Previously: The Offense, MSU's defense last year. MSU's defense in 2017

Resources: My charting, MSU game notes, MSU roster, CFBstats

Michigan State runs a…

Match quarters defense.

Yes, which…

I'm having deja vu. Did you copy this lede from last year's article?

You were going to say "which brings the corners down to play tight man off the snap while the safeties have to cover for aggressive linebackers, who are squeezed on the inside because the defensive line can play spread out."

Right and that funnels everything back into the murdertackles and the murderbacker and you get Bullough'd by whichever Bullough or Bullough-like object they have now--what's his name, Bachie.

So about that.

The Film: Illinois, because this was the only game they've played since...

Personnel: My diagram:

PDF Version, full-size version (or click on the image)

...star MLB Joe Bachie was suspended for the rest of the season for getting caught taking PEDs. To replace him they moved hybrid WLB Antjuan Simmons (+13/-5 vs the run, +0/-3 coverage) inside, and brought in sophomore HSP Noah Harvey (+12.5/-1, +0/-5 cov) for the hybrid role. Since smallish SAM Tyriq Thompson (+9/-2, +1/-3 cov) played that role some last year, there's a lot of hybrid DNA on the field now and it shows. MSU linebacker is a playmaker position and all of these guys made them, if in different ways. Simmons is a Khaleke-type athlete who can rocket into gaps but gets ejected if he meets a blocker. The SAM job of Tyriq Thompson, who earned a lot of his stars by making a couple of checks that got one of his teammates in free when Illinois audibled, operates more like our idea of an MLB now with Bachie out so Simmons can be more seek-and-destroy. That's all they get from Harvey, who surprised me with his high grade mostly from rocketing out into space against the WR screen game (and one near game-winning bat-down). Harvey is the LB who becomes a pure pass rusher on their dime package, whence he made me wonder a few times if that was Willekes.

Speaking of HSP DNA, that job previously belonged to the older brother of SS David Dowell (+2/-2, +4/-5 cov). Andrew is gone and David is now a solid strong safety except when he has to cover deep, since his mind is very run/short pass-oriented. FS Xavier Henderson (+4/-7, +3/-3 cov) is a work in progress who'll probably be a good one in a year or two.

Both safeties got big coverage dings for abandoning their posts when poor third CB and jam specialist Shakur Brown (+2/-1, +10/-6), just returned from an injury hiatus, got singled up with Josh Imatorbhebhe, the Illini's 5-star USC transfer, on such plays you remember as The Hail Mary That Didn't Have to Hail TD at the end of the half and 4th & 16. Brown splits time with both Boundary CB Josh Butler (+2/-3 cov), the dude who interfered on the 4th down, and Field CB Josiah Scott (+1/-1, +4/-1 cov), a rootin'-tootin' hard-hitting 2nd team all-B1G candidate. DB Tre Person (+0/-2, +3/-3 cov), whom you might remember from such plays as the long DPJ touchdown or the mansome Nico Collins catch last year, is now their nickel, still about 160, and still slow. Backup safeties Michael Dowell (+1/-1, -3 cov) and Jacob Slade (-2 cov) came in for the slot safety dime role, blitzing half the time.

The defensive line are the same guys since what, 2017? We'll just cover the three stars in the dangerman section. The younger brother Jacub Panasiuk (+2.5/-2.5), well you remember him trying to break Ruiz's knees last year and you're right: you hope the powers that be keep Michigan's players safe because MSU is the program that won't. His backup Drew Beesley didn't get much time but little brother comes off the field for a linebacker on passing downs. We did get a steady rotation of their next generation of DTs. Very large blue chip NT Naquan Jones (+2/-2) is a Bryan Mone type. Freshman DT Jacob Slade (+1/-5) didn't stand out to me until I tallied up his score and realized what little running game Illinois got came by washing Slade out with doubles.

[After THE JUMP: fam.]

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Base Set: They're still that same 4-3 even or 4-2-5 even (depending on whether you call the Star a safety or a linebacker) team they've been for over a decade. I copied this from last year:

There's also a pass rush package with three down linemen (one of them Noah Harvey) plus two linebackers, the nickel, and a young blitzy safety.

What are we calling the hybrid space player today? The Star, which is their field side/weakside linebacker. He's more of a traditional linebacker who will cover second level zones but not carry tight ends deep except in special circumstances. He usually splits the space between the formation and the slot receiver and will take away some edge duties from the WDE so that guy can be an inside rusher.

Man or zone coverage: Quarters. They trust Scott to play up and Butler and Brown to come up or drop back as they like. For charting purposes I counted passing situations on standard downs (like the 4th and 16) as passing downs.

2019 MSU vs Illini	FORMATIONS				SAFETIES			RUSHERS
Situation	4-3	Dime	Nkl		1-high	2-high		3	4	5	6
Normal Downs (36)	97%	-3%	-		-	100%		-	47%	25%	28%
Passing Downs (34)	35%	62%	3%		9%	91%		15%	32%	29%	24%
Total (70)	47	22	1		3	69		5	28	19	18

Pressure: GERG or GREG: Can I just quote from last year's again?

State would rather send four and have one or two linebackers activate quickly on run action, but they blitz more than enough to keep you wary. Quarters mostly locks the four true DBs into coverage, and the way State plays it they can do without the Star in coverage, and you get so used to the MLB and SAM hanging out in short zones that when they blitz you don't have any targets in the space they abandoned. They still have that dreaded A-gap blitz, and brought back the A&C gap twist blitz that you've probably forgotten and Gardner's ribs never shall.

A sizable increase in passing down blitzing puts the Spartan defense back among the aggressiveness leaders. MSU isn't afraid to send six or six and a half (a spy) from their passing down sets, winning them single-blocks for Raequan Williams and Kenny Willekes that usually don't work out well for the offense. Brandon Peters passed out of this a few times but more often he was shaken and running for his life.

Their standard downs are always going to be aggressive. MSU starts each play stepping down, bringing the safeties down momentarily to cover for the linebackers, then snapping back as their coverage kicks in.

This is now a common way to play defense in the age of the RPO: have your linebackers activate as soon as they see run action, have the safeties play down to cover quick passes, and figure it out from there. The more you do it the more you're trusting your secondary to make plays. Of the teams I've tracked this for, Illinois--whose fans scream every weak about how susceptible they are to play-action--is the extreme, running hard after 96% of things that look like runs. After that are a bunch of talented teams: PSU (84%), Notre Dame (83%), and Ohio State (81%). State is in the next category with Iowa as teams going balls out against the run on 75% of run action.

Dangermen:

On one end of the spectrum you have the most serious draft analysts who've been banging the drum for Raequan Williams (+14/-1.5 in this game to my charting) to turn pro because his freaky long arms, strength, and quick feet make him one of the best prospects in years against zone running, which is the thing everybody at that level of football runs. On the other end there are Spartan fans who say he got fewer than a handful of fancy counting stats last year, and for some reason the dude listened to them, both by sticking around, and by improving his pass rush. PFF had him for 7 pressures on 32 pass rush snaps in this game, which is on par with very good edge defenders.

He remains death against the run for anyone who takes the time to see it, and an incomprehensible pile of green jerseys surrounding the ball at the line of scrimmage everyone else:

MSU has done their part for the cause by giving him more opportunities to play the 3-tech role with more under shifts. Leave Raequan Williams singled up against a guard: gonna have a bad time.

Williams sucks so much air out of the line because you can't get him out of his gap no matter how many dudes you throw at him. The necessity of at least two has led to an extremely productive career for both Joe Bachie, and Bachie's roommate and best friend, WDE Kenny Willekes (+13.5/-1), who didn't need much help. The canonical Willekes play is killing both sides of a zone read. It's still happening:

As is the bull rush pass move and the inside swim thing. One addition to his arsenal this year is I think he got a lot stronger this offseason. I've seen Willekes get around a lot of blockers over the years but never flat-out eject one like this:

#48 the DE at the bottom

Damn, son. The other addition is craftiness. He drew a crucial hold in this game by trapping the RT's arm under his own, and drew a flag against Ohio State by pulling the Buckeye down atop of him. You see that stuff in the NFL all the time and I call it fair given what offensive linemen do on a regular basis. It's impressive to see a college kid with that part of his game developed.

Third banana/3-tech Mike Panasiuk (+7.5/-2) gets the benefit of single blocking that most DTs only dream of, but he also does more than his fair share of mucking up the run even if his pass rushing doesn't look like it will get beyond Matt Godin-level.

#72, third DL down from the top

Finally, cornerback Josiah Scott killed a guy:

OVERVIEW

This is where you publish the annual Double-A Gap blitz right?

Since you've see that enough I thought you might like to see some of Illinois's answers for it:

This isn't too different that Michigan's arc read, run to great success last year against MSU. The only difference really is pulling the tight end across the formation before the snap. This puts him where he can run directly at the guy they're optioning instead of coming at him like a split zone trap:

This gets you the hell out of the way of the blitzers and then you've got until the safeties arrive to make something out of it. The other thing you can do, if your pass rush can hold out that long against Willekes and Williams, is pick them up as blitzers and run play-action across the younger safety and the less experienced cornerbacks.

That's a bit of a bust--the cornerback is supposed to drop to take away this before coming down on the flat route. However that's an advanced read, and later in the game when they're blitzing more you can absolutely use the way they play so aggressively with their linebackers and safeties against them to win one-on-one leverage battles. Does Michigan have any receivers like Imatorbhebhe to win those?

So what you're saying is you can beat these guys if you make your reads a whole damn lot and then can pass protect against two elite d-linemen long enough to exploit the aggressive built-in response?

Yet again.

That sounds too hard.

Well they're a good, sound defense. MSU puts a lot on their defensive linemen and those guys come through for them. That keeps the linebackers clean and then you've got decent safeties and corners coming down to take away everything that isn't a long bomb.

Advice?

Don't bother throwing underneath, because they're keying on it.

And try to stay in the pocket--they're an excellent rollout defense.

Sigh. How many times are you going to write this same glowing article about how legit good Dantonio is at building a defense for modern college football out of walk-ons, rejects, roiders, damn lucky safeties, Panasiuks, and the odd long-armed freaky person?

That's up to Michigan tomorrow.