Plenty of Foot, But Can Triston Brown Handle the Rush of UW Football?

Joel Whitford's replacement at punter will need to prove himself once the pandemic eases and the college game resumes.

Triston Brown, wearing a baseball cap turned backward, a sleeveless shirt and shorts over spandex leggings, catapaults kick after kick into a pale blue Las Vegas sky. 

It's just him and a football in the sunshine. No pass rushers. No people making him hurry to put his foot into it. No wind whipping off Lake Washington.

With or without any opponents providing serious distractions, Brown clearly has a big leg. He kicks the ball so high it becomes a small distant speck as it rises and falls like a golf shot. 

While he carries the labels of Chris Sailer Kicking Camp winner and No. 1 junior-college punter, Brown comes to Washington as a most unusual recruit.

He turns 23 on June 27, making him older than most UW graduate students. He hasn't played since 2018, when he suited up for a season at Mount San Antonio College in Walnut, California.

It's been nearly a year since he put his foot up against all of the others in Vegas, 

There have been plenty of punters like him show up fat the UW with plenty of credentials but can't handle the pressure of big-time football.

This is another in a series of profiles on prospective UW football starters. While spring practice has been canceled or postponed because of the pandemic, Husky Maven/Sports Illustrated will continue to provide uninterrupted coverage.

Brown didn't play football for three seasons coming out of high school for reasons unclear. He didn't pull on a JC uniform last season to preserve three years of UW eligibility.

At Mount San Antonio, he averaged a modest 36.3 yards per punt and downed 16 of 37 kicks inside the 20-yard-line. His longest punt went 67 yards.

In Sailer's Vegas XXXIV National Punting Championship, he bested more than 200 other entries. He averaged 45 yards a kick and 4.5 seconds in hang time. He committed to the UW while competing.

Brown is in line to replace the departing Joel Whitford, an Australian who likewise spent one year in the California JC ranks and punted three seasons in Seattle.

If he struggles, jack-of-all-trades senior Race Porter, a placekick holder and short-range punter with 22 boots in him, is waiting to help.

SUMMARY: He has a big leg, but also a mysterious track record that needs some explanation. Either way, the job is his to lose.

GRADE (1 to 5): Brown gets a 2.5. Until he proves himself mentally able to do the job, he's an unknown.