A few notes from practice and coach Steve Sarkisian's radio show:

--- UW was on the field for about 75 minutes at Husky Stadium today, working without pads. Sarkisian said on his radio show that the team bounced back from the BYU loss the way he would have hoped. He said "we had a very good day today,'' when talking about the practice on his radio show.

--- In the only real personnel news of note, Garret Gilliland filled in quite a bit for Cort Dennison at MLB with Dennison resting his sprained knee just a bit; and as Sarkisian had said earlier, freshmen OLs Erik Kohler and Colin Porter got some significant work with the No. 1 offense. Kohler worked at both left tackle and left guard, Porter at right guard. Also, James Johnson got some work, mostly with the No. 2 offense.

--- Sarkisian elaborated on the radio show that the plan is to get Porter and Kohler a lot of work early in the week to figure out the best lineup and "how to rotate those guys.''

--- There was a lot of talk during his press conference of communication issues up front and one example, he said, was the sack of Jake Locker that helped kill the first drive of the fourth quarter when UW was at the BYU 31. He said that Locker "thought he would be protected'' from the right side and that the line blocked it differently than Locker anticipated.

--- He was asked again about going for it on that drive --- the fourth-and-two with just over 12 minutes left --- and said that while in hindsight he might do it differently, it was a well-thought-out decision. He said he worried that if they got three, that that could give BYU the chance to score a TD and go up by more than one score and not allow UW the time to score enough to win it. He called it a "calculated'' decision and that the play called involved the team's three top playmakers --- Locker, Chris Polk and Jermaine Kearse --- a play he thought would work. He said BYU just defended it well.

--- He also elaborated on what he'd talked about earlier at his press conference, the change in the scheme for the kickoff return. He said they had been going with having a lead blocker in front of the main returner "kind of a spy'' approach. He said they'll now just move that position back to the back line as another returner but that whoever doesn't get the ball will then resume the position of being a lead blocker.

--- On his radio show, Sarkisian was asked about using Chris Polk as a kick returner when he's also the starting tailback. He said what he's said before that it's definitely something he thinks about. He said that he's hoping that as freshmen Jesse Callier and Kevin Smith get more comfortable and experience they can get in there more.

--- Asked about the team's conditioning at BYU, he said he thought it was a factor at times early on as the players adjusted to the heat and altitude, but that once they did, he thought conditioning wasn't a factor, noting how the defense shut out the Cougars in the fourth quarter.

--- Asked about the presence of so many true freshmen on special teams, Sarkisian said that "we've got to coach better'' to make sure that those guys are prepared to play.

--- And I should include another note from his press conference that all of the true frosh who did not see the field Saturday (other than Porter) are now set to redshirt. That includes Josh Shirley.

All for now.