Washington State Cougars Football: 2021 Year In Review
Andrew Elderbaum
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Did He Or Didn’t He?
For the better part of the season, the team dealt with the weekly soap opera of Coach Rolovich’s vaccination status. Depending on the day, Rolovich might imply he was vaccinated, or maybe hadn’t, or maybe he was thinking of doing it. His opaque responses only led to more attention and distracted the team. Rolovich again made a simple situation far more difficult than it needed to be.
Without taking a side in the overarching discourse on mandates, there were less-disruptive ways of handling his status. Rolovich could have applied for his exemption earlier in the season rather than waiting until the last possible day to do so. He could have notified the University that this was a personal conviction and tried to work out a resignation/ buy-out. Finally, the coach could have accepted the terms of his employment as the highest-paid state employee in Washington and gotten the same vaccination that every other D1 coach did.
Instead, Rolovich chose to drag out the situation by waiting until the last minute and forcing the school to terminate his contract. On October 18, the university fired him and four of his assistants.
In response, he filed a lawsuit against Washington State that manages to have little merit while essentially ensuring he won’t get another Division 1 head coaching job again. Suing your employer tends to tank your future employment prospects.
Overcoming a poor start
On the field, Rolovich seemed overmatched. Including the Utah State defeat, WSU started the season 1-3. Their lone victory in that stretch was over Portland State, an FCS school. It wasn’t just that the Cougars lost those games, and they looked really bad doing it, highlighted by a 45-14 loss to USC and their backup quarterback. As October began, WSU started to turn it around. They won six of eight and finished second in the Pac-12 North behind Oregon.