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Inside The Huskies

Of Husky LBs, Alexander Is The One With Butkus Attention

In his star-studded position group, the veteran makes the watch list for the prestigious award.
Dan Raley|
Xe'ree Alexander has made the Butkus Award watch list.
Xe'ree Alexander has made the Butkus Award watch list. | Dave Sizer photo

Xe'ree Alexander usually has to really fight and scrap for everything he gets, such as coming off the bench and earning a starting linebacker job well into each of the past three seasons for three different schools.

Well, his order of business appears to be changing.

With the University of Washington season opener just over three weeks away, Alexander not only is positioning himself to be on the field when it begins, he's been named to the Dick Butkus Award watch list -- signifying him as one of the nation's best at his position.

He's one of 51 players to receive this accolade, which matches the jersey number worn by Butkus, a former Illinois and Chicago Bears player who is considered the greatest linebacker to ever put on the pads.

The 6-foot-1, 230-pound Alexander is part of a star-studded UW linebacker corps that has as many as four players who could be starters -- and most either named to the Butkus watch list or a future possibility.

Alexander started six games for Idaho as a freshman, seven games for Central Florida in 2024 and five games for the Huskies last season.

Yet he capped his first season in Montlake last December by being named LA Bowl defensive Most Valuable Player in a 38-10 victory over Boise State and his career just seems to be on an upward trend.

"Taking all that information from the other universities and bringing it here has helped me a lot," Alexander said of mulitple stops.

Of his teammates and fellow starting candidates, Buddah Al-Uqdah is coming back from a season-ending knee injury while Jacob Manu and Zaydrius Rainey-Sale each have missed some practice time with assorted ailments.

Alexander, however, has been at full strength throughout the two weeks of practice so far and could start the first season opener of his college career on Sept. 6 against Washington State in the Apple Cup at Husky Stadium.

Even while opening less than half of the UW games last season, the Auburn, Washington, product finished as the Huskies' second-leading tackler with 70, which were 23 behind safety Alex McLaughlin.

Coming into his fourth season, he's put on significant weight and cut his hair, giving him a different look.

Xe'ree Alexander celebrates an LA Bowl moment with Simote Pepa.
Xe'ree Alexander celebrates an LA Bowl moment with Simote Pepa. | Dave Sizer photo

Mostly, Alexander is a much more confident player after all of the places he's been and different roles he's held in the Big Sky, Big 12 and Big Ten.

While he and all of his fellow Husky linebackers are mutually talented players who will need to learn how to share playing time so that everyone gets on the field, Alexander has somehing that sets him apart from the other guys.

He's the only one on the current Butkus watch list.

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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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