Everything was in front of No. 14 Tennessee to stun No. 1 Texas at Neyland Stadium in Week 4. The Longhorns looked sluggish from start to finish, with the Vols' defense stepping up when needed. It wasn't enough, as the offense for Tennessee sputtered and the offensive line had a day to forget in the 20-17 loss to the Longhorns.
Right now, there are surely plenty of people who are downright livid with head man Josh Heupel - hey, we get it. Heupel's lack of in-game adjustments with Faizon Brandon hurt this team. However, Brandon had to run for his life consistently in the loss, with the guys up front not giving him any time. At the end of the day, that's on offensive line coach Glen Elarbee, who simply did NOT have his guys ready for battle. Sorry, but the performance from the OL as a whole was inexcusable.
Tennessee's OL looked awful vs. Texas and that's on position coach Glen Elarbee
With Brandon being a true freshman quarterback, he needed the hosses in front of him to bring their hard hats to work and make sure he was always upright and given more than enough time to scan the field and look for open receivers. That wasn't the case against the Longhorns, with Texas finishing with 10 sacks. Ten!
As per the esteemed @_JoshRWhite, Texas' 10 sacks are the second-most in a single game in program history.
— David Eckert (@davideckert98) September 26, 2026
Not only that, but Colin Simmons looked like an All-World pass-rusher in this heavyweight battle. We understand that Simmons is a future first-round pick and a Top 10 selection. Still, he had his way with the Tennessee offensive line, including former 5-star offensive tackle signee David Sanders Jr. That surely was not something we expected.
Simmons posted five sacks all on his own, which is wild to even think about. It was an off day for basically everyone up front. The biggest disappointment may have been Sanders. We hate to pile on the sophomore, but he kept getting his lunch money taken from him, and a false start late in the action came at the worst possible time.
Fellow tackle Jesse Perry had himself a day to forget too, which unfortunately couldn't be the case. Shamurad Umarov wasn't much better on the inside. When DeSean Bishop finishes with 11 carries for 34 yards, you know the linemen didn't deliver in the way they were supposed to.
This all comes back to what Elarbee is doing to get his group ready for big games. Sure, Tennessee looked great against Furman, Georgia Tech, and Kennesaw State, but taking such a massive step back in the SEC opener is enough to keep people up at night for the next few days. This performance brought a lot of us back to earth, but games are won and lost in the trenches.
Against Tennessee, Texas won that particular part of the game, and it wasn't close. That's 100 percent on Elarbee. You can be upset with Brandon's play and Heupel's coaching all you want, but the veteran offensive line coach isn't free of getting some blame, too. Matter of fact, he should be getting plenty of it.
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