ALLEN PARK, Mich. \u2014 Detroit Lions defensive lineman Levi Onwuzurike is out for the season after having knee surgery, a setback for a franchise that was counting on him to fill in for Alim McNeill.<\/p>\n
Lions coach Dan Campbell made the announcement Sunday morning, hours before his team had its first training camp practice of the year.<\/p>\n
The 27-year-old Onwuzurike started in a career-high 11 games last season, including Detroit\u2019s loss to Washington in the divisional round. His playing time increased when McNeill had a season-ending knee injury in December. McNeill, who signed a $97 million, four-year contract extension last October, is out indefinitely.<\/p>\n
Onwuzurike\u2019s injury gives rookie defensive tackle Tyleik Williams a chance to play a significant role when the two-time defending NFC North champions kick off the season Sept. 7 at Green Bay.<\/p>\n
\u201cLosing Levi, that hurts, but it helps that we got Tyleik,\u201d Campbell said.<\/p>\n
The Lions will play in the league\u2019s first preseason game July 31 against the Los Angeles Chargers in Canton, Ohio.<\/p>\n
Detroit selected Williams, a former Ohio State standout, with the 28th pick overall in the NFL draft. The 6-foot-3, 334-pound Williams started 13 games for the national champion Buckeyes and had 46 tackles, including eight for losses and 2 1\/2 sacks.<\/p>\n
The Lions also will lean on 31-year-old defensive tackle DJ Reader and newly acquired veteran Roy Lopez, who started 16 games last season for Arizona and has 50 career starts with the Cardinals and Houston Texans.<\/p>\n
\u201cI like what we\u2019ve got in that room,\u201d Campbell said. \u201cWe\u2019ve got an opportunity for a lot of guys. We just have to get the best unit that we can to come out of this, and then we have to weather any storm until we get reinforcements because reinforcements are coming, at least we know that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Detroit\u2019s injury report on the defensive line also lists Mekhi Wingo, who had a season-ending knee injury, and Josh Paschal, who had shoulder surgery. The team also held edge rusher Al-Quadin Muhammad out of its first practice.<\/p>\n
\u201cFeel good about getting Paschal back here at some point before the season,\u201d Campbell said.<\/p>\n
The Lions are encouraged by Aidan Hutchinson\u2019s comeback from surgery he had last season after breaking his left leg in two places, ending his third NFL season with 7 1\/2 sacks in five games.<\/p>\n
Hutchinson appeared to fully participate in practice on Sunday, wearing a black sleeve to support much of his left leg.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s hard to differentiate from any other time I\u2019ve seen because he\u2019s so fluid and he\u2019s just such a beast,\u201d said defensive end Marcus Davenport, who was limited to two games last season because of torn triceps. \u201cHe looks good to you, like he\u2019s back.\u201d<\/p>\n
Originally Published: July 20, 2025 at 2:41 PM CDT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ALLEN PARK, Mich. \u2014 Detroit Lions defensive lineman Levi Onwuzurike is out for the season after having knee…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":222760,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2071],"tags":[146,113,2506,7,3144,6279,147,6,498],"class_list":{"0":"post-222759","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-detroit-lions","8":"tag-detroit","9":"tag-detroit-lions","10":"tag-detroitlions","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-injury","13":"tag-levi-onwuzurike","14":"tag-lions","15":"tag-nfl","16":"tag-nfl-football"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114887299327801957","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222759","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222759"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222759\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/222760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}