Inside The Huskies

Sink or Swim: UW's Peyton Waters Enters Transfer Portal

The freshman safety appeared in all 13 games for the Huskies, mostly on special teams.

Dan Raley

Peyton Waters waits for his next turn in spring drills.
Peyton Waters waits for his next turn in spring drills. / Skylar Lin Visuals

A year ago almost to the day, Peyton Waters was a recent high school graduate who pulled on a University of Washington football jersey and watched the CFP national championship game from the sideline in Houston.

The idea behind this gesture was for Waters and other newly signed Huskies to share in this milestone moment against Michigan with the current team and hopefully this would lead to others someday with them on the field.

Waters, however, could take this career progression in Montlake only so far, with the freshman safety on Tuesday entering the transfer portal, according to CBS Sports.

The 6-foot-1, 182-pound defensive back from Northridge, California, appeared in all 13 games for the Huskies, mostly on special teams. He seemed to be making steady progress in his player development. Obviously, it wasn't nearly enough to mollify him.

By our count, Waters is the 26th UW player to turn to the transfer portal -- and the third safety, joining Tristan Dunn (Cal) and Justin Harrington in the free-agent talent grab.

He came to Washington as a 4-star recruit pursued by nearly all of the old Pac-12 schools, with USC, UCLA, Stanford, California, Oregon State, Washington State and Jedd Fisch's then Arizona team among his choices.

Waters originally signed with Kalen DeBoer's Husky staff, which invited him to that CFP title game in Texas. He entered the transfer portal two weeks after DeBoer departed the UW for Alabama before the safety withdrew and stuck with Fisch's staff.

He leaves the program five days after his Husky safeties coach, Vinnie Sunseri, accepted a new job as defensive coordinator for Jacksonville State.

For the latest UW football and basketball news, go to si.com/college/washington

Published
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.

Home/Football