Five Nassau County natives are on NFL draft boards this week in Pittsburgh, where the 2026 draft will distribute 257 total selections across three days. They’re not household names yet. But they should be familiar to anyone who spent Friday nights watching high school football on Long Island.
Dan Villari came out of Plainedge High School with the kind of senior-year stat line that makes recruiters double-check their notes: 1,522 rushing yards, 23 touchdowns on the ground, 1,306 passing yards, and 13 more scores through the air. Three-star recruit. Michigan wanted him at quarterback, and he went to Ann Arbor. Playing time didn’t follow, as it rarely does for freshmen stepping into one of the country’s most competitive programs, and Villari eventually transferred to Syracuse. The Orange coaching staff saw his athleticism and moved him to tight end. Smart call. He started producing in 2023, adding 326 rushing yards and 180 passing yards that season, including 177 yards through the air and a touchdown that felt like a nod to his Plainedge days. His 2026 senior season was his best, finishing with a career-high 412 receiving yards before he declared.
Villari’s Syracuse teammate Devin Grant is also drawing interest. Grant’s roots are in Elmont, though he played high school ball in Queens. He started at SUNY Buffalo in 2022, appeared in nine games, then turned heads across the Mid-American Conference the following year by leading it with five interceptions, returning two of them for touchdowns, recording a career-best 79 tackles, and recovering two fumbles. That’s a resume that gets you noticed. Syracuse came calling, and Grant transferred. He added an interception and eight tackles for losses in 2024, then appeared in 10 more games during his 2025 senior year. As Long Island Press reported, Grant is one of five Nassau County natives now chasing a professional contract.
Then there’s Matthew Sluka.
Locust Valley. Kellenberg High School. Back-to-back undefeated seasons before he ever set foot on a college campus.
Sluka’s high school numbers weren’t inflated by weak competition — they were genuinely absurd. His senior year at Kellenberg: 1,203 passing yards, 14 touchdown throws, 1,131 rushing yards, 22 rushing touchdowns. He took all that to Holy Cross University, won Patriot League Rookie of the Year in the COVID-shortened season, then in his first full year threw for 1,512 yards and 11 touchdowns while adding 868 rushing yards and 14 more scores. His junior season put him at the top of every FCS rushing chart: 1,234 rushing yards among all FCS quarterbacks, paired with 2,489 passing yards and 26 touchdown throws.
That’s not a padded resume. That’s dominance at a level where players get lost all the time.
“The production is hard to ignore at any level,” said one draft analyst tracking small-school prospects, according to The Pro Football Reference database.
I don’t have much patience for the argument that FCS production can’t translate. It can, when the player processes the game fast enough to survive the speed jump. Sluka’s rushing yards aren’t just about athleticism — they reflect decision-making, vision, an ability to read what’s in front of him and react before the window closes. That’s what scouts are actually evaluating, not the conference name on his jersey.
The broader picture here is worth noting: five kids from Nassau County working their way through the NFL’s official draft tracker system this week in Pittsburgh. That’s not an accident. Long Island produces football talent at a rate that doesn’t always get the recognition it deserves, particularly at positions and programs that don’t generate regular national coverage.
Villari went from Plainedge to Ann Arbor to Syracuse. Grant went from Elmont to Buffalo to Syracuse. Sluka went from Kellenberg to Holy Cross and kept piling up numbers until the NFL couldn’t look away. These aren’t stories about five-star prospects who were always going to end up here. They’re stories about players who kept producing until the draft boards caught up with them.
Whether any of them hear their names called this week is a separate question. The 2026 draft has 257 picks, and most of them won’t go to Long Island kids from mid-major programs. But all five Nassau County prospects have put real production on film. That part’s already done.