College football defensive stop rate ahead of Week 14

Ahead of its highly anticipated reunion with its longtime rival, Texas is playing championship-caliber defense in its first year in the SEC. The Longhorns have moved up to No. 3 in this week's updated stop rate standings.

What is stop rate? It's a basic measurement of success: the percentage of a defense's drives that end in punts, turnovers or a turnover on downs. Defensive coordinators have the same goal regardless of their scheme, opponent or conference: prevent points and get off the field. Stop rate is a simple metric but can offer a good reflection of a defense's effectiveness on a per-drive basis in today's faster-tempo game.

Last year, national champ Michigan finished No. 1 with a stop rate of 81.6% in its games against FBS opponents. The top 25 teams in the final 2023 stop rate standings won a total of 249 games, with seven earning conference titles. Great teams find a way to get stops in critical situations.

Stop rate is not an advanced stat and is no substitute for Bill Connelly's SP+ or other more comprehensive metrics. It's merely a different method for evaluating success on defense.

Texas (10-1, 6-1) is coming off another strong showing in its 31-14 win over Kentucky, getting stops on nine of Kentucky's 10 offensive possessions. The Longhorns improved their stop rate on the season to 80.5% and have now held nine opponents to 17 points or less. Defensive coordinator Peter Kwiatkowski is in his fourth year in charge and has built up a crew that's fast, tough and deep.

The Longhorns rank No. 1 in FBS in passing yards per attempt (5.1), with a TD-to-INT ratio of 4-to-17, and have also been the best in the country at preventing explosive plays of 20-plus yards (22) and 30-yard yards (seven). It's a defense that has everything it needs at all three levels. Jahdae Barron, Michael Taaffe and Andrew Mukuba bring a ton of leadership and playmaking in the secondary. Linebacker Anthony Hill Jr. is playing at an All-America level as a sophomore. The defensive line is loaded with edge rushers and is getting a breakout season from fifth-year senior Alfred Collins.

To pull off a win over Texas A&M in College Station and secure a spot in next week's SEC title game, Texas' defense needs help from its offense. Georgia's offense started four drives deep in Texas territory and converted them into 20 points in a 30-15 win. Three of those four opportunities came off turnovers by Quinn Ewers or Arch Manning. That can't happen going forward, not against the caliber of opponents Texas will play the rest of the way.

Texas coach Steve Sarkisian liked how his defense responded to a similar challenge on Saturday. Texas' offense went through a rough spell in the third quarter with a three-and-out, a Ewers fumble returned for a touchdown, another fumble and a missed field goal. But the defense never let the game get in real danger.

They shut out the Wildcats in the second half and are allowing 6.5 second-half points per game this season, sixth-fewest in FBS. If they're going to escape College Station with a win, though, the Longhorns' offense cannot make that a habit.

Here are a few more stop rate updates to note following Week 13:

• Notre Dame and Ohio State remained No. 1 and 2, respectively, after dominant performances in high-stakes games on Saturday. Army's defense dropped from No. 3 to 6 after the Irish burned them for touchdowns on seven of their 10 drives.
• How about Oklahoma? Brent Venables' defense has stayed in the top 25 in stop rate all year long despite their rough record and issues on offense, and you saw why on Saturday night. They had all the right answers for Jalen Milroe and Alabama in a stunning 24-3 upset win. Defense has never been the problem for this team, and they brought their absolute best against the Crimson Tide.
• Penn State and Iowa pretty much swapped places in this week's stop rate standings. The Nittany Lions dropped from 13th to 22nd in stop rate after a tense 26-25 win over Minnesota, while the Hawkeyes moved from 22nd to 15th thanks to 10 stops in their 29-13 road win at Maryland.
• Ohio and Cal moved into the top 25 in this week's standings with Colorado and UConn dropping out. The Buffaloes have been so good on defense all season but got zero stops -- no punts, no turnovers, no anything -- in their 37-21 loss to Kansas.

Note: All data is courtesy of TruMedia. Games against FCS opponents and end-of-half drives in which the opponent took a knee or ran out the clock were filtered out.