Jedd Fisch and Steve Belichick both have coaching roots in New Jersey

Washington’s head coach and defensive coordinator each ended up in Seattle via New Jersey, albeit in different ways from each other.

Jedd Fisch grew up in Livingston, N.J., less than an hour north of SHI Stadium, the site of Friday’s Big Ten game between Washington and Rutgers. Fisch, a star tennis player at Hanover Park High School, found his way into football when his mother, Deborah, was dating Bill Roca, a famous high school coach in the area who was coaching at Bergen Catholic at the time.

Fisch started out as a ball boy and became so enamored with the game that he chose to attend the University of Florida in the first place so he could try working for coach Steve Spurrier – which he eventually did, after a lot of perseverance.

His mother still lives in New Jersey, and Fisch estimates that perhaps 50 family members and friends will be there Friday. When he gets off the team bus, he wears custom sneakers — part of a weekly project in collaboration with Adidas and former UW safety Sean Vergara – highlighting his New Jersey rootsincluding a tribute to his older brother Jordan, who died in March after battling cancer. Fisch also wears his brother’s initials – “JAF,” for Jordan Adam Fisch – on the right side of his visor.

“I would go back often to see him, and my mother,” Fisch said. “That’s my only sibling, so now it’s just my mother. All my friends are there. We always go back in the summer, during the holidays and all that.”