Texas appears close to filling the one vacancy on its coaching staff with Miami Dolphins assistant defensive line coach Kenny Baker, according to reports.

Baker would replace Bo Davis as the Longhorns' defensive line coach. He spent 11 seasons at smaller college programs before joining the Dolphins this season.

247Sports was the first to report on Baker joining the Longhorns.

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Baker, a Georgia native who played college football at Gardner-Webb in North Carolina from 2005 to 2008, coached the defensive line at Western Kentucky from 2020 to ’22 and drew praise for his individual work with edge rusher DeAngelo Malone, the 2021 Conference USA player of the year and a third-round draft pick of the Atlanta Falcons.

He also worked as a defensive assistant at Tennessee-Chattanooga and Mercer after starting his coaching career at the high school level in Georgia.

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Baker has some big shoes to fill, considering the success Davis had with the Texas defensive line before departing for LSU this month. Last season, Texas had the nation's third-best rushing defense at 82.4 yards per game. Former defensive linemen Keondre Coburn and Moro Ojomo were both drafted last year. T'Vondre Sweat developed into the Big 12 defensive player of the year and the Outland Trophy winner during his fifth season. Byron Murphy II was lauded as Big 12 defensive lineman of the year in 2023.

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Davis also was involved in what has been acknowledged as a pivotal moment for the formation of the culture at Texas under coach Steve Sarkisian. After a loss at Iowa State in 2021, Davis heard laughter on the team bus and responded with an expletive-laden rant that was recorded and later published on social media. Reflecting on that bus ride in November, Sarkisian said that “it was one of those moments that I guess in a weird way, fortunately, that situation on the bus got out.”

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Texas football to hire Dolphins' Kenny Baker as DL coach | Report