Micah Hatchie was once too big to play football.

Then he went to the University of Washington, where he was told he was too small to start on the offensive line.

Now, the Husky senior, who is 6 feet 5 and 305 pounds, is right where he wants to be.

The rest of the country is starting to notice.

One of four Huskies from Hawaii, Hatchie, who was named honorable mention All-Pac-12 as a junior, will start his 27th consecutive game on Saturday when UW opens the season against Hawaii at Aloha Stadium.

Hatchie, a rare Division I player from Waialua High, had to give up playing Pop Warner on the North Shore when he was in the sixth grade because he was too big.

He didn’t play in a football game again until his freshman year with the Bulldogs, when he joined the varsity team for a preseason game against Honokaa.

Expecting to compete on the junior varsity team that year, Hatchie never missed another game with the varsity squad.

"Once I reached high school I was excited because I could play football again," Hatchie said. "I was supposed to play for the JV, but the varsity had a preseason game up in Honokaa, so they brought me and (teammate) Graham Rowley up to play.

"When we got back, I had a long talk with my family because I wanted to play varsity that year and they finally gave me the ‘OK.’ "

Over the next four years, Hatchie and Rowley grew into Division I prospects who received a lot of attention from coaches around the country.

UW, Stanford, Colorado and Hawaii were some of the schools to offer Rowley, rated a four-star recruit by Scout.com. Rowley eventually went to BYU.

Hatchie, who had offers from UW, Oregon, California, Colorado and Hawaii, planned to stay home and play for the Rainbow Warriors until his parents sat him down at the dinner table one night.

"I was going to pick UH and stay home, but they sat me down and told me not to," Hatchie said. "They were telling me to get off the rock and go experience life outside of the islands and just get away from here.

" ‘Go enjoy your life,’ they said, and I took that to heart and ended up at UW."

It wasn’t easy leaving the islands, but Hatchie wasn’t alone.

Three of the state’s other top recruits chose UW that year — Aiea’s Lawrence Lagafuaina, Mililani’s Taz Stevenson and Kahuku’s Hau’oli Jamora, who has since changed his last name.

Jamora, now Kikaha, was the first to get significant playing time as a freshman but had two ACL injuries that cost him almost all of two seasons.

Lagafuaina could never rise up the depth chart at defensive tackle and Stevenson was on the verge of starting as a sophomore before injuries and a position change hampered his growth.

Hatchie, who was already 6-5 but weighed only 240 pounds, was told right away he would redshirt.

If he ever wanted to play for UW, he had to gain at least 40 pounds.

"I was the lightest lineman when I got here and I had a hard time gaining weight," Hatchie said. "I got to 259, 260 and played in a couple of games but was still too light. It took another year until I finally reached 290 and now I’m 305.

"I feel a lot stronger, a lot better and I can still move around like I used to."

When he lines up at left tackle on Saturday, he’ll see an old friend down the field if he looks hard enough.

Stevenson, who sat out all of last season at UW, earned his bachelor’s degree in the spring and had a year of eligibility remaining.

He walked on at UH this summer and earned a scholarship this week. Stevenson is expected to start at safety against the Huskies.

"We used to kick it on campus. We were all close," Hatchie said. "I’m happy for him because he should have been playing up here."