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Huskies Will Work Up a Sweat Dealing with Longhorns Stalwart

Originally posted on FanNation Husky Maven | By Dan Raley | Last updated 12/27/23

In the Big 12 championship game, T'Vondre Sweat slipped into the end zone, cradled a 2-yard touchdown pass for the Texas Longhorns and mischievously assumed a Heisman Trophy pose, but only because the Outland Trophy doesn't offer one.

Sweat normally is a 6-foot-4, 364-pound defensive tackle, one of college football's headliners, in fact the latest Outland winner.

Obviously he's fairly athletic for a player with his enormous size, reason enough to be considered the nation's top top defensive lineman and a consensus All-America selection, and someone the University of Washington football team should be concerned about in the coming Sugar Bowl.

"He's a great player," Husky offensive tackle Roger Rosengarten said. "All credit to him, he deserves the Outland."

At the same time, the UW faced Sweat in the Alamo Bowl 12 months ago and rushed 28 times for 158 yards, with departed running back Wayne Taulapapa accounting for 108 of them, including 42 yards on a first-quarter touchdown scamper, in the Huskies' 27-20 victory in San Antonio.

The previous secret to the UW's success against Sweat, to keep him from single-handedly shutting down the line of scrimmage, was fairly straightforward — expend extra resources on him.

"We did a really good job on working on our double teams," UW offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb said. "We have really good clips of [center] Corey Luciano getting into double teams on him. We had good clamps on him, not a lot of daylight. That'll be the key, is getting two bodies on him."

While Luciano and offensive guard Jaxson Kirkland spent most of the time wrestling with this extra-large and determined Longhorn in tandem, everyone up front eventually had a Sweat encounter.

Perhaps the most physical exchange on behalf of the Huskies happened in the third quarter when Rosengarten went one-on-one with the Texas standout and stood him up, and fellow offensive tackle Troy Fautanu came crashing through in a second wave and cracked Sweat helmet to helmet.

Sweat, wearing long white sleeves and white gloves, definitely got a workout in Alamo Bowl. He played only half the time against the Huskies to stay fresh. He finished with a lone tackle and knocked down a Penix pass that night.

Passing on the NFL draft, the Longhorns defensive stalwart from Huntsville, Texas, returned for a fifth college season to share in the UT resurgence under Steve Sarkisian now with a 12-1 team and increase his pro stock, which he has done. Interesting enough, Sweat started just eight of his team's 13 games as he and his talented teammates rotated in and out.

This leaves an intriguing Jan. 1 matchup in the trenches, where the college game's top defensive tackle will go up against the nation's top offensive line and see who blinks first.

Some people suggest that while the Huskies got the best of Texas last December, Sweat did his part simply with his presence.

"People say he wasn't a factor but all game he was a factor for us," Rosengarten said.

This season, the Huskies have an all-new inside trio of starters in center Parker Brailsford and guards Nate Kalepo and Julius Buelow to contend with this TD-catching, Heisman-posing and continuously disruptive Sweat, and see how they fare.

Sweat is a year better, as is his fellow defensive tackle in Byron Murphy II, who was named a second-team AP All-American choice, and they're two players destined for the NFL someday.

While the Huskies are respectful of these Longhorns linemen, they remain undaunted by the task at hand once again.

"We obviously had that seniority in the interior part of our O-line and they did a great job with Sweat, Murphy and 99 [departed Keondre Coburn]," Rosengarten said. "We're looking to build off that."

This article first appeared on FanNation Husky Maven and was syndicated with permission.

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