Hopefully this won't happen this time these two teams play! [Bryan Fuller]

B1G Championship Game Fee Fi Foe Film: Purdue Defense 2022 Comment Count

Alex.Drain December 2nd, 2022 at 11:00 AM

Previously: Purdue Offense 

In my nearly two full seasons charting college teams, I have yet to encounter a unit as "meh" as the Purdue defense. One that does not elicit my outright rage nor my admiration. In charting this defense, I was left without big-name stars like a Charlie Jones on Purdue's offense, nor individual players to drag through the screaming depths of hell. They're just.... there. Purdue's defensive ratings are also... fine. 39th in SP+ and 45th in FEI, right in the middle of the P5 (though probably boosted a bit by playing in the B1G West, even if these are opponent-adjusted)..... okay. If I haven't yet put you to sleep, let's dive in. 

 

The Film: Purdue has not faced too many good offenses this season and the two best they've seen, Maryland and PSU, both came in the first month or so of the season. Of those two, Maryland was much more recent, being on October 8 (compared to the season opening game vs PSU). As a result, I opted for that game to chart, though I also looked at tape from PSU, as well as later games against semi-competent offenses like Nebraska and Illinois for more clues. 

Personnel: Click for big or here for PDF

Purdue runs a pretty generic 4-2-5ish setup, with one of those DBs being a HSP who we have denoted on the diagram as the "STAR", a defense coordinated by Old Friend Ron English. The most rotation happens on the defensive line, where an injury to starting DT Branson Deen has scuttled things a bit. It is unclear if Deen will play tomorrow but the vibes make it seem unlikely. In that case, Lawrence Johnson and Sulaiman Kpaka are the starters, with PSU transfer Cole Brevard as the third option, followed by Prince James Boyd. I don't have a ton of notes on these players, other than that they have mostly held up this season but as I will show you, there is reason to think they can be shoved around by Michigan's mighty IOL.

The edges are split between SDE Jack Sullivan and LEO Kydran Jenkins. Sullivan was one of the guys on this defense I liked the most. As you'd expect by the "LEO" name, Jenkins drops into coverage a decent amount and is a more versatile sort of player. Rotational edge rushers include Khordae Sydnor and Murray State transfer Scotty Humpich, both of whom had sacks in games I saw, as well as freshman Nic Caraway. Yes, that is his actual name, and yes, if you click this link you can see several good Gatsby jokes made by my twitter followers. The EDGEs rotate around a decent bit, in part because they have to do a lot of the pass rush themselves, with Purdue not being a terribly blitzy team. Have to keep 'em fresh. 

The LB position has dealt with injuries this season, which affected my viewing of them (they were not in full force against Maryland). Starter and Auburn transfer OC Brothers did not chart against Maryland but he was PFF's worst-graded starter and is in the "legitimately bad" territory in terms of his grade, so we slapped the cyan on him. Kieren Douglas did play a bit against the Terps, but the starters that day were Jacob Wahlberg and Semisi Fakasiieiki (our name of the week candidate). Wahlberg had a rough go of things against Maryland, receiving the cyan, but he and Fakasiieiki are now second-teamers. The "OLB" role, played Douglas and Fakasiieiki, gets a lot of work out of the box and in coverage, while the MLB role handles run D a lot more. This is because the "STAR" position does a lot of work in run D as well. The STAR is Jalen Graham and has been all season, a decent player. 

At corner the outside spots are held consistently by Cory Trice, our nominal dangerman this week (no star, though), and Indiana transfer Reese Taylor, who is not as good. Kentucky transfer Jamari Brown has played quite a bit at corner this season but he is a major weakspot. Nickel Bryce Hampton gets work out of the slot, and these four corners comprise the vast majority of snaps at the position. The safeties are pretty consistent, Cam Allen at SS and Sanoussi Kane at FS. Chris Jefferson is the third safety, but his usage dwarfs that of Allen or Kane. Like so many players on this defense, they are "okay" but not above massive busts here and there. 

[AFTER THE JUMP: meh]

Base set: Pretty standard modern 4-2-5 looking stuff for Purdue against a spread team like Maryland: 

One DB is blocked from full view at the bottom of the screen and I took this pic in the middle of a safety rolling down. Some plays he's up high in their standard Cov2 look, while occasionally he rolls down. The STAR is in the slot towards the top of the screen, four DL, one of whom standing up (the LEO). 

Coverage: Purdue runs Cover 2 a majority of the time, rocking the zone category on most all of their plays. It's a very soft and rather porous zone, which we'll dig into as we go along, so it doesn't stop all that much. Purdue commits to their zone quite a bit, not blitzing too much (see below) and dropping seven into coverage frequently, sometimes going as far as dropping eight with the LEO. This is one of those teams where it's more about your QB reading the defense and picking his spots than receivers beating DBs, though Purdue's Cov2 is not as tight of a ship or as difficult as Iowa. 

Pressure: Purdue rushed more than four players on 14.5% of snaps, one of the lower blitz numbers that I've recorded this season. On the flip side, the Boilermakers rushed fewer than four players on 11% of snaps, showing a willingness to go with the eight in coverage look from time to time. 

Dangerman: No one on Purdue's defense really jumped out to me so I went with a player who had a particularly impactful game against Maryland, CB Cory Trice. His biggest moment in this game was intercepting a pass from Taulia Tagovailoa: 

While there were some issues in coverage, I did think he was Purdue's best CB because on top of that INT, he had this PBU, probably the finest by a Boilermaker DB: 

His assistance in run defense was also pretty solid, helping the LB level stuff this run just short of the sticks: 

I understand that my praise of Trice and description here is not as glowing as most weeks and that's because it isn't. Trice is merely a good corner to me, not a star, but on this defense of Just Guys, that's fine. He had a good game against Maryland and was one of PFF's highest graded Purdue defenders, suggesting a level of competency in games I did not see, so I went with him. Not too much else to it. 

 

Overview 

Purdue's defense is a unit without a ton of relative strengths or weaknesses to me. They are a bit better against the run than the pass statistically, but aren't worldbeaters in either and there's plenty of reason to think Michigan can move the ball effectively through both methods. We'll analyze this through both dimensions as a result, starting with the run defense. This is where the Boilermakers have had more success, holding opponents to 3.80 YPC this season, 37th in the country. When you drill down a little deeper, you find varied success. They muzzled Penn State, Syracuse, and Minnesota, but had trouble against Indiana, Wisconsin, and Iowa. 

Maryland fell somewhere in between, with Terp RBs running for around 4 YPC. Maryland is not a run first offense and are not known for a great OL, so it was a rather choppy effort, but there were some good moments and bad ones for the Purdue D. Good moments were plays like the one clipped in the Dangerman section, DTs holding up and active engagement from the second and third level for run fits. There were also moments that feel replicable for Michigan: 

That's starting DT Lawrence Johnson getting blown away by a double, while the EDGE Jack Sullivan is sealed off and LBs are stuck inside, creating a big lane. Maryland got a walk-in TD just a couple plays later on a zone read: 

Take a look at the clip again and focus on the DTs. Johnson is hit by a double again and eliminated again. Michigan has relied on Duo and the prodigious strength of Zinter and Oluwatimi to eviscerate DTs and pave the path for the rushing game all season long, and I saw nothing from this game to suggest that this batch of tackles for Purdue will be able to hold up any better than that of the average team. When they played Illinois, the Illini had rushing wins that look repeatable for Michigan: 

Here's one where Bert has Illinois pulling blockers into space and creating a path for Chase Brown to pick up easy yardage: 

I'm not going to go as far as I did for Nebraska, when I was sure Michigan could run over and over again for four yards a pop against those tackles. However, it is worth pointing out that a similar rushing outfit in Illinois was able to get Chase Brown to 4.3 YPC over 23 carries against Purdue with a long of 18. A more spread-oriented rushing attack in Indiana had their RBs rush for over 6 YPC, and that may be because the LBs are not great in helping out the rushing game. I can't speak much about the starters for reasons mentioned in the personnel section, but second stringer Jacob Wahlberg had a tough time against Maryland. Here the DTs are blown up and Wahlberg can't find the hole right up the middle: 

FWIW, Wahlberg's PFF grades are better than that of the guy ahead of him on the depth chart, OC Brothers. We cyan'd both of them. Still, I don't want to act like it's all a disaster for the Purdue rush defense. They have done well against a number of rushing attacks this season and had their wins against Maryland. Here's another one: 

That said, as we know, there's a big gap between Maryland and Michigan at running the football, and wherein lies my belief that the Wolverines will be able to find success against this front seven. I don't think the DTs can hold up consistently to doubles and the LBs haven't shown me enough to think they're totally ready to handle the kitchen sink of running concepts that Jim Harbaugh has in his arsenal. 

As for pass defense, things appear to be a bit rougher here. From a grading standpoint, Purdue is 91st in PFF's coverage grades as a team, and that feels decently apt considering the results and the number of guys open on any given play. Here's a list of FBS QBs they have faced and their performances against those QBs: 

  • Clifford, PSU: 20/37, 7.6 Y/A, 4 TD, 1 INT 
  • Shrader, Cuse: 13/29, 6.2 Y/A, 3 TD, 0 INT
  • Perry, FAU: 18/30, 7.7 Y/A, 3 TD, 1 INT
  • Morgan, Minn: 18/33, 7.8 Y/A, 0 TD, 3 INT 
  • Taulia, MD: 26/38, 8.3 Y/A, 3 TD, 1 INT 
  • Thompson, Neb: 16/29, 12.2 Y/A, 2 TD, 2 INT 
  • Mertz, Wisc: 13/21, 9.7 Y/A, 2 TD, 0 INT 
  • Petras, Iowa: 13/23, 8.3 Y/A, 2 TD, 0 INT
  • DeVito, ILL: 18/32, 6.3 Y/A, 1 TD, 1 INT 
  • Freeman, NW: 9/20, 3.9 Y/A, 0 TD, 1 INT 
  • Bazelak, IU: 24/42, 4.8 Y/A, 1 TD, 1 INT 

A few takeaways here: 1.) not the highest completion percentages but 2.) very high Y/A numbers, even for some bad QBs, and 3.) wow are the Northwestern and Indiana QB situations bad. The big play is a bit of an issue for the Purdue pass defense, creating some of those high Y/A numbers. Plays like this: 

That was a bust by the #3 safety Chris Jefferson that forced Trice into a valiant effort to try and clean it up, one that came up short. It was not the only bust I saw in this game... another came very early: 

This is a problem that stretches to other games. You could also just drop in the Trey Palmer vs. Purdue highlight reel I used in the Nebraska week, which I will do so here: 

Palmer torched the Boilermakers for 237 yards on seven catches, with 2 TDs, exposing the athletic and schematic limitations of the Purdue pass D. They don't have great athletes and right now they aren't well-drilled enough to get it right all the time. This pops up with the various holes you can find in the zone. Tagovailoa was able to find one for a TD that gave Maryland a chance to tie the game late: 

On the ensuing two point attempt to win, there was another receiver wide open in the end zone: 

Fortunately for Purdue it was wiped out on an ineligible man downfield penalty and they got a stop on the re-do, but these were the most crucial defensive snaps of the game and players were pretty dang open. Not great! 

This was a similar story on 3rd downs I saw in different games, like this clip from the Illinois game: 

3rd & 4, easy completion against their zone coverage. To be clear, this isn't an all-the-time occurrence. It's not MSU 2021. They have the fundamentals of Cover 2 down enough to get plenty of incompletions (as evidenced by the list of QBs), but also not down well enough to suffocate teams and prevent the sorts of backbreaking busts that a system with two safeties high should be preventing. 

As I said previously, they do drop eight here and there: 

This primarily pops up on 3rd & long or prevent defense situations, but we saw Maryland lean into it hard earlier in the year... I'd think that Purdue will trot it out more against Michigan. Due to the tendency to drop guys into coverage and rush four, they rarely spy the QB, even mobile ones. I have reason to believe JJ McCarthy will be able to get scramble yards if he wants to: 

Another way Michigan can prey on the tendency to drop seven or eight into coverage is to check into a run when they see it. Here's an example from the Nebraska game: 

The pass rush is fine. There's no one that I think is a terror as an EDGE rusher and they don't blitz a ton so it's not something to watch out for directly. Still, they get different guys to chip in depending on the week. In the games I saw it wasn't so much the starters but the rotational rushers who got sacks. Khordae Sydnor got a sack against Maryland: 

The final thing that must be addressed with the Purdue defense is the tackling. PFF's tackling grades for them are middling, smack dab in the center of the B1G, but for my money, this is the second-worst tackling team I've charted this season, better than only Nebraska. The tackling buffoonery with Purdue shows up in some big ways, none more noticeable than Purdue. Tackling blunders cost them two TDs on equally embarrassing plays. #1: 

And #2: 

Those plays were in my mind when I went to chart the Maryland game and saw it on display there. Too often, like in the above clips, players go for the BIG HIT but don't bother to do any of the fundamentally sound stuff to tackle, like say, wrapping the guy with your arms: 

That one only cost them a couple yards, but you see it pop up on play after play, a missed tackle here, a missed tackle there. Much like with the coverage busts, there is some amount of a talent deficiency issue, but it's also some degree of a coaching issue. Just feels like there are exploitable holes in this defense that a better set of coaches could shore up. 

 

What does this mean for Michigan? 

I'm not sure if there is a need for a tailored game plan here from Michigan. Running your base offense will probably be fine. Zinter, Oluwatimi, and Keegan should be able to shove those DTs around and reach the second level where the LBs have been blockable. JJ McCarthy should have little issue activating himself in the QB run game, either through scrambling or in zone reads targeting the edges. Pass protection should be fine against a standard four man rush of mostly pedestrian edge rushers and WRs should be open pretty consistently against Purdue's zone coverage. And Michigan should get some gifts from Purdue in the way of poor tackling and big play inducing coverage busts. Tomorrow we'll find out if football is a game of "shoulds". 

Comments

dragonchild

December 2nd, 2022 at 11:06 AM ^

Did Purdue forego recruiting talent and try to instead put together the All-American Name roster on defense?

Kydran Jenkins
Sulaiman Kpaka
Cory Trice
Nic Caraway
OC Brothers
Sanoussi Kane
Prince James Boyd, Jr.
Scotty Humpich (you might want to see a doctor about that BTW)
Khordae Sydnor
Mo Omonode
Semisi Fakasiieiki
Yanni Karlaftis

P.S. Ron English:  "There is no 'I' in team!"
Semisi Fakasiieiki:  "Uh. . . crap."

NotADuck

December 2nd, 2022 at 11:14 AM ^

Not a big deal, but what's up with Donovan Edwards' circle being unfilled?  I would think as long as Blake is out that Donovan is locked in as the starter and his position is "settled".  At least that's how I interpret the settled vs unsettled thing.

stephenrjking

December 2nd, 2022 at 11:22 AM ^

I have no idea why the circle is unfilled. My guess is that Edwards will trot out for the first play as a starter, Michigan will pass, and then either on the second set of downs or second down period the current backup (probably Stokes) comes in and they try to absorb a lot of early carries with those guys and see if it works. You want Edwards to carry it, but you also want to save hits and touches when you can, especially if we need to lean on Edwards heavily late. 

NotADuck

December 2nd, 2022 at 3:12 PM ^

I see what you're saying but I don't think that's the spirit of the filled/unfilled circle.  Filled used to mean returning starter but now it means the position is "settled", meaning there is little to no doubt as to who the starter is.

If Corum were healthy the circle would be filled but you could theoretically do the same thing with Corum that you just mentioned.

NotADuck

December 2nd, 2022 at 3:15 PM ^

You're right.  It used to be that way.  This year Seth changed it to mean settled vs an unsettled position.  I think the new change is better because returning starters are not as important as you would think  A good example is JJ being the starter at QB this year but I think we can all agree he's been an upgrade over Cade from last year.  You could say the same about Blake Corum over Hassan Haskins or Kris Jenkins over Chris Hinton or Olu over Andrew Vastardis.  I think that last one is the best example.

stephenrjking

December 2nd, 2022 at 11:20 AM ^

Purdue gets to ask the same question other defenses have been asking most of the year: Do we play 2 deep and force Michigan to drive the field and hopefully grind down in the red zone? Or do we stack the box and make JJ beat us?

The difference is that we finally found out what happens when a good team asks the latter question: JJ beats them. 

And Michigan doesn't have Corum. 

So, while I don't know how Purdue will deal with this, we might see a lot of softer boxes, daring Michigan to run it. It's a cinch that Michigan will not want Edwards to absorb 25-30 carries, which means that there will be some pressure on the 3-5 string guys (guessing Stokes, but he didn't look great last week and they've been nervous about him fumbling since that bad one earlier this year) to make good gains on standard downs. 

I don't think Michigan goes full vanilla here. Full vanilla is fine when you're playing Nebraska and you are way better and you have more big games coming up every week; it's not necessary when you'll have four weeks to draw up a new gameplan after this one. There will be some interesting stuff, particularly in the red zone. Still, it's likely that the early game plan looks a lot like a game against a team like Rutgers: Work to establish the run, also sprinkle in a healthy dose of passing, even if it's against cover-2 looks, see what happens. If the running game dominates in Michigan fashion, the passing game goes away. If it's grinding a bit, bring in the JJ zone keeps and more of the fancy passing looks.

Anything you empty out of the tank this week has weeks to be replaced. 

LSA91

December 2nd, 2022 at 2:32 PM ^

For what it's worth, if I were Purdue, I'd play Michigan deep. Corum is out, Edwards is running with his off hand, and Stokes needs some time to mature.  I think Michigan can still produce a good old fashioned ferret strangling, particularly with Loveland and maybe Schoonmaker, but that seems like the least bad way to play us at this point.

Mich1993

December 2nd, 2022 at 2:41 PM ^

Seems like we can just dust off the Iowa game plan with some minor tweaks.  Should do well against a cover 2 defense that is not nearly as good.  That was a terrific game plan and should be an excellent starting point. 

I'd like to see a lot of Stokes.  We're going to need him to be playable in the CFP games even if Edwards' hand is healed by then.

NotADuck

December 2nd, 2022 at 3:21 PM ^

I'd still overload against the run and make JJ beat me if I was Purdue.  The few times Michigan has been slowed down this season, that is how the defenses played.  Indiana comes to mind immediately.  Michigan has shown that they can grind an opponent to dust at will but JJ has been inconsistent with his accuracy barring the last game and the non-conference.  Make him do it again... and I'd love to see it.  :D

The Homie J

December 2nd, 2022 at 12:57 PM ^

Alex has nailed all the scouting this year.  I can't even recall how many times Brian during the Sunday postgame podcast says "credit to Alex, he called xyz happening in the FFFF."  Alex nailed how the Ohio State defense was ripe for big plays (as much as we thought we couldn't exploit that" so if he says we should probably pave these guys, we're probably gonna pave these guys.

NCBlue22

December 2nd, 2022 at 11:42 AM ^

Seems like an opportunity to go back to the WR screen game a bit as a function off of the run game, what with the softer zone coverage and not great tackling.  

Buy Bushwood

December 2nd, 2022 at 11:57 AM ^

Alex, when you came on board and announced that you were still in diapers and training wheels, I will admit to being a skeptical, middle-aged curmudgeon.  O ye of little faith.  Now, I'm dreading the day you get a huge job at some major publication soon, and am doing everything I can to sabotage your upward mobility so that you'll stay at MgBlog 4-ever.  

JBLPSYCHED

December 2nd, 2022 at 12:10 PM ^

So...Purdue is not great, they're sort of good, but let's be honest: champs of the B1G West division doesn't really say much. Except they don't suck.

I would've liked to read more about how their defense did against Illinois, which is more like our offense in terms of primary focus on the running game. Nevertheless, I can't decide if tomorrow night's game is going to be like last year's CCG against Iowa--where we end up blowing them off the field--or a tighter struggle than that.

I really wish we had Corum for this one--we'd obviously pave them into oblivion and throw a few passes in for fun and frolic. With Edwards still wearing a cast I suspect we're going to have to diversify our offense more than our games prior to last week against OSU. That makes me a little nervous but ultimately I foresee us winning by at least 10-14 points and proceeding onto the CFP in good shape with a month to prepare for whoever comes next.

kyle.aaronson

December 2nd, 2022 at 1:06 PM ^

The combination of low completion percentage and high Y/A is so bizarre. I haven't watched all that much Purdue this year, but I did watch their Week One game against Penn State and just remember seeing missed tackle after missed tackle. That explains the Y/A, but I still can't wrap my head around why they allow such a low completion percentage to opposing QBs. I bet we see a stat line from JJ that looks a lot like what he put up against OSU.

The Oracle 2

December 2nd, 2022 at 1:27 PM ^

I agree that Michigan should win this one with relative ease, but it’s making me a bit nervous that everyone seems to view the game as a mere formality. I hope the players and coaches aren’t seeing it that way.  They need to come out with the same discipline and mental toughness they showed against Iowa in last year’s game. No let downs.

AWAS

December 2nd, 2022 at 1:52 PM ^

I don't see a very interesting game here.  I don't see a blowout, but I do see 40 min time of possession and 80 offensive plays.  The running game reduced efficiency will mean more third and fourth down conversions, and probably more Moody.  The anaconda will play with its food a little more than usual, but the result won't really be in doubt.

zlionsfan

December 2nd, 2022 at 1:57 PM ^

Purdue's defense somehow managed to make some plays in key games this season, coming as a great surprise to folks who have watched them ... not do that on many occasions this year, most importantly against Iowa and their "offense", but also at the ends of games (Penn State and Syracuse) where all it would have taken was a couple of stops in the last minute. Prevent defense + lack of tackling = very big problems.

I don't think they'll have that specific problem against Michigan, but the tackling issues and the gaps in the secondary are very big problems. A best-case scenario for Purdue is Michigan making enough first-half mistakes to not have a big lead. I would expect something less than that. Purdue got to this point partly on benefiting from teams getting big chances against the secondary and missing them; Michigan isn't going to miss enough of them to matter.

steve sharik

December 2nd, 2022 at 2:11 PM ^

Getting paved by double teams and playing 2 deep safeties is not a recipe for success against Michigan.

English will have to bring safeties down or they will get road graded for 60 minutes. Even then they'll have to run blitz to stop the run, most likely.

 

bighouseinmate

December 2nd, 2022 at 2:22 PM ^

The biggest thing to watch in this game is how the running game does (yeah, I know that’s kinda obvious). If Edwards is gaining big chunks from having good vision and seeing the cutbacks like he had started to before he got injured, then this game will be a runaway win. Also, does stokes get a large amount of carries and does he start seeing the holes better and also starts to gain big chunks. If stokes does well in this game, that’ll bode well for Michigan’s run game heading into the cfp.

Blinkin

December 2nd, 2022 at 2:56 PM ^

I think JJ is going to need to stay active in the run game to open things up for Edwards and (hopefully) Stokes.  If Corum were 100% I'd think a base offense with JJ never running would probably be fine, but without Corum (and with Edwards <100%), JJ will need to help them.