UW Huskies Camp Day 7: Not Jedd Fisch’s favorite practice

SEATTLE — Though he would have preferred not to, Laiatu Latu had to leave the UW Huskies to finish playing college football.

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His younger brother navigated his own career in reverse, playing for two different schools before landing with the Huskies for his final season.

Five years after the older Latu played his true freshman season as an outside linebacker under coach Chris Petersen, Keleki Latu, a senior, hopes to give Washington another pass-catching threat in a tight end room lacking much depth or experience.

“I wished we were able to play (together) in college,” Latu said of his brother, who is going through his first training camp with the Indianapolis Colts. “But it all worked out how it was.”

A 2021 prospect out of Carmichael (Calif.) Jesuit, Keleki — pronounced Kuh-LECK-ee — signed with California, then transferred to Nevada before the 2023 season. He caught 14 passes for 179 yards before breaking his leg in a game against UNLV on Oct. 14. Latu was having his best game of the year to that point, catching four passes for 81 yards, and had just completed a 30-yard catch-and-run — his longest reception of the season — when his left leg twisted the wrong way, resulting in a broken fibula.

It wiped out the remainder of his 2023 season.

You can’t tell it ever happened, though, as Latu lines up at tight end during Washington’s training camp, finding seams and catching passes from Will Rogers or Demond Williams Jr. He’s hard to miss: at 6-foot-7, Latu stands taller than every player on the roster except for a pair of redshirt freshmen o-linemen: Soane Faasolo (6-8) and Elishah Jackett (6-7).

That’s exactly what UW’s coaches were looking for in the transfer portal after spring practices commenced with senior Quentin Moore as the only tight end on the roster with any meaningful college experience.

“Just a big target, being a threat in the slot or in the wide-out,” Latu said, asked what UW’s coaches told him about his role. “And also being with (Jordan) Paopao, he’s going to teach me to also become a great blocker in the run game. I want to be able to be a hybrid, both run and pass game.”

As Paopao puts it: “You throw a ball to him, you get all 6-7 of him. He’s got an unbelievable chance to be able to come down with it.”

First-team reps were plentiful for Latu on Tuesday and Thursday, with Moore working out on the sideline as he recovers from an injury that Paopao described as minor. True freshman Charlie Crowell also has dealt with a minor injury, and walk-on tight end Owen Coutts appeared to be banged up on Thursday, too. That’s in addition to third-year sophomore Ryan Otton, who has battled injury throughout his career and has not yet participated in preseason camp.

Those nagging injuries underscore Latu’s value.

“Keleki’s kind of put himself in a really good spot to just be available,” Paopao said, “and I think he’s done a really nice job of stepping into whatever role we’ve asked of him, and you just see his confidence growing.”

UW’s offense, Latu said, is “very complex for me, coming from two different schools. But (head coach Jedd) Fisch and Paopao help me dumb it down so I can learn it (fluently).”

Latu took an official visit to UW when he first entered the portal after two seasons at Cal, prior to the 2023 season. He wound up at Nevada, where he hoped tight ends coach Derek Sage would help develop him for the NFL. Nevada fired coach Ken Wilson, though, after a 2-10 finish, and now, Latu’s final fresh start comes at the same school his brother chose out of high school.

Of course, Laiatu Latu was told after suffering a neck injury in October 2020 that he would have to medically retire. He later transferred to UCLA, where the Bruins cleared him to play and he became an All-American and the first defensive player picked in the 2024 NFL Draft.

“I wish he was able to finish here,” Keleki said of Laiatu, “and he wishes he could have been able to do it, too. But hopefully, I can finish out strong for him.”

UW Huskies practice notes

• Fisch was not particularly pleased with Thursday’s practice, as he told the team afterward that it looked just like a practice following an off day, which it was.

“Not our best,” he said with players gathered around him at midfield.

Fisch emphasized the importance of being truthful in their evaluations, and therefore concluded: “That was not Big Ten championship football.”

Friday, he told the team, presents an opportunity to move past Thursday’s underperformance and get better.

• Bill Belichick is back in town, and spent the day assessing the defense alongside his son. They’d occasionally chat between plays, and the elder Belichick at one point approached Prysock with some quick advice after an early rep. He spent time checking out the quarterbacks, too. This was as involved as I’ve seen him at a practice so far. From a distance, you could have confused him for Fisch, as both wore black pullovers and white UW visors.

• This was a very “Jonah Coleman” practice for Jonah Coleman. During a live tackling period, he carried on three consecutive plays, including a first-down run on which he dragged Jordan Shaw across the line to gain, and then a subsequent carry in which he lowered his shoulder and trucked through a couple of tackle attempts to grind out a few additional yards. And during the final 11-on-11 period of practice, he caught a short pass from Will Rogers and weaved his way through the defense, arm-tackle attempts sliding off him, for a 25-yard touchdown.

• As he did in the spring, freshman safety Peyton Waters continues to get on the field pretty consistently with the second-team defense, though the competition is ramping up with Kam Fabiculanan back participating in team periods and Justin Harrington becoming more involved, too. Waters, though, plucked his second interception of camp on Thursday, stepping in front of a Demond Williams Jr. pass during a 7-on-7 period. Waters was a two-way star at Van Nuys (Calif.) Birmingham, and those ball skills continue to show up.

A few plays prior, Rogers also threw a rare interception, snagged by Jordan Shaw during 7-on-7s. And just as Rogers lucked out on a couple of dropped interceptions during Tuesday’s practice, he got lucky again when linebacker Bryun Parham couldn’t corral a catchable throw. As is customary, Parhum did some light jogging afterward as punishment.

In addition to Coleman’s 25-yard journey, Rogers also rolled right and completed a 25-yard touchdown pass to Giles Jackson, and connected with both Jackson and Kevin Green Jr. on a couple successful tunnel screens. I also saw Rogers complete a great back-shoulder throw to Jeremiah Hunter against the sideline, and he also made a nice throw, off his back foot, to find Jackson in stride on a crosser with the pass rush closing in.

• The catch of the day went to redshirt freshman receiver Keith Reynolds, who laid out to haul in a deep throw from Williams over the middle during a 7-on-7 period, with freshman safety Paul Mencke Jr. in coverage. The second-best catch of the day went to Coleman, who reached out with his right hand to snag a throw from Rogers during an 11-on-11 period. This was a well-rounded practice for UW’s presumed starter at tailback.

• Sophomore edge rusher Jacob Lane continues to take ample reps with the No. 1 defense, typically opposite Isaiah Ward. Those are often the bookends around d-tackles Voi Tunuufi and Sebastian Valdez — or Jacob Bandes and Valdez, depending on the package — with Carson Bruener and Alphonzo Tuputala at linebacker, Ephesians Prysock and Elijah Jackson at cornerback, Shaw at nickel and, often, Makell Esteen and Cam Broussard at safety, though Fabiculanan took a few early reps alongside Broussard, too. And Thaddeus Dixon continues to get run at cornerback with the No. 1 defense, too.

• The No. 1 o-line continues to look the same, though the second-team group did look a bit different, with walk-on Parker Cross taking team reps at center, and freshman Davit Boyajyan taking reps at right tackle in place of Jackett, who is dealing with an injury.

• A handful of guys are taking reps at punt returner. Thursday, I saw Hunter, Jackson, Green, Denzel Boston, and Jason Robinson Jr. taking turns.

• I asked Paopao if there was a timeline for Otton’s return.

“He’s going to go through his process of making sure he takes care of everything on his end, to be able to get back as soon as possible,” Paopao said. “So I’m hopeful we’ll be able to get him here sooner rather than later.”

Moore, he said, should be back within the week as he recovers from a “lower extremity” injury.

Paopao acknowledged: “The depth right now is obviously not where you want to be come Aug. 31. But the positive thing about that is, you get to force guys into being able to take a lot of reps. You get to see and put guys in places that maybe they weren’t necessarily going to be when you started the onset of camp.”

This article was originally published at OnMontlake.com, the home for Christian Caple’s full UW Huskies football coverage. Subscribe to On Montlake for full access to in-depth UW coverage.

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