Shut Out: Wisconsin’s Shocking NFL Draft Goose Egg is a Red Flag for the Fickell Era
For the first time in almost 50 years, no Badgers were taken in the NFL Draft.
The Luke Fickell era has been a disappointment thus far. Three years into his tenure as the head coach of the Wisconsin football program, the Badgers have vastly fallen below expectations.
One particular area of disappointment has been the program’s inability to develop NFL talent. Over the past 20 years, there have always been at least one or two Badgers taken in the first few rounds of the draft and a handful of other players taken in the later rounds. Now, the ‘top’ players on the roster, like Jack Nelson and Hunter Wohler, were barely even 7th-round picks in 2025.
It looked like it was going to be more of the same late-round waiting game this season. Mason Reiger, who played just one season with the Badgers after transferring in from Louisville, looked like he was a near lock to be taken on Day 3, and maybe Vinny Anthony or Lance Mason could sneak in late in the final round.
The rounds ticked away on the third day. Round four, five, six, and finally, the seventh and final round came and went. Not one Badger was drafted.
For the first time since 1978, the Wisconsin football program didn’t get a single player selected.
While it may seem like getting players drafted into the NFL is a secondary or even tertiary goal of a college football program, you have to think that it has a big effect on recruiting. Not only have the Badgers struggled to win games, but if you can’t get players drafted into the NFL, prospects aren’t going to want to go to Wisconsin.
Obviously, if a player is good enough, they’ll get drafted. But if they can go to a program that consistently puts a player at their position into the pros, and the Badgers can’t, it makes it that much harder to convince a recruit to play for the Wisconsin football program.
On the other hand, Fickell and his staff have a really nice start on their 2027 class, which already has a handful of four-star prospects, but can they take that potential and turn them into NFL-caliber players?
There is mounting pressure on this staff to win games and lock down in-state recruiting, but they also need to restore the pro pipeline we have grown so accustomed to over the decades.
It was a pretty disappointing feeling watching the draft this weekend, waiting to hear a Wisconsin Badger called, only to make it all the way to the final pick without hearing a single one.
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