DENVER — The emotion was everywhere inside the visiting locker room. Nowhere was it more obvious than on the face of Nathaniel Hackett.
This was a man who lived a nightmare coaching the Broncos for 15 games — and 15 games only — a year ago. This was a man who had endured an uncalled for verbal attack from the man who replaced him, Sean Payton.
Now, he had just finished living a dream.
His new team knew what this game meant to him in his return to Empower Stadium at Mile High — even if he wouldn’t talk about it during the week. They handed him this 31-21 victory, and then he was handed the game ball.
Payback for Hack.
And then he spoke to this team that loves him and rallied around him and fought to win this game and keep a season alive the way his previous team never did.
Nathaniel Hackett got his revenge against Sean Payton and the Broncos on Sunday. AP“He’s trying not to be too emotional, but he was pretty emotional, and he was extremely appreciative of the defense, the way the offense came out in the second half, and how we fought … it felt heartfelt, coming from the bottom of his heart,” Laken Tomlinson told The Post. “We fight for him, man. We love Coach Hackett, and we’d go to battle any day for him.”
In every corner of the locker room, you heard those words. Aaron Rodgers’ guy is everyone’s guy.
“You could tell it was the first time he kind of broke his straight face not mentioning any of that,” Connor McGovern said.
Hackett wanted this game to be about everything and anything but him, but the Jets wouldn’t let it be.
Jets tight end C.J. Uzomah had Nathaniel Hackett’s back on Sunday. APIt started with C.J. Uzomah’s pregame speech in the huddle.
“Their coach made this personal. … Well, f–k him and f–k them. Let’s go win this s–t for Nathaniel Hackett,” Uzomah said.“Let’s win this b—h for Hack.”
No one won this b—h for Hack more than Breece Hall (22 carries, 177 yards, one touchdown, three catches, 17 yards receiving) in his return to the place where he tore his left ACL a year ago.
“Mostly, [I wanted to win] for Coach Hackett. I wasn’t even worried about myself today. He stayed quiet; he stayed humble, respectful,” Hall said, “so we wanted to come in to get a win today for him, and we did that.
Breece Hall returned to the stadium where he tore his ACL last season. AP“Better coach, better team won.”
Rodgers tweeted a photo of a red heart to honor and congratulate his friend.
“He’s a great coach,” Tyler Conklin said, “but he’s a better person. We’re all blessed to be able to play for him. To get that win for him here, after everything he’s been through, that was really big for us as a group.”
Head coach Robert Saleh beamed when he was asked about giving Hackett the game ball.
“It was a special game for Hack,” Saleh said. “Racked up over 400 yards on ’em.”
Zach Wilson threw a fourth-quarter interception and made three early errors — throwing underneath to Uzomah at the end of the first half with no timeouts and then showing no urgency to clock the ball as time ran out before a potential field goal try.
“Whether he said much this week about it or not, It meant a lot to this team for him,” Wilson said.
Sauce Gardner mocked Russell Wilson’s “Broncos Country, Let’s Ride” slogan afterward, tweeting: “Jets Country, Let’s Ride.”
“It’s a great win to get for Hack,” Garrett Wilson said. “Obviously, he was emotional about it with the situation and how things went down over there, and for good reason. It was important for us as players to make right on that and get a win for him.”
Good for Nathaniel Hackett.
“When someone talks s–t about one of us or one of our coaches or anybody in the building, we want to have their back,” Uzomah said. “We wanted to win for Hack and make him proud and make him proud [to] be back on this field looking across and knowing that we did everything we can to come out with this win and we did.”
Payback for Hack.
