More than a month after vowing to invest more in football, Wisconsin landed the program’s top quarterback target for 2026.
The Badgers have signed Old Dominion transfer Colton Joseph, sources told ESPN. He projects as Wisconsin’s starting quarterback for next season, after a dominating season at ODU that saw him finish No. 8 in the country in total offense at 302.6 yards per game.
Joseph will bring Wisconsin a true dual-threat quarterback, as he rushed for 1,007 yards and threw for 2,624. He threw for 21 touchdowns and rushed for 13 more. Joseph will have two seasons of eligibility remaining.
In 2024, Joseph accounted for 22 touchdowns in nine games — 11 rushing touchdowns and 11 passing touchdowns.
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The arrival of Joseph projects as a potential answer for what has been the most vexing problem during Luke Fickell’s three seasons at Wisconsin — consistent quarterback play. Much of that is rooted in injury, as the projected starter at Wisconsin has been hurt in all three of Fickell’s seasons there.
Last year, Billy Edwards Jr. got hurt in the opener and played just two games for the Badgers. In 2023, Tanner Mordecai missed 3½ games with a broken hand. In 2024, Tyler Van Dyke tore his ACL in Wisconsin’s third game and was out for the year.
The collective injury toll has hamstrung Wisconsin’s offense, as the team finished No. 133 of 134 teams in FBS last year in scoring offense at 12.8 points per game.
Amid that, the Badgers did forge some optimism late in the season with upset wins over Washington and Illinois in November.
Enter Joseph, a dynamic player who earned the Sun Belt’s offensive player of the year award. He led ODU to the program’s second winning season in program history.
Old Dominion finished No. 29 nationally in scoring offense with 32.0 points per game. The Monarchs were No. 16 in total offense with 454.7 points per game.
Joseph, in his second year as a starter, proved the engine behind that. He finished fifth in the Sun Belt in rushing yards and fifth in the league in passing yards.
His signature game of the year came against Virginia Tech in ODU’s 45-26 win that led to Brent Pry’s firing. Joseph threw for two touchdowns and ran for another in a game ODU led 31-0 in third quarter. He finished the game with 276 yards passing and 63 rushing yards.
The signing of Joseph, who had strong interest in the portal, aligns with what athletic director Chris McIntosh told ESPN in November when he said Luke Fickell would be back as head coach in 2026.
“[We] are aligned on significantly elevating investment in our program to compete at the highest level,” McIntosh told ESPN. “We are willing to make an investment in infrastructure and staff. As important is our ability to retain and recruit players in a revenue share and NIL era.”
