Dot Dot Dawg: Breaking Down Washington’s Apple Cup Success

The Athletic — Two-way star Sawyer Racanelli commits to Washington and to a coach his father remembers well

Christian Caple evaluates the skill set of three-star athlete Racanelli, who last week became the latest prospect to commit to Washington’s 2020 football recruiting class:

There are recruits from this state rated higher than Racanelli, recruits with more offers, recruits who play at bigger schools — and the Huskies need to sign those prospects, too. But when Racanelli announced his commitment to Washington on Friday, it assured the Huskies’ 2020 class will include perhaps the most productive two-way player in the state. (They are recruiting him as a receiver, for the record, but haven’t completely ruled out the possibility of him playing defense.)

Football Study Hall — Master class chess games of 2018: Leach vs Lake/Kwiatkowski

Ian Boyd examines the Xs and Os of how Washington’s defense has been able to so thoroughly dominate Washington State’s offense in the past five Apple Cups:

Washington’s big play in this game was just to get personnel on the field that wouldn’t give up anything easy in the passing game and to force check down city to prove they could score enough against the superior tacklers on the Husky defense. Beyond that, they shifted between two-deep coverages and their preferred single-high and brought a lot of games and bodies up front to keep up pressure on Minshew.

Credit to Lake and Kwiatkowski for understanding the nature of the fight and aiming to flip the script on Leach’s Cougars. Beyond playing dime personnel they played pass-rushers on the DL over run-stuffers and looked to try and move the focal point of the game back to the box, refusing to believe that Washington State could or would aim to win by running the ball.

Dots

• Gabbie Plain threw her third no-hitter of the season yesterday to deliver the Huskies softball team its fourth consecutive appearance in the NCAA super regionals.

• The men’s and women’s rowing teams both took home the top prize at last weekend’s Pac-12 championship at Lake Natoma, Calif.
• The Daily’s Josh Kirshenbaum digs into the details of Washington’s apparel deal with Adidas, which officially goes into effect July 1.
• USA Today’s Paul Myerberg has the Huskies at No. 12 in his post-spring football Top 25 rankings. Other Pac-12 teams include No. 9 Oregon and No. 18 Stanford.
• Myerberg also mentions a few Pac-12 matchups in his article highlighting the nation’s most compelling week one games, including Oregon vs. Auburn, Fresno State vs. USC, Utah vs. BYU and Northwestern vs. Stanford.
• Former Oregon wide receiver Keanon Lowe is in the national spotlight after he reportedly tackled and disarmed a student who entered school grounds carrying a shotgun.