Johnson-Led Huskies Spoil WSU's Title Hopes, Top Seeding Bid
In a season in which a veteran-heavy University of Washington basketball team was supposed to be a lot better than a rebuilding Washington State squad, the opposite proved to be true a month ago in an overtime game in Seattle.
And if that wasn't confounding enough, the Huskies found themselves staring at a 10-point deficit late in the opening half of Thursday night's rematch in Pullman that was inspired by the play of the son of a former UW standout.
Yet once Mike Hopkins' guys got everything sorted out — who's who and what's what — the Huskies spoiled the Pac-12 regular-season championship hopes of their rivals, beating the 18th-ranked Cougars 74-68 to split the season series.
Sophomore guard Koren Johnson, newly promoted to starter for this game, put the UW (17-14 overall, 9-11 Pac-12) ahead for good at 54-53 with a driving lay-in with 7:32 left to play. He led all scorers with 23 points, 12 coming down the stretch.
Senior forward Keion Brooks, the league's leading scorer, backed him with 22 points, keeping him right at his season average.
If only the Huskies — beating a ranked team on the road for the first time in seven years since upsetting Kansas in Hopkins' first season — could have played more like this throughout this campaign than maybe talk of a coaching change wouldn't be shadowing these guys right now.
"To go out and play well against a team in the top 25, last game, I'm really proud of our guys," Hopkins said.
The UW now awaits the rest of the weekend to play out before receiving its Pac-12 tournament seeding, which will be a mid-range number, before playing again next Wednesday in Las Vegas.
Making things interesting in the Palouse, the Cougars (23-8, 14-6) were stumbling around early until they inserted freshman guard Isaiah Watts — son of one-time UW backcourt great Donald Watts and grandson of Seattle Sonics favorite Slick Watts — and he immediately dropped in a 3-pointer and a pair of dunks to spur a 13-2 run for a 19-15 advantage.
Sitting courtside, Donald Watts, wearing a gray WSU sweatshirt, applauded enthusiastically as his son punished the Huskies and sparked his team to a 10-point lead at 30-20.
"I thought they were close to taking us out, but we made some plays," Hopkins said.
This third-generation Watts would finish with 15 points on 6-for-11 shooting, including 3 of 7 from 3-point range, and 6 rebounds.
An obvious question was why wasn't he wearing a UW uniform?
Keion Brooks let fly with a jumper against Washington State in Pullman.
James Snook/USA TODAY Sports
The Huskies, 90-87 overtime losers to the Cougars on Feb. 3 in Seattle, changed things up for the rematch in the Palouse by putting Johnson and junior center Wilhelm Breidenbach in the starting lineup in place of Sahvir Wheeler and Braxton Meah, respectively, with the latter two coming off the bench.
"We just wanted something different," Hopkins said. "You know, Koren's been really good. I wanted to see how he would be starting."
For Johnson, who's averaged 18 points per game while having a sensational month, the promotion probably was way overdue. The Huskies are a much more dangerous team with him in the lineup.
With all of these story lines taking place all at once — the Cougars chasing a title, the Watts family changing sides and the Huskies rolling out a new lineup — these rivals played to a near standstill in the opening half, with the UW needing a 10-0 run to take a 32-30 lead at the break, with Johnson supplying 5 of those points.
Into the second half they went, with both teams battling furiously and separated by no more than four points for the next 15 minutes, with that moment of two-possession separation coming when the motivated Watts dropped in a 3-pointer for a 46-42 edge with 13:46 remaining.
Yet that's where Johnson took over.
He hit his go-ahead lay-in for that permanent lead at 54-53, had the UW ahead 61-53 with a short jumper, hit a corner 3 with 1:18 left for a 68-61 edge and finished off the Cougars with a layin and three free throws to the buzzer.
Maybe the Huskies will continue to play like a different team next week in Nevada, too, though they don't want Johnson changing a thing.
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