Wisconsin enters 2026 with a clear candidate to anchor the right side of its offensive line in third-year guard Emerson Mandell, a player the Badgers have already trusted in a big way and now appear ready to settle into his best spot.
Mandell’s path to Madison started with a hard-fought recruiting battle. The four-star interior offensive lineman from Irondale High School in Minnesota committed to Wisconsin in July of 2023 after taking officials to Minnesota, Iowa State and Wisconsin that summer.
His offer sheet stretched well beyond that, including Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, Oklahoma and Penn State, among others. He was the fifth and final lineman in Wisconsin’s 2024 class, joining Colin Cubberly, Kevin Heywood, Ryan Cory and Derek Jensen.
"It was a pretty tough decision for us," Mandell told Badger247." The last couple of weeks, we just narrowed things down.
It came down to Wisconsin and Iowa State. It was a very close decision.
I could not have done it very quickly. It took a lot of time to think about it.
"I would just rather go to Wisconsin."
That choice has already led to a heavy workload. After redshirting in 2024, Mandell started all 12 games this past fall, lining up once at right guard and 11 times at right tackle.
At 6-foot-5 and 324 pounds, he’s viewed as a natural guard, and that’s where he’s projected to start this season. Still, Wisconsin has leaned on his flexibility over the past two years, including when he kicked outside to fill in for Riley Mahlman, who shifted from right tackle to left tackle after one game in 2025.
The snap count tells the story of how much the staff trusted him. Mandell played 704 of Wisconsin’s 711 offensive snaps last season, second on the team only to cornerback Ricardo Hallman, who logged 713 of 739 defensive snaps in 2025. Even so, Mandell’s spring was interrupted by a foot injury that kept him out for the second half of camp and opened the door for Blake Cherry and Stylz Blackmon to work with the No. 1 offense.
"Emerson is out for the rest of spring," Fickell said. "He had a little surgery on his foot and will be out for the rest of spring."
The production wasn’t spotless, though, and that’s part of why Mandell still has room to grow. According to PFF, his core grades were all below 63.0, and his pass-blocking numbers swung wildly from game to game.
He posted marks of 15.0 against Alabama and 8.4 against Michigan, but also landed in the 80s against Ohio State, Oregon and Illinois. That kind of inconsistency is exactly what Wisconsin wants to clean up, especially with a move back inside likely to help.
First-year position coach Eric Mateos made it clear this spring that he sees Mandell’s long-term home at guard.
"I just think that's his future, that's his best position," Mateos said this spring. "It doesn't mean he can't play tackle here.
I think that his power and his force - we want to have big guards here, and right now we do. We have some big, wide bodies on the o-line right now and we're getting the size you guys are used to seeing, we're getting closer to that.
"I just felt like, 'hey, we have a 325-pound guy who likes to hit people. Let's give him every opportunity to hit people inside rather than on the outside where sometimes they don't get the opportunity to do that fun stuff.'"
Wisconsin’s ground game needs that kind of help. The Badgers finished 115th nationally in rushing offense in 2025, averaging roughly 116 yards per game and scoring just nine times on the ground. Mateos has talked about restoring the standard in the room, and Mandell is one of the pieces expected to matter most as Wisconsin tries to push that unit forward in 2026.
"There's All-Americans all over the walls and we talk a lot about, 'you've gotta earn the W when you choose to be an offensive lineman at Wisconsin," Mateos said. "You don't get to say, 'Oh, I'm a Wisconsin O-lineman' because you signed a piece of paper.
You have to prove that you're a Wisconsin O-lineman by how you train, how you study, how you practice, your toughness, your grit. And so we've made a big emphasis that we've really got to earn the right to call ourselves Wisconsin offensive linemen.
"We're not just part of the club because we signed a piece of paper."
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