In May 2020, McAtamney became interested in American football after noticing, through Twitter, Irish punter David Shanahan accept an athletic scholarship to play college football in the U.S. for the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets.[5] He bought some equipment on eBay and began practicing at a local Gaelic football field.[5] He recorded himself and sent a message to Shanahan, who referred McAtamney to ProKick Australia, a program to help develop college football punters and placekickers.[5]
Those at ProKick were impressed by McAtamney but he was unable to travel to Australia due to COVID-19 restrictions.[5] After several months, Tom Hackett offered to work with him and Shanahan in the U.S., in January 2021.[5] The two trained for two weeks in Serbia and then were cleared to travel.[6] He trained with Hackett for several months and was able to consistently make 50-yard field goals in practice.[5] He later returned to Swatragh and continued training, being able to make field goals of over 60 yards by June 2021.[5]
In July 2021, McAtamney received and accepted a scholarship offer to play for the Chowan Hawks of Chowan University in North Carolina, an NCAA Division II program.[5][7][8] In his first season, he appeared in nine games and made 6-of-10 field goal attempts and converted all 47 of his extra point tries, also having 60 kickoffs with 19 touchbacks.[5] He entered the NCAA transfer portal after the year and underwent training with ProKick in Australia in the 2022 off-season.[5]
McAtamney ultimately transferred to the FBS-level Rutgers Scarlet Knights and won the starting placekicker role.[9] That season, he was successful on 12-of-18 field goals, with a long of 49 yards, and made 23-of-24 extra points in 12 games played.[4][10] He was the team's leading scorer with 59 total points and also made 47 kickoffs for 2,787 yards with 17 touchbacks.[4] In his last year,[a] he only attempted one field goal, a miss, after having been replaced by Jai Patel, but remained the kickoff specialist, posting a team record 40 touchbacks on 60 kickoffs.[4][11]
Having been called up off the practice squad onto the Giants roster,[17] McAtamney made his NFL debut against the Washington Commanders on 3 November 2024, kicking an extra point and a 31-yard field goal.[18][19]
Notes
^McAtamney only had three years of eligibility in college football due to having attended St Mary's University College, Belfast, for a time.[3][4]
