Key Wisconsin Badgers: No. 16 - Tight end Clay Cundiff

Wisconsin's 2023 football season is right around the corner, so BadgerBlitz.com ranked the top 30 players who we think will be the keys to success for Luke Fickell's squad this year.

Playing time, past performance and positional depth all factored into our staff rankings.

Clay Cundiff, the 14th commit in the 2019 recruiting class for the Badgers, flipped from Kansas to Wisconsin in the fall of 2018. The former three-star recruit was the second tight end in the class, along with Hayden Rucci. During the time in between those two commitments, UW missed on Hudson Henry (Arkansas), Erick All (Michigan) and Chris Hickman (Nebraska).

"When the coaches were watching my film they said the plays that we run at my high school are very similar to what they run in their offense," Cundiff told BadgerBlitz.com. "How I’m being used right now, it won’t be much different when I get to Wisconsin. They said that was a big factor and they like that I’m ahead of the game in terms of knowing a little bit about the offense."

The 6-foot-3, 236-pound tight end is once again working his way back from a major setback. Cundiff suffered a second leg injury when he was hit down low after he caught a three-yard pass on a shallow route against Ohio State. Cundiff left the field on a stretcher for the second consecutive season and was quickly ruled out for the rest of the 2022 season.

Up until that point, Cundiff looked to be on his way to a productive season. Through three games, the redshirt senior tallied eight catches for 139 yards and two touchdowns. He had a career day in Week 2 against Washington State with four catches for 59 yards and a pair of scores.

Through no fault of his own, the question with the fifth-year player is his availability. During his four seasons in Madison, Cundiff has appeared in only 10 games.

Any projection from the tight end room in 2023 has to start with Cundiff. Despite the injury-shortened season this past fall, he still led the tight end room in receiving yards and touchdowns. Overall, Cundiff had the fifth most receiving yards on the team. During the spring, Jack Pugh was a standout at the position with a number of big plays made up the seam and frequent catches on short check downs. That role is one Cundiff can easily slide into under offensive coordinator Phil Longo.

Cundiff was relegated to rehab work for the majority of the spring before he joined the tight ends for individual drills during the final handful of practices. His progression has him on pace to be ready for fall camp. Opening up an option as a big body receiver, it will be worth monitoring exactly how Cundiff is used within the offense and how he fits in during fall camp.

"The plan is that he will be full go in fall training camp and we are hoping that he has a really productive summer as well," tight ends coach Nate Letton told reporters near the end of spring practices.

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