ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- The past few seasons have been tough on Michigan football tight end Hogan Hansen. Hansen got some early run in his freshman year, in 2024, playing behind Colston Loveland and Marlin Klein. He only had seven catches for 78 yards and a touchdown, but he appeared to be the heir apparent to Loveland as a premier pass-catching tight end. But in 2025, Hansen was injured and only appeared in four games, with just six catches for 74 yards. Injuries persisted into 2026, but Hansen has played in six of Michigan's eight games and has started to come on strong the past few weeks.
He has a career-high 13 catches for 128 yards, with his best effort having come against Indiana, when he had four receptions for 34 yards.
"I think it just happened
naturally," Hansen said on Tuesday. "Just like finally putting together a full, complete season, being healthy, stacking weeks on weeks, and just the way our offense has naturally developed over the year."
Given that he hasn't been able to get into a rhythm until recently, it's simply been a situation where he's getting more playing time and getting more acclimated as the weeks go by. Thus, the more he plays, the more comfortable he's getting. And that's resulting in production.
"I wouldn't say it's too difficult in terms of like playing football," Hansen said. "I just think it's just a benefit to be able to stack weeks and not have to wait or be able to take a coaching point and apply it right away the next week and continuously get better that way."
The tight ends weren't heavily utilized in the early going of the season, much to the consternation of Wolverines fans. But their use in the pass game has increased in recent weeks. Hansen has had seven catches in the past two weeks, Jalen Hoffman has four of his seven catches in that span, and Mason Bonner got his first career reception (for 27 yards) last week.
Hansen says that he's happy to see that they're getting more utility, but it's not just that offensive coordinator Jason Beck is changing his philosophy -- the tight ends are stepping up, as well.
"I just think it's just kind of happened naturally over the season, and I think, if I'm not mistaken, we even said like, I don't think anyone in the tight end (room) would believe we're playing up to our standard at the start of the year," Hansen said. "And I think we've really developed and gotten better week by week. So it's been good to see how we come through on Saturdays."
They'll have another chance to make an impact on Saturday, when Michigan football hosts rival Michigan State at The Big House. Kickoff is at 7:40 p.m. EST, and the game will be broadcast on the streaming service Peacock.
This article originally appeared on Wolverines Wire: Michigan football TE Hogan Hansen explains recent rise in production
