Week #2 of FFFF kicks off today with NIU's offense. Michigan's (seemingly) weakest opponent actually has had a rather interesting seasonto date, knocking off a power five opponent in week one (Georgia Tech) and then playing in an absolutely crazy game last week against Wyoming, one that saw the Huskies score 43 points and come back from 42-16 down, yet still lose. Thomas Hammock's team seems rather intriguing as they prepare to head to the Big House this weekend, even if it is not entirely clear whether they are substantially better than their offseason projections, ones that saw them rank at the bottom of most of The Enemy pieces I wrote in August. Today we will take a look at the offense, featuring an old foe at QB in Rocky Lombardi, and a collection of mostly unfamiliar faces at the other positions. 

The Film: For this one I did choose to go with the Georgia Tech game. Though the 50-43 shootout with Wyoming would have been entertaining to break down, it's less useful because even though GT is a bad power five team, they are still closer in terms of talent to Michigan than Wyoming is. So, let's go with the Yellow Jackets, but it's important to keep a couple things in mind: this is not the Paul Johnson GT teams of yonder. In fact, Georgia Tech hasn't been good for a few years now. They were 6-16 over Geoff Collins' first two seasons entering this one and particularly for this piece, GT's defense was real bad last season. In 2020, GT was 110th out of 128 teams in scoring defense and a similar 109th in total defense. For reference, they ranked similarly to Illinois last season defensively, and remember, Illinois' 2020 defensive catastrophe is why we no longer get to enjoy the spectacle of Lovie Smith's beard in the B1G. So when I say that NIU scored 22 points and gained 300 yards against Georgia Tech, it's important to note that was a good showing by the Yellow Jackets defensively given last season. It was still not enough to win, though. 

Personnel: Click for big: 

Yep, the Huskies are rolling Rocky Lombardi out there at QB, the ex-Spartan and owner of the greatest football name of all-time. He hands it off to one of two dudes, speedy RB Harrison Waylee or slower RB Clint Ratkovich. Those two guys will get nearly all of the carries for NIU, with Waylee getting significantly more than Ratkovich. Hammock's team does like to use a FB, Brett Bostad. He didn't have any carries in the game I saw, though, and he does not appear in the Wyoming box score. That said, Bostad will be out there in short-yardage situations as a blocker only. 

At receiver, Tyrice Richie is the favorite target, leading the team with 7 receptions through the first two games. He will be used on the occasional running play too, getting a pair of carries in the game I saw. Cole Tucker wasn't a major part of the GT game, but then raked in 6 catches for 72 yards against Wyoming. Similarly, Trayvon Rudolph had just 1 catch in the GT game, and though he only had 2 against Wyoming, those went for 65 total yards on the back of a 40-yard TD reception so it's worth mentioning him. The WR group is rounded out by Messiah Travis, who has had one ~20 yard catch in each of the first two games. NIU likes to roll with two and three TE's, but Miles Joiner is the only main receiving target of them and he's not exactly Cade Otton. NIU tends to like him in the flat. Liam Soraghan and Tristen Tewes are more of blocking TE's. 

The OL returns four starters and is a stable unit. Only center Brayden Patton had any real buzz about him entering the season and this group generally graded out poorly in PFF's data. As you will see, I thought they had a good game against GT, and thought that RG Logan Zschernitz stood out in particular as a pulling guard on some of their better running plays. 

[AFTER THE JUMP: Huskies are pest-control... because they KILL Yellow Jackets]

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A pretty typical base alignment that NIU likes to run out of

Spread, Pro-Style, or Hybrid: NIU is interesting because they were a very run-heavy team in this game, but they did a lot of it out of the shotgun, as you'll see in the coming chart. They love their tight ends and the situations where they were running even three WR's were incredibly rare, let alone four, so we can pretty safely say that this is a pretty pro-style offense, even if the QB run plays and reliance on the shotgun look spread-like. One formation note: as you see in the above image, the Huskies do like to run out of the pistol quite a bit. 

If you're lining up like this a not-insignificant amount of the time, you are Manball 

Basketball on Grass or MANBALL? Again, this was a run-heavy team that did not want to throw the ball, yet was running the vast majority of the time out of the shotgun. And their personnel suggests more Manball than basketball on grass, if you take out the shotgun thing. But the way you can tell they were Manball is the tight end usage and the five times they lined up in the traditional I formation, which I clipped above. When you're using a fullback on more than just a goal line snap, you're not Basketball on Grass. Chart: 

The game plan for NIU in this one was not dissimilar to Michigan's against Washington. The Huskies wanted to jam it down GT's throat and for a chunk of the game it had good success. They threw just six times in the first half and their first two TD's were largely by getting enough on the ground. As you see in the chart, they didn't really do a lot with those shotgun runs in terms of disguise, rarely peppering in any play action to fool the defense. The clear majority of the time they were in the shotgun and the majority of the time they were in the shotgun, it was going to be a running play. 

A clearer picture of what NIU was trying to do is painted by this chart: 

73% of first downs were runs. 83% of second downs were run. Third down, however, was more of an even split. This was a "we will only pass if we have to" kind of team. For the record, the Huskies did not attempt a fourth down, but they did go for two to win, which I'm classifying as a fourth down here because situationally it's the same concept. This team was quite predictable, nearly as much as our charts for last week. But unlike for Washington, this worked and resulted in victory. I should note that their second game against Wyoming, one that saw NIU fall behind 42-16 at one juncture, unsurprisingly featured much more passing. Like I said, they're only going to pass if they have to. 

Hurry it up or grind it out? On the whole, this is a team with a feel that is somewhat Harbaugh-like. They prefer to run it, they have a generally limited quarterback, they use a fullback in the year 2021, and they love tight ends. But the one difference is they do something that would be incomprehensible for a JH offense: they love to hurry it up. The Huskies played with tempo often in the game I saw, at one point running three straight plays with 33 or more seconds left on the play clock. They don't do it all the time, but it is a legitimate feature of the offense that they throw in there to catch the defense off guard. NIU trapped GT in a too many men penalty on one occasion during this game. Here's a clip of them rolling with tempo at one juncture: 

I know this is rather long but I clipped it because it showcases both sides of how they used tempo. First, NIU huddles up but then uses tempo as a sneak attack, breaking the huddle and snapping the ball within four seconds, catching the GT defense off guard. Then after gaining the first down, they run up to the line and hike the ball with 33 on the playclock. This wasn't something that NIU did all the time, but they peppered it in enough that it's worth discussing, because you know there's going to try and throw out every trick in the bag to beat an opponent like Michigan. 

Quarterback Dilithium Level (Scale: 1 [Navarre] to 10 [Denard]): Lombardi is not a running QB by style, but they have integrated his legs into the offense. Lombardi had one read which he kept that went for a significant gain, and later they called a design run that got nullified due to an unrelated pre-snap penalty but it was a good play and showcases Rocky's legs: 

So while Lombardi does not deserve to be ranked highly on this scale because he's not a true running threat QB, it is something you have to be aware of and is a bit more of a threat than Dylan Morris was last week. So we'll give him a 5. 

Dangerman: I think this one is pretty easy, because he is a big reason that Hammock has built the offense to be the way it is: RB Harrison Waylee. Waylee rushed for 456 yards and 1 TD last season over NIU's brief six game season, but is on pace to totally obliterate that pace this season, having piled up 323 yards and 3 TD's in the first two games (!!). Waylee was a menace in the game I watched and he passed my preliminary test of how I assess RB's: by comparing him to the other RB's. Waylee was significantly better than the second string guy Clint Ratkovich against Georgia Tech. Ratkovich is a generic MAC back. Waylee is a cut above it, especially with his speed. 

He used that speed to score a TD from 35 out, NIU's best offensive play in the game: 

Yes, there's a big hole opened by the OL and yes the safety isn't in the best spot to start the play, but normally you see mid-major running backs get chased down by P5 safeties at like the 10 on plays like these. That didn't happen here. Waylee isn't all speed though, he can break tackles and grind out extra yards: 

Very, very good football player. Given what he's already done against the non-conference, it's very easy to imagine he could end up being first or second team All-MAC by the end of the season. Don't be outraged if Waylee outraces a Michigan defender, or trucks somebody, because Waylee is a legit dangerman and not a "2005 MLB All-Star Dmitri Young, Well You Gotta Pick Someone" Dangerman. 

Waylee wasn't perfect though, and I should note that. I thought he took a few bad routes and missed some holes that would have given him more yards in the Georgia Tech game I watched. He also fumbled, but it was not a butterfingers or even a Peanut Punch fumble, it was a Huge Man Who Is Significantly Bigger Than You Violently Rips It From Your Cold Dead Hands fumble that probably isn't replicable in the average game because you rarely see this kind of thing happen in a normal game: 

What I hope you learned from this clip: Michigan can beat Waylee if they just have Mazi Smith pin him down and Nikhai Hill-Green spend five seconds violently prying at the football. Just do that, it's a totally usual football play. In all seriousness, Waylee is the guy to watch on Northern Illinois. 

HenneChart: Rocky.... Balboa? No. Rocky.... and Bullwinkle? No. Rocky..... Marciano? No. Rocky..... LOMBARDI? Yes: 

This was a very interesting chart to put together but not terribly surprising if you watched last season's MSU game. Lombardi is a QB who NIU doesn't want to have throwing all that much, because it can be all over the place. When they did let him throw, it was mostly safe checkdowns and overall he finished with 6.1 yards per attempt for the game. But unlike Dylan Morris against Montana, he wasn't totally neutered and there were some deeper throws to look at. Those tended to be pretty typical Rocky Lombardi: the occasional "wow!" throw and several real duds. This was from the good bucket: 

That's a perfectly placed ball into a tight window 30 yards down the field. Not bad. Unfortunately, it wasn't often he was making those kinds of those throws. From the bad bucket, you have a few plainly inaccurate balls that just totally sail on Rocky: 

(Note: that's the play where NIU caught GT with too many men as those players running off at the bottom of the screen didn't get off in time).

It's always a mixed bag with Lombardi, sometimes you get a pathetic ragdoll, and other times you get the guy who was dropping dimes against Michigan on Halloween last season. For example, followed this performance up with 3 INT's last week against Wyoming. That's why Hammock & Co. prefer to put a straitjacket on Lombardi by making him keep the ball on the ground and limiting him to easier throws. 

One thing you may notice from the above chart is that there was only one tally in the "pressure" category, which is a change from last week when Morris notched four of them. In general this was a very solid game from the NIU offensive line and Lombardi was rarely in any kind of trouble. Every so often a little pressure would come but it rarely affected the short, quick passes that Lombardi was throwing. He's not a QB who does well on more than one read, and so you can expect him to get the ball out in a hurry, just as he did against Michigan last year. Overall, he's a pretty unremarkable QB who will make some mistakes, even if the offense has been designed to prevent him from making them. 

Overall

So what can we say about NIU as a whole? It's been a pretty common theme throughout this article, but the Northern Illinois Huskies like to run the football, based on the strength of their very good RB, but they do it out of a half-modern, half-old school look. They like two TE sets and play with a fullback a good bit. As a base set for their running game, NIU likes to utilize a pulling lineman, and as I mentioned previously, I thought RG Zschernitz looked best as the pulling guard for the Huskies. Here's an example of a pretty standard play they ran against Georgia Tech, with the center Patton as the puller: 

That run was able to gain nearly 10 yards and for the game, NIU was able to get 4.7 yards per carry. The Huskies didn't get a ton of push on every play from the OL, but their run concepts worked more times than not against a power five defense and they had a RB who was generally adept at finding the hidden yards. Their first two TD drives took 21 combined plays and Lombardi threw the ball three times of those 21 plays. You would not be incorrect to use the Spiderman pointing at Spiderman meme comparing the GT performance to Michigan's against Washington. 

However, if we look at their game against Wyoming we can see some of the problems that can pop up when you play the way that NIU wants to. With the Husky defense being exposed, the offense was playing catch up from the beginning and Lombardi had to air it out a lot more and in more uncomfortable ways. The result wasn't pretty. Rocky still only averaged 6.5 YPA, but with 1 TD and 3 INT's. Notable: the 3 INT's came when NIU was trailing 14-0, 14-3, and 35-16. When you put Northern Illinois in a deficit, they are very uncomfortable (though they did make a late charge!). 

I think it is worth pointing out a few players who are interesting to watch besides Waylee and Lombardi on the offense. Tyrice Richie is the guy to shout out when it comes to the receiving corps. While they don't use that many WR's and the TE's shuffle a decent bit, Richie was the receiver who consistently stood out for me the most in this game. He caught a beautiful pitch and catch on a fade early on in the game: 

Richie had 597 receiving yards last season in just 6 games a year ago and he racked up 400 back in 2019. He's a player with a good bit of experience as a target, now in his third year with the program after a multi-year JuCo career at Dodge City. Richie, being a MAC dude, isn't super big at only 6-0, 194, but he can play. Richie is the player who should probably be the focus of most emphasis in the secondary room leading up to this game. All the other targets are pretty interchangeable. 

TE isn't a position of major threat. As I mentioned, Miles Joiner isn't bad, but most of his plays were stuff like this: 

At 6-4, 249, Joiner has good size, but isn't close to dangerman level when it comes to being a position you have to be concerned about. 

The other thing I want to note about the NIU offense overall, is I thought they generally had more success running outside the tackles than between them. Sometimes they were able to find success running behind the pulling OL, as we talked about earlier in this section, but when Waylee was able to get to the edge that they seemed to be doing a bit better. A lot of times the draws between the tackles ran for 2-4 yards. If they can't get push against Michigan's interior DL, Northern Illinois will probably target the edges, and with Waylee's speed, you have to be careful about letting him turn the corner. 

So how did NIU beat Georgia Tech?

I haven't been the most effusive in my praise of NIU's offense overall, and their defense just gave up 50 to Wyoming... so how in the world did the above image come to pass? It must've been an upset, if that fellow's mouth is so wide open ("you can tell big the upset is by how big the jawdrop is", a wise man definitely never said), right? Well, yeah. It was definitely an upset, but it was much more of a "middling mid-major beats power five team" type game than Montana beating Washington was. The latter was legitimately a case where an FCS team looked like the better football team. This game was more how it typically goes down: the power five team outgains the mid-major by over 100 but a combination of turnovers and better efficiency of drives leads to the mid-major winning. 

I haven't gone through the defensive side of things yet so I can't do the full diagnosis, but GT missed three FG's (though the last one was a ridiculous, desperation 60-yard attempt at the buzzer), turned it over on downs twice (once at the goal line), and also fumbled in NIU territory. The Huskies were by no means perfect, but they maximized their offense, with all of their drives except their own fumble basically being either TD drives or three-and-outs. NIU also was able to grind the clock a bit in the first half when the running game was really working, shortening the length of the game. Again, a pretty usual mid-major beats power five team type contest. 

Another important game for Michigan's DL upcoming [Patrick Barron]

So what does this mean for Michigan?

This is an offense that has played well its first two weeks, doing enough against GT to win and then racking up nearly 500 yards in its second game. But, obviously, they are limited. There's a huge gap between the talent of Michigan (15th on 247's talent composite) and NIU (114th) (and for the purposes of this piece, a decent gap between Michigan and GT, who are 33rd). Michigan's players will be bigger and stronger along the line of scrimmage, and that should help to nullify some of the holes NIU was able to open against Georgia Tech. But, I came away thinking that the Husky offense was pretty disciplined and well coached, not making a ton of mistakes, having a coherent game plan and sticking to it. It won't be surprising to see them have a couple nicely designed runs that turn into chunks because Waylee is a Dude. 

However, as we saw from the Wyoming game, taking an early lead will force NIU to air it out more, which isn't what they want to do. They still managed to scrape together a valiant comeback that in the end didn't result in them winning, but the Rocky Lombardi numbers in that game were not stellar. If Michigan can cover his first read with any kind of consistency, he's prone to making mistakes. Bottle up the run, put him in third and long, and keep your receivers ahead of the sticks. There will be the one or two Rocky dimes, but this is an offense that would rather dink and dunk and will be very uncomfortable in third and long situations, especially if they are trailing. Win at the line of scrimmage and play good offense to get in those situations, and then profit.