Inside The Huskies

Huskies Offer Paki Finau's Little -- And Heavier -- Brother

A Class of 2028 prospect, he's just getting started as a desired recruit.
Dan Raley|
Hame Finau (77), Paki's youngest brother, has a UW offer.
Hame Finau (77), Paki's youngest brother, has a UW offer. | Finau

If the Finaus do this right, brothers Paki and Epalahame will be University of Washington football teammates in 2028, and, who knows, maybe playing alongside each other as offensive linemen on Saturdays like the Hatchetts have done.

On Friday, this third of three football-playing Finau brothers -- who's also known as Hame for short or "Mountain" for his large body -- received a scholarship offer from the Huskies.

Just getting started, this young Finau also holds offers from Arkansas, UNLV and Sacramento State.

He just completed his sophomore season for an 8-3 team from Oak Hills High School in Hesperia, California, on the edge of the Mojave Desert, which makes him a Class of 2028 recruit.

At 6-foot-4 and 315 pounds, Hame Finau already is heavier than his oldest sibling, with Paki packing 310 pounds on his 6-foot-5 frame for the Huskies.

Paki Finau, in fact, weighed in at 268 pounds when he first reported to the UW nearly two years ago and has since added 40-plus pounds to get himself ready to play on Big Ten Saturdays and even become a starter at time early in his career.

As a 10th-grader, Hame really doesn't need any great weight gain, at least not at the moment. He's already at an exceptional weight for someone his age. He just needs to continue to build strength for his inevitable transition to college ball.

This Finau comes into play two years after Paki left the high-desert town as a 4-star player who was heavily recruited by the likes of Auburn, Florida State, Miami, Nebraska, Oregon and Penn State.

The second-oldest brother is Inoke, who's a 6-foot-3, 225-pound edge rusher and a senior at Oak Hills, and decidedly smaller than his siblings. In June, he received an offer from the Big Sky's Northern Arizona.

Paki Finau has set a high football bar for his siblings to follow. As a redshirt freshman this season for the Huskies, he's started four games at left offensive guard, replacing John Mills when the latter both was injured and moved to right tackle.

A week ago at UCLA, Paki had the rare outing for a college offensive lineman when played three different positions in one game, a 48-14 victory over the Bruins.

He started at left guard, moved to left tackle when starter Carver Willis momentarily was shaken up and took a turn at right tackle presumably as part of a stacked line for a particular play.

He's given the fast-rising Epalahame something more to aim for should he ultimately choose the Huskies.

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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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