Inside The Huskies

Tale of 3 UW Commits and Their Strange College Football Journey

Germie Benard, Sir Mells and Anthony Jones once intended to leave their Las Vegas-area high school and all play for the Huskies.
Dan Raley|
Tale of 3 UW Commits and Their Strange College Football Journey
Tale of 3 UW Commits and Their Strange College Football Journey

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Washington Huskies

The COVID pandemic was raging and Thanksgiving was approaching in 2020 when three high school football teammates from the Las Vegas area decided to offer a show of solidarity in their recruitment.

Wide receiver Germie Bernard, defensive tackle Sir Mells and linebacker Anthony Jones together braved a flight to Seattle when few others were willing to travel anywhere in what was a virus-infested world.

Each one was a University of Washington commitment or about to become one from Liberty High School in Henderson, a Vegas suburb, and together they were sold on a mutual college football interest — all would play for the UW.

They booked a hotel room together and wandered around campus, ending up at Husky Stadium, where they posed for a photo out front with the bronzed dog.

Yet pandemic restrictions prevented them from having any personal contact with the team or coaching staff, or even going inside and watching the UW beat Arizona 44-27 in a stadium completely devoid of fans.

So much for best-laid plans. Two and a half years later, Bernard recently joined the Huskies as a transfer after spending a season at Michigan State, while Mells and Jones just this week both left Oregon and entered the transfer portal.

Whew.

Demonstrating how transient college football has become, Jones was the first to rescind his UW commitment once Husky defensive coordinator Pete Kwiatkowski took a job at Texas.

The 6-foot-5, 240-pound Jones even committed to Texas before changing his mind once more and taking a scholarship from Oregon. This past season, he appeared in two games for the Ducks, including the Holiday Bowl against North Carolina, before entering the portal on Wednesday.

On Thursday, the 6-foot-4, 310-pound Mells likewise bid farewell to the Oregon program, this after withdrawing his UW commitment way back when. As a redshirt freshman, he played in one game for the Ducks, the 2022 season opener against Eastern Washington.

 

Bernard ended up signing with the Huskies, without his Liberty teammates in tow, but asked for his release once receivers coach Junior Adams left the UW to take a job at Oregon. 

After a season in the Big Ten, however, Bernard reached out to Kalen DeBoer's coaching staff and has come back full circle back to Montlake. 

It's unclear whether Jones or Mells still have an interest in coming to the UW on the rebound, similar to Bernard, or whether DeBoer's staff would welcome the two defensive players.

Everyone should best be advised to stay tuned. Anything is possible. At all times. 

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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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