It was a tale of two halves for the Miami Dolphins on Sunday against the Jacksonville Jaguars.
When the second quarter ended, Miami trailed 17-7 and looked out of sync on offense. A 39-yard screen pass to De’Von Achane was the only play for more than 20 yards for the typically explosive Dolphins, and two first half drives ended with turnovers on downs.
“We all were like kind of timid a little bit, shaking all the dust off our knees and stuff like that,” Dolphins receiver Tyreek Hill said. “The thing that really motivated me the most was when we come in, during halftime, and this is like the first time I heard Tua’s Hawaiian accent. It’s crazy. Like, he was turned up and animated in the locker room. I’m like, ‘Ok, I’m liking this.’”
According to Hill, who had 32 receiving yards at halftime, Tagovailoa spared no one on the offense, including the star receiver.
“He called me out,” Hill said. “I’m like, I’m loving this, bro. Me, I love accountability at its finest, because that’s what I grew up on. I grew up on my dad telling me, ‘Reek, I need you to be better. Not patting me on my back, not doing this. For my quarterback to call me out in front of the whole offense like that, I had to step up, I had to do my thing. I like that in a leader.”
Hill responded to the call. In the second half, he racked up 98 receiving yards, 80 of which came on a game-changing touchdown late in the third quarter.
🗣️ HE'S GOT HILL!!!!! pic.twitter.com/u3gbPcANuz
— Miami Dolphins (@MiamiDolphins) September 8, 2024
Jaylen Waddle stepped up his game too with 77 second half receiving yards.
“It was a cool moment because it was genuine and it was not anything but constructive,” Dolphins coach Mike McDaniel said of Tagovailoa’s halftime speech. “It wasn’t ‘let’s win’ or ‘let’s make plays.’ It was, ‘let’s adhere to our standard,’ which is what a captain and a franchise quarterback have to be that voice to echo. So it was cool to have him beat me to the punch of something if he wouldn’t have said it, I probably would have very closely, holding all of us accountable.”
The growth of Tagovailoa as a vocal leader has been a talking point from several Dolphins player throughout the offseason. On Sunday, the team saw that carry into the regular season.
