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Inside The Huskies

Huskies Pull Out All Emotional Stops In Pursuit Of Kennedy's Son

The UW got both Tye Kennedy and Lincoln to put on uniforms together.
Dan Raley|
Lincoln and Tye Kennedy share a UW recruiting visit moment.
Lincoln and Tye Kennedy share a UW recruiting visit moment. | UW

There are official college football recruiting visits and then there is the extra creative and persuasive salesmanship that took place in Montlake over the weekend.

Tye Kennedy, who hasn't made his intentions known just yet, seemingly never had a chance.

The University of Washington staff pulled out all stops in trying to close the deal on this kid and made a concentrated if not emotional appeal to touch his heartstrings.

In trying to secure the services of the 6-foot-6, 275-pound offensive lineman from Mountain View High School in Mesa, Arizona, Jedd Fisch's recruiters somehow convinced Tye Kennedy and his father Lincoln Kennedy to suit up together in Husky uniforms.

Dressed alike were the desirable 3-star recruit and his consensus All-American, first-round draft pick and national championship ring-wearing father.

They looked like bookends, like they both could play.

It was No. 73 and 75, confidently standing beside each other or kneeling down together in Husky Stadium, framed by gold helmets and the south deck, with Lincoln also wearing his game face.

An added touch would have been to take young Kennedy to the crew house and show him where his father lived as a freshman, however the passage of time removed all dorm rooms out of the remodeled facility long ago.

Or Tye Kennedy's hosts would have walked him over to University Avenue and taken him to his father's favorite restaurant, but, alas, it no longer exists either.

Tye and Lincoln Kennedy spend some time in Husky Stadium.
Tye and Lincoln Kennedy spend some time in Husky Stadium. | UW

Instead, they were left to let Tye Kennedy dream a little or a lot about how his college football career might turn out in the Northwest, especially in a family-related, customized fashion.

Lincoln Kennedy, 55, no doubt supports this idea, hence him pulling on the purple and gold once more.

Yet the older Kennedy once had to think long and hard about choosing the Huskies over Michigan, which is the same option presented to his son.

Tye Kennedy toured Ann Arbor a week ago and no doubt had a whole cauldron of recruiters trying to close on him as if he were buying a Land Rover or a Mercedes Benz.

It's almost hard to believe now that it's been 38 years since Lincoln Kennedy went through a similar UW recruitment process, yet with a few alterations.

He had to listen to a more extended sales pitch, one that included meeting the Husky Honeys coed coalition batting their their eyes at him, a group that no longer exists anywhere because it wouldn't be politically correct.

Instead, Tye Kennedy will sort through all of the football sentimentality and see where he lands.

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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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