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Inside The Huskies

Harnetiaux, Much-Decorated Husky Practice Player, Enters Portal

The linebacker from Seattle seeks a bigger role.
Dan Raley|
Harnetiaux, Much-Decorated Husky Practice Player, Enters Portal
Harnetiaux, Much-Decorated Husky Practice Player, Enters Portal

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Washington Huskies

Austin Harnetiaux just has that linebacker look about him. If a movie director was casting for someone to portray a football player, this would be his guy. Rugged features, solid frame, aggressive style.

However, all Harnetiaux ever wanted was to get on the field on game day for the University of Washington football team on a regular basis and he did everything he could to make that happen.

However, the 6-foot-3, 237-pound Harnetiaux, a non-scholarship player from Seattle, on Wednesday entered the transfer portal, apparently having exhausted his efforts to move up the ranks in Montlake.

In the process, the Huskies lose one of their most prolific practice players. This past season, he was named scout team player of the week five times, either on defense or special teams, before he was awarded defensive scout-team player of the year honors. In 2022, he earned three more weekly scout team accolades.

In two seasons, Harnetiaux played on game day against Tulsa, Michigan State and California this past fall and against Colorado in 2022, when he registered his only tackle.

He couldn't crack the UW's linebacker top six of Edefuan Ulofoshio, Alphonzo Tuputala, Carson Bruener, Ralen Goforth, Drew Fowler and Deven Bryant.

After playing for Seattle Preparatory School just up the street from the UW, Harnetiuax originally committed to Wisconsin as a preferred walk-on player before switching in the same capacity to the Huskies once Kalen DeBoer's staff took over.

Yet he didn't quite fit the UW's stated linebacker mold for moving forward, which co-defensive coordinator William Inge explained during the season would be transitioning to players with sprinter speed across the second row. 

Husky freshmen Deven Bryant and Jordan Whitney fit that criteria, as does newly signed linebacker Khmori House, all from Southern California.

 

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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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