Sprinkle Says UW Basketball Will Have Fluid Starting Lineup

The new coach has a host of players who can handle a game-opening role.

Huskies center Franck Kepnang (11) applauds a play against the Xavier Musketeers in 2023. / Stephen R. Sylvanie-Imagn Images

Mike Hopkins used to settle on a starting lineup for the University of Washington basketball team and wouldn't change things up at all. Preferred to live and die with his chosen five. Refused to tinker with his Husky manpower.

Or do you not remember shot-challenged forward Hameir Wright starting 80 games for Hopkins' UW teams when some of Wright's teammates might have been a lot more accurate from long range?

This sort of set-in-stonel decision-making won't be the case for his coaching successor, Danny Sprinkle, who seems a lot more open to trading players in and out of the opening lineup and has a lot more guys worthy of pre-game introductions.

"I don't have a starting lineup set right now.," Sprinkle said following a 105-68 exhibition victory over Western Oregon. "That was just kind of the guys playing the best over the last two or two and a half weeks."

For the no-counter game, Sprinkle opened with a lineup of 6-foot-8 Great Osobor at power forward, 6-foot-11 Franck Kepnang at center, and Mekhi Mason, DJ Davis and Tyree Ihenacho at the guards, all seniors.

Davis, a 6-foot-4 Butler transfer, topped the Huskies with 16 points; while Osobor and Kepnang, a Utah State transfer and holdover player, respectively, each supplied 12 points; and the 6-foot-4 Mason from Rice had 8 points while the 6-foot-4 Ihenacho from North Dakota went scoreless.

Sprinkle had four players who came off the bench and reached double figures: freshman guard Zoom Diallo and 6-foot-8 sophomore forward Tyler Harris, the latter a Portland transfer, each scored 14 points; and 6-foot-10 senior forward Wilhelm Breidenbach and 6-foot-8 redshirt freshman forward Christian King, both returning players, added 11 and 10 points, respectively.

"Some of our guys who came off the bench played great tonight with their energy," Sprinkle said. "I thought Zoom played well and I thought Tyler Harris played well at times. The starting lineup is going to be fluid."

The UW went without 6-foot-9 Chris Conway, an Oakland transfer, and guard Luis Kortright, a Rhode Island transfer, both sitting out with injuries. Conway is out indefinitely with an unspecified injury and Kortright took a blow to the head was in concussion protocol, according to their coach.

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