Not content with becoming the only unbeaten Pac-12 champions in history or shattering the program record for most wins in a single season, the 2023–24 Washington Huskies football team continued to write history in the 2024 NFL Draft.
Only in 1941 were two huskies selected in the top ten, and only in 2015 were three huskies selected in the first round. When Troy Fautanu was selected by Pittsburgh with the 20th overall choice, and Michael Penix Jr. and Rome Odunze went back-to-back (at positions 8 and 9 overall), both those records were tied.
It wasn’t simply a top-heavy class, either. Ten huskies were selected over the course of the three days, shattering the school record for combine invites with 13. The previous record in the Pac-12 era was nine after the 2019 season. Although 11 UW players were taken in the NFL Draft in 1983 and 1992, four of those selections were between rounds eight and twelve. Thus, since the Draft was shifted to seven rounds in 1994, this ties the program record of ten picks (1998).
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Pac-12 records and the Washington football program are broken in the 2024 NFL Draft.
In its final year in existence, the PAC-12 went out with a bang, setting a conference record with 43 total picks —only behind the SEC’s 59—and UW left its mark on that, as no school had more players selected in a single NFL draft than Washington’s ten during the Pac-12 era (since 2011). Moreover, no team in the conference had more total first-round picks than the Huskies during that span, with 12.
Only Michigan (13) and Texas (11) had more of their players selected in the 2024 NFL Draft than Washington, which tied with Alabama and Florida State for third place. However, Washigton led all of college football by total draft value (according to the Fitzgerald-Spielberger chart) mainly helped by the fact that no school had more of its players selected during either the first (3) or second (7) day of the Draft.
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