Skip to main content
Inside The Huskies

Ex-Husky Maurice Heims Emerges from Transfer Portal with Idaho

The edge rusher from Germany spent four seasons at the UW.
Dan Raley|
Huskies edge rusher Maurice Heims walks the sideline at the Sugar Bowl against Texas a year ago.
Huskies edge rusher Maurice Heims walks the sideline at the Sugar Bowl against Texas a year ago. | Stephen Lew-Imagn Images

Maurice Heims came halfway around the world to play college football at the University of Washington, where he stayed four seasons before the edge rusher decided his time in Montlake had run its course.

Looking for a new place to land, the 6-foot-5, 253-pounder from Hamburg, Germany, didn't even have to leave the Pacific Standard Time zone, revealing on Thursday night he had committed to Idaho and its new coach Thomas Ford Jr. to use his final season of eligibility.

The Vandals are getting a good-sized defender who appeared in 30 games for the Huskies, all as a reserve player, often as a special-teamer, who finished his time for the Huskies with 9 tackles and a sack.

Heims continually has tried to make up for lost time after turning to the American game later than most and moving to the U.S. to better learn how to play it.

He ended up at Santa Margarita Catholic High School in Southern California, where the UW practically signed him sight unseen. As a junior, he played for the junior varsity only because transfer regulations kept him off the varsity. When he was a senior, the COVID pandemic forced school officials to cancel the football season.

At the UW, he was a regular special-teams presence. He also got bogged down in one of the Huskies' most competitive position groups, finding himself having to try and beat out players such as Bralen Trice, Jeremiah Martin and Zion Tupuola-Fetui, each a first-team All-Pac-12 selection at some point in his career.

Heims last played for the Huskies against Oregon in Eugene, skipping the Sun Bowl to enter the transfer portal.

He joins an Idaho team coming off a 10-4 season that included a pair of FCS playoff games. The Vandals coaching staff, still in flux, so far consists of Ford, a one-time UW analyst; defensive coordinator Cort Dennison, a former Huskies linebacker; and running-backs coach Deontae Cooper, a one-time UW rusher.

For the latest UW football and basketball news, go to si.com/college/washington

Loading recommendations... Please wait while we load personalized content recommendations

Published
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.

Home/Football