching staff when the team plays this poorly.

Grade: D.