BATON ROUGE — LSU’s offensive line, which featured All-America center Ethan Pocic along with All-SEC guards Will Clapp and Josh Boutte, has been ranked as the top collective unit in college football by Pro Football Focus for the 2016 season.
According to Pro Football Focus, “as a collective unit, no offensive line performed better than that of the LSU Tigers in 2016. The group finished atop our offensive line metric, largely because all three starting interior players had overall grades of at least 74.5.
“The Tigers were led by C Ethan Pocic, whose overall grade of 82.7 was bolstered by his pass-blocking performance that saw him yield just 11 total pressures with no sacks or hits allowed. LG Will Clapp was also outstanding in pass protection, as he was responsible for just nine total pressures, with two hits and no sacks. RG Josh Boutte was the only member of the interior trio to give up a sack, but his lone sack charged to him was accompanied by just seven other pressures.”
LSU used seven different starters on the offensive line in 2016 with four starting combinations. LSU finished the year ranked No. 4 in the SEC in rushing offense with 233.0 yards per game. The Tiger offensive line allowed only 19 sacks all season, which ranked No. 3 in the SEC.
Led by All-SEC running back Derrius Guice, LSU averaged an SEC-best 6.1 yards per carry and scored 30 rushing touchdowns. Being LSU’s offensive line, Guice led the SEC in rushing yards (1,387) and yards per carry (7.6) and he finished second in the league in rushing TDs (15) and rushing yards per game (115.6).
According to Pro Football Focus, “not surprisingly, the success of LSU’s run game can be directly attributed to the outstanding play of the offensive line. Tiger runners averaged 6.6 yards per carry on the season, and earned 46.8 percent of their yards before initial contact.
“By comparison, Alabama and Clemson runners gained 40.7 and 40.1 percent of their yardage before contact, displaying perfectly just how much more efficient the play of the LSU offensive line was. With Pocic and Boutte both graduating and onto the next level, the Tigers are unlikely to duplicate this year’s effort in 2017. However, this year’s group can take pride in knowing the unit put together a truly elite 2016 campaign.”
The Tigers return four players in 2017 who started and/or saw significant action on the offensive line this past season: Clapp, left tackle K.J. Malone, right tackle Toby Weathersby and Maea Teuhema, who has played both guard and tackle during his career.