Video: Meet the 'Dancing Dawgs' of Washington
Whether it's skinny jeans, neon sneakers or leggings underneath mini-skirts, all the most grotesque fashion trends from the 1980s are reappearing around us these days.
Perhaps then it should come as no surprise that Washington is attempting to bring back another '80s fad: the cheesy, cringe-worthy yet absolutely hilarious sports music video.
Move over Super Bowl Shuffle. Step aside Dodgers' Baseball Boogie. Get out of the way Arizona Wildcat rappers. Meet the Dancing Dawgs, a virtual victory cigar of a music video featuring shimmying Washington basketball players that has played on the jumbotron in the second half of blowout home victories this season.
"Each time we've played it the crowd has gone nuts," said Jon Horton, executive producer of Flying Colours, which handles the sights and sounds of HuskyVision. "I used to work in TV, and in that medium you never get to see it when the viewers laugh. The best part of my job here is that I actually get to see the fans react."
The origin of Horton's idea came a few years ago when he used outtakes from the full motion head shots he made for each player to create an advertisement for the gymnastics team. The video, which featured players dancing or hamming it up, ended with the words, "Luckily they're good at basektball because they're no good at gymnastics."
Last year, when Horton filmed the head shots at the beginning of the season, the outtakes included footage of Justin Holiday and Matthew Bryan-Amaning dancing and mugging for the camera. It sat unused on Horton's computer for a year until he rediscovered it this season, added some clips of a few of their teammates and set it to German dance act Cascada's electropop hit, "Evacuate the Dancefloor."
"Matthew and Justin, they're the spearheads of it," Horton said. "They gave me the idea because they're so funny on camera. When you put them on camera, they relax and have fun. It wasn't their idea, but it absolutely was their inspiration."
The only disappointment so far for Horton is that the Huskies didn't build a big enough early lead against rival Washington State last week for him to be able to play the video. He will not take any chances that the Huskies' opponent could come back and win after the video airs.
"If we're up 20 at the four-minute mark, we're usually good," Horton said.
