Inside The Huskies

Ex-Husky Stewart Earns Big NBA Pay Day in Detroit

The former UW player receives his rookie contract extension.

Dan Raley

In this story:

Isaiah Stewart played his college basketball and resided in Seattle for just a year, setting him up for a long stay in Detroit that's about to get a lot longer. 

This week, multiple news accounts reported the 6-foot-8, 250-pound Stewart has agreed to a four-year, $64 million rookie contract extension with the Detroit Pistons, his NBA home for the past three seasons.

The former University of Washington big man — who missed 32 games this past winter because of a left shoulder injury — is being paid more for his basketball promise than past production.

With his toughness and unbridled desire, Stewart remains a building-block player at power forward for the rebuilding Pistons, who were a 17-65 and last-place team in the Eastern Conference.

Detroit likes his physicality and leadership capabilities, especially in the face of major franchise struggles with its young roster.

Rather than be a short post player, such as a Wes Unseld, the Pistons see him becoming more of a 3-point shooting threat as well as an inside player.

“I feel like I don’t have a ceiling,” Stewart told reporters when the season ended. “It’s a lot of room for growth. I know when first I got drafted, people viewed me as a different player. I put the work in to work on my skills to continue to develop my game. I don’t know what the final version looks like because I’m going to continue to put in the work and continue to build my game as much as possible.”

Stewart played only the 2019-20 season for the Huskies and averaged 17 points and 6.8 rebounds per game as a freshman for a 15-17 team and earned first-team All-Pac-12 honors.

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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.

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