Inside The Huskies

Let's Boogie: UW, Others Get to Know Young DB Prodigy

The Huskies have hosted Tay Lockett on an unofficial visit, complete with promotional photos.
Dan Raley|
Let's Boogie: UW, Others Get to Know Young DB Prodigy
Let's Boogie: UW, Others Get to Know Young DB Prodigy

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Washington Huskies

Tay "Boogie" Lockett looks, talks and acts like any other high school football prospect. 

He's a defensive back who got himself noticed by the college talent scouts this spring while making the rounds of the California 7-on-7 circuit. 

He has an air of confidence about him, demonstrating his ability to spin a football on the ground almost on command, as if putting an exclamation point on his play.

A wiry 6-foot-1, 165-pounder from San Diego, Lockett received his first scholarship offer from Florida State on March 3, followed by others from Arizona, Arizona State, Boise State, Charlotte, Jacksonville State and San Jose State.

Nothing unusual about that, right?

Not unless you consider that Lockett, Tay not Tyler, just completed the eighth grade.

He's from the Class of 2026.

He will attend high school — University City, in the northern part of his city —for the first time this fall. 

While he doesn't have an offer from Seattle yet, Lockett  toured the University of Washington on an unofficial visit, posed in a white Husky uniform for promotional purposes and spoke to Kalen DeBoer's staff.

"I liked Washington," Lockett told BuffStampede.com, which covers Colorado. football "It was just beautiful and the coaches were just down to Earth. Washington's coaches were talking to me more about school and at the end of the day you want to go somewhere that's going to help you after football, too."

As enters his freshman year of high school, Boogie talks about being a leader for a University City team that went 8-5 in 2021 and will want to get a good look at this kid who probably has more scholarship offers than all or most of his teammates. 

Lockett, as much as anyone, has been surprised by the sudden rush of interest in him by the colleges. 

"I thought recruiting was going to come later, but I'm happy it's here now," he said. "I'm enjoying it."

Lockett clearly has been following the UW recent recruiting developments, retweeting the Husky commitments offered on social media by wide receivers and fellow Californians Keith Reynolds and LaMason Waller II. 

Reynolds will arrive a year from now to join the Huskies while Waller is a Class of 2024 commit.

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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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