Huskies Ready to Remove the Wrap Off Reynolds

The redshirt freshman speedster has worked his way into a couple of game-day roles.

Keith Reynolds has put himself in position to play this season for the UW. / Skylar Lin Visuals

When the University of Washington football team lines up for a kickoff return, it will be as if the Huskies have two Lamborghinis idling side by side, taking turns gunning their engines and ready to go screaming down the road.

Giles Jackson is one of these runback specialists, a veteran speedster with impressive enough credentials from his time spent at Michigan, with electrifying 95- and 97-yard kickoff returns for scores before coming to the UW in 2021.

The other guy?

Next to No. 5 is the equally diminutive and maybe even faster Keith Reynolds, a 5-foot-9, 180-pound redshirt freshman who wears No. 15 -- making these two look like bookends when standing together at the goal line -- and he might be the holdover Husky who's made the biggest jump for playing time under Jedd Fisch's newly installed coaching staff.

Reynolds it appears will be on the field for each kickoff and regularly rotate in with the second wave of wide receivers, with the UW doing everything it can to get this guy loose in the open field.

"Honestly, outside of Denzel [Boston], I would say Keith was the biggest positive in the receiver room coming out of the spring, in just how he progressed," Husky receivers coach Kevin Cummings said.

Reynolds hails from the California high desert town of Adelanto, elevation 2,800 feet and 90 miles northeast from Los Angeles.

He's one of the hidden gems on the roster left behind by Kalen DeBoer, whose staff was uncanny at finding football talent well off the beaten path, such as in a tumbleweed town on the edge of the Mojave Desert.

With Reynolds, it's all about pure speed, possibly sub 4.4-second speed though he doesn't have an official time covering 40 yards. Just consider him ultra swift.

Keith Reynolds toes the sideline while making a catch in practice. / Skylar Lin Visuals

While playing for a dismal 1-9 Adelanto High School team as a senior, Reynolds was so good he was named Desert Sky League Offensive Player of the Year. He was so versatile, he played snaps at quarterback, running back, wide receiver, defensive back and kick returner.

Typical of his senior outings in 2022 was a game against Granite Hills in which Reynolds rushed for 225 yards and 3 scores and, as a left-hander winging it, passed for 319 yards and 4 scores in a 68-56 defeat. That's Marques Tuiasosopo stuff.

Keith Reynolds eyes a fall camp pass on the East field / Skylar Lin Visuals

"That's my guy," said UW freshman quarterback Demond Williams Jr., another noted speedster. "We put in extra work all the time. I definitely have a lot of trust in him."

It got to the point in recent scrimmages where Williams would sometimes exclusively go to Reynolds, in one instance completing three medium-range passes to him in consecutive snaps.

With his big-league speed, Reynolds has the ability to go the distance no matter what he's doing on the football field. In his time at Adelanto High, he snapped off 77- and 94-yard runs for instant touchdowns. He got free for 77- and 80-yard punt returns for scores. He returned an interception 89 yards for yet another long-distance TD.

Quarterback?

"I didn't know that, that's crazy," Williams said.

Reynolds came to the UW as one of three wide receivers signed out of California for the class of 2023, as a 3-star recruit joined by Rashid Williams and Taeshaun Lyons, both 4-star prospects. He made cameo appearances in lopsided games against Michigan State and California as a true freshman to get a taste of game action. Yet unlike the others, he wasn't a true pass-catcher when he arrived in Montlake from Adelanto.

"It was let's get the best athlete in the area on the field and let him play," Cummings said. "He wasn't asked to do a lot of things pure receiver-wise. His opportunity this spring to get that technique down and do all that stuff really showed. He was probably one of the [biggest] bright spots in the spring for us."

That high-squeal revving sound you hear now is Reynolds, a guy with a lot of horsepower getting ready to accelerate in Husky Stadium and beyond.

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