MORE: 2021 Spring Football Coverage Central

It began with an unexpected phone call. And it blossomed into a job offer that Mark Hagen couldn’t refuse.

“To have a head coach like Jeff Brohm reach out to you and say, ‘Hey there's interest. Can we get together and talk?’ ” Hagen said.

Now, Hagen finds himself back on familiar ground in West Lafayette, where he worked as an assistant in various capacities from 2000-10 first under Joe Tiller and then Danny Hope.