Get to Know Your Orange Man: #95, P/PK Ian Hawkins

New football season. New Dome name. New reasons for optimism for Syracuse Orange fans? Let’s get to meeting the 2022 Orange....up next is

Name: Ian Hawkins

Position: Punter / Placekicker

Year: Redshirt Freshman

Height: 6-0

Weight: 183 lbs

Hometown: San Diego, Calif.

High School: Cathedral Catholic

2021 stats: Went from walk on to starter down the stretch. While the punting game still needed some work, that’s pretty impressive. On the year he averaged 37.2 yards per punt on 26 attempts, with two longer than 50 yards and four inside the 20. If that average remained, it would have placed him 90th in the country if he had enough punts to qualify for rankings.

2022 projections: He started down the stretch so he’s technically the incumbent. We’ll see who trots out at the beginning of the Louisville game, with Bob Ligashesky getting an offseason to address some of the concerns coming out of the third worst punting unit (33.42 net yards) in the nation last year.

How’d he get here?: Came in as a PWO, prior to the 2021 season to help liven up the special teams room in a post Dixon/Hofrichter/Cooney era.

What’s recruiting sites say?: Not ranked coming out.

Money quote: After he was thrust into the starting role on the road trip to Florida State, he sat for an interview with Chris Carlson over at Syracuse.com. Hawkins talked about his desire to compete at the collegiate level.

“This is my passion,” Hawkins said. “I wouldn’t have worked so hard to come play at the collegiate level. I was ready to play if something happened. I was ready to do the job and try to help out.”

Twitter Feed: @IanHawk83142864

Tweets of wonder: Commitment tweets are always a thing. See below

Interesting nugget o’interest: Looks like Mr. Hawkins is also an avid wakeboarder. When you grow up in a place you can be on the water all year, it makes total sense.

Let’s get a look at ya: Some kicking footage, because that’s what kickers do.