Dot Dot Dawg: Inching Closer Toward a Pac-12 Title

The Seattle Times — Three impressions from UW’s 72-70 win at WSU: Huskies are close to locking up the Pac-12 title

Percy Allen compiles his biggest takeaways from the Washington Huskies men’s basketball come-from-behind victory over the Washington State Cougars Saturday. They include the cumulative effect that Jaylen Nowell and Noah Dickerson have on the offensive side of the ball when both players are on their game, UW’s first-half defensive struggles against the Cougs, and Washington’s increasingly visible path to an outright Pac-12 championship.

The Seattle Times — Co-defensive coordinator Jimmy Lake staying at Washington, with a smile on his face

With Washington defensive coordinator Jimmy Lake having reportedly turned down Nick Saban’s entreaties to become the Alabama Crimson Tide’s defensive coordinator for a second consecutive year, Matt Calkins examines what factors may have led to his decision to remain in Seattle. Not least among them is the importance of “when to know when you’re happy”:

Washington has led the Pac-12 in scoring defense in each of the past four years, being the only school to keep teams under 20 points per game last season. The Huskies were sixth in the country in scoring defense last year, seventh the year before that and 10th the year before that.

And think of the recent UW products out of the secondary, which has been Lake’s area of focus. Budda Baker, Sidney Jones and Kevin King were all selected in the first two rounds. Come April, Byron Murphy and Taylor Rapp likely will be, too.

If you’re on the back end at UW, you’ll end up at the front end on draft day.

The Athletic — Which of Washington’s 2019 signees are most likely to make an early impact?

Christian Caple singles out each position group represented in UW’s 2019 recruiting class, and examines the likelihood of each player seeing the field as a true freshman this fall. As you might expect, his strongest prediction for a player forgoing a redshirt seems to be reserved for four-star wide receiver Puka Nacua, especially in light of the presence of a new position coach in the form of Junior Adams.

Dots

• Dawgman’s Scott Eklund lays out the areas of need that the Dawgs will need to hit in the football team’s 2020 recruiting class.
• Oregon defensive coordinator Jim Leavitt, who is widely regarded as the architect of the Ducks’ defensive resurgence during the 2017 and 2018 seasons, has parted ways with Mario Cristobal’s program for reasons that are not entirely clear.
• The women’s softball team won a pair of games at a tournament in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, to improve to 8-1 on the season.
• Chris Petersen spoke to Stephen Holder of The Athletic about what the Indianapolis Colts are receiving in the form of their new offensive line coach Chris Strausser, who formerly coached the same position alongside Petersen at UW.
• Rivals got punk’d by some trolls who created a fake recruit with “offers” from a handful of SEC powerhouses, and the recruiting service somehow awarded him a three-star evaluation. Not a good look.
• It’s been a decent couple of years for Washington’s revenue programs.