USC considering Dave Aranda/a look at how Aranda responded to last year's blowout loss to OSU

I don't know how to embed a tweet, but Bruce Feldman reported last week that USC is looking at Dave Aranda. Sam Webb referenced the report this AM.

Bruce Feldman ‏@BruceFeldmanCFB Dec 9 Name that I hear #USC may pursue for its DC job: #Wisconsin's Dave Aranda. Does a terrific job w/ Badgers & went to college at Cal Lutheran. https://twitter.com/BruceFeldmanCFB

Another Aranda note: Below is a an piece about Aranda's response to being blown out by OSU last year. Wisconsin played Auburn in their bowl, so they were facing a similar offense. Wisconsin beat Auburn 34-31 after losing 59-0 to OSU. For comparison's sake: Auburn' gained 485 yards per game last year. They were 5th in FEI and 4th in S&P+. OSU gained 512 per game. They were 3rd in FEI and 1st in S&P+. Some highlights of the article:

The Badgers played 2-4-5 nickel personnel with cornerback Darius Hillary in the nickel position to allow them to play man coverage on the Buckeye receivers. The outside linebackers, Vince Biegel and Joe Schobert, looked to keep the Ohio State run game forced inside of the tackle box where the inside linebackers and down safety would clean it up.

 

Although they were playing cover 3, the Badgers deep safety would just look to help over the top of the slot receiver or outside receivers on in-breaking routes in the middle of the field. He didn't drop particularly deep so that he could serve as an 8th man in the box so consequently the Badger DBs were totally isolated in man coverage without safety help on any throws outside of the hash marks.

 

The Buckeyes destroyed this game plan first by attacking the man coverage with play-action, then they took apart the run defense with zone slice and other RB-focused run schemes. The Badger safeties and linebackers struggled to navigate space well and get their hats in the appropriate places to stop the run, partly because they spent their practice week preparing to stop the QB run game.

Against Auburn, the Badgers played a different nickel package and utilized the same 2-4 personnel but with a different approach up front. This time the Badgers played with three safeties rather than three corners, and asked different things of their outside linebackers.

 

The goal remained to keep the ball between the tackles but the Badgers were able to put less stress on the linebackers and safeties by canceling out an interior gap with one of the outside linebackers playing over a tackle as a de-facto defensive end.

 

After a coverage bust early in the game, they also substituted a new free safety, started playing cover 3, and found a solution that made it very difficult for the Tigers to bust big plays...

 

With the outside linebacker asked to play inside gaps like a defensive end, the nickel became one of the run-force players. Instead of having an eight man front the Badgers settled for getting seven players into the box but they were actually more successful here in forcing the Tigers to play in tighter spaces and freeing their inside linebackers from having to pick the right gap playing behind only two DL.

 

More importantly, they were in much better shape against the passing game giving up only 6.9 yards per pass after the initial 66 yard coverage bust. Auburn was still able to run the ball but weren't able to consistently land big punches.

http://www.footballstudyhall.com/2015/7/23/9013753/wisconsins-Badgers-v…