Inside The Huskies

Elite Point Guard Lists Huskies Among his 5 Options

The New York playmaker has whittled it down to four schools and a pro league to choose from.
Dan Raley|
Elite Point Guard Lists Huskies Among his 5 Options
Elite Point Guard Lists Huskies Among his 5 Options

Dior Johnson, one of the nation's leading point guards for the Class of 2022, on Thursday disclosed his basketball options for moving forward — and they come with a twist that is indicative of the sign of the times.

The 6-foot-3 player originally from Saugerties, New York, and currently playing basketball for Centennial High School in Corona, California, has narrowed his choices  to Alabama, Kentucky, Oregon and Washington.

And, in case, he passes on those schools and college basketball in general, he will head to the NBL. 

That's NBL, as in a pro league in Australia and New Zealand.

Johnson's situation likely will sound an alarm among a Husky fan base that has seen the program fall apart and at least one coach lose his job after relying on one-and-done players such as Markelle Fultz, Isaiah Stewart and Jaden McDaniels.

With Fultz the Husky centerpiece before getting injured, the UW's 2016-17 team slipped to 9-22 and Lorenzo Romar was let go as coach after 15 seasons.

With Stewart and McDaniels in the lineup in 2019-2020, Mike Hopkins, Romar's replacement, saw his Huskies fall to 15-17 and last place in the Pac-12, and then the losing residue carried over to this past season, where the UW sank to a miserable 5-21 and 11th place.

Now here comes Johnson, who originally committed to Syracuse this past fall and then backed away from Jim Boeheim's team.

While it likely helps recruiting for all to know the playmaker is considering the Huskies, his presumed one-season presence in Seattle likely wouldn't amount to much for Hopkins' program.

Follow Dan Raley of Husky Maven on Twitter: @DanRaley1 and @HuskyMaven

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Dan Raley
DAN RALEY

Dan Raley has worked for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, as well as for MSN.com and Boeing, the latter as a global aerospace writer. His sportswriting career spans four decades and he's covered University of Washington football and basketball during much of that time. In a working capacity, he's been to the Super Bowl, the NBA Finals, the MLB playoffs, the Masters, the U.S. Open, the PGA Championship and countless Final Fours and bowl games.

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