All we know for certain to be different is that Alastair Clarkson has changed polos, and Gunston can now grow a full beard.

A baby-faced 21-year-old Gunston was left out of the side in round 10 of 2012 when the Hawks and Kangaroos played in front of more than 16,000 Tasmanians.

Gunston was in his first year down at Waverley Park after coming across from the Adelaide Crows. Having featured early in the season in Hawthorn’s team, the Hawks’ then-coach Clarkson elected to drop Gunston after round 4, and he wouldn’t come back into the fold until after Franklin’s big day out.

Gunston wouldn’t be overlooked much longer though, instead becoming the centrepiece of Hawthorn’s forward line, which had a massive void to fill after Franklin left for Sydney a couple of years later.

Four months after Buddy’s brilliance in Launceston, the Hawks would ironically come up heartbreakingly short against the Swans in that year’s Grand Final by 10 points. Amidst the misery though emerged arguably the greatest team of all-time, with Gunston playing a starring role.

Hawthorn returned to the Grand Final in 2013 knowing Franklin would likely be wearing the brown and gold for the last time. Any worries about the future of the forward line were put to rest that day though, with Gunston’s game-high four goals taking the spotlight from Franklin, who finished with just one.

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In the aftermath of Buddy’s departure, Gunston would boot 58 and 57 goals in 2014 and 2015 respectively, coinciding with two more flags for the Hawks. Another four-goal haul in 2015’s Grand Final triumph over West Coast meant Gunston could’ve retired then and there, and forever been a Hawthorn legend – and he was only 23.

Gunston would stick around though, remaining a familiar face at the club as they transitioned from the kings of the league into a rebuild. Key pillars of their premiership teams would eventually follow Franklin through the door, as Hodge, Lewis and Mitchell disturbingly donned different colours to end their careers. Meanwhile, fellow stars in Rioli, Roughead and Burgoyne departed the game for good.

The Hawks looked to reset along the way, recruiting ball magnets to the club such as Tom Mitchell and Jaeger O’Meara. But they were never able to reach the heights of those legendary teams of the mid-2010’s, and eventually that core, including Gunston and Clarkson, would also be out the door by the end of 2022.

Having become less productive in front of goal and facing more challenges with his body, Gunston was recruited by Brisbane for one last run at a flag and a likely retirement tour before he sailed off into the Queensland sunset.

(Photo by Michael Willson/AFL Photos via Getty Images)

The Lions would get all the way to within a kick of a premiership in Gunston’s lone year at the club, losing by four points to Collingwood, with the Pies’ new recruit in Mitchell playing a key role. But Gunston was nowhere to be seen for the Lions, unable to make his way back into the lineup after an injury late in the season.

With a new system, form struggles and an unfortunate run of injuries, Gunston never seemed comfortable up in Brisbane. Having spent just the one year away from the Hawks, he would request a move back to the club in the wake of the Lions’ Grand Final defeat.

It was a move that was said to have taken both the Lions and Hawks by surprise, and puzzled pundits, with former two-time premiership player David King questioning what Gunston had left to offer in his assessment.

“He’s not quite there at Brisbane – what’s left?” King wondered for News Corp.

Regardless, Gunston would get his wish, with the Hawks bringing him back, and the expectation being that he’d just play a leadership role for a rebuilding team.

Early on, with Hawthorn at 0-5 and fielding a relatively inexperienced team, everything was just about going to script. Gunston had taken rising star Calsher Dear under his wing for 2024, helping the fourth-round pick smash expectations in his first year at AFL level.

“The amount of experience that has been passed down to me from players at the club, especially Jack (Gunston), has just been so huge for me and the start of my career,” Dear said in 2024.

But the tide would change abruptly at Waverley, with the Hawks winning 14 of their last 18 to storm into a shock finals appearance, with Gunston playing a key role. Gunston would average 1.6 goals a game in 18 contests en route to a semi-final appearance, an improvement on 1.3 in his year with Brisbane.

But after another season’s worth of wear and tear on his body, nobody could’ve expected Gunston to repeat those efforts in 2025, despite many tipping the Hawks to go even deeper into September. Although Hawthorn have somewhat stagnated in their development this year to sit rather unconvincingly at fifth on the ladder, Gunston has been playing like one of the best key forwards in the competition, recapturing his form from a decade ago.

Gunston is third in the league in goals per game, with an average of 2.9 from 12 contests, making him the oldest player with an average of more than two. He has been active in front of the sticks, averaging the most shots at goal in the competition, with some slight accuracy issues and lack of games played being the only thing holding him back from being a real contender for the Coleman medal.

His form has taken many by surprise, and forced some greats of the game to admit that they may have written the 33-year-old off too early, including Matthew Lloyd.

“What a smart player is Jack Gunston,” Lloyd said on the Sunday Footy Show.

“I must admit, I’ve said a number of times I think it’s over for Jack, and I’ve got that wrong because of the form he is in.”