The Football Brainiacs

Image via The Associated Press (Sue Ogrocki)

Some defenses are fast. Some defenses are physical. Some defenses are disciplined. This sounds like the beginning of a Dr. Seuss book. In order to defend Dana Holgorsen’s attack you want to be all of those things. Let’s look at each of those in some detail and how they will be needed to slow down West Virginia’s attack.

A FAST DEFENSE

When you hear someone talk about a fast defense they are normally referring to three types of speed. One is the actual speed and athleticism of the individual players on that defense. The other is the intelligence of the defenders on a particular defense. How well do they read their keys and react? And the third, which is related to the second, is how much of their defense is predicated on attacking and how much is in fact reading and reacting?

How does WVU test “actual speed?” While there are differences between a Holgorsen spread offense and, say, a Mike Leach spread offense the fundamental idea of a spread offense still exists in both, get athletes in space and in one-on-one match-ups. Unlike Leach though, Holgorsen wants to beat you deep. Everyone “wants to”, but Holgorsen attempts to more often than others who run a similar system. He wants to test your back end speed, and he’ll test it on the edges and in the middle. He’ll also test your linebackers and safeties’ down hill speed and ability to stone a wide receiver on contact by giving you stick route after stick route (basically an inside WR will stem about 5-8 yards, stop, turn and look for the ball). He’ll do that all while he sends an outside WR deep and another inside receiver out. And, of course, he will test you on the edge with his sweep plays.

How does Oklahoma hold up against this? Let’s use the classic 3 x 1 (3 WRs on one side and 1 WR on the other) set that you may see from WVU. OU will usually match up against this in man coverage or a type of zone man coverage I call ‘Banjo’ coverage where a DB will take the man that releases into his designated area. I prefer ‘Banjo’ coverage in these situations, because it helps avoid the natural “picks” that happen when you have an inside WR going out and an outside WR running up field. A few years ago, WVU had guys like Stedman Bailey and Tavon Austin that made these simple routes a nightmare for even LSU’s great defense. Tavon would run those stick routes all day, then he’d turn and beat the LSU defender in space. While Stedman Bailey was a difficult one-on-one match up for most outside CBs. But those guys are long gone. WVU does, however, have some very capable skill guys and one WR in Kevin White who is flat out fantastic. But White isn’t going to beat you purely with his speed. He’s a physical receiver that will go up and take the ball from you.

How did LSU attack Holgorsen? One of the things I did when previewing this game was to go back and watch the old WVU vs. LSU game to watch what one of my favorite DCs, John Chavis, did against WVU. For the most part, he played man coverage on the back end with a 4-man front. He did, however, sprinkle in some of his ‘Mustang’ package, which is his 3-2-6 dime defense and that will blitz from different angles. LSU also had Tyrann Mathieu, who was a blitz master. People assume WVU is the type of team that is going to get the ball out fast, which is somewhat true. But because they like to test a team deep, they still need time for those routes to come open. WVU wants to simplify the QB’s read so that regardless of what he sees pre-snap, he can make a simple read and know where to go with the ball immediately. To me that all sounds well and good, but we are still dealing with human beings who have to get open and a QB whose ability to make a good decision is going to be affected by how quickly he’s forced to make that decision.

How OU attacks Holgorsen: OU’s base defense is an odd front, so by definition they have the ability to come from different angles, not unlike Chavis’ ‘Mustang’ package. You’re going to see OU put a lot of pressure on the WVU offensive line. But I suspect that instead of simply seeing man coverage behind it, you’ll see some zone blitzes with Cover-3 deep behind it. Additionally, LSU had Tyrann but OU has Eric Striker, a decent blitz guy in his own right one might say. The other thing OU does a lot of is disguise what they are doing pre-snap, both in terms of pressure and coverage. You’ll see CBs showing a man technique on the outside and then right before the snap show a zone technique. You’ll see all kinds of pre-snap pressure looks that turn into something completely different a second before the snap. OU’s defense is built to do this and they do it well. It’s the reason they’ve been generating turnovers.

A DISCIPLINED & PHYSICAL DEFENSE

How Holgorsen might respond to OU’s “actual speed”: Holgorsen loves to run screens, and he’ll do a lot of that in order to keep Oklahoma’s speed up front in check and test their discipline. But he also wants to test the physicality of a defense. Another misunderstanding about Holgorsen is that he doesn’t live in 10 personnel like many assume. He uses a TE, and he loves to use two RBs. He’ll motion a running back as a lead blocker, or he’ll send one out to the flat in order to clear out an ILB. He does this because he wants to soften the interior part of a defense, or force a defense to strengthen the interior part in order to soften the coverage on the edges. Fortunately, Oklahoma has Jordan Phillips. He and the rest of the defensive line have thus far pretty much protected the LBs and safeties. In fact, I truly believe that our safety run support would have been heavily exposed without guys like Phillips, Tapper, Chuka, etc.

Another thing OU does really well is read screens. They are one of the few teams that’s able to play fast and disciplined. Striker and Geneo on the edges do a really good job of understanding when to attack and when to pick up a receiving threat. The defensive line is also able to walk that line between speed and discipline.

How does Holgorsen make a disciplined defense falter? Again, he runs a simple scheme with plenty of room for receivers to improvise, so he wants to run a lot of plays in a hurry. This has the effect of doing three things; (1) preventing as much pre-snap disguise, (2) tiring out the defense & (3) creating mental/technique errors. So far OU has done a pretty good job of being assignment sound, but obviously WVU will attempt to test that further. Additionally, OU has a lot of depth up front which is where it matters the most when facing this style of offense.

What do I expect to see from WVU?

1. I expect to see a lot of plays that will isolate OU’s outside CB in man coverage against Kevin White and from there you’ll see 9 routes and slants.

2. I expect them to try to specifically isolate Julian in order to beat him on slant routes. A couple times I’ve caught him trailing on these routes.

3. As I mentioned, expect to see plenty of screens especially throws to the flat where our CBs are forced to come up and make tackles (see Z.Sanchez).

4. I expect to see looks start out as a two back set then turn into 4 and 5 WR sets. They are going to try to test Ahmad Thomas. If they can, they are going to try to test him in space whether it’s in coverage or tackling.

5. They’ll continue to try to run the ball even if it’s not working. It might not be a lot but unlike Leach, Holgorsen wants to run the ball and he’ll keep trying to regardless.

What do I expect to see from OU? 

1. Lots of man blitzing and lots of movement. This is a staple of OU’s defense.

2. Plenty of zone blitzing. OU will blitz five guys regularly and play a fire zone behind that with three guys in underneath coverage and three in deep coverage. But those zone defenders should not be covering space, they should be matching men. The Oklahoma defense should know WVU’s route combinations inside and out by now, and they should force Trickett to throw the ball into tight spaces regardless what kind of coverage they are in.

3. More man coverage in general. OU plays man coverage but I expect to see it a little more in order to ensure less secondary breakdowns.

Key to the Game

To me it’s simple. Everything WVU does is predicated on finding space. So if OU can stop the run with their four front defenders, that means there are more defenders in coverage and  less space to space to find pass opportunities. Stop the run with the front for and WVU’s offense is dead meat…dead meat.