SEATTLE — The Washington Huskies men's basketball team was unable to navigate the stout defense of in-city rivals, the Seattle University Redhawks, and dropped a slugfest 70-66 on Dec. 19 at Climate Pledge Arena.

The Huskies' fell to 7-4 on the season. It was just the sixth win for the Redhawks in 41 games in the all-time series between the two programs. It was the first time since the first game was played in 1953 Seattle U won two-straight against Washington.

Friday's game was as physical as either team has played so far this season. The two sides combined to shoot 48 free throws (21 for the Huskies, 27 for the Redhawks). Washington connected on 37% of its shot attempts (24-for-65) and Seattle U shot 39% from the floor (23-for-59).

"There were some things that we did that we shouldn't have done and they were able to get a couple advantages off it," Huskies senior guard Desmond Claude said after the game. " ... Every game you just got to come ready. ... (Big Ten play) is gonna be physical. It's probably gonna be more physical than this game. You have to figure out ways to work around that and play through contact and play through physicality."

Claude finished the game with a team-high 24 points on a 9-for-14 clip, including a 6-for-8 mark from the free-throw line. He added three rebounds, four assists and a steal.

"(Claude) was the one guy who could actually get by his defender," Washington head coach Danny Sprinkle said postgame. "Be able to create. Even early, he had the two drop-offs to (Franck Kepnang) when their five helped up. We got to keep using him. If he's gonna be our only guy that can get by somebody, then we got to start building the offense around that and figure out how to get other guys in spots where we can get open drives or open shots."

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Despite the low efficiency and lack of 3-point shooting (0-for-7 from beyond the arc in the first half), the Huskies were able to go into halftime with a narrow 29-26 lead.

In the second half, Washington was able to extend its lead to nine points multiple times and held a 40-31 advantage with 15:33 left in the game. It was the largest advantage for either team.

The Redhawks refused to go away and kept chipping away at the Huskies.

Seattle U outscored Washington 15-6 after the latter's last nine-point lead to knot the contest 46-46 with 9:33 left.

The two sides went back-and-forth from that point, constantly tying and exchanging leads. In total, the Emerald City rivals tied each other eight times and exchanged the advantage 17 times.

The Redhawks finally pulled ahead by multiple possessions and led 66-62 with 43 seconds left. Claude pulled the Huskies within two with a pair of free-throws and the Dawgs were able to create an open look for senior guard Quimari Peterson that failed to fall with 20 seconds left in the game.

The Dawgs finished the game 1-for-15 on 3-point attempts. Freshman forward Hannes Steinbach, who finished with 15 points and 12 rebounds, was responsible for the only triple.

"I was happy with a lot of the looks that we had," Sprinkle said.

Seattle U was sent intentionally to the foul line after Peterson's miss and was able to add on at the charity stripe and held off Washington for the four-point final score.

Sophomore guard Zoom Diallo, who fouled out of the game with 43 seconds left, finished with 17 points on 5-for-11 shooting and added three rebounds, three assists and five steals.

The Huskies will next be in action against San Diego at 7 p.m. PT on Dec. 22 at Alaska Airlines Arena in Seattle.

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