Thanks to his Lions beating the Seahawks, Hogan Hatten’s Idaho homecoming has been extra happy

Fresh from helping his Detroit Lions dismantle the Seattle Seahawks on Monday, long snapper Hogan Hatten headed to Moscow.

While many of his newly minted University of Idaho alum colleagues are probably making coffee, taking lunch orders and projecting an eager aura at meetings while they get their careers under way as junior members of companies, Hatten, at age 24, is one of 32 people in the world entrusted with delivering a football on target and with velocity to the holders and punters of the multi-billion-dollar enterprise that is the National Football League.

Hatten performed the same service for the Vandals and played linebacker from 2019 to 2023. When he learned about three weeks ago that the Lions’ bye week dovetailed with Idaho’s homecoming, the Lions rookie says “there was a 100-percent chance that I would be back in Moscow.”

He has been making the rounds this week in a nether world where he can visit former teammates and old haunts as the familiar figure he was as recently as four months ago while at the same time being an emissary from the adult world with insights on how to get from here to there.

“I have been driving through the city absorbing the energy of being around town again,” he says. “There are things here I will remember forever.”

As a recent former Vandal, “I overwhelmingly appreciate these coaches, this program.

“I really wanted to come back, show my appreciation, and give these young guys a sense of how amazing this place is. I really want to get around and see some important faces that need to be told ‘thank you,’”

At the same time as he was reconnecting with old teammates at practice Wednesday, Hatten offered “I think they can look at me as something they can be, as well.”

With both the perspective of a college football player and a pro, Hatten says “the crazy part is it is not that much different. It is just as high stress.” For the Vandals “making this team is these guys’ Super Bowl. For me, it was playing in my first preseason game.”

But there is an understood imperative among NFL players “if you are not getting better, you are getting out of the league,” Hatten says, and at the same time there is a heady rush of playing in the NFL that cannot be duplicated.

“If you could bottle the emotion of walking out of an NFL tunnel and sell that, there would be none left. It is the best drug in the world,” he says.

As an NFL rookie who has made a team “you feel like you are on the best team in the world,” says Hatten, and with the highly regarded 3-1 Lions, “I am in a special situation. We might actually be the best team in the world.”

Detroit is enjoying a renaissance both as a city reimagining itself after emerging from decades of decline in assembly line auto manufacturing and with the formerly woeful Lions, Hatten says. This makes it a great place to represent as an athlete.

“The city is very proud of what they have built, what they have become,” he says. “I think the city sees the football team as part of their work.”

In Monday’s 42-29 win over the Seahawks, Hatten recorded his first NFL tackle against punt returner Dee Williams, and while making the rounds of Moscow, he brought a jersey worn in that game to Marc Trivelpiece, owner of the Corner Club, which in addition to its reputation as the center of the social world for generations of UI students is also home to a trove of Vandals athletics memorabilia. Hatten negotiated with Trivelpiece to have his framed jersey displayed next to a plaque honoring the pass receiving records of his brother, Hayden Hatten. Having had it pointed out to him that the framed jersey is larger than the plaque, Hogan Hatten laughed

“The guy is a legend here,” he said of his all-America brother. “He can slap me around in Idaho any time he wants.”

While he is town, Hatten plans to make the most of the alum-returning-for-homecoming experience. He expects to be at the traditional bonfire Friday, and when Idaho plays Northern Arizona Saturday, a team Hatten played four times as a Vandal, he is as devoid of pity as any rabid alum.

“There is not a school in the world I want to beat more,” says the Arizona native. “They looked my brother and I in the face and said we were not good enough to play there.”

Even as he making his way at the pinnacle of professional football, during his week-long break from that world Hatten seems to be getting the hang of this alumni thing, too.

“This will be my first bonfire as a fan,” he notes. “This will be my first game as a fan. At the end of the day, that’s what we all are, fans.”