What's it like blocking Dylan Stewart? Just ask Cason Henry

Picture this. Imagine you have to block a 6-foot-5, 245-pound edge rusher in a 60-minute football game.

And that 19-year-old you’re blocking — yes, you read that right — is coming at you like a freight train as he blasts off the line of scrimmage when the ball is snapped.

Now imagine having to do that every single day. Granted, at least not in a game since he’s on your team, but certainly in practice leading up to the game.

Sound scary yet? Well, then here’s some good news.

That job is already taken by South Carolina right tackle Cason Henry. He gets the chance to go up against Dylan Stewart, a unanimous Freshman All-American in 2024, in practice every day.

Is it tough to block someone of Stewart’s size and freakish ability? Undoubtedly. But Henry, who outsizes him at 6-foot-6, 310 pounds, doesn’t back down from the opportunity he has.

“I was talking to Mr. (Pat) DiMarco on (Tailgate Talks with DiMarco and Garcia), and he was asking me, you know, it’s kind of hard to not get better when you go against a guy like Dylan,” Henry said. “And I was saying, like, yeah, I go against him literally every day. So it’s almost like you have to try not to get better if you’re going against the premier pass rusher in North America, you know what I mean?”

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Henry, now going into his fourth season with the Gamecocks, loves going against Stewart in practice. He believes it makes him “a lot better” when he gets to do so every day.

And it’s not hard to see why that would be the case, especially when he’s able to hold his own. Stewart is coming off a freshman season where he had 10.5 tackles for loss and 6.5 sacks in 13 games. He’s just one of the many talented players on South Carolina’s defensive line who posed real challenges for defenses last year.

“I want to surround myself with guys that are better than me, or know what I’m doing, or know what to look for,” Henry said.

The way that Henry finds himself making the most improvement in these battles isn’t necessarily all in just blocking Stewart and others like him. It’s also thinking about things from the defender’s perspective.

“I asked Dylan, ‘Hey, do you know when I’m going to go down block? Do you know when I’m gonna come out and pass block you?'” Henry said. “And he’s like, ‘Yeah, you do this or you do this. Like I can kind of tell from the backfield motions or whatever.’

“There’s nothing I can do about that with the backfield stuff. But me personally, I can help with not giving any tells, not leaning in my stance, not having my hands a certain way, when they’re not looking a certain way, you know, anything that would give away any sort of hint to a defensive lineman. So, yeah, I asked those guys, and I hope that helps my game, for sure.”

Over the years, injuries have hampered Henry’s college career. He was finally fully healthy in 2024 and started all 13 games at right tackle. Before then, he had only appeared in four games with one start in his first two seasons.

“I think that when you play 13 games, you’re a lot more comfortable in situations like that, like hard two-minute situations, stuff like that, where we’re all out there,” he said. “I’ve been here before. So it’s like, I’m able to play more free. I’ve seen that throughout practices and everything.”

As he goes into this season, he’ll be battling in fall camp to retain his starting job. But if there’s any way to earn that spot, blocking a player like Stewart seems like a good start.

“I know how to play faster,” Henry said. “I’ve done it in hard situations and been successful with it, so I think it’s helped a lot.”

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