Luke Fickell has 'no doubt' he would defeat Mike Vrabel in wrestling match

Former Ohio State teammates Luke Fickell and Mike Vrabel built an unbreakable bond during their time with the Buckeyes that included plenty of football, and a fair amount of tusseling. The two head coaches apparently used to go at each other in wrestling bouts, and according to the new Wisconsin skipper, there’s a chance they still could.

Asked whether he could still take Vrabel in a wrestling match, Fickell said on Stadium’s The Rally, “no doubt.”

“Oh, yeah. There’s no doubt,” Fickell said.

A former All-American wrestler in high school, Fickell won a whopping 106 matches in a row while at St. Francis DeSales High School.

Once the duo made it to Ohio State, Fickell says you could find them wrestling on any given day. However, by the time they reached their final seasons with the Buckeyes, the fighting had died down.

“Whoever gets the upper-hand one day, they’re going to be back the next,” Fickell said. “Those things kind of go and don’t ever end. So, we figured it out by about the fourth year of college that, ‘Hey, let’s just be on the same side and not worry about hunting someone down for the next month, year or however long it’s going to take.'”

Fickell, Vrabel form unbreakable bond at Ohio State

Fickell and Vrabel played defensive tackle and linebacker, respectively, for the Buckeyes, before embarking on pro careers, then coaching careers. The former Cincinnati head coach gave Vrabel his first assistant job at Ohio State when he was interim in 2011. Fickell previously credited the Titans head coach for picking him up when he needed it most during those days.

““I remember him picking me up and saying, ‘This is when they need you the most,’” Fickell said of the advice Vrabel gave him after a tough loss versus Nebraska. “I don’t know what the hell I said, but we continued to move forward.

“And there’s just things like that, that I don’t know exactly what would have happened had he not been there. Would you have enjoyed what you were doing? Because it was a crazy time, I don’t know if I did. I don’t know if I’d enjoyed it enough to stick with it or if I’d ever want to be a head coach again without him. It was a rough year, tough year, but I’m not sure I would have made it if he’d not been there with me.”

Vrabel stayed on the staff under Urban Meyer until the Houston Texans called and the rest is history. With the Texans, he took over coordinating the defense and finally got his shot at head coaching with the Titans in 2018.

Although both coaches are far removed from their playing and wrestling days, there are still plenty who’d pay to see a match between the former Buckeyes.