Idaho kicker Ricardo Chavez puts the ‘special’ in special teams with perfect start to season

MOSCOW, Idaho – Ormanie Arnold’s scoop and score Saturday with time expiring after Sacramento State fumbled the kickoff perfectly capped Idaho’s 36-27 victory over the second-ranked Hornets in the Vandals’ home opener.

The victory was secured, however, when Ricardo Chavez broke a 27-all tie by nailing a 30-yard field goal with 1 second left.

“This is something we thought about in the offseason and fall camp,” Chavez said. “We knew we were going to get a game-winning kick one day. Imagine if it was here at home.”

The win lifted the Vandals (3-1, 1-0 Big Sky Conference) to No. 4 in the STATS Perform FCS poll heading into Saturday’s game at Eastern Washington University, 19th in the poll.

Chavez won his second Big Sky Special Teams Player of the Week award after kicking three field goals, including one of 50 yards, and three extra points against the Hornets. It follows his first Big Sky award after making four field goals and three extra points in a 33-6 victory against Nevada of the Mountain West Conference and Football Bowl Subdivision.

Idaho’s kicking game is perfect on extra-points attempts and 8 for 8 on field-goal attempts. The team consists of long snapper Hogan Hatten, a senior; holder LJ Harm, a sophomore; and Chavez, another senior.

“Every time I am interviewed, I try to give compliments to them as much as I can,” Chavez said of his teammates.

“We feel the love, regardless,” Hatten said.

The trio has worked together about four months. All three are golfers, and Hatten said there are similarities between the sports.

“Millimeters matter,” Hatten said.

“Golf is my thing,” he added, pointing out he owned the low score for June on the University of Idaho course.

Chavez, who said Hatten introduced him to golf, likens a golf swing to a successful kick – “head down, follow through.”

Harm, who graduated from Mead High School before spending a year at Ventura (California) College as a punter and kicker, joined the Vandals last spring. He was an all-league punter in California’s All-Northern Conference and competed with Chavez throughout the spring for the Vandals’ punting job. Chavez won that competition, but Harm, in a text before they met, pointed out to Chavez, his roommate, “I can also hold.”

“Let’s see it,” Chavez replied, and began spinning snaps his way in their living room and watching Harm’s placements.

“I am impressed with LJ’s coachability,” Hatten said. “He just wants to get better and better. He wants to learn.”

Harm replaced graduated Vandals tight end and holder Connor Whitney. Chavez said Whitney, as a holder, was “a freak of nature as an athlete,” but Hatten points out that Harm is even more precise as a holder.

As much as they are growing in sync, the three are still learning about each other. Chavez, who came to football from soccer, is a left-footed punter and right-footed kicker.

“(As a goalkeeper) I would kick as hard as I can left-footed and when I was kicking on the ground, I would kick right-footed,” Chavez said

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“We feel we are playing at a championship caliber, a team within the team,” Hatten said of the connection between snapper, holder and kicker.

The natural outgrowth of that was developing a celebration after successful field goals. Hatten and Chavez would dance the salsa, and Harm and Chavez would do “desk pop guns” in the air, according to Hatten.

“(Idaho coach Jason Eck) kind of shut that down,” Hatten said.

“We did it one time in Nevada,” Hatten said.

Their practices are typical of football specialists. One day this week, while the offenses and defenses ran plays, Hatten and Harm spent much of a workout running 50-yard striders across the practice field. Chavez, who suffered a minor injury against Sacramento State, pulled on the handles of a rowing machine. For the kicker and holder, this might have echoed how practice has always been. But Hatten was a linebacker for the Vandals before he agreed to concentrate on long snapping as a senior.

Eck said last spring it is a useful trend in college football for teams to have dedicated long snappers. Hatten, who has dreams of playing professionally, said he agreed to give up playing defense in an effort to stay healthy and put on weight to impress NFL scouts and “to help the team.”

As a freshman linebacker, Hatten said, he was with the Vandals for a game at Penn State when Idaho’s long snapper skipped the first two snaps to the punter.

“It was all hands on deck,” Hatten said. “I didn’t want to tell the coaches I could long snap. But I did.”

He points out he has started 44 games for the Vandals as either a linebacker or long snapper.

“At the end of this year, it will be 51, or if we win the (FCS) championship, 55,” he said.

Hatten considers Idaho’s win against Sacramento State as the best one in his Vandals career.

“Even bigger than beating Montana in Montana last year.” he said.

EWU’s notably windy field in Cheney will test them, Hatten said, but the winner against the Hornets will always be remembered.

“That was like winning the lottery,” he said. “It does not come around that often. I long snapped four years in college, four years in high school, and four years before that.

“That was my first game-winning kick.”