Dunn Deal is Getting UW Safety More Involved in Defense

dunn-in-cfp

After a week of spring football, only subtle differences have emerged from the way Jedd Fisch runs the University of Washington football team compared to his predecessor Kalen DeBoer.

The Huskies warm up differently, answer to different sounding horns when changing drills and the defense wears purple jerseys rather than white.

Offensively, the UW still intends to throw the ball a lot but use more line-of-scrimmage snaps than shotgun. A lot of the schemes are similar to the holdover players, yet the terminology is new.

The most noticeable personnel alteration so far has been Fisch’s coaches using just a solitary linebacker at times, such as senior Carson Bruener by himself manning the second row and paired with someone much different physically beside him like sophomore safety Tristan Dunn.

Dunn stands a sleek 6-foot-4 and 197 pounds and isn’t afraid to hit anyone, as shown on his past special-teams heroics on kickoffs. While all safeties are urged to learn a nickelback role, this assignment better resembles a rover or quasi linebacker.

The idea is to get the youthful and earnest Dunn more involved in the defense.

“That’s another young buck coming up right now,” safety Kam Fabiaculanan said of Dunn. “He’s working hard, really hard in the film room. I kind of want to take him under my wing. He’s going to get there.”

Dunn from Sumner, Washington, played in all 15 games last season as a reserve defensive back and special-teams leader for the CFP runner-up team and in four outings the year before. He originally was committed to Arizona State before DeBoer’s staff got him to flip to the UW.

He often leaves opposing kick returners sprawled all over the football field. He received the UW’s Big Hit award following last season.

So it makes sense to have this physical player branch out in his defensive responsibilities, take on more tight ends coming off the line and have a chance to treat ball carriers much like he does the return men, which is flattened with a full-speed hit.