Washington ranks No. 35 in team talent in 2024

The Washington Huskies fall outside the blue-chip ratio in 2024.

It’s hard to understate how much talent the Washington Huskies lost after the 2023 season. While Jedd Fisch has done an impressive job building his roster back up in a short amount of time, he still has a long way to go before reaching one of college football’s most treasured thresholds, the 50 percent blue-chip ratio.

Ahead of the team’s first Big Ten campaign, the Huskies rank as the nation’s No. 35 most talented team according to the 247Sports Composite rankings. The Huskies have 22 former four-star recruits on the roster, which is five less than the 2023 season when 27 former four-star recruits populated Montlake.

That historic Washington team came very close to disproving one of college football’s longest-standing theories that teams below the coveted blue-chip ratio can win a national championship.

Teams that are above the blue-chip ratio have former four and five-star recruits taking up more than 50 percent of their roster spots and have won every national championship since 2011. In 2024, 16 teams come in above that 50 percent threshold, with Ohio State leading the way at a whopping 90 percent. Four Husky opponents are also above the blue-chip ratio: Oregon, Penn State, USC, and Michigan.

Fisch has plenty of work to do to get the Huskies up to 50 percent and will have to surpass several Big Ten teams, as the Huskies rank No. 9 in the conference in total talent this year.