Jackson Hawes’ last touchdown reception was on Oct. 21, 2023. He was a Yale Bulldog at the time, and the 9-yard reception was one of his nine catches that season.
He went on to play at Georgia Tech, where he had 16 catches in his lone season as a Yellow Jacket, but never logged a touchdown.
On Thursday in Highmark Stadium, Hawes found the end zone once again in the Buffalo Bills’ 31-21 win over the Miami Dolphins.
Hawes, a rookie tight end that the Bills took in the fifth round of this year’s draft, has been heralded for his blocking skills. But on Thursday night, he showed he’s ready for anything that comes his way. In this case, that meant a 5-yard touchdown.
“Yeah, I mean, we called it,” Hawes said. “I kind of blinked a little bit because it was a short week, and we just installed a bunch of new plays. And we called the timeout. Went back out there. Slipped a little bit, felt good, though. And Josh (Allen) just being Josh, and getting the ball out.”
Before that, Hawes blocked Dolphins defender Matthew Judon to the ground, showcasing his other talents.
“I did give him a good little pop,” Hawes said. “Yeah, a good little pop.”
From there, Hawes rolled left, as did Allen, who likely could have run it in himself, but instead flipped the ball to Hawes.
“Yeah, just extending the play, a little naked action,” Allen said. “He did a good job of just staying in concert with me and just got the corner there. I think it was just cool to just kind of commit one way, and he stayed alive for me and made a play.”
Bills pass catchers always talk about how they have to be ready for Allen to extend a play. The team practices it in scramble drills so that younger players like Hawes can prepare as much as possible for what happens come game days.
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“I mean, he’s the MVP, man,” Hawes said. “He’s the greatest player in the world. Anything can happen with him, so you just got to be ready.”
It was Hawes’ third catch of the season; he’s had one in each game.
“Yeah, it’s great when these young players can come in and contribute and earn their spots and their roles,” coach Sean McDermott said of Hawes. “And he’s very humble and comes to work every day, extremely tough, hard worker and it’s good to see him contributing in both the run and the pass. So, we’ll see where it goes from here.”
Now in his sixth season, fullback Reggie Gilliam has had an up-close look at Hawes’ journey.
“It’s honestly amazing – it reminds me a lot of myself, actually, when I first got here,” Gilliam said. “Just learning the offense, head spinning, just everything’s moving so fast. And you get one red-zone possession, and it comes to fruition. It’s like, ‘You know what? Maybe I can do this.’ And I’m just super happy for him, ’cause I know how difficult things were for him coming in, and he just kept his head down and kept going.”
Gilliam calls Hawes a “hell of a blocker,” but the rookie is proving he’s more than that. When Hawes is a threat in the passing game, too, the Bills’ opponents have plenty to deal with.
“It just opens it up, honestly,” Gilliam said. “And like we always say, we’re all interchangeable parts, and we’re an ‘everybody eats’ mindset. So, it doesn’t matter if you’re a ‘blocker’ or a ‘pass catcher,’ we’re all doing it all.”
Veteran tight end Dawson Knox, who was in on the touchdown play, has always lobbied for more tight ends on the field. While the Bills ran that particular play out of a jumbo package, with Alec Anderson on the field, the team has shown this season why 13 personnel works for them. And with Hawes ascending, there’s no reason to slow down.
“I think that’s what’s fun as a tight end – you put three of us in there, they don’t know what we’re going to do,” Knox said. “We can run it, we can throw it, and that kind of two-dimensional style of offense is what we want to specialize in.
“So, you establish the run game, that’s going to naturally open up the pass game. It’s going to create an extra safety coming up into the box, and then, once they start doing that, we can spread them out and pass the ball. So, having that versatility and being dynamic, I think, it’s just really fun, especially as a tight end to do it.”
Knox, however, thinks Hawes needs to fine-tune his celebration. The rookie understandably got a little caught up in the moment, and it wasn’t his best spike.
“I knew we had that play in, so I was kind of planning something, but in the moment, everything just … my mind was just, I don’t even know where I was,” Hawes said. “It was just, ‘This is amazing.’ And just thought to go with the spike.”
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Katherine Fitzgerald
Sports reporter
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