College football's national champions from the 2017-18 season also were champions on NFL Draft weekend.
Alabama exited Saturday with a whopping 12 players drafted -- including four in the first round -- breaking both the school and SEC record for most players taken by in a single draft. This surpasses the Crimson Tide's 2017 mark when they had 10 players taken. While Alabma did not break the record for most players taken in a single year -- Five Thirty Eight has a full breakdown on that -- it does come close to the modern era record of 14 set by Ohio State in 2004.
Furthermore, this continues to show how well coach Nick Saban and his staff develop players. For reference, as Alabama pointed out on its Twitter account, all 11 defensive starters from the 2016 opener have now had their name called on draft weekend in the past two years.
With Shaun Dion Hamilton's selection by the Redskins today, all 11 of @alabamafootball's 2016 season-opening defensive starters have been selected in the last two NFL Drafts Nine were chosen in the first three rounds. #NFLDraft #RollTide #BamaDraft pic.twitter.com/wUeecV8tH6
— Alabama Football (@AlabamaFTBL) April 28, 2018
Alabama may have won draft weekend, but plenty of other teams had a big few days as well. LSU, NC State and Ohio State each had seven players drafted. In fact, the entire NC State starting defensive line was picked up. Florida State, Georgia, Miami and Penn State had six players taken, and Florida, UCLA, Virginia Tech and Washington were among those schools with five players drafted.
Check out the full breakdown of picks by school (highest pick):
- Alabama -- 11 (Minkah Fitzpatrick, No. 11 to Dolphins)
- Appalachian State -- 1 (Colby Gossett, No. 213 to Vikings)
- Arkansas -- 2 (Frank Ragnow, No. 20 to Lions)
- Arizona -- 1 (Dane Cruikshank, No. 152 to Titans)
- Arizona State -- 3 (Kalen Ballage, No. 131 to Dolphins)
- Auburn -- 4 (Braden Smith, No. 37 to Colts)
- Boise State -- 2 (Leighton Vander Esch, No. 19 to Cowboys)
- Boston College -- 3 (Harold Landry, No. 41 to Titans)
- BYU -- 1 (Fred Warner, No. 70 to 49ers)
- Cal -- 2 (Devante Downs, No. 225 to Vikings)
- Central Michigan -- 1 (Tyler Conklin, No. 157 to Vikings)
- Cincinnati -- 1 (Korey Cunningham, No. 254 to Cardinals)
- Clemson -- 3 (Dorian O'Daniel, No. 100 to Chiefs)
- Colorado -- 1 (Isaiah Oliver, No. 58 to Falcons)
- Colorado State -- 1 (Michael Gallup, No. 81 to Cowboys)
- Florida -- 5 (Taven Bryan, No. 29 to Jaguars)
- Florida State -- 6 (Derwin James, No. 17 to Chargers)
- FIU -- 1 (Alex McGough, No. 220 to Seahawks)
- Georgia -- 6 (Roquan Smith, No. 8 to Bears)
- Houston -- 1 (Matthew Adams, No. 221 to Colts)
- Indiana -- 2 (Ian Thomas, No. 101 to Panthers)
- Iowa -- 3 (James Daniels, No. 39 to Bears)
- Kansas -- 1 (Dorance Armstrong, No. 116 to Cowboys)
- Kansas State -- 1 (D.J. Reed, No. 142 to 49ers)
- Louisiana-Lafayette -- 2 (Tracy Walker, No. 82 to Lions)
- Louisiana Tech -- 1 (Boston Scott, No. 201 to Saints)
- Louisville -- 4 (Jaire Alexander, No. 18 to Packers)
- LSU -- 7 (Donte Jackson, No. 55 to Panthers)
- Maryland -- 2 (D.J. Moore, No. 24 to Panthers)
- Memphis -- 2 (Anthony Miller, No. 51 to Bears)
- Miami -- 6 (Chad Thomas, No. 67 to Browns)
- Michigan -- 2 (Mason Cole, No. 97 to Cardinals)
- Michigan State -- 1 (Brian Allen, No. 111 to Rams)
- Middle Tennessee -- 1 (Richie James, No. 240 to 49ers)
- Mississippi State -- 4 (Martinas Rankin, No. 80 to Texans)
- Missouri -- 1 (J'Mon Moore, No. 133 to Packers)
- NC State -- 7 (Bradley Chubb, No. 5 to Broncos)
- Nebraska -- 1 (Tanner Lee, No. 203 to Jaguars)
- Nevada -- 1 (Austin Corbett, No. 33 to Browns)
- New Mexico -- 1 (Jason Sanders, No. 229 to Dolphins)
- New Mexico State -- 1 (Jaleel Scott, No. 132 to Ravens)
- North Carolina -- 3 (M.J. Stewart, No. 53 to Bucs)
- Northwestern -- 1 (Justin Jackson, No. 251 to Chargers)
- Notre Dame -- 4 (Quenton Nelson, No. 6 to Colts)
- Ohio -- 1 (Quentin Poling, No. 227 to Dolphins)
- Ohio State -- 7 (Denzel Ward, No. 4 to Browns)
- Oklahoma --4 (Baker Mayfield, No. 1 to Browns)
- Oklahoma State -- 4 (James Washington, No. 60 to Steelers)
- Ole Miss -- 4 (Breeland Speaks, No. 46 to Chiefs)
- Oregon -- 2 (Royce Freeman, No. 71 to Broncos)
- Penn State -- 6 (Saquon Barkley, No. 2 to Giants)
- Pitt -- 3 (Brian O'Neill, No. 62 to Vikings)
- Purdue -- 1 (Ja'Whaun Bentley, No. 143 to Patriots)
- Rutgers -- 2 (Kemoko Turay, No. 52 to Colts)
- San Diego State -- 2 (Rashaad Penny, No. 27 to Seahawks)
- San Jose State -- 1 (Jermaine Kelly, No. 222 to Texans)
- SMU -- 3 (Courtland Sutton, No. 40 to Broncos)
- South Carolina -- 1 (Hayden Hurst, No. 25 to Ravens)
- South Florida -- 2 (Deadrin Senat, No. 90 to Falcons)
- Southern Miss -- 3 (Tarvarius Moore, No. 95 to 49ers)
- Stanford -- 4 (Justin Reid, No. 68 to Texans)
- Syracuse -- 1 (Zaire Franklin, No. 235 to Colts)
- TCU -- 3 (Joe Noteboom, No. 89 to Rams)
- Temple -- 2 (Jake Martin, No. 186 to Seahawks)
- Tennessee -- 3 (Rashaan Gaulden, No. 85 to Panthers)
- Texas -- 4 (Connor Williams, No. 50 to Cowboys)
- Texas A&M -- 3 (Christian Kirk, No. 47 to Cardinals)
- Texas Tech -- 2 (Keke Coutee, No. 103 to Texans)
- Toledo -- 1 (Logan Woodside, No. 249 to Bengals)
- Tulane -- 2 (Parry Nickerson, No 179 to Jets)
- UCF -- 4 (Mike Hughs, No. 30 to Vikings)
- UCLA -- 5 (Josh Rosen, No. 10 to Cardinals)
- UConn -- 1 (Folorunso Fatukasi, No. 180 to Jets)
- USC -- 4 (Sam Darnold, No. 3 to Jets)
- Utah -- 1 (Kylie Fitts, No. 181 to Bears)
- UTEP -- 1 (Will Hernandez, No. 34 to Giants)
- UTSA -- 1 (Marcus Davenport, No. 14 to Saints)
- Vanderbilt -- 1 (Oren Burks, No. 88 to Packers)
- Virginia -- 2 (Micah Kiser, No. 147 to Rams)
- Virginia Tech -- 5 (Tremaine Edmunds, No. 16 to Bills)
- Wake Forest -- 2 (Jessie Bates III, No. 54 to Bengals)
- Washington -- 5 (Vita Vea, No. 12 to Bucs)
- Washington State -- 2 (Cole Madison, No. 138 to Packers)
- West Virginia -- 1 (Kyzir White, No. 119 to Chargers)
- Western Kentucky -- 2 (Joel Iyiegbuniwe , No. 115 to Bears)
- Western Michigan -- 2 (Chukwuma Okorafor, No. 92 to Steelers)
- Wisconsin -- 5 (Nick Nelson, No. 110 to Raiders)
- Wyoming -- 1 (Josh Allen, No. 7 to Bills)
And here's the breakdown by conference:
- SEC -- 53
- ACC -- 45
- Big Ten -- 33
- Pac-12 -- 30
- Big 12 -- 20
- American -- 18
- Conference USA -- 10
- Mountain West -- 9
- Independent -- 5
- MAC -- 5
- Sun Belt -- 4
- FCS/Division II/III -- 23