Yahoo Sports As a student journalist, Dwayne Haskins predicted Washington would need a QB — turns out, it's him
As sports editor of his high school’s student newspaper in 2015, Dwayne Haskins wrote a pre-NFL draft column looking at trends for teams picking in the top five.
His note about the team that chose fifth that year, Washington, has become a funny footnote to this year’s draft.
‘Hopefully RG3 pans out’
Writing for The Bullis Bulldog, Haskins noted that Washington had drafted three quarterbacks in the first round of the draft since 2002 — Patrick Ramsey in ’02, Jason Campbell in ’05, and Robert Griffin III in ’12.
“Hopefully RG3 pans out in DC but if not expect them to draft another [quarterback] in the next 5 years,” Haskins wrote.
Haskins couldn’t have been more right: four years later, Washington drafted him in the first round.
‘People from home know exactly what he can do’
Bullis coach Pat Cilento — Washington owner Dan Snyder’s son is on the football team at the school now — told the Washington Post he was hoping Haskins would be taken sooner.
“We thought that he’d go in the top 10, but he didn’t,” Cilento said. “The Redskins being the hometown team [Bullis is about a 40-minute drive from Washington’s practice facility], he knows where to work out, he knows the community, he knows he can always come here.”
Alex Trippi, who was on the football team with Haskins and now plays lacrosse at North Carolina, was ready to post congratulations on social media Thursday night, hoping the New York Giants would take Haskins sixth — except that didn’t happen.
After a tense wait, the Washington team Haskins had once predicted might be drafting a quarterback in the first round within five years submitted a draft card with his name on it.
“I guess we’re just on the cusp of really seeing what he can do,” Trippi said. “And I know the people from home know exactly what he can do. They’ve seen it first-hand.”
Haskins changed Bullis’ football fortunes
Haskins arrived at Bullis midway through his freshman year, but it didn’t take long for him to take command of the football team.
Before he arrived, the Bulldogs had won just two conference championships in program history, in 1973 and 2011. Haskins was a three-year starter, and Bullis won the Interstate Athletic Conference championship in every season: 2013, ’14 and ’15.
He threw for 3,974 yards and 45 touchdowns before graduating and playing for Ohio State.
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