After a weekend of crazy upsets against many ranked teams, the No. 1 Texas Longhorns head to Dallas for a big weekend against the No. 18 Oklahoma Sooners for the 120th game in the Red River Rivalry.
Trenches
The line is one of the most overlooked positions to the casual fan, so I wanted to bring back the importance of the trenches as I did in last year’s preview going into this week. A reminder, line yards are how many yards were generated by the offensive line in the first five yards of a running situation. In order to standardize the data, I am displaying how much Oklahoma or Texas moved their opponent’s lines from what they are usually able to produce, the arrow being a display of how much Oklahoma pushed them. For example, Temple’s offensive line usually generates 2.8 line yards a game, but OU held them to 2.3. Meanwhile, Temple’s defense was already weak, enforcing just 3.3 line yards per game, yet OU’s offense was able to push that further to 3.6. Arrows directed towards the bottom right indicate that teams struggled on both sides of the ball against OU.
Oklahoma’s defensive line has been a force without a doubt, being able to severely limit opponents from generating yards on the ground. However, outside of their game against Temple, their offensive line was relatively easier to play against compared to the rest of their opponent’s schedules so far this year. This has spelled a lot of the frustration Oklahoma head coach Brent Venables has experienced and fueled the decision to pull quarterback Jackson Arnold, but I would argue that any quarterback with a struggling offensive line is going to find it difficult to assess defenses in enough time.
Oklahoma’s starting center Branson Hickman got banged up early on against Temple, and returned for Tennessee and Auburn. His backup, Joshua Bates, played against Tulane and Houston, Regardless of who is slotted in that position, they are the bottom two centers to have started in the SEC this year. Of all guards in the SEC, left guard Heath Ozeata ranks 25th and right guard Febechi Nwaiwu ranks 36th. Right tackle Michael Tarquin seems to be the sole player on their line who can be relied on.
Below is the same graph but replicated for Texas.
Veteran Jake Majors ranks as the fourth-best pass blocking center in the SEC and he has certainly improved his draft stock with his strong leadership this season. Hayden Conner and DJ Campbell are the third best guard duo amongst Power Four teams (Rutledge–Fairchild at UGA is one, Frazier–Dellinger is two at LSU). Kelvin Banks has cemented himself as a first round pick and Cam Williams has been able to supplement him well in his first season as a full-time starter.
Havoc
Oklahoma’s defense has been stout, led by preseason All-American Danny Stutsman at middle linebacker. They were touted as having the one of the best turnover margins at plus-1.6 a game (fifth amongst all FBS, first in Power Four). I wanted to dig deeper to see if this is a true measure of evaluating their defense or if it had been inflated.
Havoc rate is the percentage of plays in which the defense recorded a sack, tackle-for-loss, forced fumble, interception, or pass breakup. Like the method I used in the trenches graphs, I compared the havoc rate OU generated on defense to what their opponents have faced season long. The data is further separated out by whether the havoc was caused by the front seven (defensive linemen and linebackers) or the secondary (defensive backs).
We see a similar story where Oklahoma thrashed Temple, but I think that really skewed their data. For instance, Houston and Auburn are both towards the bottom of their respective conferences. Being able to slow down Tennessee’s explosive offense is probably their most impressive feat, but then again, Arkansas was able to do the same.
They have a deep rotation of potent players in their run-stopping game. This matchup could be up there with the difficulty Texas faced against Michigan. The interior consists of defensive tackles Gracen Halton (8 tackles, 6 stops), Da’Jon Terry (6, 4) and nose tackles Damonic Williams (8, 7) and Jayden Jackson (4, 3).
Supplementing that already solid performance is defensive end Ethan Downs (5, 4) and Trace Ford (4, 4), mike linebacker Danny Stutsman (25, 20), and Samuel Omosigho (13, 8) who plays the cheetah position (a linebacker/safety hybrid who can cover tight ends and slot receivers).
In the pass rush, defensive ends Trace Ford (1 sack) and R Mason Thomas (5.5 sacks) are scary. After that the rest of the defensive front performs about average in the nation, which is slightly below average in the SEC.
In coverage, free safety Robert Spears-Jennings (0 pass breakups, 1 interception) is the third best graded safety in the SEC. He is also a force in being the last line of defense in stopping the run, with a very low missed tackle rate. Cornerbacks Dezjhon Malone (2, 1) and Kani Walker (5, 1) seem to be menacing but they rank 17th and 27th in the SEC by PFF grading. The production in their DB room drops off even more after them.
Below is the same graph replicated for Texas.
While the Longhorns haven’t been able to thrash to the level of OU versus Temple, I would argue they have been more consistent. Corners Malik Muhammad and Jahdae Barron, along with safeties Andrew Mukuba and Michael Taaffe have produced a higher havoc rate than their opponents effectively. The only exception is Week Five against Mississippi State in which they still held the Bulldogs to just 144 passing yards. Up front, after being sack-less through the first two games, Colin Simmons and company have racked up 13 sacks in the past three games.
Scouting the offense
In the backfield, Oklahoma’s best back, four-star freshman Taylor Tatum, ranks 37th amongst all 52 SEC backs who have recorded 10 snaps. Jovantae Barnes and Gavin Sawchuck rank 50th and 52nd, which speaks volumes to their offensive line again. They often resort to using Tatum and Barnes to able to break away to the outside in the run game, usually running off the tight end attached to the line because they can’t find daylight in between the tackles. Barnes is effective as a receiving back, either on Texas/angle routes or rolling out into the flats.
As mentioned before, Jackson Arnold was set to take over a program that has been blessed with a lot of talented quarterbacks in the past decade, but was pulled after Week Four. He severely struggled when under pressure, and he saw major drop-offs in accuracy in play action and screens. Freshman Michael Hawkins took over against Auburn and will see the start against Texas this weekend. A further argument that this isn’t entirely on Arnold, is that Hawkins has performed even worse under pressure and still struggles on screens which can be attributed to the offensive line being able to do their job or a receiver’s ability to gain yards after the catch. Hawkins doesn’t have the poise that Arnold had in a pure drop back only going 9-of-20 passing. But he performs drastically better in the play action schemes given his mobility. He has gone 14-of-17 passing on these plays, and scrambled for the other two to get first downs. Texas will be able to provide the pressure and lock down receivers, but sealing the edge against a slippery quarterback is some trauma we are never ready to relive.
Slot receiver Deion Burks has seen the most targets, reeling most of them over the middle of the field in the 0-10 yard range, though he caught his touchdowns on the right side of the field in the intermediate (10-20 yards). Brenen Thompson is their X receiver, but both quarterbacks haven’t been able to connect with him deep consistently going just 2-of-10 passing on throws over 10 yards in the air. Jaquaze Pettaway is a troublemaker with his speed, often forgotten and then finds gaps in the defense in the intermediate.
Tight ends Bauer Sharp and Jake Roberts both love of the middle of the field with Sharp dominating the short game while Roberts does the intermediate. If given enough time, either Hawkins or Arnold can find them in these areas craftily navigating between linebackers and knowing where to sit down. Below are the PPA and usage metrics for their offense.
History
With the inaugural rendition of this historic rivalry that is now a part of the SEC, I pulled together some big-picture trends. I developed histograms that separate each game by the score differential, positive ones meaning Texas won. Since 1900, in an amazing history through 119 games, Texas is 63-51-5 in the series.
I then filtered it down to only the Red River games where both teams were ranked going into the weekend. A note is that the AP started conducting preseason polls in 1950 and became more consistent with the weekly version in 1989.
In the games, where both teams seem to be having solid years so far, Texas winds up being 16-24 which seems a bit disappointing. Note that some of the biggest blowouts by Oklahoma came in these situations as well. But if we go one step further, let’s focus on when Texas was ranked higher.
Texas is 10-3 in these situations, but one of those losses did come just last year in their 30-34 battle against a team led by Dillon Gabriel.
Conclusion
I am confident that the Texas defense will be able to severely dampen the Oklahoma offense. The defensive line has gained momentum, figured out their flaws, and their depth should be a nightmare for the Sooners offensive line. The Horns will be able to effectively handle pure passing and running games, but the X-factor will be Hawkins’ ability to roll out and make defenders miss.
On the other side of the ball, the Sooners have an equally impressive defensive front. Texas has yet to still have very many explosive plays in running the ball and I don’t anticipate it happening this weekend. But if they can chip away with Jaydon Blue, Quintrevion Wisner, and Jerrick Gibson as they did against Michigan, it opens all the other creative possibilities Sark has in store. I am thrilled for Quinn Ewers to be back under center, and again, establishing the run, will allow him to torch their secondary. The presence of Thomas, Stutsman and Spears-Jennings is worrying, and I am expecting them to generate a turnover or big play here and there. Ultimately, it might be a slow start, but Texas will be able to edge them out and the score could really range anywhere from 24-7 to 34-17.