Inside The Huskies

Huskies Offer DT From Finau's Mojave Desert High School

Sione Felila is a defensive tackle at Oak Hills High outside of Los Angeles who's getting considerable recruiting attention.
Dan Raley|
Sione Felila, left, shares a moment with Oak Hills HS teammates Nathan Cabrejo and Inoke Finau.
Sione Felila, left, shares a moment with Oak Hills HS teammates Nathan Cabrejo and Inoke Finau. | Finau

Eighty miles out of Los Angeles, in the Mojave Desert, the city of Hesperia has become a necessary stop on the itinerary of University of Washington recruiters in search of Southern California football talent.

From the Class of 2024, the Huskies previously signed offensive guard Paki Finau, a heavily recruited 4-star player at Hesperia's Oak Hills High School who's now pulling steady game time as a redshirt freshman offensive guard in Montlake.

On Friday, the UW extended a scholarship offer to 6-foot-3, 290-pound Sione Felila, Oak Hills' 2027 defensive tackle who counts Notre Dame, Oregon, BYU, UCLA, Arizona and Utah among his other pursuers. And the Finau family as a second home.

"Made my day," Finau's dad, Si'i, posted on social media of the UW offer to Felila. "He's like my own child."

Felila brings a lot of power and quickness coming out of a stance for an Oak Hills team that's won two of its first three games. He has 11 tackles so far, including 2.5 sacks.

One of his current teammates is Inoke Finau, Paki's younger brother, a 6-foot-3, 225-pound edge rusher and a Class of 2026 recruit who holds an offer so far from Northern Arizona in the Big Sky Conference.

UW influences are everywhere for Felila, who not only is considered part of the Finau family, he posed for a football summer camp photo with former Husky defensive tackle Elijah Qualls, who held some sort of advisory role.

Coming to the UW from Northern California, the 6-foot-1, 320-pound Qualls played for Steve Sarkisian and Chris Petersen UW teams in 2013-2016. He was named as a first-team All-Pac-12 selection as a fourth-year junior and played the 2017 season in the NFL for the Philadelphia Eagles.

Former Husky DT Elijah Qualls, center, poses with Inoke Finau and Sione Felila earlier in the summer.
Former Husky DT Elijah Qualls, center, poses with Inoke Finau and Sione Felila earlier in the summer. | Finau

In the football camp circuit, Felila impressed many of the national recruiting analysts with his strong hands. He was described as using them violently.

He's in his third season playing on the defensive line for the Oak Hills varsity. As a sophomore, he was a starter for a 10-1 team that advanced to the CIF Division II playoffs. As a freshman, he finished with 36 tackles.

Same as Finau, Felila plays his football in the high desert, where the summer days reach 100 degrees more often than not, and he has now a chance to move to a much more temperate climate alongside Lake Washington if he chooses.

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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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