Friday Dots: That’s All He Wrote (2024)

UW Dawg Pound Dots

• UW Dawg Pound Managing Editor announced this morning right here, right now as you’re reading this that he is stepping down from the role effective this upcoming Monday, July 1st. Lucky you! You got to read his last published article as managing editor! A bit of history.
• Our own Andrew Berg will be taking the step up to managing editor while Ray Lucas Jr. will be sliding into Andrew’s role.
• Dan Lanning held a press conference this morning to announce that while he wasn’t formally offered the job, he was clearly the UWDP’s first choice and was only not asked because they knew he’d say no and so would like everyone to give him credit for that.
• Why now? From a cosmic perspective it felt like a good time to make a clean break. The football team has a new coach. The men’s basketball team has a new coach. The softball team has a new...team. The department has a new Director of Athletics. The school is about to have a new president. Why not a new managing editor?
• The more relevant answer is that it has also been a time of personal change. Just before the start of last football season my wife and I welcomed the birth of our first child. I had the fall off from my day job on paternity leave and still felt like it was a huge lift to keep the site running up to the standards I’ve set. The prospect of trying to do it this fall and meet my obligations both at home and from the job that pays the bills was just a little much.
• The good news (I hope)! This isn’t going to be the last article you see me publish. In fact, you’re not going to notice a difference for a while. Starting Monday I’ll be rolling out my Team Talent Preview series for the Big Ten throughout all of July. If anything, you’ll be sick of me. But moving forward I’ll just be writing when I want to and have the time and won’t be taking official assignments.
• I got into this “business” because I love applying numbers to sports, in particular college sports, and wanted a place to share the stuff I spent hours researching. That part is still my hobby and I still plan on this being my outlet for that hobby.
• A sincere thank you to every reader of the site over the last 7.5 (?!?) years and the 5 years that I’ve been in this role. Except for those of you who necessitated a ban on the Out of Bounds thread. You get an insincere thank you.

Football Dots

• A number of Husky recruiting targets are set to announce their commitments today and some are more realistic than others:

-CB Dijon Lee (0.9873 247 Composite rating). Final 6 of Alabama, Georgia, Washington, Texas, USC, Texas A&M. Lee viewed Washington as one of his top schools before the coaching change and the tea leaves suggest he’ll end up committing to DeBoer and co at Alabama with Georgia in second place

-DL Josiah Sharma (0.9161 247 Composite rating). Final 4 of Alabama, Oregon, Texas, Washington. Sharma committed to UW just before DeBoer left for Alabama and it seems likely he ends up at somewhere other than Washington. Brandon Huffman of 247 Sports put in a crystal ball pick for Texas last night.

-DL/ED Caleb Smith (0.8659 247 Composite rating). Final 2 of Purdue, Washington. At 6’5 and 265 pounds, Smith has the frame to bulk up and move inside if necessary. This one seems to be trending in Washington’s direction after they got the last visit. Someone else can do the research for the last time UW got a commitment for a recruit from Alabama.

-OL Darius Afalava (0.8878 247 Composite rating). Final 4 of Washington, Utah, Michigan State, Oklahoma. This one is a tight race between home-state Utah and the Huskies who recently earned a commitment from Afalava’s cousin Champ Taulealea.

• I have a track record of skepticism over US News rankings in many forms but it’s still nice to be able to say.

Basketball Dots

• With Will Conroy and Quincy Pondexter moving on to USC, there will still be a former UW player on the Husky staff.

Softball Dots

• Washington officially signed Montana transfer P Rylee Rehbein.