UW men’s basketball To Play in 2025 Acrisure Invitational
By Charles Hamaker
Palm Desert, CA - Our University of Washington Husky men’s basketball team will be looking to defend their Acrisure Invitational title this upcoming season, as they’ll return to the event that takes place inside of the Seattle Kraken’s AHL affiliate Coachella Valley Firebirds arena from November 25th through 28th later this year. While a lot is unclear for the Huskies at this point in their offseason, considering their lack of a complete roster due to players in the transfer portal and most of their schedule still unreleased, it’s nice to have at least something certain to look forward to in what will be head coach Danny Sprinkle’s second season running the show at Washington.
Looking to defend their title from last years event
Last years event saw Washington take down eventual NCAA tournament team Colorado State by a final score of 73-67, as the Huskies were powered ahead by a big second half, scoring 47 points to push past the Rams. In that contest, sophomore guard Tyler Harris led the way for Washington with 24 points and eight rebounds while Great Osobor flirted with a triple double behind a stat line of 16 points, eight rebounds, and seven assists while adding four steals to his total numbers for the day. Those two were the only players for Danny Sprinkle’s squad that hit double digit points, as eight total Huskies added to the final score. Washington’s defense was a big story in this game, as they held Colorado State to an ugly 12.5% from three point range in the first half to really help themselves get an advantage early. On the flip side, the Huskies strong shooting in this contest (particularly in that second half where they pulled away behind 57% from the field) helped them move on to the second and final round of this event where they’d face the Santa Clara Broncos.
The title game of this event took place the very next day, and Washington used a strong first half to get the win over Santa Clara in this one to become the Acrisure Invitational champions for 2024. The Husky scoring was slightly more balanced in this contest as Osobor led the way with 19 points, eight rebounds, five assists, and two steals while Zoom Diallo (15 points) and DJ Davis (13 points) were also in double digits scoring wise. Eight Washington players got on the board in this contest, and their poor three-point shooting (which became more and more apparent as the season went on) didn’t hold them back from a decent lead that propelled them forward. A key for the Huskies in this contest was their defensive play, as Washington took advantage of mistakes from the Broncos with 22 points off turnovers. It’s not much to celebrate a sort of early season tournament, but considering that it was the only real accomplishment that the Huskies had this past season, here’s to hoping that next year it’ll be a launching point for the rest of their 2025-26 campaign.
The Huskies were in a better place at that time
When this event took place, Washington was coming into the event with a 5-1 record as their only defeat at that point in the season came by way of a ten-point result on the road against Nevada. The Sprinkle era was off to a solid start, but there was skepticism about the Huskies given their lack of a true star besides Osobor and general inconsistencies from the rest of the roster. This was also the second to last sort of stretch of games before Washington got to experience their first stretch of games as an official member of the Big Ten Conference, as they took tough losses to UCLA and USC immediately after the Acrisure Invitational. Those two losses to California schools helped create a sort of Big Ten sandwich as the Huskies played four non-conference games at home after that before fully getting into their conference schedule. Things didn’t seem too bad for Washington before they fully got into their Big Ten schedule, considering that they did beat NCAA Tournament bound Maryland at home for a strong victory, but that was the only victory they picked up over a nine-game conference stretch from January into early February. With the full schedule not quite unveiled yet, it’ll be fascinating to see where the Huskies will be when they head down to Southern California for this event, and if it’ll be a sort of launching pad for them as they look for a better performance than their first season in the Big Ten.
What’s next?
For the Washington Husky men’s basketball team, head coach Danny Sprinkle and the rest of the staff is still looking to fill out their roster for the 2024-25 season considering their own players that are currently in the transfer portal and the losses that they had from graduating players. The rest of Washington’s 2025-26 schedule hasn’t been revealed yet, but they do now know that they’ll have this four-team tournament to partake in during late November as the event will be in it’s third season. While the Husky men’s basketball team largely had a disappointing season in Danny Sprinkle’s first year at the helm, they do have one minor event to celebrate from last season and it’s this event.
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