UCLA Football: 3 Takeaways from Week 9 loss to Washington

2. Washington has lost its big play offense

Jake Browning truly had an embarrassment of riches at his disposal last season. Both John Ross and Dante Pettis combined for 17 touchdowns last season. Even Chico McClatcher had more than 500 yards receiving and five scores.

Ross was a first round selection of the Cincinnati Bengals in the 2017 NFL Draft and McClatcher is out for the season via injury. That leaves just Pettis. While “just Pettis” is a dangerous weapon, the lack of pop from the Husky offense has been evident. Pettis has done nearly as much damage on punt returns (three touchdowns) as he has on offense (six touchdowns).

A season ago the Huskies had 30 pass players of 30+ yards in 14 games (2.1 big pass plays per game). So far this season they have 11 such plays in eight games (1.4 per game). It was the defense that was the bigger concern entering the season. It was believed that they had more pieces to replace than the Washington offense. So far that doesn’t seem to be the case.

Moving away from the big play isn’t the end of the world and it won’t make the Huskies a bad offense. However, if they’re not scoring in bunches they’ll need to be better on third down. Washington was 5-of-11 on Saturday.