North Texas 2025 Season Rewatch: Caleb Hawkins Runs Through Navy

Support PFB with a PFB+ membership — $8 a month or $50 for a year.

GAME 1 | GAME 2 | GAME 3 | GAME 4 | GAME 5 | GAME 6 | GAME 7 | GAME 8

This game was billed as the Air Raid vs. the always-potent Navy ground game, but it was a Mean Green rusher who stole the headlines.

North Texas beat Navy 31-17 to move to 8-1 on the 2025 season.

In preparation for Oklahoma State’s 2026 season, we’re going back and watching North Texas’ 2025 season. Here are some takeaways from this game against Navy.

Hawkins Was Near Unstoppable

Through two drives, Caleb Hawkins had 80 rushing yards and two touchdowns. The pace slowed a bit from then on, but not by much.

Hawkins finished this game having carried 33 times for 197 yards and four touchdowns. He caught another three passes for nine yards.

Just about all of Hawkins’ runs left a trail of humanity behind him. Per PFF, he forced 10 missed tackles in this game. If that number had been 25, I would’ve believed it.

His most bruising run of the day was probably touchdown No. 3, where four different Midshipmen got hands on him, but none were able to bring him down. In fact, the last guy was straight up trucked.

He finished with 119 yards after contact.

Two New Cowboy Defenders Have Big Days

This also marked a big game for a pair of Mean Green-turned-Cowboy defenders.

Ethan Wesloski had 14 tackles, the most he had in a game in his career to that point. One of those tackles was for a loss, as Wesloski came screaming downhill to blow up an option play.

The safety Quinton Hammonds iced the game on two occasions with a pair of picks.

The first looked like the Jordan logo, as Hammonds went up one handed and plucked the ball out of the sky. It was a sick interception, but it was also important, as North Texas’ lead was 24-17 at the time and it set up North Texas’ final TD of the game.

Then with Navy down 31-17 late, the Midshipmen were driving again, but Hammonds grabbed another INT, this one coming in his own end zone to end Navy’s unbeaten run. He also had four tackles.

Other Notes

• As I just mentioned, Navy was 7-0 coming into this game, which included a 5-0 mark in the American.

This Navy squad finished the year 11-2 with its only loses being this game to North Texas and a 49-10 loss to Notre Dame the next week. The Midshipmen’s wins included USF, Memphis and Cincinnati.

• Skyler Cassity’s defense has a knack for getting the football back. Along with Hammonds’ interceptions, the Mean Green also recovered another fumble, winning the turnover battle 3-0.

• Navy tried a surprise onside kick at one point in this game, but Baron Tipton called a fair catch to nullify it. It was a heads up play that Cowboy Demarco Jones pulled off against Texas Tech back in 2022. Good coaching.

Maybe the play of the day for #okstate. Demarco Jones you can see gives a brief “fair catch” wave as Tech attempts an onside. Tech recovers, but called for catch interference. So OSU gets the ball in great position, scores two plays later. pic.twitter.com/qPGgIONan8

— Pistols Firing (@pistolsguys) October 8, 2022

• Again, there were signs that this show was moving to Stillwater, as one small group of tarpless fans turned into an army.

• Although Drew Mestemaker didn’t have the gaudy 608 yards he had in the previous game, he was uber-efficient. He finished with 234 yards while going 19-for-24 (79%).

His best ball, in my eyes, was a 39-yard pass to Cameron Dorner on a double move that Mestemaker dropped from the heavens into a bucket.

• The 31 points UNT scored in this one were the second-fewest they scored in a game this season. The most points OSU scored in a game last year was 27.