With Claude Back, Huskies Just Got Whole Lot Better

Zoom Diallo, Quimari Peterson and Wesley Yates III are accomplished scoring guards in their own right for the University of Washington basketball team, each capable of taking over a game and affecting the outcome.

They're hard-nosed, savvy players.

In Tuesday night's thrilling 99-93 double-overtime win over Southern, Diallo kept the Huskies from slipping into too much of a hole early, Peterson was heroic in the first extra session and Yates led them in points for the evening.

Desmond Claude, however, was a just cut above everyone else with the influence he wielded once he stepped on the floor.

Making his season debut for the Huskies following a month-long ankle injury, the 6-foot-6 Claude, so smooth and so confident, changed the whole tenor of the game whenever he was in.

His teammates deferred to him. Southern tried to double him. His coaches squeezed every last minute they could out of him.

"I'm a hooper though, I'm a gamer," Claude said of his limited lead-in.

Desmond Claude sets up the Huskies on offense. | Dave Sizer photo

Everything went through Claude. He was the tallest of Danny Sprinkle's backcourt players, the best shooter, the team's best NBA guard prospect.

Had he played against Baylor, the Huskies (4-1) would be undefeated right now.

Instead, the Huskies had to wait five games for him to recover and then he went out and played 34 minutes and scored 20 points, two behind Yates.

"Super impressive," UW coach Danny Sprinkle said "That's who he is. That's why he's a great player."

Desmond Claude heads for the basketball against Southern. | Dave Sizer

The previous time Claude played in Alaska Airlines Arena was almost exactly a year ago, when he scored 20 points in USC's 85-62 early December dismantling of Sprinkle's first team.

The Husky guards that night had no answer for a guy who looked right at home in Montlake and ended up transferring and making Montlake his home.

Thirty-four minutes were never in the game plan for Claude, who in any other injury return might have played no more than half that.

"He was on a minute restriction but I wasn't making eye contact with our trainer because we needed him in the game," Sprinkle said.

"At the end of the day, the team, the coach, needed me," Claude said. "On top of that, I was feeling good, too."

Without having his game legs yet, he twice had to leave the floor area near the end of the game after cramping up. Other than that, he held up well.

"The ankle is the least of my problems," he said.

Southern often doubled up on the UW's Desmond Claude. | Dave Sizer photo

Claude showed why he is going to play in the NBA some day because of his size, his self-assuredness, his inside and outside game.

"He's a big guard who's really hard to keep out of the paint," Sprinkle said.

For now, the Huskies finally have their full complement of guards available for the first time and will work on getting 6-foot-10 freshman sensation Hannes Steinbach recovered from his ankle sprain, 6-foot-7 forward Bryson Tucker healthy from his own sprain and eventually 6-foot-8 Jacob Ognacevic back in January from a broken bone in his foot.

Yet Claude, with his talent level and floor presence, just took a decent UW basketball team up a notch.

Every Big Ten entry should be wary of facing the Huskies, who are no longer that last-place pushover of a year ago, who got beat twice by Claude when he was with the Trojans. Now they get to enjoy unleashing him on others.

"It was natural for him to go out there and do what he do," said Yates, who came with him from USC to the UW. "I wasn't worried about him out there at all. I knew he was going to pick up right where he left off last year."

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