Yellow Jackets’ QB/RB duo among 80 preseason candidates for national player of the year award
THE FLATS – Georgia Tech junior quarterback Haynes King (Longview, Texas/Longview H.S.) and junior running back Jamal Haynes (Loganville, Ga./Grayson H.S.) are among just 80 student-athletes nationwide on the official watch list for the 2024 Maxwell Award, which has been presented to college football’s player of the year since 1937.
Georgia Tech is one of just 17 teams with multiple representatives on the Maxwell Award watch list.
King accounted for 3,729 yards of total offense (2,842 passing, 737 rushing) and 37 touchdowns (27 passing, 10 rushing) in his first season as the Yellow Jackets’ starting quarterback in 2023. He was one of only two Power Five conference players with at least 2,800 passing yards, 700 rushing yards, 25 touchdown passes and 10 touchdown runs in 2023, joining Heisman Trophy winner and eventual No. 2 overall pick in the NFL Draft, Jayden Daniels of LSU, while he became only the fourth Atlantic Coast Conference player since 2000 to reach those plateaus in a single season, joining Clemson’s Deshawn Watson (2015), Louisville’s Lamar Jackson (2016 and 2017) and Virginia Tech’s Jerod Evans (2016).
Haynes, who made the switch from wide receiver to running back during Georgia Tech’s fall camp in 2023, became the Yellow Jackets’ first 1,000-yard rusher in five years when he ran for 1,059 yards last season. He capped four 100-yard games with a career-high 128 en route to being named MVP of the Jackets’ 30-17 win over UCF in the Union Home Mortgage Gasparilla Bowl. In addition to his 1,059 rushing yards (the 15th-most in Georgia Tech single-season history), Haynes also caught 20 passes for 151 yards and returned two kickoffs for 47 yards, totaling 1,257 all-purpose yards and earning all-ACC recognition as both a running back and all-purpose performer.
Led by King and Haynes, Georgia Tech ranked third in the ACC and among the top 35, nationally, in total offense last season (424.6 ypg). Tech led the conference/ranked 12th nationally in rushing offense (203.8 ypg). The Yellow Jackets return eight starters from last season’s prolific offense in 2024.
Tech opens the 2024 season on August 24 versus Florida State in the Aer Lingus College Football Classic at Aviva Stadium in Dublin, Ireland. Kickoff is set for noon ET and the game will be televised nationally on ESPN.
