Last night, Northwestern lost a major piece of its 2025 defense to the transfer portal in EDGE Anto Saka. On3 reporter Pete Nakos reported the news via X, and he followed up that report with the news that Saka entered with a "do not contact" tag.
That final piece of information makes the decision all the more interesting. For one, before this season, many believed Saka would set himself up to be drafted in this year's draft. After accumulating just three sacks in 2025, it seems the pass rusher wants to put more college tape together.
Additionally, Northwestern's defensive line coach Christian Smith left yesterday to join Penn State. He's been Saka's position coach this whole time, and the "do not contact" tag typically means a player has already figured out where he wants to go.
For that reason, a Smith-Saka reunion at Penn State feels exceedingly likely. Smith is already headed there, and it would give Saka an opportunity to stay comfortable with his position coach while also playing for one of the premier programs in the sport.
The risk for Saka? He didn't have his greatest season in Evanston this year, and if he slips down the depth chart at all in Happy Valley, it's going to be tough to recover in the eyes of NFL GMs. At the same time, though, if he's a starting caliber EDGE and has a good year for the Nittany Lions, he's almost sure to be selected higher than he would have been if he entered the draft this season.
In three seasons with the Wildcats, Saka had 12 total sacks. It's an impressive total, but not one that fully reflects his level of play. Throughout his career, Saka had issues finishing off quarterbacks, but he was a constant problem in the back field.
There's a reason some analysts believed he could not only be selected in the upcoming draft, but taken in the first couple of rounds. Saka, despite a comparatively low sack total, was a massive piece of Northwestern's defensive line unit in 2025.
Now knowing that he does, in fact, plan on playing another season in college, this hurts the Wildcats more. But the reality is that I don't think anyone was factoring him into 2026 plans anyway. Everyone just figured he'd enter the draft.
Losing Smith is an actual unexpected blow. David Braun has spent much of the past week reconstructing his offensive staff, and now he's going to have to do some work on the other side of the ball.