Indiana football’s 2026 on campus Pro Day is a month later than the 2025 version.
IU will host NFL scouts and executives in Bloomington for workouts and evaluation on April 1 this year, just three weeks ahead of the NFL Draft. It held the event on March 5 a year ago.
The reason why is pretty simple — Indiana’s national championship season didn’t end until Jan. 19.
While most college football players started thinking about draft preparation in late November/early December, the Indiana players were just getting started on a more than eight-week postseason run.
And when that run ended with confetti in Miami, most of the Indiana players’ bodies were in no condition to begin preparing for the NFL Draft Combine, which has its own training regimen for a unique set of drills more focused on speed and agility than the brutality of football.
Most of Indiana’s players left to begin their draft preparation on the Sunday following the team’s championship celebration at Memorial Stadium, but they were playing catch up compared to their draft peers, and their bodies still needed time to recover from the 16 game grind they just endured. These Hoosiers actually tied a record for the most games played in a college football season.
So some of the nine IU players invited to the NFL Draft Combine in Indianapolis this week and weekend won’t be participating in the the full slate of drills at Lucas Oil Stadium.
Linebacker Aiden Fisher did some on field work Thursday but wasn’t timed or tested in any of the formal events.
Cornerback D’Angelo Ponds is expected to be one of the fastest players in the draft, but he won’t be formally timed in the 40-yard dash until the IU Pro Day. He is doing some of the other defensive back drills in Indianapolis.
Safety Louis Moore was undecided all the way up to the day before his scheduled testing.
Quarterback Fernando Mendoza is only going to throw at the IU Pro Day, something that just generate extra buzz and interest for his former teammates.
And the list goes on.
Indiana’s April 1 Pro Day is likely one of, if not the latest on campus Pro Days in college football. Given that it stands alone and features the national champs, and given the number of Indiana players with legitimate NFL aspirations ranging from the first round to getting a mini-camp invite, the event in Bloomington should be high profile.
And it should also provide an opportunity for Indiana players who weren’t invited to the combine, such as Kaelon Black, Mikail Kamara, Devan Boykin, E.J. Williams and others to make an impression in front of what should be a heavy presence of representatives from the league.
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