Colby Wooden anticipates a “slight change” in his role in the weeks ahead.

With edge rusher Eku Leota likely out for the rest of the season due to a pectoral injury, Wooden expects to see more reps on the exterior of Auburn’s defensive line beginning with Saturday’s road game against No. 2 Georgia.

“I’ll get a few reps outside, but not too much is going to change,” Wooden said. “I’ll still be inside mostly. I may have to bump out, you know, slightly more than normal.”

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Wooden has started all five games at defensive end this season, but with Auburn typically utilizing two edge rushers — Leota and Derick Hall — in its base formation, the majority of Wooden’s snaps come on the interior of the defensive line. The 6-foot-5, 284-pounder has been a force along the line, with 19 tackles, 4.5 for a loss, two sacks, a forced fumble and four quarterback hurries through five games. He’s third on the team in stops behind the line of scrimmage and tied for second in sacks, along with Leota.

Now Leota is sidelined for the foreseeable future, and likely the remainder of the season, leaving Auburn in need of some help off the edge. Wooden, who signed with Auburn as a 6-foot-4, 239-pounder, started his career playing off the edge but has since bulked up into a formidable interior lineman.

He has still maintained his pass-rushing prowess, even at his bigger stature. Entering this season, Wooden had the best pass-rush win rate (15.7 percent) among SEC interior linemen over the last two years, just ahead of Georgia preseason All-American Jalen Carter, according to Pro Football Focus. Wooden finished last season with 41 pressures, which was the most by an Auburn interior lineman since Derrick Brown.

Wooden has continued that this season. He leads SEC interior linemen in quarterback pressures this season, while Hall leads SEC edge defenders in the same category.

“Anytime I get to get outside, it brings me back to my sophomore year when I was out there, but yeah, I love being out there,” Wooden said. “Every time I get out there, I feel like Derick, just rushing, running around the end. I feel like I can show off how fast I am, show I can keep the edge. Just show position versatility. That’s a big word. But yeah, show off my position flexibility. Anytime I get to do some other than what I normally do, you know, 3-technique or 2-I, it’s great. And I enjoy playing everywhere on the line if we’re being real.”

That versatility should pay dividends for Auburn following the loss of Leota. The former Northwestern transfer had been one of the Tigers’ most productive pass-rushers this season, and his injury leaves the team with just three scholarship players at the edge position: Hall, redshirt freshman Dylan Brooks and Western Kentucky transfer Marcus Bragg.

How big was the loss of Leota? Auburn adjusted its base defensive personnel on its official depth chart following Leota’s injury, shifting from the two-edge grouping it showed since Week 1 to a 4-2-5 base with one edge (Hall) and a nickelback. Auburn coach Bryan Harsin said Monday that the team will work through its plan for replacing Leota off the edge, and while part of that will evidently include more reps for Wooden on the outside, the senior said it doesn’t really matter to him where along the line he lines up.

“I just like playing, so inside, outside, let’s get it on,” Wooden said.

Even with Wooden seeing more action on the exterior of the line, it’s likely Auburn will find more playing time for Bragg. The 6-foot-5, 262-pound transfer filled in for Leota after he left the LSU game late in the first quarter last weekend, and he finished with a season-high four tackles and his first sack at Auburn.

“I thought Bragg did a really good job,” Harsin said. “…We’ll see what that looks like as we put the packages in and who we have to utilize, but we still want to get the best front seven we have out on the field, especially against what Georgia does — they run the ball effectively, alright, they obviously can throw it; you got to get pressure on the quarterback. If you give him too much time, those guys create out in the open space. We’re still working through some of that, but I thought overall, I thought Bragg played well.”

Bragg has seen the field in all five of Auburn’s games this season and has 10 tackles on the year, with two for a loss and one sack. He has a stop behind the line of scrimmage in each of Auburn’s SEC games, with seven of his total tackles coming the last two weeks.

“Now it’s time for him to step up,” Wooden said.

Tom Green is an Auburn beat reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @Tomas_Verde.