Charting Our Offense - BYU

[BigRedBuster]

Really interesting to me that we didn't see any kind of zone read/option plays.

We did see some. Far fewer than I expected though.

From the article I linked.

By my count, the coaches called five designed quarterback run plays - one draw, one traditional option and three zone reads (one of which resulted in a critical fumble).

 

[4skers89]

Two things on the running game that I agree with and have been mentioned.

1) We have got to get more creative with it. I believe we will. For good reason, the coaches keyed on the passing game in practice before this season. Now, they need to balance that out and give our guys (O line) a better chance at success by being creative and mixing it up more.

2) I like the run game from under center much better than out of shot gun. It allows the RB to get to the line faster and hit the hole with a head of steam. In the shot gun, he has to stand there and wait for the ball before he can take off. The jet sweep also works much better from under center.

So, right now, from under center they have an RB up the middle or the jet sweep. That allows the defense to basically only have to defend half the field. What they need to do moving forward is develop a mis direction play out of that so the LBs and safeties can't just flow to the jet sweep. If they ran something like this, I missed it.

Good points. From that HOL article that BRB posted a link to, 77% of the times they lined up under center they ran, 84% of the times they lined up in shotgun they passed. Maybe this is a by-product of blending in Beck's offense but it seems like something easy for defenses to key on. Probably not an issue in the BYU game since nobody knew what the offense was going to look like. Going forward they probably need to get more creative and mix things up.

Edit: Thank you Mavric, great stuff.

 

[Mavric]

Really interesting to me that we didn't see any kind of zone read/option plays.

We did see some. Far fewer than I expected though.

From the article I linked.

By my count, the coaches called five designed quarterback run plays - one draw, one traditional option and three zone reads (one of which resulted in a critical fumble).

Yeah, the one true option play worked great - TA with a nice fake and some good yards. The one zone read look was fumbled. so not so good. I don't remember the others. They must be in the second half.

 

[desertshox]

Really interesting to me that we didn't see any kind of zone read/option plays.

We did see some. Far fewer than I expected though.

From the article I linked.

By my count, the coaches called five designed quarterback run plays - one draw, one traditional option and three zone reads (one of which resulted in a critical fumble).

Yeah, the one true option play worked great - TA with a nice fake and some good yards. The one zone read look was fumbled. so not so good. I don't remember the others. They must be in the second half.

think it was in the second half, they called a zone read where, had TA kept it he had room to run for days. instead he gave the ball to the back and lost several yards.

 

[Mavric]

Really interesting to me that we didn't see any kind of zone read/option plays.

We did see some. Far fewer than I expected though.

From the article I linked.

By my count, the coaches called five designed quarterback run plays - one draw, one traditional option and three zone reads (one of which resulted in a critical fumble).

Yeah, the one true option play worked great - TA with a nice fake and some good yards. The one zone read look was fumbled. so not so good. I don't remember the others. They must be in the second half.

think it was in the second half, they called a zone read where, had TA kept it he had room to run for days. instead he gave the ball to the back and lost several yards.

Yeah, you're right. That was a pretty bad read.

 

[BigRedBuster]

Why do you think coaching staffs don't allow Tommy to run traditional option plays more? It seems to me that he does a pretty dang good job running them. The one he ran this game was awesome. I think he is more natural running that type of option than a read option.

 

[The Dude]

Good stuff. I liked that our third possession was so clean we decided to have another third possession.

 

[Mavric]

Good stuff. I liked that our third possession was so clean we decided to have another third possession.

Three kinds of people - those who can count and those who can't.

 

[zoogs]

Why do you think coaching staffs don't allow Tommy to run traditional option plays more? It seems to me that he does a pretty dang good job running them. The one he ran this game was awesome. I think he is more natural running that type of option than a read option.

It sounds like QB depth is really shaky. Hopefully it's a much better situation by next year, or maybe even by midseason, but that's optimistic. Really, not running the QB won't stop him from getting hit and injured either. It's a risk to manage.

 

[ZRod]

Why do you think coaching staffs don't allow Tommy to run traditional option plays more? It seems to me that he does a pretty dang good job running them. The one he ran this game was awesome. I think he is more natural running that type of option than a read option.

It's a head scratcher. He's pretty natural at it, and can carry out the ball fake as smooth as a guy with the same name but different spelling.

 

[Mavric]

Second Half

Eighth Possession - 15:00 3rd Quarter

1&10, -25 - Shotgun trips left - Zone right, Newby picks up three. Decent push, small hole, Newby could have hit the hole harder

2&7, -28 - Shotgun doubles TE, HB right, jet motion right - Zone read, TA keeps. Trey Foster from the HB position tries to block across the formation but gets bumped off by the unblocked DE. There was a big hole to run through but the timing is off as TA bumps into Foster. TA picks up about 4 but a couple penalties negate the play.

2&17, -18 - Shotgun spread TE left - Straight drop, great protection. TA hits Westy on the cross for 7

3&10, -25 - Shotgun doubles motion to trips right - Straight drop, Kondolo whifs, TA throws under pressure to a covered Westy, incomplete

4&10, -25 - Punt

3 plays, 0 yards. Officially 1 run for 3 yards, 2 passes for 7 yards.

Kondolo whiffed on the one block but it didn't change the play much. Other than that, a very good series by the OLine. Penalty killed the drive which came after the play was disrupted by Foster.

 

[admo]

I know they have a script for the first 15 (possible) plays that they work on in practice. Do they do that for the second half too? I've never thought about that until now.

 

[Mavric]

Ninth Possession - 11:52 3rd Quarter

1&10, +35 - Pistol FB/TE right - Outside zone right. Big hole, Cross runs for 14

1&10, +21 - Shotgun spread right - Reverse to Reilly. Not very well blocked - Reeves, Westy and Utter all miss blocks - but Reilly still gets 11

1&G, +10 - Offset I left, jet motion left - Inside Power left, Newby for the TD

3 plays - all runs - 35 yards.

Finally a little more creative with the running game. Pays off, even on one play that wasn't well blocked.

 

[Mavric]

Tenth Possession - 9:00 3rd Quarter

1&10, -38 - Offset Pro I right - Zone left was called but instead TA throws to Turner because of the soft coverage.

2&5, -43 - Shotgun trips left - Huge hole for Newby on the inside zone. Newby with a nice hesitation move to set up the block that cuts outside for 14

1&10, +43 - Shotgun bunch trips left - Fake end around to Reilly, Wilbon on the screen for 14 yards.

1&10, +29 - Shotgun TE trips right - Zone read, TA should have kept it but gave and lost 7. It was the wrong read but the play wouldn't have gone anywhere anyway as both Reeves and Kondolo missed blocks.

2&17, +36 - Shotgun trips right - TA hits Morgan on the curl. Morgan makes a nice move to get 14

3&3, +22 - Pistol doubles, jet motion - Fake sweep, traditional option. Nice fake pitch by TA and he gets 11 yards through a huge hole.

1&10, +11 - Pistol offset I left - Outside lead zone to Cross. Well blocked but Cross takes a long time to get to the line and the backside safety gets there to stop him for 2 yards.

2&8, +9 - Shotgun Ace - Straight drop. Great play design as TA finds Foster on the delayed release for the TD.

8 plays, 62 yards. 4 runs, 20 yards, 4 passes, 42 yards.

Again, better variety of runs and run fakes. Easy throws for TA. Well blocked overall.

 

[Mavric]

Eleventh Possession - 4:07 3rd Quarter

1&10, -20 - Shotgun TE trips right - Newby on the inside zone cuts back and gets about 10 but it's called back for an illegal block on Turner

1&12, -18 - Shotgun trips left - TA throws off the blitzing corner and hits Westy for 16

1&10, -34 - Doubles - Jet sweep to Turner. BYU reads it well and there are simply too many defenders to block. Makes the late Jet Sweep to Turner look that much worse.

2&10, -34 - Shotgun trips left - Straight drop, TA hits Morgan on the curl for 5

3&5, -39 - Shotgun tight doubles, Newby motion to trips left - Straight drop, Kondolo with another whiff. TA gets luck with a late, floating throw over the middle but hits Reilly for 10

1&10, -49 - Pistol offset I left - Lead zone left but Newby cuts back instead of following Janovich to the hole and gets stopped for no gain

2&10, -49 - Doubles, jet motion - Fake sweep. BYU blitzes and TA has to throw before Wilbon get set up for the screen.

3&10, -49 - Shotgun tight doubles - Straight drop, Newby misses the blitz pickup. TA has to scramble and throws a floater that is intercepted.

7 plays, 29 yards. Officially 2 runs for 0 yards, 5 passes for 31 yards

We pretty much kept shooting ourselves in the foot until we hit.