Washington Athletics has been getting raided by USC in recent years with AD Jen Cohen starting the parade that led to former basketball assistants Will Conroy and Quincy Pondexter joining the Trojans along with freshman Wesley Yates III. The Huskies already struck back this offseason bringing back Yates and Pondexter and continued the trend today by also adding transfer guard Desmond Claude. The 6’6 Claude led USC in scoring and finished with 15.8 points and 4.2 assists per game last season.
Claude was the #86 recruit in the 247 Sports Composite coming out of HS in New Haven, CT as a big point guard prospect. He committed to Xavier and struggled a bit as a true freshman coming off the bench to average 4.7 points per game on 43% FG shooting and nearly as many turnovers as assists. Claude was one of the breakout players in the country though as a sophomore and averaged 16.6 points and 3.2 assists per game. But Claude dominated the ball to get those numbers and shot just 24% from 3-point range with 2.5 turnovers per game.
Advertisement
On the back of that performance, Claude entered the transfer portal last offseason and ended up committing to Eric Musselman and USC. Claude saw his usage rate go up yet again and had career highs of 30.7% shooting from deep and a 52% free throw rate. But he also averaged a career high 3.5 turnovers per game.
It took until the final day of the transfer portal being open this offseason for Claude to announce his intentions to leave USC. There was heavy smoke connecting Claude with defending champion Florida but he ultimately did not sign after visiting there and the Gators opted to move on from their pursuit of Claude. More recent rumors connected Claude with Ole Miss and Gonzaga in addition to the Huskies and later Tennessee and Oregon reportedly got involved.
Adding Claude represents a heavy risk/reward scenario for Washington. The Huskies’ biggest need appeared to be at the small forward position with a projected starting lineup currently including a 3-guard lineup including the 6’4 Zoom Diallo and Wesley Yates III. Claude has the requisite size for the SF spot at 6’6 but is a ball dominant non-shooting point guard in terms of usage on offense. That provides some heavy overlap between Diallo and Claude’s skillsets and the spacing projects to be sub-optimal if the 2 are ever on the court together.
Coach Sprinkle certainly spoke extensively with both Quincy Pondexter and Wesley Yates III about their experiences playing with Claude last season. This wasn’t a Husky lineup just in need of someone to run the offense. If Claude’s objective was to find somewhere that he could for sure remain the #1 option as a primary ball handler then he presumably would’ve picked another team. Hopefully the addition of Claude is a sign that he is willing to play a more well-rounded and efficient brand of basketball. If not, then Washington’s questions about having too many mouths to feed just became even more pronounced.
Advertisement
It’s also possible to view this as a slam dunk addition. Claude has averaged 15+ points per game for consecutive seasons at the power conference level. He’s a proven scorer who won’t be afraid to take the last shot or handle the ball against top B1G defenders. He raises Washington’s floor by given them a 4th potential primary ball handler who had scored a lot at the college level.
Nearly every outlet had Claude as the top available remaining transfer and he was in the top 25 of the composite rankings I made based on 6 major transfer rank outlets. He and former and once again teammate Wesley Yates II were both in that range and are instantly one of the best transfer duo pickups this cycle.
**********
Potential 2025-26 Depth Chart
Minutes per game estimates in parentheses
Advertisement
PG: Quimari Peterson (25), JJ Mandaquit (5)
SG: Wesley Yates III (30), Zoom Diallo (20), Courtland Muldrew
SF: Desmond Claude (30), Bryson Tucker (10), Jasir Rencher
PF: Jacob Ognacevic (25), Hannes Steinbach (20)
C: Lathan Sommerville (15), Franck Kepnang (15), Mady Traore (5)
More from uwdawgpound.com:
