Pete Nygra Ready to Take Over at Center for Louisville

Bryan Hudson is now in the NFL, but the transfer from NIU is primed to take over the reigns in the middle of the offensive line for the Cardinals.

Louisville center Pete Nygra / University of Louisville Athletics

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - The Louisville football program looks to have a deep and talented offensive line for their upcoming 2024 campaign, but it was certainly a process to get to this point.

For starters, they had to replace three of the five starters from 2023 - including their best lineman on the roster in Bryan Hudson. The center had been a stalwart on the offensive line for three season, even earning First-Team All-ACC honors last season. He was even named the winner of the Jakobs Blocking Trophy that year, which goes to the best lineman in the conference.

Replacing the best lineman in the ACC is certainly no easy task. But so far this offseason, Pete Nygra has done a great job at filling the role left open with Hudson's departure for the NFL.

"I think Pete does a good job working," offensive line coach Richard Owens said. "He's a hard worker, good leader. Same thing with Victor Cutler sitting there too. ... Both guys are doing a good job for us working hard."

Nygra joined Louisville via the winter portal window as a transfer from Northern Illinois, having spent his first three seasons in college with the Huskies. After redshirting his true freshman season in 2021, he became a two-year starter for NIU, and was one of the best centers in the MAC this past season.

Starting all 12 games in 2023, he did not allow a single sack, while giving up only two quarterback hits and 6 hurries in 382 pass block snaps and 772 blocking snaps overall. He finished as the second-highest rated center in the MAC according to Pro Football Focus, with his 73.7 grade trailing only Western Michigan's Jacob Gideon.

Of course, coming from the Group of Five to the ACC, there was a natural transitionary period in terms of the level of physicality during spring ball. But Nygra, along with the other four transfer offensive linemen that joined the Cardinals, made it a personal mission to have as smooth of a transition to their new home as possible.

"It was definitely hard work going to a Power Five school and everything," he said. "But with all the transfers, all the offensive line, we came together in January and were like, 'This team is gonna go as far as we take them.' It's kind of been nose to the grindstone, and just constant every day, get one percent better every single day in order to have a successful season."

Louisville's returning linemen, such as Michaal Gonzalez and Austin Collins, did a fantastic job of taking in these newcomers and showing them the ropes. But Nygra also got support from another person as well: Bryan Hudson.

While Hudson was busy working towards trying to be selected in the NFL Draft, he wanted to lend a helping hand to Nygra in his transition to the Cardinals. Hudson later went undrafted, but signed as an undrafted free agent with the Detroit Lions.

"Pete is a great guy that I was fortunate enough to meet and be around while I was training at UofL for the NFL and helping out during their spring ball and summer workouts," Hudson told Louisville Report. "He was always eager to learn as much as he could from my experiences and what I’ve learned as I have started my NFL journey. His work ethic and commitment to improve in any way is what stood out to me the most. He fits in well with the great group of lineman that are there now."

This assistance helped play a major role in Nygra getting acclimated to spring ball.

"I got really close with Bryan, actually, since being in the winter when he's been back here for his NFL training," he said. "I've worked with him, watched film with him, just kind of learned from him being the guy last year, and obviously being a great center and player for Louisville. I tried to learn as much from him as I could, and he's been great in helping me do that."

Some of Hudson's tendencies have already started to rub off on Nygra. During last fall camp, Hudson was described as the "traffic cop" for Louisville's offensive line, helping get the proper reads and protections set for everyone on on the line of scrimmage. Nygra has adopted this mindset as well.

"Just as a center in general, that's your job," he said. "You have to call out the front, make the ID, get everyone on the same page. It's a lot of talking out there for me with communication to the other guys, but if we get good plays that happen because of it, it's all worth it."

As a result, Nygra has very much looked the part during fall camp. The 6-foot-4, 300-pound lineman regularly took the starting reps at center during the open practices, and by far and away looked the best in the middle of the line.

He believes that, because of the progress made up to this point, both himself and the offensive line as a whole are in store for big things this upcoming season.

"It's been great," Nygra said of fall camp. "As an O-line collectively, us coming together in the offseason and really building that relationship. Obviously, we had a lot of new guys come in, but we're up to speed thanks to some of the older guys taking us in, and helping us with the offense and everything. As we progress through camp, it's only getting better."

(Photo of Pete Nygra via University of Louisville Athletics)

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