4 overreactions from Texas football’s late collapse vs. OK State

The edge rushers are showing more life in run defense than rushing the passer

I don’t know how much of an overreaction this is compared to just the reality of Texas’ situation among the edge rushers at the moment. Co-DC/LB coach Pete Kwiatkowski and the Longhorns have a group of edge rushers that are proving to be much more formidable defending the run than getting after opposing quarterbacks.

Oghoufo and sophomore edge rusher Barryn Sorrell were solid stopping the run in this game. Ovie was the highest-graded Longhorns player in run defense in this game, as he came up with five stops on run plays and no missed tackles. This was definitely the best game of the season so far for Oghoufo, who was setting the edge and getting after the ball carrier effectively.

Sorrell was also pretty effective in run defense in this game. He had two run stops, including one run stuff. There were some high-effort plays from Sorrell that stuck out to me.

While the edge rushers are clearly producing at a higher level in run defense of late, Texas is still having issues with this position group in the pass rush. Among the seven defensive players for the Longhorns that took at least 20 snaps rushing the passer, Sorrell and Oghoufo had the lowest pass-rushing productivity and win percentage.

Sorrell posted a win percentage lower than 5.0 in this game, which is one of his worst outings of the season in this regard. And Oghoufo posted a win percentage rushing the passer of just 6.3.

Most of the successful pass-rushing plays from Texas continued to come from the interior of the defensive line as the three highest-graded pass rushers were all defensive/nose tackles.