Inside The Huskies

Huskies Still Scouring Arizona Desert for Football Talent

The UW has an offer out and a visit coming from wide receiver Dontay Tyson Jr.
Dan Raley|
Dontay Tyson Jr. and family members visit Ohio State.
Dontay Tyson Jr. and family members visit Ohio State. | Ohio State

This is the time of year, when all sorts of prospective Seattle players -- as in the baseball-minded Mariners -- descend on Peoria, Arizona, looking to emerge with a roster spot and a chance to advance their careers.

This month in the desert, the opposite also is true.

University of Washington football recruiters are working hard on pulling a wide receiver out of Peoria, first by getting Dontay Tyson Jr. to agree to visit Montlake on Saturday, March 7.

The 6-foot-3, 185-pound Tyson is ranked by Rivals as the No. 1 receiver for 2027 coming out of Arizona.

Jedd Fisch and his staff simply can't talk enough players out of leaving the desert and heading north to play their college football.

He currently holds 20 offers from mostly high-brow school, with 247Sports citing Arizona, Tennessee, Texas A&M and Washington as the current leaders for. his services.

For good reason: Tyson will enter his senior season for the Peoria High Panthers with 109 career catches for 1,448 yards and 18 touchdowns.

The Huskies last season started two Arizona-produced freshman receivers in Dezmen Roebuck and Raiden Vines-Bright, though the latter left and joined Arizona State once the season ended.

A versatile athlete, he's rushed 29 times for 234 yards and 2 touchdowns over three seasons, and even thrown an incomplete pass in a game.

This past season, Tyson appeared in seven games for a 7-4 Panthers team and hauled in 37 passes for 448 yards and 7 TDs.

A track man with an 11-second 100-meter dash, Tyson always been a fast kid while he changes his body size. In 2025, he added an inch and 15 pounds as his recruitment picked up.

Among the other schools pursuing him are Florida State, Nebraska, Oregon, Miami, North Carolina and Texas.

"I feel good, but I feel like I have to work more every day," Tyson told the Arizona Republic.

As a sophomore in 2024, Tyson caught 45 passes for 647 yards and 7 TDs while staying healthy and playing a full schedule.

For a 4A state playoff team in 2023, he had 27 catches for 353 yards and 4 touchdowns.

Tyson was born in Peoria, grew up in town and never considered playing for anyone other than Peoria High.

Now he didn't say if he's been a spring ballpark regular for Mariners' spring training games that are held just down the street.

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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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