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Signing San Diego LB Would Be UW Recruiting Victory

Uniquely named defender received Husky scholarship offer.
Dan Raley|
Signing San Diego LB Would Be UW Recruiting Victory
Signing San Diego LB Would Be UW Recruiting Victory

Someone might have to remind Victory Johnson when he returns to the football field that wearing a helmet and shoulder pads is still advisable.

For now, this Cathedral Catholic High School athlete in San Diego shifts between the more traditional game of football and a newly discovered winter endeavor for him — rugby.

They're both contact sports, yet one's padded, the other not. It's unclear if this punishing player can tell the difference yet.

"Decided to challenge myself by playing rugby this year, a sport I’ve never played and knew anything about before the season," Johnson tweeted this month. "Working on speed, explosiveness, and tackling form."

The 6-foot-4, 230-pound Johnson is a fearsome junior inside linebacker who thrives on contact and recruiters are drawn to that, including the University of Washington.

On Monday, Kalen DeBoer's Husky coaches offered Johnson a scholarship, his seventh overall, joining USC, Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado, Oregon State and San Diego State.  

Johnson comes off a 12-2 season in which he came up with a 36-yard interception return and shared in Cathedral Catholic's Division 1AA state championship after transferring in from The Bishops School in La Jolla, California. 

He was so good at knocking and chasing people down this past fall CalHi Sports named him to its All-State team, where three of the four first-team linebackers each held a UW scholarship offer. The others were Deven Bryant of St. John Bosco and Leviticus Su'a of Mater Dei, both from the Los Angeles area. 

Victory actually is his given name, which some people think makes him an obvious candidate to end up at USC because of its "Victory" fight song that is played over and over and over. 

He's the younger brother of uniquely named Champion Johnson, a redshirt freshman and walk-on fullback for the California Bears who played his school football at Mater Dei.

Johnson has a first name and a secondary sport that are foreign to most college football recruits, which makes him different, seemingly in a good way. 

Whoever gets him no doubt will do a Victory lap.

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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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