#68 Luke Hayes — Walk-on offensive lineman Joe Vickers, a late addition to the fall roster, will don the No. 68 jersey made popular by past offensive linemen such as Luke Hayes (68). | Bo Rader/Wichita Eagle/Tribune News Service via Getty Images

In which BracketCat counts down the 16th day until the 2024 kickoff with a profile of Kansas State offensive lineman Joe Vickers.

#68 Joe Vickers

Redshirt Freshman | 6-6 | 271 lbs. | DeWitt, Iowa

Position: Offensive Line
Previous College: None
Projection: Scout Team
Status: Walk-On

Joseph Vickers (Jan. 6, 2005) is a walk-on offensive tackle from Central DeWitt High School in Iowa who is majoring in agriculture.

He is considered to have redshirted during 2023, although I can’t for the life of me figure out where that might have been. It’s possible Vickers merely sat out of football for one year.

He prepped under head coach Ryan Streets at Central DeWitt, where he was selected to play in the Iowa Shrine Bowl after he tied a school record with 4.5 sacks in one game.

Vickers also qualified for State in discus and shot put. You can watch an interview with him during his junior season here.

Good luck finding any additional information about him on the ol’ interwebs. I wasn’t able to turn up any articles or anything like that. I like a good mystery, but this is baffling to me.

I did turn up an archived page listing on Google that suggests Vickers originally was slated to play defensive end at KSU and wear No. 97, but that plan obviously didn’t last very long.