2025 NFL Mock Draft: ESPN’s Mel Kiper projects 15 SEC stars as first-round picks

2025 NFL Mock Draft season is upon us! Now that the college football season is officially complete, attention will begin shifting to which players will be heading toward the draft hoping to hear their name called in April.

On Wednesday, ESPN’s Mel Kiper Jr. opened the pre-draft process with his initial projection at the draft. He did not include an SEC football star in the first 5 picks of the draft, but things quickly changed after that.

At the top of Kiper’s projection, he has Miami QB Cam Ward edging out the Colorado duo of Travis Hunter and Shedeur Sanders to be the No. 1 overall pick. Kiper’s big board does list Sanders as the top available QB prospect, but he believes the Tennessee Titans will grab Ward with the first pick. Be sure to track the odds for the No. 1 overall pick throughout the pre-draft process with our best betting apps.

Should Kiper’s projection hold true, it would be the first time since the 2018 NFL Draft that the SEC failed to produce a top-5 pick. Oklahoma (then in the Big 12) produced the No. 1 overall pick in Baker Mayfield while Georgia’s Roquan Smith was the league’s top selection at No. 8 overall.

Even if that scenario plays out, Kiper still has the SEC by far leading the rest of college football with a whopping 15 first-round picks out of the 32 available slots. Georgia leads the way with 3 first-round picks while Mizzou, Texas A&M and Alabama each have 2 players represented in Kiper’s mock.

Here is every SEC player projected as a first-round pick in Kiper’s 1.0 2025 NFL Mock Draft:

No. 7 New York Jets — Mykel Williams, OLB, Georgia
No. 8 Carolina Panthers — Jalon Walker, LB, Georgia
No. 10 Chicago Bears — Will Campbell, OT/G, LSU
No. 11 San Francisco 49ers — Kelvin Banks Jr., OT, Texas
No. 12 Dallas Cowboys — Luther Burden III, WR, Mizzou
No. 13 Miami Dolphins — Malaki Starks, S, Georgia
No. 15 Atlanta Falcons — Shemar Stewart, DE, Texas A&M
No. 16 Arizona Cardinals — Tyler Booker, G, Alabama
No. 17 Cincinnati Bengals — Jihaad Campbell, LB, Alabama
No. 18 Seattle Seahawks — Armand Membou, OT/G, Mizzou
No. 19 Tampa Bay Buccaneers — Nick Emmanwori, S, South Carolina
No. 28 Detroit Lions — James Pearce Jr., OLB, Tennessee
No. 29 Washington Commanders — Nic Scourton, DE, Texas A&M
No. 30 Buffalo Bills — Maxwell Hairston, CB, Kentucky
No. 31 Kansas City Chiefs — Walter Nolen, DT, Ole Miss

Paul Harvey

Paul Harvey lives in Atlanta and covers SEC football.