{"id":58681,"date":"2025-11-21T02:35:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-21T02:35:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/58681\/"},"modified":"2025-11-21T02:35:09","modified_gmt":"2025-11-21T02:35:09","slug":"how-texas-would-adapt-if-he-misses-arkansas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/58681\/","title":{"rendered":"How Texas would adapt if he misses Arkansas"},"content":{"rendered":"

But the junior middle linebacker could miss his first game Saturday when No. 17 Texas<\/a> (7-3, 4-2 SEC)\u00a0hosts Arkansas<\/a> in a renewal of a once-fierce rivalry. Several reports<\/a> have said Hill won\u2019t play because of a broken hand suffered late in last week\u2019s loss at Georgia. But the Longhorns listed Hill as questionable<\/a> Wednesday on the SEC\u2019s initial injury report, and Texas coach\u00a0Steve Sarkisian<\/a> hasn\u2019t ruled him out yet, he said Thursday during his weekly Zoom meeting with the media.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe’s been limited,\u201d Sarkisian said. \u201cObviously, you guys have seen he’s questionable for Saturday, and he’ll probably be questionable again (on Thursday’s injury report). We’re kind of taking this day by day with him to see how he feels towards the end of the week. The beauty of it for Ant, he’s played so much football for us (that) you can get a lot of reps done throughout a walk-through to see if he’s healthy enough to go. The walk-through reps, I think, can carry over into a ball game.\u201d<\/p>\n

But what would the absence of Hill in the middle mean against an Arkansas squad that leads the SEC in rushing with 230.5 yards a game behind dual-threat quarterback Taylen Green and bruising running back Mike Washington?<\/p>\n

The 6-foot-3, 238-pound Hill, who\u2019s on track to earn a second consecutive All-American selection, leads the Longhorns with 69 tackles and three forced fumbles and also has seven tackles for loss, four sacks and a pair of interceptions. Replacing that kind of production isn\u2019t easy, especially considering Hill\u2019s physical style of play matches up well with the Razorbacks\u2019 power running.<\/p>\n

But Sarkisian likes his team\u2019s depth at\u00a0linebacker.\u00a0Liona Lefau also has appeared in every game since joining the Longhorns with Hill in 2023 and has 20 career starts. He’s played every linebacker spot and has 54 tackles this season. And\u00a0Ty\u2019Anthony Smith already has 45 tackles and two forced fumbles in a breakout sophomore campaign.<\/p>\n

\u201cLiona has played a ton of football for us, and Ty\u2019Anthony has really come on, and I’m really proud of him of how far he’s come in our program and the impact that he’s had at linebacker,\u201d Sarkisian said.<\/p>\n

But Lefau and Smith weigh 227 and 215 pounds, respectively. That means Texas may need outside linebacker Trey Moore to shift inside more against Arkansas if Hill misses the game. Moore, a 6-foot-3, 250-pound senior, switched from edge rusher<\/a> to linebacker this season and has racked up 28 tackles. But he still spends as much time rushing the passer as plugging fits in the run game, as evident by his four sacks and four other pressures.<\/p>\n

Can Moore handle the duties inside if Hill doesn\u2019t play? He may have to against an Arkansas squad that loves to pound the heart of the defense.<\/p>\n

\u201cTrey Moore obviously provides a little bit more stature, I guess if you want to call it that, at linebacker,\u201d Sarkisian said. \u201cI think between all three of those guys, we’re in pretty good shape at the position.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"But the junior middle linebacker could miss his first game Saturday when No. 17 Texas (7-3, 4-2 SEC)\u00a0hosts…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":11257,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[2747,263,132,134,133,261,3232,266,3231,537,536],"class_list":["post-58681","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-arkansas-razorbacks","tag-arkansas-razorbacks-football","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news","tag-college-football","tag-sec-conference-football","tag-sec-football","tag-steve-sarkisian","tag-texas-longhorns","tag-texas-longhorns-football"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58681","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58681"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58681\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11257"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58681"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58681"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58681"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}