With all respect to Tua Tagovailoa, Will Grier and Kyler Murray, no quarterback in college football has proven more in the first half of this season than Dwayne Haskins. The nation’s leader in touchdown passes (25) won his third consecutive Big Ten Offensive Player of the Week award Monday. The conference has given out the award six times this season, and Ohio State’s sophomore quarterback has won it four times. In the history of the award, only the Buckeyes’ Troy Smith has won it more over the course of a season (five, in 2006).
Those other three QBs also have gaudy stats. None has put up those numbers, though, against the kind of competition Haskins has faced. In Texas against Gary Patterson’s speedy then-No. 15 TCU team, Haskins threw for 344 yards, passing for two touchdowns and rushing for a third with no turnovers against what is the nation’s No. 10 defense. Two weeks ago, Haskins led OSU into a very hostile setting to face then-No. 9 Penn State. He threw for 270 yards and three touchdowns, including two in the game’s final seven minutes to rally the Buckeyes facing the nation’s No. 20 defense.
Against Indiana last weekend, Haskins came 3 yards shy of Art Schlichter’s 1978 school record of 458 yards passing in a single game. Haskins threw six touchdown passes. He also tied J.T. Barrett’s school record with 33 completions, and his 462 yards of total offense was a school record, eclipsing Barrett’s 423 vs. Penn State last year.
As good as Barrett was as the Buckeyes’ triggerman, he didn’t threaten defenses downfield the way cannon-armed Haskins does. It’s a dimension Ohio State hasn’t had since Cardale Jones was its QB. And the Buckeyes’ receivers notice the difference in the juice on the ball this season.
“I really like it,” senior Parris Campbell says. “Lots of drops and double-catches happen when a receiver has time to think.”
Haskins isn’t the running threat that Barrett was, but Buckeyes coach Urban Meyer said it’s not a complete departure from what he’s won with. Meyer noted that of the three national titles he’s won, two have been with guys not known as running QBs — Chris Leak and Jones. Yes, both of them could run — as can Haskins, who is considered a 4.7 40 guy by folks in the Ohio State program — but Meyer says they didn’t rely on any designed runs with Jones or Leak. And when those guys did run, it was off of scrambles. “We adapted,” he says.
By now, most folks around college football know about Haskins’ wondrous arm talent, but something that really impressed his coaches is how he handled the aggressive Hoosiers before the ball was even snapped.
“He did a really good job with protections,” Buckeyes offensive coordinator Ryan Day says. “They were blitzing us, but it didn’t look like it because we picked up almost every blitz that they brought. Him checking the protections was huge. He did a great job with that.”
Day says Haskins’ accountability is an area in which he’s probably made the biggest strides over the past year, especially as it relates to understanding what he’s up against as a quarterback.
Haskins had a good example to follow in Columbus in predecessor Barrett, the only three-time captain in the program’s storied history.
When Haskins arrived from a Maryland private school three years ago, his arm created plenty of buzz, but his body — and his work ethic — drew some eye rolls inside the program.
“He was skinny fat,” strength coach Mickey Marotti says. The young QB learned by studying Barrett, a fiery competitor, and he improved his diet. It also helped that he got to spend some time around Houston Texans quarterback Deshaun Watson, the former Clemson star. Haskins and Watson trained together several times with private quarterbacks coach Quincy Avery.
Haskins said they honed skills by doing realistic drills that translated to the field with off-platform throws, knowing not everything is going to be clean in the pocket. Off the field, though, their work was just as important, as he picked Watson’s brain about leadership. “I got to talk to him about what does he do that works,” Haskins says. “He’s not very vocal, but I was watching his work ethic.”
Avery, who has worked with Haskins since he was a senior in high school, said he sees similarities in the personalities of Watson and Haskins. Both are low-key yet have a presence about them.
“They seem to be pretty quiet until you know them, then they open up,” Avery says. “But they’re always very calm and collected. Never super high or low, and guys gravitate toward them despite them not being the loudest in the room.”
Haskins’ numbers this season are eye-popping: He’s completing 72 percent of his passes and has a 25-4 TD-INT ratio. He’s on pace to smash the Big Ten’s passing touchdown and yardage records this season.
My FOX Sports colleague and former NFL quarterback Brady Quinn and I got to spend some time around the Buckeyes last week, and seeing Haskins throw in person was impressive. When you see some of the throws he can make, you realize he has a “wow” arm. I asked Brady how Haskins stacks up to the first-round QBs from last April’s NFL Draft.
“I think he’s too early in his career to compare to those guys in my opinion, but he would have the second-strongest arm (to Josh Allen), the accuracy/motion/mechanics of (Josh) Rosen, and not quite the athleticism of Sam (Darnold) but close,” Quinn says. “Probably the best deep-ball thrower of all of those guys. He diagnoses very well. Only thing I don’t see him do a lot of is manipulate the defense like Baker (Mayfield) did. He also needs to continue to work on his pocket movement, but boy, he gets the ball out on time and is pretty damn accurate with it.
“I would put him against any of the other draftable QBs and say he compares very favorably. I would say, though, that I’d caution to get too overhyped. It’s such a small sample size. That’s where I’d be worried if I was an NFL team. Even though he’s responded when getting hit and pressured, his accuracy and production drops a bit — like most QBs.”
Haskins’ completion rate of 71.7 percent, which ranks seventh in the FBS, falls to 55.3 (16th) when pressured, according to data compiled by Sports Info Solutions. His on-target percentage — the number of catchable throws divided by number of attempts — is 79.8 (26th) when not pressured but slides to 65.8 (30th) when pressured.
But the numbers also show a resilience uncommon for a redshirt sophomore: Haskins is the FBS’ highest-rated quarterback in fourth quarters this season and has the highest on-target percentage (88.0).
Last year, Haskins only threw 57 passes but was very impressive against a tough Michigan defense on the road after stepping in for injured Barrett in a huge rivalry game. After beating out Joe Burrow and Tate Martell for the vacant starting spot this summer, Haskins knew he had big cleats to fill. Continuing to develop that camaraderie with his teammates has been crucial.
“It’s hard to be like J.T.,” he says. He’s only had a handful of starts, he points out. In the meantime, he just keeps trying to earn his teammates’ respect and the trust of the older guys. “I feel like I’m getting better with that every week.”
If he keeps getting better at this rate, he’s going to smash every passing record in Buckeyes history and should lead Ohio State into the College Football Playoff.
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