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How well did UW plug holes on the offensive end this offseason?
Prior to Washington’s last game of the season, I wrote an assessment of what UW’s priorities should be in the portal on offense and on defense. There’s still the chance that one Husky player returns from the portal but otherwise, it seems like Washington is done until the spring.
It should be noted that Washington is currently substantially over on scholarships at the moment. My tracking has us at 92 scholarships right now. The new roster rules take effect this year which cap rosters at 105 players but allow schools to offer scholarships to all of them if they so choose. Coach Fisch has said he would prefer to remain at 85 on scholarship so it’s possible UW goes over by a few but we are still probably looking at another 7+ portal defections in the spring after position battles play out.
There are still 6 players I had flagged as potential transfers based on playing time circumstances who did not enter the portal. So it wouldn’t be that difficult for UW to get to that level still without losing players expected on the two-deeps. Although some of those on my list from November I would now amend since other players at their position went portaling instead that I didn’t expect.
In order to make judgments on portal performance I’ll be using my own portal ranking system. If you’ve read any other portal content on the site here then you’ve probably seen it but it factors in 3 main variables: recruiting ranking, snap counts, and on-field performance. The older a player is, the less the system cares about recruiting ranking and the more it cares about on-field performance. It also weights playing time by years in college. So if two players have each played 1,000 career snaps then the one who did that in 2 years will score higher than the one who did it in 4 years.
Let’s go position-by-position to see how Washington has been able to fill its gaps so far.
My portal priority scores last month: Starter 4/10, Backup 8/10
Portal additions: None
Portal defections: None
This one’s easy. Everything has been status quo at the quarterback position. I thought that maybe Washington would seek to upgrade the backup spot from Shea Kuykendall with him entering the portal and someone else coming in but that hasn’t happened. It appears UW is set with Demond Williams Jr. as the starter and Kuykendall battling the pair of incoming true freshmen for the backup job.
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My portal priority scores last month: Starter 3/10, Backup 4/10
Portal additions: None
Portal defections: Cam Davis- 66.2 (31st RB) to Minnesota, Sam Adams II- 43.1 (123rd)
This one sort of doesn’t count. Cam Davis had been expected to not seek a medical waiver and be out of eligibility. Instead, he decided to suit it back up for one more year and will still play in the Big Ten at Minnesota hoping to be their goal line back. Regardless, he wasn’t expected to be on the roster for UW this upcoming year either way.
It made sense that Adams would look elsewhere for his final year of eligibility despite being a local prospect. With Jonah Coleman and Adam Mohammed returning, it was almost impossible to see him being better than the 3rd back which saw very little playing time this year. I thought Washington might bring in one more veteran here for depth but they instead opted to sign a 2nd RB in the 2025 recruiting class with Quaid Carr. There’s no indication they pursued a running back in the portal and think they’re set.
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My portal priority scores last month: Starter 9/10, Backup 3/10
Portal additions: Johntay Cook- 79.4 (15th) from Texas
Portal defections: Jason Robinson Jr.- 41.3 (238th), Keith Reynolds- 37.0 (260th) to Miami Ohio
The Huskies badly needed a starting-caliber WR in this portal class with both Giles Jackson and Jeremiah Hunter graduating. The coaching staff thinks they found one by bringing in Texas WR transfer Johntay Cook. I wrote about how Cook’s numbers stack up to other recent top WR recruits right here. His raw numbers were worse than you’d expect for a 5-star in his first 2 seasons but his efficiency numbers were one of the best. If he is able to keep up a yards per route run total anywhere close to what he had at Texas while playing a full season at Washington then he has clear star potential.
No other position had as many players offered who didn’t end up signing with the Huskies as at WR so it’s possible that the coaches would’ve been fine adding a second veteran. But it seems like they made Cook their priority and they were able to just fend off Florida for his services.
My system wasn’t very high on Reynolds who didn’t see a ton of snaps this year but I’m not including any return game data into the rankings and Reynolds looked to be an above average kick returner. That has real value which is now lost, especially for a Husky team that was among the worst special teams units in the country. Robinson didn’t see the field as a true freshman but won scout team offensive player of the year from the coaches which says something about the chances for his development. But this is the cost of bringing in 5 more true freshmen.
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My portal priority scores last month: Starter 3/10, Backup 8/10
Portal additions: Kade Eldridge- 47.0 (33rd TE) from USC
Portal defections: None
I listed the need for a starting Tight End in my portal preview as a 10/10 but noted that role could be filled by Quentin Moore coming back. All indications are that he will do so, especially now that he doesn’t need a waiver given the JUCO ruling in the Diego Pavia case giving him a free extra year of eligibility.
Washington ended up bringing in Kade Eldridge from Lynden, WA to fill the need at the backup tight end spot. He played running back as a do-everything offensive weapon at Lynden but was almost exclusively used as a blocker for USC which didn’t seem the best deployment of his skillset. We’ll see if he can catch on at Washington. If everyone stays healthy this year then UW should be all right regardless with Moore and DeGraaf then Eldridge as the 3rd TE.
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My portal priority scores last month: Starter 9/10, Backup 5/10
Portal additions: Carver Willis- 67.7 (12th OT) from Kansas State
Portal defections: Kahlee Tafai- 42.4 (74th) to Minnesota
Washington absolutely needed to get an instant starter at the offensive tackle spot and that’s just what they did grabbing Kansas State’s RT Carver Willis. He started 18 games at right tackle for the Wildcats and was roughly league average in the Big 12 per Pro Football Focus. That’s still a massive upgrade over what the Huskies trotted out last year. The expectation is that Willis will move over to left tackle and start opposite Drew Azzopardi but it wouldn’t be a massive shock to see Willis instead beat out Azzopardi and have a hopefully fully healthy Max McCree win the LT job next year.
It was a bit of a surprise to see Tafai depart after earning 200+ snaps this year as a redshirt freshman. But then again he was 3rd on the depth chart at LT to start the year and Washington brought in someone above him for this season. PFF was extremely down on how Tafai played but he was a redshirt freshman who started games against USC, Penn State, and Oregon. It’s hard to even be average when put in that spot. It wouldn’t be a shock to see him end up an above average Big Ten starting offensive tackle but it probably wasn’t going to happen this year at Washington.
There’s still a chance that UW tries to get another starting level OT in the spring portal session depending on how the line looks in spring ball. But there were no OTs that received at least an 80.0 grade in my rankings so the Huskies did about as good as they could have here.
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My portal priority scores last month: Starter 7/10, Backup 4/10
Portal additions: Geirean Hatchett- 45.1 (82nd) from Oklahoma
Portal defections: Gaard Memmelaar- 43.2 (89th) to Central Florida
This was one of the more interesting situations in the portal for almost any team I’d argue. The Huskies traded out players that were both in the same recruiting class at Washington at the same position which I’m sure doesn’t happen very often. Hatchett of course left in the wake of Scott Huff’s departure last year and transferred to Oklahoma who was his 2nd choice out of high school. Hatchett was the starting center for the Sooners but suffered a season-ending injury before week 2 and so hardly played. He’s not a guaranteed starter at guard for Washington at this point but at the very least gives experienced depth.
Memmelaar meanwhile missed the previous season with an injury and started 11 games for the Huskies this year at left guard. He finished with a very similar PFF grade to the rest of UW’s interior offensive linemen this year and probably would’ve still penciled in as a starter for the Huskies but it’s possible he could’ve been passed up on the depth chart.
My rankings think UW came out slightly ahead here but it was by no means a slam dunk. I’d expect Washington to circle back in the spring portal cycle if they don’t like the first look of the interior spots. Last year they were able to get both Titialii and Vimahi as serviceable options in that window. The problem last year was they needed multiple of them without any stability around them either. This year there’s reason to think that young players such as Paki Finau and Zach Henning may be ready to emerge.
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QB: Demond Williams Jr. (So), Shea Kuykendall (RS Jr)
RB: Jonah Coleman (RS Sr), Adam Mohamed (So)
WR: Denzel Boston (RS Jr), Audric Harris (RS Fr)
WR: Rashid Williams (RS So), Chris Lawson (Fr)
WR: Johntay Cook (Jr), Kevin Green (RS Jr)
TE: Quentin Moore (RS Sr), Decker DeGraaf (So)
LT: Carver Willis (RS Sr), Maximus McCree (RS Sr)
LG: Geirean Hatchett (RS Sr), Champ Taulealea (Fr)
OC: Landen Hatchett (Jr), Michael Watkins (RS Fr)
RG: Zach Henning (RS So), Paki Finau (RS Fr)
RT: Drew Azzopardi (RS Jr), Soane Faasolo (RS So)
-Removed Keith Reynolds as starting WR, replaced with Johntay Cook
-Removed question marks from Jonah Coleman, Denzel Boston, and Quentin Moore
-Moved Carver Willis to starting LT, bumped Maximus McCree to backup LT, removed Kahlee Tafai as backup LT
-Replaced Gaard Memmelaar as starting LG with Geirean Hatchett
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