Washington State Football opens a new era on Sunday, Sept. 6, 2026, when it faces No. 17 Washington at 1:05 p.m. in the Boeing Apple Cup at Husky Stadium in Seattle. It is the first time the rivalry game has ever opened a season.
That is the reason the matchup matters now. Kirby Moore, who grew up in Prosser, Wash., is taking over his first season as Washington State’s head coach in a game that immediately drops him into one of the program’s biggest stages. The Cougars are not easing into the schedule. They are walking into a ranked rivalry game in Seattle to start Moore’s tenure.
Washington State enters with 24 letterwinners from a team that finished 7-6 and closed last season by beating Utah State in the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl in Boise, but the roster will look far different. Moore brought in 50 new players, including 29 transfers from four-year schools, a reshaping that gives the opening game added weight beyond the name on the schedule. Among the returnees are four starters on offense: Tony Freeman, Ashton Tripp, Jonny Lester and Kirby Vorhees. Freeman, Tripp and Vorhees were named to the Pac-12 Conference Preseason Impact Watch List.
The roster turnover is only part of the pressure around the opener. Washington State is walking into a 118th meeting in a series Washington leads 77-34-6, and the teams have split the last two games at Husky Stadium. Washington State won 40-13 there in 2021, Washington answered with a 24-21 win in 2023, and Washington State won 24-19 at Lumen Field in Seattle in 2024. That history makes the scheduling twist feel sharper: for all the meetings between the programs, this is the first time the Apple Cup will be played to open a season.
Moore has also crossed paths with Washington before. He was a graduate assistant there in 2015 and 2016, then spent three seasons as offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Missouri, where he helped the Tigers to an 8-4 record in 2025 and a berth in the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl against Virginia on Dec. 27. Washington State named him its 36th head football coach on Dec. 12 and gave him a five-year contract. By the time the ball is kicked off at Husky Stadium, the questions around Washington State Football will not be about whether the season is starting. They will be about how quickly a rebuilt team can hold up in the game that opens everything.
