SEATTLE — These are the questions Chris Petersen would rather not face.
No, not the ones about his first season at Washington and the debate that came with an 8-6 record and a flop in the Cactus Bowl against Oklahoma State. Or the questions about how much of a step the Huskies will likely take backward in his second season with the amount of talent that has departed.
Petersen has no problem answering football questions.
It’s the questions about Washington’s season opener on Sept. 4 that Petersen would prefer to avoid, when the coach that was at the helm of Boise State’s rise to prominence returns to the blue turf to face the Broncos. It’ll be the most awkward and odd reunion of Petersen’s career, and equally a huge moment for the program he helped build in Boise, which is getting a fourth Pac-12 Conference team to play on the famous blue turf.
“I know what that environment’s like, and whether it’s good, bad, whatever, that lasts five seconds and then it’s on,” Petersen said in a recent interview with The Associated Press. “Those people are all there to see Boise win. That’s how it is, that’s how it should be, that’s how it will be.”
Petersen’s return to Boise is one of the biggest stories of the first week of the college football season. He spent 13 years total in Boise, eight as the head coach of the Broncos, and complied a 92-12 record while leading the school to unprecedented success before making the jump to a bigger school in a bigger conference when he took over at Washington.