On The Plains with Hudson Kaak: 'Try new things'

Hudson Kaak has never watched an American football game in person.

He’s played in plenty of them, of course. But the Auburn senior punter from Seymour, Australia, has never sat in the stands to experience all the trappings and traditions of a gameday at Jordan-Hare Stadium – or anywhere else, for that matter.

In fact, the first time he ever got to see Auburn’s famed pregame eagle flight was at the Argentina vs. Iceland soccer friendly in June.

“I’ve never been to a football game that I’m not playing in,” Kaak said. “In my whole life I’ve never sat and watched a football game in a stadium, which is funny to think about. My friends and family all come over, and they’ll have this whole crazy experience, and I’ve never done that."

If not for a four-year run of one setback after another as a teenager, Kaak might never have experienced American football or culture in any form.

Kaak grew up playing Australian football, or footy, as most Aussie kids do.

“We grow up playing kick-to-kick instead of catch with our dads,” Kaak said. “If you ask most Aussies to throw a ball, we’d be not that great.”

A promising prep career ahead of him, Kaak knew that teams from the Australian Football League were interested in him, and the three final years of high school are key for prospective AFL players to solidify their draft stock.

In 2017, when he was 16, he had an ankle reconstruction and missed significant playing time.

A year later, he had an appendectomy that required a 10-day hospital stay. Complications from that procedure led to internal bleeding, a hematoma, and another lengthy hospital stay.

“I wasn’t able to come back the rest of that year,” Kaak said. “So, I got healthy again that offseason, and I had another year, which was my draft year.

“I played eight games (of a 16-to-20-game season). And all the clubs were excited to watch me again, I’d built up momentum.

“And then I got glandular fever (mononucleosis). I had a bad case of that, I was in hospital for another two weeks with that. So I wasn’t able to do any contact sport for the rest of that season, so that season was written off.”

Normally the AFL drafts players after their 18-year-old season. But the clubs in the league can request an overage exemption – a medical redshirt, if you will – and all 18 clubs wanted to see Kaak play one more season as a 19-year old.

This was in March of 2020.

“We had our first game, I kicked five goals, I was like, this is going to be the season, I’m going to go on to potentially get drafted,” Kaak said. “And then the next week COVID hit and the whole season got canceled.”

With the chances of getting drafted now near zero, Kaak went into selling real estate while still playing part-time in the minor leagues with the hopes that an AFL club would eventually be interested.

“The stars didn’t align for me,” Kaak said. “There was something that was like, this isn’t what you’re supposed to do."

Soon after, he heard from ProKick Australia – a coaching program that trains footy players to punt and kick with the aim of obtaining scholarships to play for American college teams.

“I knew nothing about American football,” he said. “Literally nothing. They asked me what I knew, and I said, ‘Well, I know who Tom Brady is.’ That was about it. That was my whole knowledge. You could have asked me about Cam Newton or Bo Jackson, and I literally knew nothing. I don’t think I would have known any college teams.”

Kaak said that American football has a following in Australia, particularly the NFL, but the 15-hour time difference makes it difficult to follow the sport. A noon game here becomes a 3 a.m. kick there, and Sunday Night Football becomes Monday Morning Football in Australia.

"The games are during the day when everyone’s at work,” he said. “It would be a Monday at 9 a.m., and no one’s sitting at home watching the NFL.”

Through the ProKick program, Kaak signed with Oklahoma State and played there for two years before transferring to Auburn prior to the 2025 season. He said the small-town atmosphere and the community involvement with the university were key factors in his decision to enroll at both schools.

“I’m from a town of 1,000 people,” he said. “Small, country town north of Melbourne. I didn’t want to go to a big city. My comfort zone is a small town, so I loved that about both Auburn and Stillwater.”

Kaak has embraced the Auburn culture and traditions and has introduced his friends and family to them – in many cases, to general astonishment.

"I love the Toomer’s toilet paper,” he said when asked about his favorite Auburn traditions. “When my family comes over and we have a win, taking them there and showing them that, it’s one of the most mind-blowing things. You’ve basically got 80,000 people vandalizing the main street of the town, and that’s a celebrated thing, which makes no sense to most people. If you did that anywhere else, you’d get arrested.”

With his senior year at Auburn upcoming, Kaak is keeping his options open for his post-college career. A shot at the NFL would be a key goal, of course. But in the short-term, he is launching a social media show called “The Gifted,” which will focus on musicians and other artists and the processes that go into creating their works.

"I find it fascinating watching amazing people write music, or painting, things like that,” he said. “The focus of the show will be the process and behind-the-scenes of creating a masterpiece.”

A music lover, Kaak also caught the acting bug during the spring semester when a theatre class turned into an appearance in a campus musical and led to a change in major.

“I was in ‘Sweeney Todd’ in January,” he said. “I just kind of stumbled my way into that. I was in a theatre class, I made some friends in there, and they offered me to audition for the musical. Maybe 130 people auditioned, and I got a part.

“It was so fun, one of the most fun things I’ve done in college. Way, way out of my comfort zone. I was way more nervous performing in front of 400 people than I am in front of 90,000.”

The experience led to him adding a theatre major to his current track of interdisciplinary studies.

Between jumping into the world of American football kicking with no previous experience in the sport, moving to a new country and embracing acting on a whim, Kaak said his philosophy has always been to try new things.

“If an opportunity presents itself, just try it,” he said. “When people ask if I have advice, it would just be, don’t be scared to try something. You just never know what something’s going to lead to.

“Going to the ProKick tryouts, which led to an opportunity to come to America, terrified me. Moving across the world to a place you’ve never been before with no one you know, it’s terrifying. Then when the opportunity came up to do theatre, I was like, don’t be a hypocrite, your message is always to try things.

“Just try anything. You never know what’s going to happen.”