Joey Bosa currently ranks fifth in the nation in total sacks with 11.5 sacks. Because some players have played more games than others, the NCAA normalizes the rankings by listing the players by sacks per game.
Here are the top 20 current leaders in terms of sacks/game:
Rk | Player | School | games | sacks | sacks/game |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Nate Orchard | Utah | 10 | 16.5 | 1.65 |
2 | Hau'Oli Kikana | Washington | 11 | 16.5 | 1.5 |
3 | Scooby Wright | Arizona | 10 | 13 | 1.3 |
- | Shane Ray | Missouri | 10 | 13 | 1.3 |
5 | Joey Bosa | Ohio St | 10 | 11.5 | 1.15 |
6 | Myles Garrett | Texas A&M | 10 | 11 | 1.1 |
7 | Christian Ringo | La-Lafayette | 10 | 10.5 | 1.05 |
8 | Emmanuel Ogbah | Oklahoma St | 10 | 10 | 1.0 |
9 | Pete Robertson | Texas Tech | 10 | 9 | 0.9 |
- | Derek Barnett | Tennessee | 10 | 9 | 0.9 |
- | Hunter Dimick | Utah | 10 | 9 | 0.9 |
12 | Terrell Hartsfield | Cincinnati | 9 | 8 | 0.89 |
13 | Andre Monroe | Maryland | 10 | 8.5 | 0.85 |
14 | Vic Beasley | Clemson | 10 | 8 | 0.8 |
- | Marcus Hardison | Arizona St | 10 | 8 | 0.8 |
- | Curt Maggitt | Tennessee | 10 | 8 | 0.8 |
- | Henry Coley | Virginia | 10 | 8 | 0.8 |
- | Michael Odiari | Texas St | 10 | 8 | 0.8 |
- | Drew Ott | Iowa | 10 | 8 | 0.8 |
- | Preston Smith | Miss St | 10 | 8 | 0.8 |
I thought it might be interesting, though, to see where Bosa ranks if we normalize by sacks per opponents' pass attempts, rather than sacks per game. After all, the top three guys on the above list - Orchard, Kikana, and Wright - play in the Pac 12, which is known as a passing league and hence might give its pass rushers more opportunities to rush the passer.
As it turns out, Bosa's numbers do look even better when we take the above top 20 guys and "re-normalize" them by sacks per opponents' 100 pass attempts:
Rk | player | school | sacks | opp pa | sacks/ 100 a |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Orchard | Utah | 16.5 | 362 | 4.56 |
2 | Kikana | Washington | 16.5 | 417 | 3.96 |
3 | Ray | Missouri | 13.0 | 348 | 3.74 |
4 | Bosa | Ohio St | 11.5 | 318 | 3.62 |
5 | Wright | Arizona | 13.0 | 380 | 3.42 |
6 | Barnett | Tennessee | 9.0 | 291 | 3.09 |
7 | Garrett | Texas A&M | 11.0 | 365 | 3.01 |
8 | Robertson | Texas Tech | 9.0 | 306 | 2.94 |
9 | Ringo | La-Laf | 10.5 | 358 | 2.93 |
10 | Beasley | Clemson | 8.0 | 277 | 2.89 |
11 | Ott | Iowa | 8.0 | 288 | 2.78 |
12 | Maggitt | Tennessee | 9.0 | 306 | 2.75 |
13 | Ogbah | Okla St | 10.0 | 367 | 2.72 |
14 | Odiari | Texas St | 8.0 | 312 | 2.56 |
15 | Dimick | Utah | 9.0 | 362 | 2.49 |
16 | Hartsfield | Cincinnati | 8.0 | 322 | 2.48 |
17 | Hardison | Arizona St | 8.0 | 323 | 2.48 |
18 | Coley | Virginia | 8.0 | 326 | 2.45 |
19 | Monroe | Maryland | 8.5 | 364 | 2.34 |
20 | Smith | Miss St | 8.0 | 427 | 1.87 |
Notes (caveats):
1. I didn't know how many of the above plays each player actually participated in (e.g., if he was injured, and/or if he is part of a heavy DL rotation system), which could have skewed the above list.
2. Also, the "re-normalized" list might leave out a few guys that should be listed on the true top 20 list for sacks per Opp PA, because I simply re-normalized the top 20 guys on the sacks per game list (maybe some other player that has 7.0 sacks so far has played on a defense that's faced a relatively low number of pass attempts).