The Reality of a UW Basketball Season Playing Out the String

Following Wednesday night's 24-point loss at Ohio State, people who follow University of Washington basketball fortunes were noticeably chagrined, if not more vocal about it than usual.

After a string of bad Big Ten losses that have left the Huskies (12-12 overall, 3-10 Big Ten) with a break-even record and mired in 17th place in the 18-team conference standings, they questioned everything from Danny Sprinkle's ability to coach to Great Osobor's seemingly pudgy around-the- edges physique.

Some began to wonder how Sprinkle's predecessor, Mike Hopkins, was able to win right away eight years ago and this new guy hasn't had similar results? After all, wasn't Osobor paid $2 million in NIL funds to lead this UW team to the NCAA Tournament promised land?

Yet there were early signs this might be a difficult basketball season in Montlake when Sprinkle canceled the Gonzaga series, in effect raising a white flag that he was in a serious rebuild and his team wasn't ready for primetime.

Looking over his hastily put-together roster, astute prognosticators in the preseason pegged the Huskies for a 17th-place finish in the very first polls that came and the Huskies have delivered on that promise right on cue so far.

As for the Hopkins vs. Sprinkle takeover comparisons, Hopkins inherited a roster headed up by NBA-bound players in Jaylen Nowell and Matisse Thybulle, and he culled two years of success out of everyone with 21-13 and 27-9 seasons -- and even took the Huskies to their only NCAA appearance in the past 13 soon to be 14 seasons.

Sprinkle inherited just three Hopkins leftovers in 6-foot-11 senior center Franck Kepnang, whose medical history now reveals three knee surgeries in three years, including a pair that have been season-ending; 6-foot-10 senior forward Wilhelm Breidenbach, a career role player; and 6-foot-8 Christian King, a redshirt freshman who hadn't played just yet.

While Osobor goes hard and has put up team-leading numbers with an admirable 15.2 points and 8.5 rebounds per game, he more often than not is double-teamed, which is the big problem for his teammates. And his talents for this season stand to go to waste, much like those for Keion Brooks, Isaiah Stewart and Jaden McDaniels did before him.

WSU's Isaiah Watts dunks on Great Ososbor. | Skylar Lin Visuals

The guards brought in by Sprinkle have found the Big Ten to be a total shock to their systems and opponents tend to ignore them if not exploit them.

While freshman Zoom Diallo continues to experience growing pains and throws the ball away a lot, he is a fearless and an athletic player who should turn into a decent conference player, and more under control, once he gets older.

The others, however, generally don't shoot well, don't defend and often have disappeared against the better teams.

While Hopkins came out hot and then tailed off badly with his program, Sprinkle stands to suffer early and likely build it into something formidable if people can be patient.

According to the rankings, Sprinkle has proven himself to be an accomplished recruiter, sitting on the No. 13 recruiting class nationally with a pair of top 50 players in 6-foot-10 forward Niko Bundalo and 6-foot-1 guard J.J. Mandaquit, plus he has the nation's No. 2 JC player in Mady Traore, formerly of Maryland and New Mexico State.

As the Huskies most likely play out the string over the next seven regular-season games -- including today's match-up with last-place Penn State (13-12, 3-11) -- and miss out on the Big Ten and NCAA tourneys, Sprinkle just has a bigger rebuilding job to deal with than maybe even he imagined. That shouldn't be a surprise to anyone.

After all, the last time the UW was any serious momentum as a program, Isaiah Thomas was its focal player. He's now 36, gone through a dozen NBA seasons and trying to get back to the show through the G League, though he's clearly of pro basketball retirement age.

Considering all of that, Sprinkle deserves a little slack as he tries to build something out of long-suffering and often neglected Husky basketball.

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