Briefly a Husky football Sensation, Shelley Passes Athletic Genes to Sons

The wide receiver made a splash in Montlake before getting dismissed from the program.

Former Husky Jason Shelley, second from right, shares a USC moment with his son, Jalen, and others. / Twitter

The USC basketball team, with its coaching staff heavy on former University of Washington headliners, has been celebrating the recent enrollment of talented 6-foot-8 forward Jalen Shelley from Frisco, Texas, a top 100 prospect.

In order to follow newly hired coach Eric Musselman to the Trojans, Shelley asked for his scholarship release from Arkansas in early April and pledged to USC a short time later.

Musselman and his new staffers, Will Conroy and Quincy Pondexter, once former Husky players and Mike Hopkins assistant coaches, feltl that getting Shelley on board with the Trojans was a significant program boost.

Coincidentally, Shelley comes to Los Angeles with a distant UW football connection in his background -- he is the youngest son of Jason Shelley, who briefly was a Husky receiving sensation before he was dismissed from the team during his sophomore season in 1993 for off-field missteps.

The older Shelley, 49, came to Montlake as a highly regarded pass-catcher from Vallejo, California, arriving in the recruiting class put together by Don James' coaching staff immediately following the Huskies' 1991 unbeaten and national championship run. The 6-foot-2, 180-pound Shelley didn't disappoint.

He played right away, becoming the only freshman pull a lot game time in 1992 while used as a reserve. He caught a 31-yard touchdown pass against Oregon, a 40-yard scoring pass against Stanford and a 64-yarder that went the distance against Michigan in the 1993 Rose Bowl, all coming from quarterback Mark Brunell.

Shelley next started the first four games of the 1993 season, catching a 52-yard TD pass against San Jose State, before everything came undone for him.

Ex-Husky and fam ... https://t.co/p8PutkRz2q

— Washington Huskies on FanNation at SI.com (@UWFanNation) July 6, 2024

After a series of missteps, which includd a dorm-room theft at the University of Oregon that involved a pair of Husky basketball players and breaking someone's jaw in a pickup basketball game, Shelley was suspended indefinitely from the UW football team in November 1993. He was 19.

Shelley later resurfaced at Central State University, an NCAA Division II school in Ohio, and then began a long professional career that took him to NFL Europe, the XFL and the Arena Football League.

He played five seasons for the AFL's Dallas Desperadoes, showing what might have been at the UW. In 2004, he caught 105 passes for 1,309 yard and 23 touchdowns that season and followed that in 2005 with 99 catches for 1,240 yards and 27 scores, giving him an incredible 50 TDs in two seasons, even if it was pinball football. He also played or the Columbus Destroyers and Nashville Kats. For three seasons, he even spent time in the Atlanta Braves' farm system as a first baseman and outfielder.

Jalen Shelley will play college basketball for USC. / Twitter

Shelley settled in the Dallas metroplex area and since has raised two sons to become heavily recruited college athletes.

His oldest, Jason Shelley II, played quarterback for Utah, Utah State and Missouri State, even starting for the Utes against the UW in the 2018 Pac-12 championship game. He completed 17 of 27 passes for 131 yards in a 10-3 loss to the Huskies.

Now comes Jalen, a left-hander highly proficient in the open court and strong around the basket, who enrolled for USC classes on June 28 and celebrated the moment with mom and dad on campus.

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