Wisconsin football mailbag: High school recruiting in the NIL era and tampering issues
Our latest Wisconsin football mailbag discusses the importance of high school recruiting in this transfer portal era and touches on tampering.
BadgerNotes.com received a handful of questions about the Wisconsin Badgers football program from our dedicated readers earlier this week.
So, without further adieu, Let's jump into your mailbag questions...
How does Wisconsin’s reliance on high school recruiting fit into the current college football landscape with NIL and the transfer portal? In my opinion, it feels like a total waste of time and resources since nobody sticks it out at the place they committed to anymore.
There's a lot to unpack with this one, so let's start here: The Wisconsin football program’s 2025 recruiting class officially put pen to paper, and with that, there are plenty of reasons to be optimistic about how Luke Fickell and the Badgers staff fared in the cycle.
The Badgers signed 24 scholarship recruits (now 23)—spanning 14 states in the early signing period, earning a 247Sports Composite class score of 227.72, which sits at 27th nationally and 8th in the Big Ten conference.
Led by the tag team of Pat Lambert and Max Stienecker, they secured eight four-star prospects and 15 three-stars, made up of nine offensive and 14 defensive players. This balanced haul reflects Wisconsin’s focus on building out depth across the team's roster—specifically, in the trenches.
“You’ve got to rely upon young guys a lot more,” Fickell said on National Signing Day. “And whether that’s in every program or not, what we’re seeing is the trend will continue. Those second-year guys, one of two things: they either can’t play, maybe at that point in time or [they] don’t see themselves playing there. So, to me, I see 25, 30 guys you’ve got to bring in every year, high school guys.
"You’ve got to get them to trust and believe and be able to develop them and get them on the field at an earlier age," Fickell continued. "And these guys are going to have that opportunity.”
Let's call a spade a spade: the on-field product wasn’t great this past season. Player movement through the transfer portal is inevitable. And yes, college football is undeniably changing. But none of that diminishes the significance of landing high-level high school talent.
For Wisconsin to rebuild and sustain success, securing young talent is the foundation. Development and retention are crucial steps in the process—but those steps can’t happen without first bringing that talent to Madison.
Not long ago, you could count on a solid head coach delivering a consistent range of outcomes—between 10-2 and 7-5. But in today’s college football landscape, that kind of stability is nearly impossible to replicate without the ability to recruit players with the traits you want, invest three-plus years into their development, and position yourself to have a "next man up" ready to step in season after season.
Nowadays, even an elite coach might see his team swing anywhere from 12-0 to 4-8, and much of that isn’t directly tied to his ability to coach a football team, in my opinion. External factors such as the transfer portal, tampering (we'll get to that later), NIL, and the ever-changing recruiting ecosystem—often have a more significant impact. For programs that depend on player development rather than consistently landing top-10 to 15 recruiting classes, even a proven head coach can stumble into a turbulent season. Fans and administrations need to recognize that reality.
That's not to give Luke Fickell a pass for this past season—quite the opposite. I've been as critical of what we've seen on the field as anyone.
But here's where the optimism comes in: this recruiting class represents an essential step in the right direction. Wisconsin isn’t a program that can overhaul its roster every offseason through the transfer portal with major difference-makers like some bluebloods. The money isn't there for that.
Instead, Wisconsin will need to succeed in finding players who fit its culture, developing them over time, and blending those efforts with a few targeted transfers to fill gaps, much like it always has. Then, the Badgers staff has to do whatever it takes to find the necessary funds to keep them. I'm of the belief that most of the players in this program don’t want to leave. This isn't just a stepping stone for the vast majority of guys who come here.
With that said, signing 19 blue-chip recruits in the past two cycles is a noteworthy shift from the program's historical norm, and it reflects a process that could potentially lead to long-term success.
Ironically, landing better recruits on paper hasn’t historically translated to more success at Wisconsin. But for the “stars don’t matter” crowd, there’s a clear national trend—teams with a roster made up of more than 50% blue-chip recruits are the ones that are consistently in the conversation as legitimate contenders. So, it has to count for something.
What Fickell and his staff have done is raise the recruiting floor. This class won’t instantly cure all of Wisconsin’s issues, but it gives the program a better starting point moving forward if they can keep the better part of those classes together. The challenge then becomes translating these efforts into results. Development is non-negotiable, but so is retention in an era where top recruits can be poached in the blink of an eye.
Building a program takes time, talent, and consistency—especially with younger players being counted on to contribute earlier in their careers to keep them invested. I don’t envy coach Fickell or his staff; the position they’re in right now is a tough one. Without $15–20 million annually to piece together a roster, I honestly don’t know how anyone is supposed to build something truly sustainable in today’s college football landscape.
Tampering feels like it's out of control in college football. How on earth is someone supposed to build a program anymore? Can it be fixed? Is Wisconsin screwed?
That’s a great question because tampering really has become one of the biggest challenges in college football today. It’s frustrating for fans, coaches, and players alike. The transfer portal was supposed to empower student-athletes and create additional opportunities, but instead, it’s turned into a free-for-all where tampering has become commonplace.
Wisconsin's head coach, Luke Fickell, spoke openly about this when asked about the difficulties this new reality has brought to his program.
The Badgers, who currently have 25 outgoing transfers, suffered a massive blow with the departure of freshman cornerback Xavier Lucas, who announced he was leaving the football program after one season in Madison. Lucas’ decision was unexpected, leaving fans to come to terms with the forces that are at play behind the scenes.
“I would tell you that, and this is the truth. I think every kid is being recruited right now,” Fickell said on 97.3 The Game. “The issue is not just the kids in the transfer portal, and that’s probably the most alarming thing of all—it’s making it almost impossible to know where you’re headed because there’s an open line to everybody.”
As Fickell pointed out, there’s a growing concern about other programs and coaches reaching out to athletes still on their current teams, using NIL opportunities and other incentives to lure them away—an unfortunate reality of the shifting nature of college football in this era.
So, how do you deal with it? For Fickell, the solution begins at home.
“It’s got to start with your own program. It’s got to start with your own team, and then you’ve got to find a way to move the thing forward," Fickell explained. "And being able to retain your own team in a lot of ways—that also means the ones that you need to be able to retain, I think, is where you’ve got to continue to focus."
This focus on retention has become an increasingly complex task for Wisconsin coaches. What was once an environment built on relationships and development now feels more like free agency. And they know damn well that if a talented young player isn't earning snaps, someone is more than likely in their ear nudging them to explore greener pastures.
Programs are left to grapple with the uncertainty of who might be targeted next, whether they can fill that void if they do transfer, and how to navigate a system seemingly designed without proper safeguards or a uniform set of rules everyone must follow. All teams are operating with a salary cap of available funds. However, that number is drastically different depending on what college football program you're talking about.
Tampering isn’t just a Wisconsin problem—it’s a college football problem. Other teams are actively reaching out to players who are not in the portal, promising lucrative NIL deals and leveraging the "system" to their advantage. Respect among programs has eroded, leaving coaches like Fickell in a constant battle to protect and rebuild their rosters each year.
"I think it's almost like it's going to have to maybe get so broken that they figure out some way of having a little bit more structure to it," said Fickell. "But I'm not one of those to sit here and complain because you can catch yourself running down a rabbit hole and miss the opportunities that are in front of you, and things pass you by. But it's tough. It's not just tough for us to navigate; it's tough for these kids to navigate, too."
While the transfer portal is designed to empower student-athletes and provide them with more opportunities to capitalize on their name, image, and likeness, its current iteration is unsustainable and has left programs like Wisconsin—and those even further down the pecking order—in an even more precarious position.
As tampering becomes more prevalent, Fickell’s comments reflect the need for regulations to ensure some form of continuity and accountability across the FBS. Player compensation has been long overdue, but the lack of guidelines for NIL and the transfer portal is hurting college football, and there needs to be a clear-cut set of rules, perhaps even contracts.
Until meaningful changes are made, this is the reality we’re stuck with. Tampering has become a part of college football, and there’s no denying—it’s frustrating. To answer the last part of your question, it would be hypocritical to say Wisconsin is screwed when they’re likely playing the same game with schools beneath them. But when it comes to programs with deeper pockets, there's not much they can do about it.
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