Living His Dream

David Crisp – Hometown kid at the hometown school // By Mason Kelley

By Washington Huskies

February 6^th, 2019

Tattooed on the inside of David Crisp’s right elbow is the Tacoma Rainiers’ logo. On the right side of his chest, he has an outline of the state of Washington inked with Lakewood running in a script font across the map. He has evergreen trees and the I-5 shield.

He is a local guy playing for his hometown team. He grew up in the area’s basketball scene. He is ingrained in the culture.

And now as a senior, playing at Washington, Crisp is exactly where he wants to be. He is living his dream.

“I understand a lot of people aren’t in this position, a lot of people want to be in the position we’re in,” he said. “I’m blessed. I’m happy. Every day I get to live my dream.”

Crisp takes his role as a local guy seriously. He wants to represent his hometown well each time he takes the floor.

“I see all my friends playing in college at their schools and I’m like, ‘They’re not playing for their hometowns,’” he said. “I’m so lucky. I can literally go home after a game if I wanted to. It means a lot to me, to go out there and make everybody proud.

“I want to leave a legacy, leave my mark.”

This year has been his opportunity.

“If we reach that mountain top and everybody is working hard, it’s going to be a year I’ll never forget,” he said. “We’re definitely on that path.”

But to get to where he is now, to have the opportunity to put his hometown school back on the map nationally, it has been a “roller coaster.”

Growing up, all of his teams won. They won a lot. State championships. A national championship. Crisp won with every team he played on. During his time with the Huskies, though, he has faced adversity and has taken each challenge as a learning experience.

“Like my mom always tells me, I’ve just got to take the good with the bad,” he said. “There’s always going to be someone out there doing worse than you, so I take the good with the bad all the time. As much as there’s been down times, there’s been highs that are 10 times that.

“From a basketball standpoint and in life. I’ve grown so much on the court and, especially, off the court. Looking at the grand scheme of things, it’s such a short time we’re here in college, four years in life is nothing. It went by in the blink of an eye.”

Everything Crisp has done through his first three years has prepared him for this moment. After the team went 9-22 his second season, the players in the program woke up at 6 a.m. every day to work toward ensuring that never happened again.

Last season, with a coaching change, the team took a step forward. And now as a senior, Crisp has been trying to set an example that will propel the Huskies into the NCAA tournament.

“This class that came in with me, we want to be the group that brings Washington basketball back to where it should be, where it will be from here on out,” he said.

Crisp wants to leave the program better than he found it and he wants to thank those who helped him get to this point by finishing off a breakthrough season.

“I’m just extremely thankful for my parents, my coaches, all my teammates, the whole city and community, everybody who believed in me and supported me, even those who doubted me, those who hate on me,” he said. “All it does is make me hungry and motivated.”

As a freshman, Crisp Milly Rocked his way through the year. He danced in airports. He danced on the court. He celebrated the realization of a childhood dream. These days, he’s still dancing. Not quite as much as he was then, but he’s still having fun. He’s still doing what he loves.