Saturday’s top 10 showdown between two undefeated conference rivals in the No. 8 Oregon Ducks and the No. 7 Washington Huskies is one of the most hotly anticipated games of the college football season thus far. Whichever team wins that game will gain a humongous advantage in their bid for a Pac-12 championship.
Washington will be quarterbacked by a Heisman candidate in Michael Penix Jr. The Indiana transfer is off to a hot start this season, with 1,999 passing yards, 16 touchdowns, and just two interceptions. He’s completing almost 75% of his passes at an eye-popping 11.2 yards per attempt.
Penix is rapidly improving his NFL Draft stock with each passing week. Sports Illustrated projects the signal-caller to go in the second round of the 2024 NFL Draft. If he can catch on in the pros, Penix will be exposed to football fans on an even wider scale.
Even now, he’s a name most casual fans have at least a surface-level awareness of. This begs the question posed in the headline, who raised Michael Penix Jr.?
Who Are the Parents of Huskies QB Michael Penix Jr.?
Michael and Takisha Penix are the parents of Washington’s star QB. They welcomed him into the world in May 2000 and raised him in Tampa, Florida. As we’ll discuss momentarily, they’ve always been proud and dedicated supporters of their children’s athletic careers.
The elder Michael was an athlete himself, playing running back for Tennessee Tech in the nineties.
As the school’s sports website details, Penix set several team records during his tenure with the Golden Eagles. Notably, he holds school records for most single-game rushing yards (261) and longest play from scrimmage (94 yards) in program history.
He’s remained close to the game even after hanging up his helmet and pads, coaching at his alma mater, Pasco High School in Dade City, Florida. His wife and Penix Jr.’s mother, Takisha, works as a senior project manager for Lockheed Martin.
As mentioned previously, Penix’s parents are extremely devoted as far as supporting their children goes.
Several stories exhibiting that devotion made the rounds in the last year or so.
Watching both my boys play@themikepenix & @MekhiPenix pic.twitter.com/EvVWT4GwRs
— Mrs. Penix 🇯🇲 (@his_star4life) November 13, 2022
For instance, last December, Penix’s parents drove three hours cross-state to watch their middle child, Mekhi, in his high school’s playoff football game. Simultaneously, their eldest son was playing in a huge late-season Pac-12 game against, coincidentally enough, Oregon.
They split their viewing attention between both games — keeping an eye on Michael Jr.’s efforts with the assistance of an iPad.
“The game got so intense that I kid you not: while we were riding down the road, the car was shaking. We were shaking the car,” Michael Penix Sr. told The Seattle Times. “We were screaming and yelling like we were at the game.”
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They exhibited similar dedication just a few weeks later, driving 16 hours from Florida to Texas to see their son play in the Alamo Bowl after the flight they booked to the game was canceled at the last minute.
Penix’s parents were rewarded for their efforts when their son earned Offensive Player of the Game honors in a victory.
They’ll be rooting hard for a similar result in this Saturday’s showdown with Oregon.