It’s a warm and enduring image: Young Jennifer Smith weaving her way through the bleachers to get to the tunnel before Coach James would emerge from the Washington tunnel by himself.

“It's still a vision I can clearly see,” UW Athletic Director, Jen Cohen’s father, Dennis Smith said, “The gates would open and she'd race down to our seats in the Family Fun Zone. She'd ‘reserve’ our seats and then bolt for the tunnel to catch Coach coming down the tunnel -- Not a lot of people were aware that Coach James had this part to his pregame routine”

But she knew -- and she cherished her “alone” time with the Husky head coach she had come to idolize.

“It was really important for her to get there for him,” Smith remembers.

Coach James would come to recognize the young lady, and exchanging pleasantries in the tunnel became a part of their collective routine...as proud papa watched from afar through binoculars.

Smith said that Jen figured Coach James was coming onto the field by himself to check weather conditions before he went in to talk to the team.

“Don was a perfectionist”, Carol James said of her late husband and Husky coach, “He wanted to go outside and make sure that things were the way that he thought they would be. No detail was too small for Don.”

Cohen spoke of her early days at Husky Stadium, and the love she had for her Huskies – and the Huskies’ coach.

"I fell in love with the Husky community, the fans, the atmosphere, the stadium,” she remembers.

Cohen had Dennis, her father, and Don James, her Dawgfather.

“I think that every kid needs somebody to look up to away from their parents and I had Don James,” she said, “I admired his character, his work-ethic, his demeanor, and especially his attention to detail.”

Through her observation of Coach James, the young Jen Cohen would come to understand the value of having a routine -- and that's what ultimately what brought them together.

She knew Coach would be there every Saturday -- and so would she.

“I was born in Arcadia, California,” Cohen said. “But when we moved to Washington in the second grade dad thought football would be a great way to share some memories.”

With binoculars in one hand and his little girl’s hand in the other, father and daughter went to all of the home games. Smith purchased season tickets to the old Family Fun Zone so that they could go to all of the home games.

In the fifth grade, Cohen was so impressed with Coach James that she decided to write him a letter.

“I told him that I wanted to be a football coach like him,” she mused. And of course, the Dawgfather was kind enough to offer his support and guidance.

Cohen took his advice to heart and found a career path that took her into the field of athletics.

Carol James said that “fans took the time to write him, so Don felt the responsibility to answer every piece of fan mail personally…I think her letter made an impression on him.”

James wrote back to Cohen, and that letter made a marked impression.

With her eyes and heart on bigger things she developed her own game-prep routine. It began with game prep Friday night after school. She would get things ready for the trek from Tacoma to Husky Stadium.

She knew everything that one could know about the opponent.

“She had a lot of anxiety the night before the game”, Smith remembers about his daughter.

They would arrive at Husky Stadium early to cook up a breakfast and still have time to be the first fans at the gate.

“The gates opened at 11:30 to Family Fun Zone”, Smith continued, “Back then those seats were unassigned. She had to be there first to make sure she got our seats in the top row below the scoreboard.”

Cohen was the more vocal of the father-daughter duo, however. “I was the yeller and dad was the analytical one,” she said.

Her “woof” was rather prominent -- so one season Dennis decided that it might be more appropriate in another area of the stadium where she could really cut it loose.

They packed up the binoculars and moved to old Section 19.

In their new seats he could see the field better and his daughter could make sure that her “woof” echoed through Husky Stadium with other rabid fans. Having reserved seats also made it easier for them to tailgate before the games, but Smith had to make sure that it didn’t interrupt Cohen’s interaction with Coach James.

Husky Fever was more than a game on Saturdays; “It was an event...routine..ritual”, Smith chuckled, “The first part if the routine was anxiety about the game”.

To calm her own nerves, Cohen learned about the opponents during the week, and like many Husky fans, she had quite the button collection. The Friday night before the games Cohen sorted them according to the opponent and wore the appropriate button to the game.

In the mornings before big games, to help calm her nerves, Smith made sure that they were out of the house and on the road early.

Despite his best efforts, however, his daughter would still be the first one out the door and in the car waiting for him.

Once Cohen got back from the tunnel they had another in-stadium ritual, Smith explained, “We never sat down the entire game. She understood the game incredibly well at a young age.”

Young Cohen didn't need binoculars -- she anticipated the situations and what Coach James was about to do on each series of downs.

“Jennifer knew what play was coming up. She would tell me the play-call,” Smith remembers.

Scanning the field with the binoculars pressed to his eyes, dad would nod in approval -- and she was usually right.

Cohen hated losing and she would take the losses to heart, “She cried when Chuck Nelson missed the field goal against WSU,” Smith said.

If Nelson had made the kick the Huskies would have gone to the Rose Bowl. Cohen usually was the last one out of the car after a loss.

After the game, the two would watch James’ coach’s show together, “hoping the outcome would be different after a loss”, Smith said.

By Monday night the future Husky A.D. would be ready mentally for the next game and would begin sorting the buttons she had for the next opponent. She spent the better part of the week getting ready the next game.

“By the time the 1984 season rolled around she had quite the collection of buttons of all the teams they were about to play,” Smith said.

The passion Jen Cohen had for the Huskies as a youngster and the attention to detail learned from Coach James helped carry her to her role as Athletic director. Cohen cares deeply about ensuring that the student-athlete's experience is outstanding and rewarding. It may have been perceived, by some, to be a “crazy idea” that she would work in the Washington Athletics Department, but Coach James always believed in her.

“He was with her every step of the way as she progressed through the athletic department,” Smith said of his daughter.

“Don thought the world of Jen,” Carol James said. “He remembered her from the tunnel and was thrilled with every promotion she received.”

Cohen remained close to Coach James until his death in 2013 -- and is close with Carol James today.

She keeps a picture of Coach James close to her in her office; the picture helps remind her that Husky Nation is a family.

“There are many similarities between Jen and Don”, Carol James said “But perhaps the biggest is that she cares deeply about everybody in the program. She understands that it is a family.”

In January, Cohen became Washington's Interim Athletic Director on January 2016. After an exhaustive search the university decided that everything they were looking for was already sitting in the chair -- so they dropped “interim” from her title.

Cohen understands the Washington fan’s experience and expectations because she has been bleeding purple and gold virtually all of her life.

When she and her marketing team sat down, they dusted off an old moniker. It was a perfect time for the department to breathe new life into “Purple Reign” for the 2016 season.

Purple Reign hearkens to Cohen's sophomore year in high school in 1984.

She remembers that team as “a cast of characters” -- befitting a Hollywood movie on the defensive side of the ball. In fact, she could probably name them all if asked.

Cohen understands that a big part of the 1984 Washington Huskies’ Purple Reign defense was the fevered fans. After all, as a sophomore in high school, she was one of those crazed fans.

“I made sure that my ‘Woof’ was heard when the opponent came onto the field”, she said.

In Coach James’ 11th year at the helm the Huskies, just as Prince’s Purple Rain raced up Billboard’s Top 40, Washington’s Purple Reign was dicing up the opposition’s offense. During the weeks of the autumn of 1984 Cohen would groove to Prince’s Purple Rain on the radio as she waited for the weekend trip up to Husky Stadium with her father.

She watched as the Huskies climbed the polls all the way to number one.

Opposing offenses were greeted with rabid, capacity crowds and a defense that took advantage of the noise. Upon returning to Husky Stadium after dismantling the #1 Michigan Wolverines’ in the Big House, Washington players stormed through the tunnel to their own house packed to the rafters.

The James Gang finished 11-1 for the 1984 season and finished ranked No. 1 and No. 2 in The AP and Coach's Poll.

Their lone loss was a road loss to conference rival, USC-- sending USC to the Rose Bowl and the Huskies to the Orange Bowl to face Barry Switzer’s Oklahoma Sooners.

“Dad was always a frugal man,” Cohen remembers. “He would always drive us to the Rose Bowls.”

But in the 1984 season the Huskies went to the Orange Bowl in Miami, Florida, so the family watched the Huskies beat the Sooners on January, 1, 1985 on television.

“Purple Reign has helped to reignite the football fan base,” Cohen said.

But she also sees Purple Reign to have a much broader meaning for the entire athletic department. Her vision for the Washington Athletics Department, as a whole. It embodies the values and characteristics that she admired at an early age when she watched Coach James with his arms folded and his steely gaze on Washington's sideline for 18 years that impassioned her to Washington Football.

It is those traits admired as a young girl in Section 19 that Cohen now emulates in her everyday personal life as well.

Cohen and her team are working night and day at recreating one of the most intimidating places to play for the opposition.

Just as her father has a clear vision of little Jennifer leaning over the tunnel railing to talk to Coach James, Jen Cohen has a vision for the program: To fuse Husky Fever with Purple Reign and let the Dawgs run wild in the conference.

The university did not just strike gold with they hired Jen Cohen, they struck purple and gold. Her father’s vision remains clear about young Jen racing to the tunnel to greet Coach James...just as Jen is clear about her vision for the program.