When Louis Grante-Halliday was 16 years old, he and his parents made the decision for him to move from Sutton — in South London, England — to Seattle to further his basketball career. He came alone, staying with two different host families and playing for Nathan Hale High School (2019–20) and Eastside Catholic School (2020–22).
Grante-Halliday, now 20, is in the middle of a big summer. On June 17, he was announced as one of the new additions to the Western Washington University men’s basketball team. Grante-Halliday spent the 2022–23 season redshirting at Seattle University before entering the transfer portal and choosing Western.
This summer, Grante-Halliday returned home to play for Great Britain in the FIBA U20 European Championship Division B. From July 7–16, he played in seven games against other European countries in Skopje, Macedonia.
“It was eye-opening, for sure. I loved it, but I started off pretty slow, not timid, but I wasn’t scoring the ball how I usually score,” Grante-Halliday said. “I think it took me about two games to get it. It’s a completely different style [of] basketball than I’ve been used to in America.”
Great Britain placed eighth out of 20 teams, but Grante-Halliday felt they underperformed, losing several close matchups against beatable opponents. He averaged 7.4 points and 4.7 rebounds in 19.5 minutes per game.
“We played a couple prep games against Finland and you could just tell,” he added. “That was my first taste of it, I was like ‘Yeah, these refs, they don’t call anything, we’re getting hacked.’ It’s more physical and it’s also a slower game. It’s more fundamental based, I’d say.”
Grante-Halliday still lives with his family in London during the offseason, but he said he is looking forward to getting started at Western. Tony Dominguez, Western’s head coach, said the staff liked Grante-Halliday’s versatility out of Eastside Catholic but didn’t have a spot on the roster for him at the time.
Once they heard he was leaving Seattle University, they reached out and had him visit the campus.
“We always look at trying to have tough, gritty players and I think that really is his style of play,” Dominguez said. “It’s not like he’s going to drive the lane and throw some monster dunk down on somebody. But what he does do is make the right plays. He handles the ball on offense like a guard, can shoot the 3 and, defensively, he can guard multiple positions — guards, wings and some bigs. We felt like we got a nice, gritty player. He just is tough, works hard, strong body, just a great guy.”
Grante-Halliday’s all-around game is what makes him such an intriguing player. At 6-foot-7, he has the size of a wing but can create plays like a guard.
At Eastside Catholic, where Grante-Halliday played his junior and senior seasons, he averaged 18 points and eight rebounds per game.
He said his favorite position to play is point guard — noting his passing as one of his best tools — and he expects his diverse skillset to fit in well with Western’s roster this upcoming season.
“Obviously I don’t know everyone there yet, but from what I’ve seen a lot of guys like to score,” Grant-Halliday said. “The other [transfer Will Wilson], he was averaging crazy numbers at his junior college, so I know guys are going to come in hungry to score.”
With his redshirt season last year, Grante-Halliday still holds four years of eligibility and will look to make an immediate impact for the Vikings after losing their two leading scorers (D’Angelo Minnis and Daniel Hornbuckle) following the 2022–23 season.
“If I can impact the game not having to score as much, then that helps our team win more,” he added. “I know guys like [Jonathan Ned] and [BJ Kolly], they’re also talented guys inside and out, so fitting in with them, I think it’d be really cool.”
