Inside The Huskies

Huskies Offer Basketball Scholarship to a Legend

Sophomore-to-be at Seattle's Garfield's High possesses a catchy name.

Dan Raley

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Someday maybe he will be referred to as the legendary Legend Smiley. 

For now, he's just Legend, a promising 6-foot-5 sophomore shooting guard for Garfield High School who on Monday received a scholarship offer from the University of Washington basketball program.

With his long and lean stature, an obvious move would be to compare him to Seattle native Dejounte Murray, the former Rainier Beach High and UW playmaker, and now an All-Star guard for the San Antonio Spurs.

Yet another player for him to emulate is Roydell Smiley. That's right, his dad. The elder Smiley was a 6-foot-4 shooting guard who played at Garfield High alongside Brandon Roy and Will Conroy, among others, and wound up at USC.

The offer extended to the versatile Legend Smiley came from his dad's former teammate, Conroy, now a Husky assistant coach.

This Smiley is an all-round player who's just beginning to catch everyone's eye on the AAU national circuit while a member of Seattle Rotary. He's a notable perimeter shooter who considers himself a capable defender.

He comes off a freshman season in which he played a support role for a Garfield team that went 24-1, losing only by four in the state quarterfinals. 

"I can play one through five if needed," Legend Smiley said of the positions on the floor. "Primarily, I play two or three."

Roydell spent two years at an Iowa junior college before he joined USC. He averaged 8.6 points and 2.6 rebounds per game as a part-time starter for the Trojans in 2002-03 before he broke his leg in an NCAA Tournament game and couldn't return for his senior year.

While it's still early, the younger Smiley received his first scholarship offer from the University of San Francisco during this past season. A few Big Sky schools have weighed in. The UW now has put in an early offer.

It's just a beginning for this player named Legend, who will work on becoming a true legend.

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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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