QUES TIONS BY BART POTTER • FOR GO HUSKIES MAGAZINE
K
eion Brooks Jr., the 6-foot-7 forward for the University of Washington basketball team, enters his fifth and final collegiate season as a preseason All-Pac-12 first-team selection. That’s just another notation on his esteemed resume, which already includes a national championship and recognition among the best players in the country. Keion won the AAU national championship as an 11-year-old fifth grader. He went on to develop his game to the point where, in 2019 as a senior in basketball-impassioned Indiana, he was among the top recruits in the nation. Brooks elected to play for eight-time national champion Kentucky, playing all 31 games his freshman season, serving as a team captain as a sophomore and averaging 10.8 points his junior year, while starting all 33 games. The Huskies star’s bio has infinitely more space for even more prestigious entries as he embarks on his final season, his second with Washington. After transferring from Kentucky last season, he averaged 17.7 points per game for the Huskies, third best in the Pac-12. He also averaged 6.7 rebounds and 1.2 blocks per game, earning Pac-12 second team honors. Brooks has come a long way from Fort Wayne, a city located in northeast Indiana near the Ohio border. His parents, Keion Sr. and Sarita, raised four boys. Keion, the second oldest, “tried to beat my brothers in everything we did, all healthy competitions.” Keion said his father is his “superhero.” Keion Sr. played at Wright State and graduated as the school’s second alltime leading scorer. He taught his sons the game and coached Brooks’ fifth-grade team all the way to that national title. “He’s always been my favorite player, and still is,” Keion said of his father. Keion Jr. now finds himself in the same situation as Keion Sr. was in at Wright State, a senior team leader attempting to guide his squad to the NCAA Tournament. As Keion Jr. says in this 10-question format, “the better I can be, the better the team can be. I’m all about winning. Whatever I can do to help us win. I think we’re going to surprise some people, how well we play together, our talent level.” Here’s Keion Jr.’s 10-question snapshot for the 2023-24 Huskies.
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