Looking toward Texas football's future: Alex January
With four defensive tackles leaving the Texas Longhorns football program after exhausting their eligibility, Steve Sarkisian and company are going to scour the transfer portal once again for instant-impact players on the defensive line. While that’s a key part of painting the 2025 picture, so too is developing the defensive linemen already on the UT roster.
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One of those Longhorns, Alex January, got his feet wet in 2024 and will be looked to for more contributions during his sophomore season in 2025.
January appeared in 13 games in 2024 (his appearances versus Michigan and Clemson are not reflected on his roster page), notching a tackle versus ULM, a tackle versus Oklahoma, and a tackle versus Kentucky. His snap count was limited as he saw 10 or fewer defensive snaps in all but the UTSA, Oklahoma, and Florida games.
Even so, he played in important contests. His best contribution to the 2024 Longhorns may have been his ability to goad TreVeyon Henderson into an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty in the Cotton Bowl. All in all, it was part of a season January thought was a good foundation for the next few years.
“It was pretty good,” January said prior to the Peach Bowl. “It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, transitioning from high school to college.”
According to Pro Football Focus, January earned an overall defensive grade of 63.2, a rush defense grade of 68.2, and a pass-rush grade of 54.2. Forty-four of his 2024 snaps were in the B-gap, 26 were over the offensive tackle, and 17 were in the A-Gap. He did not record any snaps on special teams.
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As his grades reflect, there’s an area January knows he needs to improve on ahead of 2025.
“Probably my pass rush,” January said. “I need to work on my pass rush.”
Ranked as the No. 433 overall prospect in the 2024 class, January’s path to the field in 2025 currently does not have many obstacles on it. The current defensive tackles at Texas’ disposal for next season include January, North Carolina transfer Travis Shaw, Purdue transfer Cole Brevard, redshirt freshman Melvin Hills, true freshman Justus Terry, true freshman Josiah Sharma, and true freshman Myron Charles.
Like the all-conference and All-American players before him, a freshman season spent learning the ropes while still seeing real action is a valuable aspect in development. All of Moro Ojomo, Keondre Coburn, Byron Murphy, T’Vondre Sweat, Alfred Collins, and Vernon Broughton spent some time on the field during their debut seasons on the 40 Acres. Some of that was dictated by need but their talent level made early playing time possible.
Out of a two man class, January was the one Texas thought capable of first-year snaps. Even with transfer portal additions to the roster ahead of his freshman season, January outperformed those imPorts to where he was in line for time on the field over his more experienced cohorts. That fact alone is a positive trend line for the Longhorn legacy.
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Texas would like to add at least two more players to Kenny Baker‘s position group. No matter how many defensive tackles the Longhorns add to the roster, January will be one of the players charged with maintaining the high level of play Sarkisian’s program has enjoyed at the position over the past three years.
