The Florida Gators made history in the 2026 NFL Draft by having at least one player selected in each of the seven rounds. This marks the third draft in four years with at least six players drafted.
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Florida Gators make school history following 2026 NFL Draft originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
The Florida Gators came out of the 2026 NFL Draft having joined an elite list of college teams in history. They saw at least one player from last season's roster drafted in each of the seven rounds.
It started off with defensive tackle Caleb Banks being selected with the 18th pick of the first round by the Minnesota Vikings. Each round, they had one player drafted in rounds 2-5.
This also marks the third draft in four years that Florida has sent at least six players to the NFL, and the sixth time in the last seven years that they’ve had a player drafted in the first round.
There are several other key teams to have completed this stat. Just last year, in the 2025 NFL Draft, both the Texas Longhorns and sent 10+ players each to the NFL, which included at least one player in every single round. In 2022, did the same with 10 players.
The Florida Gators had a total of seven players drafted in the 2026 NFL Draft.
Defensive tackle Caleb Banks was the first player selected from the Florida Gators, picked 18th overall by the Minnesota Vikings.
The Florida Gators became one of the few college teams to have at least one player drafted in each of the seven rounds of the NFL Draft.
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Florida is the only team, though in recent history, to have done this with fewer than 10 players selected in the entirety of the draft.
There have also been plenty of close calls. In this year's 2026 draft, Alabama was a third-round pick away from joining that list. Arguably the best draft class in the modern draft era, the 2020 LSU class came close as well, only missing a fifth-round draft pick.
We’ll get our first look at the Gators rookie class come May 11th, when the rookie mini camps begin, and they are required to report to team facilities.