Huskies' Nate Fellner earns start at free safety

In the spring, Nate Fellner figured he might be watching Saturday night's Washington-Arizona game from his living room in Fresno, Calif.

Instead, he was starting at free safety, a rather meteoric rise for the 6-foot-1, 198-pound freshman from Clovis High School.

Fellner signed with UW last February as part of the Class of 2009, one of just three players who committed to former coach Tyrone Willingham to end up coming to Washington.

But a couple months later, when new UW coach Steve Sarkisian thought he might have too many players to fit into 85 scholarship spots, he asked Fellner if he would be agreeable to grayshirting, That's an increasingly common tactic in which players delay enrolling by a quarter or a semester and begin to officially count on scholarship after the season, opening up a scholarship on the roster.

"It was a little hectic," Fellner said earlier this week. "There was a numbers problem they had. I just stayed patient. I was working out in Fresno. I was ready if they wanted to bring me up."

In May, after the Huskies had a couple of players leave for academic reasons, the coaches called Fellner and told him there was a spot for him this year, after all.

"I got the call in May that they weren't going to grayshirt me, so I was really excited," he said. "I came in trying to contribute. ... I honestly didn't want to grayshirt. I think I was a better caliber than that. They gave me an opportunity, and I was grateful for it."

He has proved that his faith in his abilities had merit as he impressed the coaches enough to take him off possible redshirt status the week of the Stanford game, putting him on special teams.

Then a succession of injuries in the past week moved Fellner into a position to start. Free safety Justin Glenn suffered a season-ending knee injury against Notre Dame and strong safety Nate Williams suffered a concussion that held him out of the Arizona game.

On Wednesday, Greg Walker, a possible replacement for Glenn, suffered a knee injury early in practice that caused him to miss work that day. Walker suited up Saturday but it was Fellner who got the start.

"He's a guy who has been working extremely hard and has done a nice job with his stuff on special teams and is starting to understand the defense more and more," Sarkisian said. "He showed up on special teams last week with a couple of tackles and he's got a nice feel for the game. He keeps growing on everybody because he does stuff right and he plays physical and fast and obviously he has the blood lines with coach Jim Sweeney being his grandfather. He's got football in his blood and it shows."

Fellner had two tackles on special teams the past two weeks and said Wednesday he thought that experience would help prepare him for Saturday.

"That really gave me a big confidence boost," he said. "Once I saw I could play at this level and actually make plays, I started to believe more in myself. I've taken it from there, and just kept working hard."

Bob Condotta: 206-515-5699 or bcondotta@seattletimes.com.