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Week 7 SEC Primer: While contenders drop, Texas is riding high. Can Oklahoma summon the chaos to Red River?

Matt Hinton

By Matt Hinton

Published:

Everything you need to know about the Week 7 SEC slate, all in one place.

(All betting lines via FanDuel Sportsbook.)

Game of the Week: Texas (-14.5) vs. Oklahoma

The stakes

You can paint an “SEC” logo on the field, but the Red River Shootout Rivalry is a tradition unto itself: The Cotton Bowl, the Texas State Fair, the crowd split right down the middle into crimson and orange factions. As usual, one side arrives this year thinking big — Playoff, Heisman, national title, sky’s the limit — while the other is reduced to a spoiler, hoping to kickstart an underwhelming season with a major upset. The only thing that’s changed is that it’s been awhile since it was Texas in the former role and Oklahoma in the latter.

We’re not quite to the midway line, but so far it’s been a charmed season for the Longhorns. While every other SEC contender has taken an L directly to the gut, the ‘Horns have cruised, acing their big non-conference test at Michigan and hammering their other four opponents to date by more than 40 points per game. They’re comfortably atop both major polls for the first time since the weekend before Barack Obama’s first election, so long ago it was still possible to afford rent in Austin. ESPN’s Football Power Index gives them a 90.0% chance to make the Playoff and a 23.7% chance to win it all, the best of any team.

Their single biggest concern at this stage is handling the dynamic between an entrenched veteran quarterback, Quinn Ewers, who was leading the Heisman odds before suffering a short-term oblique injury in Week 3, and his blue-chip understudy, Arch Manning, who immediately confirmed the hype in Ewers’ absence. Ewers will be back in the saddle against the Sooners … but for how long? This is what passes for a problem right now at Texas.

Oklahoma has actual problems. The Sooners are 4-1, more or less as expected. But they got there the hard way, stumbling through what should have been a routine nonconference slate before getting waxed at home by Tennessee in their SEC debut, and they arrive at midseason staring down a schedule that promises harder times ahead. Their aspiring face-of-the-program quarterback, Jackson Arnold, was sent to the bench shortly before halftime against the Vols, possibly for good. The entire two-deep at wide receiver contracted injuries at the same time. By the end of September, a come-from-behind, 27-21 win over a mediocre version of Auburn qualified as a triumph.

An open date, a neutral site, and a rivalry atmosphere can go a long way toward leveling the playing field, as both sides in this rivalry have proven repeatedly in recent years. Despite some fairly lopsided circumstances at times, 9 of the past 10 games in the Cotton Bowl have been decided by 8 points or less. (That’s excluding a 39-27 Oklahoma win in the 2018 Big 12 Championship Game, their only meeting outside of the regular season.) We’re coming off a weekend that saw 5 of the top 11 teams in the AP poll lose to unranked or (in Missouri’s case) significantly lower-ranked opponents, while a 6th, Miami, barely escaped the same fate by the skin of its teeth.

Is Texas too good to succumb to the chaos? Let’s find out.

The stat: 6.2 yards

That’s Quinn Ewers’ average depth of target on pass attempts this season, per Pro Football Focus, lowest in the SEC and 2nd-lowest nationally among Power 4 quarterbacks. Prior to his injury in Week 3, Ewers was just 3-for-7 on attempts of 20+ air yards, while 30.4% of his attempts fell behind the line of scrimmage.

Chalk it up to small sample size, but that continues a downward trend in Ewers’ downfield aggressiveness, if not his overall production. His ADOT declined by 2 full yards from 2022 (10.5 ypa) to 2023 (8.4 ypa), and is on pace to decline by another 2 yards in ’24. In the same span, though, his net yards per attempt has improved, jumping from 7.3 ypa in ’22 to 8.8 last year and holding steady at 8.7 this year, a result of big gains in both completion percentage and yards after catch. The former gunslinger has learned to take the throws that are there and trust his receivers to make up the difference.

Of course, that all could change quickly in a game in which Ewers is likely to have a green light to take more chances. The offense was more aggressive in his absence, with Arch Manning connecting on 8-of-16 attempts in the 20+ yard range — a little over 20% of his total attempts, compared to just 8.9% for Ewers in the early going. The Longhorns probably doesn’t need to light up the scoreboard to win comfortably on Saturday, but as long as the outcome is in doubt their willingness to open things up downfield (or not) will be a window into the kind of attack they want to be with Ewers back in the fold.

The big question: Does Oklahoma’s offense have a pulse?

If your default image of the Sooners is still of a high-scoring, shootout-friendly outfit that plays no defense, time for an update: They left that identity in the Big 12. This is a full-fledged Brent Venables team from top to bottom, and if it has a snowball’s chance on Saturday it’s based on the defense’s capacity to turn the game into a slugfest.

It’s a little bit ironic that Oklahoma fans spent the Lincoln Riley years lamenting “if only we had a defense …” only to watch the dynamic reverse itself virtually overnight. Not only does OU rank dead last in the SEC in total offense: It ranks last in both rushing and passing offense, as well as in yards per play, 3rd-down conversion rate, first downs and plays of 20+ yards. It ranks near the bottom of the conference in scoring (13th), pass efficiency (15th), and Offensive SP+ (15th). Name a category, and the Sooners are probably struggling in it.

That extends to the injury list, which checks in just above a fluid quarterback situation and an anemic ground game as their most pressing concern. Four of the top 5 wideouts on the preseason depth chart have already been ruled out against the Longhorns, and the 5th, leading receiver Deion Burks, is likely to join them on the sideline due to a soft tissue injury. Elsewhere, the running backs are healthy but nondescript.

If there’s a silver lining, it’s the long-term outlook for freshman QB Michael Hawkins Jr., who has the potential to grow into a plus starter. Eventually. For now, Hawkins remains a work in progress. He ran hot and cold in his first career start at Auburn, pulling off a couple of explosive plays — a 48-yard touchdown run in the first quarter, a 60-yard bomb that set up another TD in the fourth — but not much else in between.

For a fledgling QB in a hostile environment with a depleted surrounding cast, that was all his team could ask for. (Although it still took a pick-6 by the defense to put the winning points on the board.) Hawkins has yet to throw the ball to the wrong team or cough it up as a runner, which certainly beats the alternative. Beyond that, well, he’s still a fledgling QB with a depleted surrounding cast facing baptism by fire against a Texas defense residing at or near the top of all the same columns where Oklahoma is languishing. Adjust your expectations accordingly.

The key matchup: Texas OL Kelvin Banks Jr. vs. Oklahoma Edge R Mason Thomas

There are bigger names on Oklahoma’s defense, but no one who has made quite as big an impact in the early going as Thomas. A role player in his first 2 seasons at OU, Thomas enjoyed a breakout September, generating 13 QB pressures and an SEC-best 6 sacks as a newly minted starter in Year 3.

More important, he’s been at his best with the game on the line.

In the win over Auburn, he singlehandedly snuffed out a late Auburn drive by recording back-to-back sacks on 3rd and 4th down, preserving a slim, 24-21 lead in the process; the turnover on downs set up a field goal that extended the margin to 6, leaving the Tigers with less than a minute and no timeouts for a futile, last-ditch drive that came up well short. A few weeks earlier, Thomas also took over the end of the Sooners’ Week 3 win over Tulane, slamming the door on the Green Wave’s comeback effort by wrecking 2 late drives in a row, both of which ended with Thomas getting to the quarterback in emphatic fashion.

Thomas doesn’t tend to favor one side of the line or the other (see above), but when he’s aligned over left tackle it will put him facemask-to-facemask with Banks, a preseason All-Everything who has played up to his advance billing. Banks is the SEC’s top-graded o-lineman per PFF, as advertised, coming in for a single QB pressure allowed on 167 pass-blocking snaps; he also boasts a massive size advantage over Thomas, whose 6-2, 240-pound frame is not nearly as well-suited to holding up against the run as it is to winning with speed off the corner. The more success the Sooners have forcing Texas into passing downs, the fairer the fight.

The verdict …

Oklahoma owned the series during Texas’ decade-plus stint in the wilderness, winning 11 of the past 15 entries since 2010 and 5 of the past 6. Last year’s meeting marked the first time Texas came into the game as the higher-ranked team since 2009, and a down-to-the-wire, 34-30 decision in OU’s favor turned out to be the Longhorns’ only loss of the regular season. Strange things happen in this game.

Is any of that relevant in 2024? If Texas brings anything close to its A-game, almost certainly not.

The Longhorns have more talent, more balance, fewer key injuries, and a huge advantage at the most important position. On paper, this matchup looks a lot like Texas’ 31-12 win at Michigan in Week 2, another team with quarterback issues (albeit for different reasons) and not nearly enough firepower to overcome them. Texas scored on 4 of its five 5-half possessions in that game, led 24-3 at halftime, and shifted into power-saver mode with zero concern about the Wolverines offense mounting a rally.

Oklahoma’s defense might be good enough to keep it from getting that out of hand that quickly, but if the Sooners are going to put enough points on the board it might be up to the defense and special teams to take matters into their own hands.
– –  –
• Texas 34 | Oklahoma 13

Ole Miss (-3.5) at LSU

Texas-Oklahoma might be the more high-profile game, brand-wise, but for my money the weekend’s most compelling matchup is the primetime collision in Baton Rouge. It’s a season-defining game for both sides, for longstanding blood-feud reasons as well as the more immediate one: With a loss apiece already on the books, the loser will be effectively bounced from the Playoff race by mid-October.

That cuts both ways, but given the enormous investment Ole Miss made in assembling a winner in 2024 the stakes are especially high for Lane Kiffin. Sure, they’re kvetching in Louisiana over the lack of big wins under Brian Kelly, whose team is 1-5 vs. ranked opponents since the Tigers’ memorable overtime upset over Alabama in 2022. (The lone win in the meantime coming against then-no. 21 Missouri last October.) Barring a complete meltdown, though, at least Kelly can always point to next year, when massively hyped QB recruit Bryce Underwood will arrive to reset the competitive window. Kiffin, on the other hand, is all-in right now, and already faces a season on the brink. A 2nd loss with Georgia still looming on the schedule would put the Rebels’ Playoff hopes on life support and send the rumor mill connecting Kiffin to a potential vacancy at Florida into overdrive.

Historically, a night game in Baton Rouge is where ambitious Ole Miss teams come in for a reality check. The Rebels haven’t won in Tiger Stadium since 2008, a 7-game losing streak that includes losses by undefeated, top-10 teams against lower-ranked LSU outfits in 2014 and 2022. Is this year really different? Saturday night is their first big chance to prove it.

•     •     •

Can Ole Miss turn up the heat on Garrett Nussmeier? Kiffin has made upgrading the defensive line a top priority, and it’s paid off so far in a dramatically improved pass rush: They lead the nation in sacks and boast at least 5 future pros in the rotation. (It’s 6 if you count linebacker Chris Paul Jr., a frequent and productive blitzer from the second level.) The edge rushers alone — Princely Umanmielen, Jared Ivey and Suntarine Perkins — have more combined sacks between them (14) than most FBS teams. Any combination of those guys on the field at the same time with Walter Nolen and/or JJ Pegues on the interior belongs in the conversation with the most fearsome front-line units in the country.

https://twitter.com/OleMissFB/status/1840097267396817183/

Still, getting to Nussmeier might be as a steep a challenge as they’ll face all season. For starters, Ole Miss is likely to be shorthanded up front, with both Umanmielen and Pegues listed as “questionable” on the weekly injury report. And regardless of who’s available on the other side, Nussmeier has been one of the best protected quarterbacks in America. He’s faced pressure on just 17.8% of his total drop-backs, per PFF, the best rate among SEC starters and the 4th-lowest in the country.

LSU’s highly touted offensive tackles, Will Campbell and Emory Jones, deserve much of the credit for keeping their man clean. But so does Nussmeier himself, who gets rid of the ball quickly (in 2.51 seconds, on average) and rarely takes sacks even when under duress: Despite his limited mobility, only one of his 36 pressured drop-backs has resulted in a sack, good for a pressure-to-sack ratio of just 2.8% — easily the lowest rate of any Power 4 passer. If those numbers hold up, Ole Miss’ considerably less-decorated secondary could be in for a long night.
– –  –
• LSU 31 | Ole Miss 27

South Carolina at Alabama (-21.5)

Typically following the rare Alabama loss in the regular season, I’d review the Crimson Tide’s record in rebound games, which (spoiler alert) is impeccable over the past 15 years. Bama hasn’t lost consecutive regular-season games since Nick Saban’s first season in Tuscaloosa in 2007; only twice in that span, in 2010 and 2019, have they lost 2 games in the same month. But Nick Saban is not the coach anymore, and last week’s monumental defeat at Vanderbilt — still a surreal sequence of words to type! — was more unsettling by an order of magnitude than anything that might serve as a precedent from the Saban years. How Kalen DeBoer‘s Tide will respond is anybody’s guess.

Is it possible that they got waylaid by a perfect storm of bad luck and exhaustion coming off their epic Week 5 win over Georgia, and that flop in Nashville has no bearing on anything that happens going forward? Yes, of course. Is it possible that they were legitimately outplayed by Vandy because they’re a legitimately flawed team with a more vulnerable defense than anyone realized? Also yes.

My instincts lean toward the former, but I look forward to being reassured before I file away one of the most stunning results of my lifetime as a fluke.
– –  –
• Alabama 39 | South Carolina 16

Florida at Tennessee (-15.5)

Billy Napier might be the coach on the hot seat in this game, but Napier has been on the hot seat for the better part of the past 2 years. The hot seat is just his life at this point. Josh Heupel, on the other hand, is suddenly facing more pressure than he bargained for coming off a deflating, 19-14 loss at Arkansas. In the course of a few hours in Fayetteville, Nico Iamaleava went from a rising star to just another young QB subject to the typical growing pains, while Tennessee’s margin for error in the Playoff chase took a massive hit with Alabama and Georgia still on the schedule. Like Bama, the Vols still have everything in front of them; also like Bama, they want to be heading into the Third Saturday in October with some assurance that they are who they thought they were.
– –  –
Tennessee 36 | • Florida 24

Mississippi State at Georgia (-33.5)

Just thinking about this game makes me want to sim ahead to next week’s collision between Georgia and Texas in Austin, which with the way this season is unfolding can only mean something extremely weird is in store this week in Athens. Georgia doesn’t do weird, as a rule, especially when the other team is showing up with a true freshman quarterback making just his second start. Still, keep an eye on this one until notoriously slow-starting UGA is safely up by at least 3 scores.
– –  –
Georgia 38 | • Mississippi State 10

Vanderbilt at Kentucky (-13.5)

The Commodores and Wildcats are both coming off landmark upsets, and both pulled it off in identical fashion: By being epic ball hogs. In its Week 5 ambush of Ole Miss, Kentucky amassed a nearly 2-to-1 advantage in time of possession, holding the ball for nearly 40 minutes while limiting the Rebels to just 56 offensive snaps. Inspired, Vanderbilt went to even greater lengths last week against Alabama, amassing an incredible 25-minute advantage in TOP in its 40-35 stunner over the Tide; Bama’s explosive offense managed just 44 plays across 9 possessions. I’m at a loss to explain why a matchup that appears very competitive on paper warrants a 2-touchdown spread, but one thing I will say for certain is that regardless of the outcome, the passage of time in this game is going to feel like the end of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
– –  –
Kentucky 29 | • Vanderbilt 24

Missouri (-27.5) at Massachusetts

Yeah, I did a double-take on this one, too: Why is any SEC team playing at UMass, in a stadium with a capacity of 17,000? No reason in particular; it’s just part of a standard home-and-home contract signed in November 2018, when UMass was merely another bad team vying to stay afloat as a “major” program. In the meantime, the Minutemen have been arguably the most hopeless outfit in the FBS ranks, going 4-48 vs. FBS opponents since the start of the 2019 season. Maybe rejoining the MAC in 2025 will be the first step toward turning things around. In the meantime, Mizzou can take out its frustration over last week’s 41-10 flop at Texas A&M in a secluded area where no one will come looking for the body.
– –  –
• Missouri 44 | UMass 6

OFF THIS WEEK: Arkansas, Auburn, Texas A&M

Scoreboard

Week 6 record: 3-3 straight-up | 3-3 vs. spread
Season record: 54-12 straight-up | 40-23 vs. spread

Matt Hinton

Matt Hinton, author of 'Monday Down South' and our resident QB guru, has previously written for Dr. Saturday, CBS and Grantland.

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