Road to 1991 Perfection: Sons of National Champs Emerge in College Football
Jay Barry Jr., Gavin McKay and Joey Hobert.
They're all wide receivers.
Scholarship athletes.
Descendants of members of the University of Washington's 1991 national championship team.
Barry and McKay recently signed national letters of intent with Florida International and Missouri, respectively, while Hobert just completed his freshman year at Washington State.
The 6-foot-2, 180-pound Barry, whose father Jay was a starting Husky tailback at times in a talented stable of running backs, chose FIU over Colorado State. He's also a capable defensive back.
In the video recorded last October, the 3-star player had held out hope that he might interest the UW in recruiting him and made a pitch, but as talented as he was the pandemic didn't do him any favors in getting exposure.
In fact, Jay Jr. had to switch high schools, from Denver East to Fairview, in order to play his senior season. He caught 36 passes for 553 yards and scored 8 touchdowns at East in 2019, and followed that up with 523 receiving yards and 5 scores at Fairview, where he also intercepted 5 passes.
"That was a big opportunity for me because if I had stayed at Denver East, we probably wouldn't have had a fall season and I probably wouldn't have gotten a scholarship," he told Denver reporters.
The 6-4, 215-pound McKay from Memphis University School in that Tennessee city, where his father Orlando is a teacher and assistant football coach, chose Missouri over Kansas, Indiana, Florida Atlantic and Memphis.
Gavin stands six inches taller than his father, who was a UW starter and played in the NFL for the Green Bay Packers. Orlando McKay discusses his three sons in the video clip.
Hobert, whose father was the 1991 Husky starting quarterback and played in the NFL for the Oakland Raiders, Buffalo Bills and New Orleans Saints, is a 5-11, 183-pound receiver and special-teams player from Ladera Ranch, California.
A 3-star recruit, the younger Hobert chose the Cougars over BYU and Colorado State.
As a freshman this past season, he appeared in all four games for WSU. He caught 3 passes for 31 yards, all against Utah. He blocked a punt.
Billy Joe Hobert, after living in Southern California for 20 years, has been living in Pullman, Washington, so he could watch his son play football.
There's even one more out there, still in high school, a kid named Donald Jones Jr. in Charlotte, North Carolina. He's an edge rusher like his dad, who grew up in Virginia.
If he's half as good as that ferocious national championship defender, Jones Jr. still should have unlimited choices.
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