Picture-pages: defending the option against NW, volume I

Submitted by dnak438 on

When we weren't getting bubble-screened by Northwestern, we were defending the option with mixed success. I was curious about what was happening and I decided to picture-page some plays to satisfy my curiosity. I'll be interested to see how Brian treats it in his UFR. At any rate, here is a play from Northwestern's first drive (click on images to embiggen):

Colter has just gone in for Persa. NW is going to run a veer (I think) option, as follows:

As the interview with Mattison suggests, the ends have the quarterback, Kovacs has the pitch man. But the linebackers need to flow to the ball, and all too often -- to anticipate my conclusion a bit -- both of the linebackers would jump the first option, allowing the QB to keep and get to the outside. Here are the next couple of shots:

and

You can see that both Hawthorne and Demens have been sucked inside, and Roh too has lost contain on Persa. I've never played organized football, but I think that Demens needs to respect the quarterback keep here. At this point, Roh, Demens and Kovacs have all realized that the QB still has the ball and are flying to Kolter.

The image above is the moment of the pitch. The Michigan defenders have made up ground, but they are going to give up five yards on this play.


The second play is on NW's first scoring drive (second drive overall). It is second down and 6 on the 15 yard line, Colter is again in for Persa. [UPDATE: this has also now been picture paged by Burgeoning Wolverine Star].

NW will basically run the same play:

The right side of the NW line lets Will Campbell and Jake Ryan through and blocks/seals Demens and Hawthorne. Here we are at the mesh point:

Will Campbell and Jake Ryan are through, and have a free shot. You can see that both linebackers (Demens and Hawthorne) have taken a step or two forward and towards the hashmarks. Hawthorne is about to get sealed by #70.

The problem: four Michigan defenders tackle (or head towards) the first option, the dive:

This is NOT good. Hawthorne and Demens are engaged and can't get out to the edge. Kovacs is streaming to the QB now, but a split second later, you see the result:

Kovacs is in a real bind: one defender on the QB in space with a pitch man. But Kovacs misses the tackle anyway:

The result: TOUCHDOWN.

My diagnosis is that the defenders were too eager to get to the first option, and forced Colter to keep. This was bad insofar as the DEs didn't keep contain. On the second play, Ryan has to let Will Campbell take the first option and hit the quarterback, forcing a pitch. But Ryan and BWC tackle the same guy, giving Colter a free release.

Next, Hawthorne and Demens can't (I think) both step towards the center. This gets Hawthorne (the playside LB) sealed, leaving Kovacs one-on-two. I noticed another big option play where Hawthorne got sucked in, and I wonder if this is why he was pulled for Morgan (until the 3rd quarter, when Hawthorne went back in).

We must have corrected this in the second half--but that's the topic of another diary (or more probably, Brian's defensive UFR).

Again, let me plead ignorance; if the more football-savvy among you can tell me if I'm wrong (or right), and why, I'd appreciate it.

Comments

G-Man

October 12th, 2011 at 12:13 AM ^

This bothered me during the game, because I couldn't see what was happening in real time in the bar where I was watching.  I'm glad someone (Brian, diarist, whomever) took a stab at this.  You made some good points, too.

Thanks for the insight!  

w2j2

October 12th, 2011 at 7:43 AM ^

Kovacs was in a tough situation, and it appears that he made a decision to "threaten" Coulter, hoping Coulter would  pitch the ball, then Kovacs would tackle the running back.  A high-stakes gamble, which he lost, but what the hell...

This is a little like a hockey defenseman facing a 2 on1 breakout.

tasnyder

October 12th, 2011 at 2:29 PM ^

In a 1-on-2 situation, you take away the outside, forcing the ball to the middle where there are more defenders.  Kovacs basically took the pitch away and forced the QB inside, both good moves.

Basically, if he were to tackle the QB, ball would have been pitched before, and that's a definite TD.  If he takes away the pitch, and forces the QB inside, while slowing him down a little, that's not a guaranteed TD. 

ND Sux

October 12th, 2011 at 8:14 AM ^

He tries to play both ends of it, but you kinda have to choose.  I feel like he at least turned the play back inside hoping his help would tackle.  There was no help. 

MQues

October 12th, 2011 at 8:32 AM ^

Here is what I see, for what it is worth.

Jake Ryan blew his assignment on that second set of pics. In the third frame, the defense is actually set up pretty well. BWC is in position to force the pull and Jake, should he step to the QB, is in position to force an immediate pitch. Hawthorne is the second person to blow it on this one. In the fourth frame, he should be stepping down to the outside shoulder of his blocker (70) to avoid getting sealed which would have put him in position to assist on the pitch back (Kovacs is already working downhill to that position).  Basically it looks like poor recognition on the part of Ryan, Hawthorne and (to a lesser extent) Demens.

Now this is coming from a high school coach on how we would be defending that play. I can't speak with any certainty on Mattison's instructions to his D on defending the option.

colin

October 12th, 2011 at 9:02 AM ^

There are a couple other items of interest to me there. For one, look at how we're lined up in that first option play. 7 in the box leaves us one short of what we'd need to account for all blockers and the ball carriers. As it turns out, it looks like the boundary corner is also in the run fit and playing zone, possibly a deep third? The other defenders lined up over WRs are clearly playing man and Gordon bails so deep you can't see him in most of the screencaps.

So they're splitting the coverage in half it looks like. And making sure they don't get beat over the top rather than crush the run. And I'm guessing they want to funnel the ball to the short side. So probably they were coached to slowplay the QB and try to force the dive? Which they screwed up both times on that drive.

colin

October 12th, 2011 at 12:02 PM ^

It's in relation to the hashmarks. If you have the ball on the hash, one half of the offense will operate much closer to the sideline than the other. This side is called the boundary, presumably since that's what it's close to? The other is called the field. Teams often will split up their corners with that designation because they will have somewhat different responsibilities. The field corner can play farther off because the ball ia farther away and is usually less involved in the run game. So I guess Countess is more of a prototypical field corner while (healthy) Woolfolk is more prototypically boundary. I'm not sure with what frequency defenses actually abide by such alignment rules. It's probably more common in HS.

MQues

October 12th, 2011 at 9:16 AM ^

The only real way to force a give (dive)  is for BWC to slant away. He is left unblocked as part of the play design. The QB makes his give/pull read based on the unblocked DT. Once BWC slanted down, it became an automatic pull where Jake Ryan should have forced the pitch, almost immediately.

Deep Under Cover

October 12th, 2011 at 9:48 AM ^

Maybe I am not understanding our defense well enough, but it really seems like our ends tend to crash way too hard on plays going inside, like here with Roh.  Now, he didn't "crash" so much in this instance, but he is looking inside to make a play when that is not his responsibility (especially against an option team!!).  His first goal is to keep the play inside, to NOT LOSE CONTAIN.  Bad things happen when you lose contain.

chitown.victor

October 12th, 2011 at 9:48 AM ^

...in the first half was we not once absolutely punished the QB for trying to run the option.  Several times our defensive ends/OLBs had chances to lower the boom on Persa/Colter, but they didn't.  I just wanted to see NU's quarterbacks get planted a few times, even if it meant giving up yardage.  Hell, we were giving up yardage anyhow, why not give the quarterbacks something to remember next time they ran that play?

That said, I was more than happy with the adjustments that were made in the second half.  Edge containment should be an area of emphasis for Saturday's game, I would think.

Undefeated dre…

October 12th, 2011 at 9:49 AM ^

Nice work, just note that the plays are not the same. In the first one, the deep/leftmost back fakes the dive while the rightmost back takes the pitch. In the second one, the rightmost back fakes the dive while the leftmost back is in pitch position. That's NW messin' with our keys.

Agree with the others' analyses -- too eager, not playing good enough assignment football.

dnak438

October 12th, 2011 at 9:53 AM ^

I was just thinking that the plays were similar in that there were two RBs and they ran a triple option. There's also a significant difference in the formation; in the second play they've got three receivers on the other side of the field, which draws four defenders in essence away from the play.

twizzle12

October 12th, 2011 at 11:53 AM ^

In the second picture page NW actually uses an unbalanced formation.  The two receivers at the top of the screen are both on the line.  Meaning the the #2 receiver is actually Ineligible...yet our DB is covering him like he is going out for a pass. By lining up like this NW has out numbered us because we have 4 defenders guarding 2 eligible recievers.  Because of this alignment it seems that this play was designed to go away from the trips set because of the numbers advantage to the boundary side.  By getting JR to commit you have a 2 on 1 numbers advantage instead of a 1 on 1.  This play design would have still gained 5/10/15 yards easy depending on our tackling.