Ranking the top pass-rushers in college football for 2024
When we began our top 10 rankings for 2024 in college football, we started at quarterback, a natural spot given the importance of the position.
This week we turn to the players whose job it is to make the quarterback’s life miserable.
We asked our reporters to rank their top 10 pass-rushers — and the list is as varied as it is impressive. We have a couple of transfers, a mix of veterans and underclassmen and even a pair of teammates.
Points were assigned based on their votes: 10 points for first place, nine for second place and down to one point for 10th place.
Here are the results.
Previous top 10 lists: Receivers | Running backs | Quarterbacks
2023 stats: 10 sacks, 14.5 tackles for loss, 2 forced fumbles
Points: 58 (five first-place votes)
Tennessee signed six blue-chippers in its 2022 recruiting class. Pearce wasn’t one of them, but he had a blue-chipper’s offer list — Georgia, Florida State, Oklahoma, Texas and so on — and in only his first season as a regular, he quickly developed into one of the best pass-rushers in the sport. He was seventh nationally with 10 sacks and fifth with 11 sacks created (first pressures on what eventually became sacks). He boasted a 19% pressure rate (third nationally) and created pressure within 2.5 seconds of the snap on 10% of his pass rushes (also third). He brought down the quarterback at least once in eight of 13 games, and he created at least three pressures in eight contests, including five of his last six. He was Pro Football Focus’ highest-graded SEC defensive lineman.
Pearce is listed at a lanky 6-foot-5, 242 pounds, but he proved capable doing damage against the run too, finishing the season with 10 run stops — he was one of only 12 defenders (and one of only two in the SEC) with double-digit run stops and sacks. He is an absolute menace, and as he enters only his third year of college, he might still have more room to develop. — Bill Connelly
2023 stats: 11 sacks, 14.5 tackles for loss, 3 forced fumbles
Points: 53 (one first-place vote)
When Gillotte announced he was returning to Louisville for another season, the decision sent Cardinals fans rejoicing. Gillotte gives Louisville a bona fide star heading into the 2024 season, a player who has been on a steady upward trajectory since his freshman year in 2021. Gillotte has started 26 games the past two seasons, but last year was his breakout, with 14.5 tackles for loss and 11 sacks (his sack total ranked No. 10 nationally). As a result, Gillotte earned first-team All-ACC honors and was a second-team Walter Camp All-American.
Entering this season, Gillotte will head a defense that returns six starters and made significant strides up front as one of the best pass-rushing teams in the ACC. He will be a preseason favorite for ACC Defensive Player of the Year honors. — Andrea Adelson
2023 stats: 14 sacks, 17.5 tackles for loss, 1 forced fumble
Points: 43 (two first-place votes)
Don’t be surprised if Moore is among the most impactful non-quarterback transfers during the 2024 season. He brings elite pass-rushing skills to an ascending Texas defense that enters the SEC needing to replace Big 12 Defensive Player of the Year T’Vondre Sweat and other standouts. Moore shined for UTSA, setting the team record for tackles for loss (18) as a redshirt freshman, then the sacks record with 14 last season, just a half-sack shy of the AAC record. He earned conference Defensive Player of the Year honors and had 35.5 tackles for loss, 22 sacks and 3 forced fumbles over the past two seasons with the Roadrunners.
The San Antonio native should fit seamlessly into coordinator Pete Kwiatkowki’s defense, which showed clear improvement in 2023 but had no player eclipse 5.5 sacks. Moore has collected sacks in bunches, recording three or more in three contests last season. He fills an obvious need at Texas, which hasn’t had a player reach 13 sacks since Jackson Jeffcoat in 2013. Moore has room to grow as a run defender, and Texas’ move to the SEC will allow him to sharpen his skills against top competition before a likely move to the NFL. — Adam Rittenberg
2023 stats: 6.5 sacks, 10 tackles for loss, 2 forced fumbles
Points: 35
Sawyer said he knew deep down in his heart that it wouldn’t have felt right to leave Ohio State following last season, triggering a return that will give the Buckeyes one of the top defensive end tandems in the country in Sawyer and JT Tuimoloau.
The 6-4, 265-pound Sawyer was ESPN’s No. 1-rated prospect overall in the 2021 signing class and played like it during the second half of last season. He had 5.5 of his 6.5 sacks in his past six games and also racked up eight tackles for loss during that stretch. He spent time during the 2022 season in a hybrid “Jack” linebacker role, but has the burst, size and skills to reach double digits in sacks in 2024 on an Ohio State defensive line that will be loaded. — Chris Low
2023 stats: 7.5 sacks, 12.5 tackles for loss, 3 forced fumbles
Points: 35
Here’s what Bain had going against him in 2023: He was a true freshman. He was splitting time between edge rusher and interior defender. He was on a team that, for the second straight year, felt directionless. It would have been entirely reasonable then to assume Bain would chalk up the season as a learning experience, work to sand off some rough edges and be ready to take the ACC by storm in 2024. Unfortunately for opposing QBs, he wasn’t that patient.
Bain was a force of nature in 2023, racking up 7.5 sacks, 12.5 tackles for loss, 4 quarterback hurries, 3 forced fumbles and 31 pressures — ninth most in the ACC — en route to being named the league’s Defensive Rookie of the Year. His expected progression in 2024 is one of the reasons Miami believes this season could be a turning point for the Canes. — David Hale
2023 stats: 8.5 sacks, 15 tackles for loss, 1 forced fumble
Points: 30
Rucker is one of the nation’s most experienced pass-rushers, having started games in each of the past four seasons. Although he showed the ability to disrupt quarterbacks early in his career, he didn’t have a true breakout year until 2023, when he collected 8.5 sacks, 15 tackles for loss and 12 quarterback hurries. He led UNC in all three categories and earned second-team All-ACC honors, while ranking seventh nationally in total quarterback pressures with 41. Rucker opened the 2023 season with a career performance, recording 5.5 tackles for loss and two sacks in a win over South Carolina. He enters his final season with 16 sacks, 30.5 tackles for loss and four forced fumbles in 28 career starts.
An unheralded three-star recruit out of Georgia, Rucker gives new Tar Heels defensive coordinator Geoff Collins a proven star off the edge in 2024. Nicknamed “The Butcher,” Rucker has become a bigger factor against the run and posted a career-high 61 tackles, 24 more than in any other season, in 2023. At 6-foot-2 and 265 pounds, Rucker is a bit undersized but makes up for it with his technique and savvy in pursuing quarterbacks. He will be one of the ACC’s most recognizable defenders entering the fall. — Rittenberg
2023 stats: 5.5 sacks, 13 tackles for loss, 3 forced fumbles
Points: 26
There’s no argument against Perkins’ otherworldly pass-rush skills. He burst onto the scene as a true freshman in 2022, holding his coming-out party in a 13-10 win over Arkansas in which he racked up four sacks and effectively shut down the Hogs’ offense single-handedly. Big things were expected of Perkins’ sophomore campaign, but the results were mixed. He continued to be a force off the edge, racking up 5.5 sacks, 13 tackles for loss and recorded an impressive 16% pressure rate when rushing the quarterback.
But Perkins struggled badly against the run and often became a nonfactor on defense when playing inside. LSU has suggested it plans to use him inside again this season as Perkins works to become a more well-rounded defender. How much that takes away from his biggest strength as a pass-rusher remains to be seen, but the bottom line is inarguable: When Perkins is set loose on the passer, good things happen for LSU’s defense. — Hale
2023 stats: 5 sacks, 7 tackles for loss
Points: 23
A swarm of talented Ohio State players elected to return for the 2024 season, and Tuimoloau was at the top of that list. He was a first-team All-Big Ten selection a year ago, and at 6-foot-4, 270 pounds, he has the strength and power to overwhelm opposing offensive tackles. Tuimoloau’s length makes it difficult for quarterbacks to throw over him, and he’s always a threat to bat down passes at the line of scrimmage.
He was second on the team to returning defensive end cohort Jack Sawyer last season with five sacks and led the Buckeyes with six quarterback hurries. This will be Tuimoloau’s fourth season in the program, and as he said himself, the Buckeyes have “athletes everywhere” on defense. — Low
2023 stats: 7 sacks, 11.5 tackles for loss
Points: 19
Ole Miss coach Lane Kiffin went to work in the transfer portal to remake his entire roster, and one of the best players he brought in has the ability to elevate an already stout defense that likes to be aggressive. Umanmielen was a force as an edge rusher at Florida last season, earning second-team All-SEC honors with 11.5 tackles for loss and seven sacks.
But it is safe to say we probably have not seen the best of him just yet. His career numbers might say otherwise, but in the defensive scheme he is entering, Umanmielen is capable of putting up the best numbers of his career. At 6-foot-5 and 255 pounds, Umanmielen uses his large frame to his advantage. But his former Florida coaches also raved about his lower body control, allowing him the leverage to stay balanced and make plays. — Adelson
2023 stats: 9.5 sacks, 14.5 tackles for loss, 3 forced fumbles
Points: 18
When a former blue-chipper leaves his original school in search of a new opportunity (and maybe a bit more playing time), this is how you hope things turn out. After starting five games and recording three sacks at Florida in 2022, Powell-Ryland moved to Blacksburg and went off. He finished second in the ACC in sacks (9.5), first in individual sack rate (3.9%) and third in pressure rate (14.6%). He was third nationally with three forced fumbles from sacks. He had one of the most incredible games you’ll see from a pass-rusher in Tech’s 30-13 win over Wake Forest in October, recording six pressures and four sacks in just 29 pass-rush attempts. He had four more pressures and two more sacks the next week against Syracuse.
Despite being a bit on the smaller side (6-3, 246), Powell-Ryland, who hails from the Portsmouth, Virginia, proved solid in run support too, recording eight run stops and finishing the season with 15 total tackles for loss. Even better, he’s returning for another season and will anchor one of the most experienced defenses in the country. — Connelly
Also receiving votes: Patrick Payton, Florida State (17); Elijah Roberts, SMU (15); Jah Joyner, Minnesota (11); Anthony Hill Jr., Texas (10); Deontae Lawson, Alabama (8); Mykel Williams, Georgia (8); Landon Jackson, Arkansas (7); Tyler Baron, Louisville (5); Jordan Burch, Oregon (4); Josaiah Stewart, Michigan (4); Jasheen Davis, Wake Forest (3); R.J. Oben, Notre Dame (3); Aeneas Peebles, Virginia Tech (2); Barryn Sorrell, Texas (2); Maxwell Hairston, Kentucky (1)
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Greg Wyshynski
The Dallas Stars‘ 3-1 win in Game 4 against the Winnipeg Jets on Tuesday night was a contrast in offensive efficiency. The Jets converted just once on 72 shot attempts. Dallas center Mikael Granlund, meanwhile, needed only three shot attempts in the game to score three goals. His hat trick was all the offense the Stars needed to take a commanding 3-1 series lead, moving one win away from their third straight trip to the Western Conference finals.
“Obviously, the job is not done. We’ve got a lot of work to do. [But] that was a good win,” Granlund said.
It was the first career hat trick for Granlund, a 13-year veteran whom the Stars acquired from the San Jose Sharks in a trade back in February. Three goals on three shots, all of them sailing past Jets goalie Connor Hellebuyck, who remained winless on the road in the 2025 postseason.
Granlund’s first goal came at 8:36 on the power play, as he skated in on three Jets defensemen and fired a snap shot past Hellebuyck from the top of the slot.
“I was just shooting it somewhere and it went in,” Granlund said.
“I got a clean enough look. It was just a damn perfect shot, just above my pad and below my glove,” Hellebuyck lamented.
“Obviously, he probably wants the first one back, the wrister,” Jets coach Scott Arniel said of Hellebuyck. “At the end of the day, we’ve got to get him some run support. Get him a lead.”
Granlund’s second shot and second goal came on a play started by Mikko Rantanen, whose league-leading point total now stands at 19 for the playoffs. His outlet pass found Granlund in the neutral zone, sparking a 2-on-1 with Roope Hintz. Granlund kept the puck and roofed it to give Dallas a 2-1 lead after Nik Ehlers had tied the game for Winnipeg earlier in the second period.
“When you pass all the time, you can surprise the goalie sometimes when you shoot the puck. It’s good to shoot once in a while,” said Granlund, who had twice as many assists (44) as goals (22) in the regular season.
Granlund’s third and final shot attempt of the game was on another Dallas power play in the third period, following a double-minor penalty to defenseman Haydn Fleury for high-sticking Hintz.
Defenseman Miro Heiskanen, in the lineup for the first time since Jan. 28 after missing the last 32 regular-season games and first 10 playoff games because of a knee injury, collected the puck after Matt Duchene rang it off the post. Heiskanen slid it over to Granlund for a one-timer that brought him to his knees on the ice. After the shot beat Hellebuyck at 7:23 of the third period, waves of hats hit the ice in celebration of Granlund’s three-goal night.
It was fitting that Rantanen and Heiskanen had points on Granlund’s hat trick. This was the first game that the Stars’ so-called “Finnish Mafia” played together, as Heiskanen was injured before Granlund and Rantanen joined the team. Those three skaters joined countrymen Hintz and defenseman Esa Lindell in helping Dallas to victory.
“It was fun for sure. Fun to finally be on the ice with them,” Heiskanen said.
Goaltender Jake Oettinger did the rest with 31 saves, many of them on dangerous Winnipeg chances. But in the end, all the Stars needed were three shot attempts, while the Jets’ voluminous offensive night produced only one goal.
“Oettinger made some big stops. But we had 70 shot attempts. We have to get more than one goal,” Arniel said. “If we can’t find more than one goal, we’re not going to win hockey games, especially [against] this team.”
Dallas will attempt to close out the series on Thursday night in Winnipeg.
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David Schoenfield
Pete Rose, Joe Jackson, seven other members of the 1919 Chicago “Black Sox”, six other former players, one coach and one former owner are now eligible to be voted on for the Hall of Fame after commissioner Rob Manfred removed them from Major League Baseball’s permanently ineligible list.
Hall of Fame chairwoman Jane Forbes Clark said in a statement: “The National Baseball Hall of Fame has always maintained that anyone removed from Baseball’s permanently ineligible list will become eligible for Hall of Fame consideration. Major League Baseball’s decision to remove deceased individuals from the permanently ineligible list will allow for the Hall of Fame candidacy of such individuals to now be considered.”
Due to Hall of Fame voting procedures, Rose and Jackson won’t be eligible to be voted on until the Classic Era Baseball committee, which votes on individuals who made their biggest impact prior to 1980, meets in December of 2027.
Let’s dig into what all this means.
Why were these players banned?
All individuals on the banned list who were reinstated had been permanently ineligible due to accusations related to gambling related to baseball — either throwing games, accepting bribes, or like Rose, betting on baseball games.
Most of the banned players, including Jackson and his seven Chicago White Sox teammates who threw the 1919 World Series, played in the 1910s, when gambling in baseball was widespread. As historian Bill James once wrote, “Few simplifications of memory are as bizarre as the notion that the Black Sox scandal hit baseball out of the blue. … In fact, of course, the Black Sox scandal was merely the largest wart of a disease that had infested baseball at least a dozen years earlier and had grown, unchecked, to ravage the features of a generation.”
The most famous player, of course, was Jackson, one of baseball’s biggest stars alongside Ty Cobb and Tris Speaker in the 1910s. While many have tried to exonerate Jackson through the years, pointing out that he hit .375 in the 1919 World Series, baseball historians agree that Jackson was a willing participant in throwing the World Series and accepted money from the gambling ring that paid off the White Sox players.
While the White Sox players were acquitted in a criminal trial in 1921, commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis banned the eight players in a statement that began with the words “Regardless of the verdict of juries …”
If there was an innocent member in the group, it was third baseman Buck Weaver, not Jackson. Weaver had participated in meetings where the fixing of the World Series was discussed, and Landis banned him for life for guilty knowledge.
As for Rose, he was banned in 1989 by commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti for betting on games while he was manager of the Cincinnati Reds, including those involving his own team. While Rose denied the accusations for years, he eventually confessed. He died last September at age 83.
Who else is impacted?
Phillies owner William Cox was banned in 1943 and forced to sell the team for betting on games. Cox had just purchased the team earlier that season. None of the other non-White Sox players are of major significance, although Benny Kauff was the big star of the Federal League in 1914-15, winning the batting title both seasons. The Federal League was a breakoff league that attempted to challenge the National and American leagues.
When is the soonest Rose and Jackson could go into the Hall of Fame?
The Hall of Fame voting process for players not considered by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America — such as Rose and Jackson, who never appeared on the ballot due to their banned status — includes two eras: the Contemporary Baseball Era (1980 to present) and the Classic Baseball Era (pre-1980). The voting periods are already set:
December 2025: Player ballot for the Contemporary Era.
December 2026: Contemporary Era ballot for managers, executives and umpires.
December 2027: Classic Era ballot for players, managers, executives and umpires.
Each committee has an initial screening to place eight candidates on the ballot, so Rose and Jackson will first have to make the ballot. While it’s unclear how a future screening committee will proceed, it’s possible that both will make the ballot. While comparisons to players with PED allegations aren’t exactly apples to apples — since they were never placed on the ineligible list — it’s worth noting that Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens and Rafael Palmeiro were included on the eight-player Contemporary Era ballot in 2023.
Once the ballot is determined — a 16-person committee consisting of Hall of Fame players, longtime executives and media members or historians — convenes and votes. A candidate must receive 12 votes to get selected. In the most recent election in December, Dave Parker and Dick Allen were on the Classic Era ballot.
Which players have the best HOF cases?
Obviously, Rose would have been a slam-dunk Hall of Famer had he never bet on baseball and had he appeared on the BBWAA ballot after his career ended. The all-time MLB leader with 4,256 hits, Rose won three batting titles and was the 1973 NL MVP. And while he’s overrated in a sense — his 79.6 career WAR is more in line with the likes of Jeff Bagwell, Brooks Robinson and Robin Yount than all-time elite superstars — and hung on well past his prime to break Ty Cobb’s hits record, his popularity and fame would have made him an inner-circle Hall of Famer.
Whether he’ll get support now is complicated. Bonds and Clemens both received fewer than four votes in 2023. The committee usually consists of eight former players, and they may not support Rose given the one hard and fast rule that every player knows: You can’t bet on the game.
Jackson, meanwhile, was a star of the deadball era, hitting .408 in 1911 and .356 in his career, an average that ranks fourth all time behind only Cobb, Negro Leagues star Oscar Charleston and Rogers Hornsby. He finished with 62.2 WAR and 1,772 hits in a career that ended at age 32 due to the ban. Those figures would be low for a Hall of Fame selection, although the era committees did recently elect Allen and Tony Oliva, both of whom finished with fewer than 2,000 hits. And again, it is hard to say how the committee will view Jackson’s connection to gambling on the sport.
The only other reinstated player with a semblance of a chance to get on a ballot is pitcher Eddie Cicotte, who won 209 games and finished with 59.7 WAR. While his final season came at 36, the knuckleballer was still going strong, having won 29 games for the White Sox in 1919 and 21 in 1920 before Landis banned him.
For what it’s worth, the top position players in career WAR who made their mark prior to 1980 and aren’t in the Hall of Fame are Rose, Bill Dahlen (75.3), Bobby Grich (71.0), Graig Nettles (67.6), Reggie Smith (64.6), Ken Boyer (62.8), Jackson and Sal Bando (61.5).
Pitching candidates would include Luis Tiant (65.7), Tommy John (61.6) and Wes Ferrell (60.1). John was on the recent ballot and received seven votes. Others on that ballot included Steve Garvey, Boyer, Negro Leagues pitcher John Donaldson, Negro Leagues manager Vic Harris and Tiant.
Other potential pre-1980 candidates could include Thurman Munson, Bert Campaneris, Dave Concepcion and Stan Hack.
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