The only way to stop backs like Herschel Walker is to eliminate their daylight by filling all the gaps.

The term “run to daylight,” made famous by Vince Lombardi through a book named just that, became a mantra for running back coaches across the country. It is also (unsurprisingly) exactly what defensive coaches fear the most — a runningback who can see the hole and run to daylight.

I was a college running back coach for six years in the early and mid 1990s and coached a kid, Rene Ingoglia, who did a bit more than simply havet a cup of coffee with the Buffalo Bills.** I asked him what he saw when he ran the ball and how he always seemed to find the hole. He told me that all he saw were flashes of color and he simply went to the hole where there was no color.

From us defensive coaches, it is up to us to provide a solid wall of color that encompassing every possible hole or gap. Although this seems simple in theory, it is much harder than it appears. Defensive coordinators are confronted with a number of problems.

First lets take a look at the I-formation, the formation of the great running teams of yesteryear. Over the decades the I has produced some of football’s most prolific rushers, including Archie Griffin of Ohio State, O.J. Simpson of Southern Cal, and Herschel Walker of Georgia. Any defensive coordinator worth his salt has to have a plan for the I.

As you can see in the image below, an offense in the I presents seven gaps to defend.

As stated above our goal is to put a player in each gap. The problem is that the gaps are not stationary. Let’s take a look as the offensive lineman come off the ball to our left .All the gaps have moved. Each defensive player must move and still fit into his proper gap. Remember the offense know the snap count, we don’t.

In the diagram below, all our gaps have moved to our left.

In the next figure, we are aligned an under defense, which a common front against teams that have a tight end and two backs in the backfield. Under defense is generally characterized by a linebacker over the tight end, defensive ends aligned in an outside shade on the offensive tackles, a nose shaded on the center to the tight end and a defensive tackle in an outside shade away from the tight end.

The important thing to remember is that it doesn’t matter what front we present to the offense — all gaps must be filled with color. A motto that I picked up from CoachHuey.com is to “play defense, not defenses.” It’s more important that we play well as team than to present a ton of different defensive looks to the offense.

Now that we know our gaps can move, the next thing to consider is that, since the fullback is in the middle of the offensive formation, he can insert himself anywhere along the line of scrimmage to thus create an extra gap for us to defend.

Because the offense is now presenting us with another gap to defend, as shown in the diagram above, we must now add another defensive player to combat this extra gap. This is one of the reasons why the I formation is so deadly. A clever offensive coordinator is going to insert him in most every gap from play to play.

Let’s take a look at how we might defend against an Archie Griffin or Herschel Walker running an isolation play towards the tight end — the strong side of the formation. Remember, although the play might be headed one way, the great runningbacks can expose any weakness and can cut the run back.

In the next diagram, because the fullback creates an extra gap between the offensive guard and tackle the strong safety must come up to fill the extra gap.

Now every gap is filled by a player. The tailback has nowhere to run. Of course, offensive coordinators have pens and pencils too, and once they see that the free safety is flying up to tackle the tailback near the line, they will release the tight end to throw a pass to him at the spot where the strong safety came from.

As a result, a second, and maybe better way, to defend against a strong side isolation run is to bring the weak safety into the picture because he doesn’t have an immediate vertical threat to worry about. In the last diagram below, the weakside (“Will” or “W”) and Middle (“Mac” or “M”) linebackers fill the extra gap created by the fullback.

Now the weak safety must come down and present color in the vacated gap left by the will linebacker. Again, every gap is covered; there is nowhere to run, and now the strong safety can cover the immediate vertical threat presented by the tight end.

In sum, to play great run defense you must  attack your assigned gap, shed blockers, pursue the ballcarrier, and make the tackle.  Play defense, not defenses.

** Footnote: Ingoglia was inducted into the UMass hall of fame, spent time with the Bills, and, in a bit of trivia, scored a touchdown in World Bowl VII of NFL Europe. Lawrence Phillips, the famous Nebraska star and NFL cast off, also scored a touchdown in that game.]

Although Saban is known for having one of the most complex defenses schemes to play against, he has a pretty simple philosophy for how he wants defensive backs to defend opposing receivers, whether to play the ball or the man. He explained it without too much coach-speak during his radio show last Thursday:

“There were several occasions last week [against Florida International], where guys should have played the ball and they didn’t. That’s something [where] if you can see me on the sideline I’m always going to be yelling at them, ‘Why didn’t you play the ball? Why didn’t you play the ball?’

“Let me explain it to you this way: There’s two positions you can be in when you’re defending a receiver. You’re either ‘in-phase’ with him or you’re ‘out-of-phase’ with him. Now, . . . ‘in-phase’ means that you’re pretty much even with the guy [as he runs straight downfield], but if you can see the guy’s number nearest [to] you, you’re in-phase when you’re covering him down the field. So when he gets through the move area — the move area defined being 14 to 18 yards down the field where the guy’s going to break a route in or out — we play a lot of closed coverage, [i.e.] we’re in bump-and-run a lot; we’re in that position with the guy when he gets in the move area. Now, if you’re in-phase with him when he gets into the move area, you should be become the receiver and look for the ball. That’s what you should do, and then the ball has to go through you.

“If you’re in the out-of phase position, which means you can’t see his near number, you can’t be even with him, then you have to play the guy’s eyes and hands for the ball because you’re not in position and if the quarterback throws it correctly [on a fade type pass] you’re not going to be able to get to the ball — you’re behind him too far.

“Now, to explain why some of the guys didn’t play the ball last week, is [this is] what FIU is really good at: If you play bump-and-run and you have pretty good corners, and they keep the guys cut off, that means my shoulder is ahead of his shoulder going down field so I can control his speed and he can’t run all over the place, [and because] I have good coverage on him, they’ll throw it to what’s called the back shoulder [fade]. By the time you turn around he catches it.

“The way the defensive back should read that is you read the guy’s upfield shoulder and when his upfield shoulder turns back you should turn into him and play the ball into him and you’ll be able to play that pattern. I think with a lot of our guys we probably over-coached that last week and did it in practice a lot. They were waiting for the guy to make the back shoulder throw when he had him cut off and they ended up not playing the ball.”

So much good stuff in here, but I particularly liked this last bit about reading the receiver’s “upfield” (i.e. inside) shoulder so as to defend the back shoulder fade. The idea that your man coverage DB wants to turn away from the QB and “into” the receiver when he opens up to catch the back shoulder fade is a very good coaching point.

(H/t deaux on CoachHuey.)

Q: Can you talk about the job the defense did on Tony Gonzalez? He was a big topic of conversation this week.

Belichick: Well, he’s good. We devoted a lot of coverage to him. We doubled him a lot and he’s a guy — game plan-wise — that you’ve got to account for. You’ve got to put some coverage on him; he’s really hard to handle. Again, I thought our guys stepped up and did a good job on him. We doubled him plenty of times and he still caught the ball. He’s tough, but then we held up in some other spots as well. Terrence [Wheatley], Shawn [Springs] and Leigh [Bodden] really did a good job out there. We didn’t give them very much help and they stepped up to the challenge on a good group of receivers and did a competitive job. . . .

Q: Can you talk about the job Brandon McGowan did today? It looked like he was part of your coverage on Tony Gonzalez.

Belichick: Oh, he was. Brandon [McGowan], it seems like he does a good job for us every week in the kicking game and on defense. He’s involved in a lot of plays, makes tackles and is a good coverage player and he did. He had a lot of responsibility on Gonzalez today. But we put a lot of coverage on Tony, too, and I’m not taking anything away from the job Brandon did, but we gave him some help. I mean Gonzalez is almost impossible to matchup with. . . .

Q: Were there changes defensively in the second half?

Belichick: No, not really. It was basically the same game plan we went into the game with. The calls matchup differently like they always do. Certainly, a big part of this game was to deal with Gonzalez, which I am not coming in here talking about him being seven [catches] for 110 [yards] with two touchdowns. . . .

And then Tom Brady had some interesting insight into Belichick’s role with the offense, specifically in drawing up plays in the dirt:

Q: On the Chris Baker touchdown, a guy had you in his grasp, but you were able to get away from the defense and deliver the ball well.

Brady: Yeah it was great protection. It wasn’t how we drew that play up. It was pretty much on the sideline, Coach Belichick said, ‘Well, what do you think about this?’ The guys that ran the play didn’t run it all week in practice and they made an adjustment. Chris [Baker] has been really dependable for us since the day he got here, and he made a great catch and run. . . .

Q: You said Bill Belichick drew up the Chris Baker touchdown play on the sideline. Was he more involved in the offensive communication with you and the play calling this week?

Brady: He’s always involved. He’s involved in every play that’s called. That one, like I said, we just kind of drew it up there on the sidelines and made it work.

And, while the game itself, a 23-13 affair, was quite possibly a snoozer, the ennui that has followed the game has been remarkable. The storylines have swirled: Tebow’s passing was questionable, Meyer says that he put the brakes on because Lane Kiffin wasn’t interested in winning, and he mentioned that his team was flu-stricken. Yet there is no overshadowing that Monte’s defense did a nice job against Florida’s offense. His plan was to take away the inside run game and make the receivers beat them. And, indeed, the subtext of Meyer’s post-game comments indicate that Monte’s plan was pretty much on target:

“You don’t have to be a genius to figure out the strength of our team right now,” Meyer said. “And that’s a big offensive line running off the ball and a freak quarterback that just takes the game over.

“Is it perfect? No, it’s not perfect. But until we get the full allotment, the full compliment, of wide receivers playing at the level we need them to play, we’ve got to do what we’ve got to do to win.”

So what was Monte’s plan? A few bullets:

• The basic theory was clear: focus on Florida “inside to out,” meaning focus first on the line and the gamebreaking runningbacks, then on Tebow running and the inside receivers and tight-ends like Hernandez, and, only last, Florida’s outside receivers. I had predicted Monte might do this, but I was wrong with his prescription. I had said they might plan man and use Berry as a “rover” like Dungy used Bob Sanders. I was wrong: Monte played zone defense almost exclusively, played his cornerbacks way off usually to help deep inside, while the other nine guys — Eric Berry included — all kept their eyes in the backfield. And this is why Monte gets the big bucks: this was better than what I had suggested.
• For example, Kiffin played a lot of Cover 4 or “quarters” against Florida. Florida, in turn, uses a lot of “trips” sets with three receivers to a side to try to force them out of it. The defensive adjustment is to have the safety to the single-receiver side cheat over and help with the inside slot. The diagram below shows this, though I admit it looks a little confusing. The point is that the safeties help with bracketing coverage but also fly up for run support; both guys can hit people on the line of scrimmage.
  
• Where are the weaknesses? To the outside receivers. The single receiver backside is basically in one-on-one coverage because the safety to his side has cheated over for trips. Yet Tebow could not get the ball outside.
• And when he tried, the Gators looked awful. Tebow was 14-19 for 115 yards and an interception, and also took a couple of sacks. First, Monte was able to make Florida’s line look poor with a lot of stunts and occasional blitzes, though he never brought an all-out one. Frequently, Tebow had very little time to go through his reads.
• But even when he did, he looked off-kilter. The interception he threw to Eric Berry was a prime example. Kiffin changed up his coverage to what was (I believe, the camera angles were not great) an “invert Cover two” where instead of two deep safeties, a safety and the cornerback played deep. Yet this wasn’t heavily disguised: Eric Berry just sat in the flat. Tebow stared at him, and stared at him, and stared at him…and then threw him the ball. (Senior?!) Anyway Kiffin was mixing up the schemes well, but again the common theme was zone with pressure on Tebow to get him rattled.
  
• Below is video of the pick; it should begin at the proper point. If not, skip ahead to the 0:50 mark.
  

• Of course, take away the Gators passing game and you still have to deal with their strength, the run game. Again however, the zone Kiffin played was very effective because zone defenders, unlike man ones, get to look into the backfield on every play, and can therefore react quickly to the run. So much of the game Kiffin stayed in his base 4-3 looks with one or two safeties, and played aggressive.
• But there was one adjustment which was very interesting, and that was Monte’s move on first downs and short yardage — basically any obvious running down — to a 5-2 “double eagle” look. I don’t know what personnel Monte was using exactly, but instead of the base 4-3 he went to a nose guard, two defensive linemen in “three techniques” (outside eye of the offensive guards) and then two stand-up types in “five techniques” (outside eye of the tackles). Two linebackers roamed behind them. See the image below, and apologies for the very low quality.
  
• Why do this? It’s a move Pete Carroll uses a lot at USC, but is particularly effective against a spread set without a tight-end. It’s a numbers issue: the defense “covers” every person on the offensive line (the five line guys, or three down linemen and two stand-up guys), while both possible ballcarriers — the runningback and quarterback — have defensive counterparts, i.e. the two inside linebackers. Now a few times they went to this Florida was still able to bull for a short first down, but that’s just line movement as much as anything else. But it was no doubt effective as it helped keep Florida in check most of the game. Again, Monte dialed this up on first down too, which again called into question how dependable Florida’s outside receivers were.
• But of course, Tebow being Tebow, found a way to win. He was helped by some late game adjustments Meyer called in. For starters, when Florida went to its read plays it was clear that Tennessee preferred to keep the ball in Tebow’s hands. This is not as irrational as it sounds: a carry by Rainey or Demps is a touchdown, whereas Tebow just bludgeons you for positive yards. The problem was that the Kiffins assumed that Tebow would eventually wear down, which is something that does not actually happen.
• Meyer called for the veer option, where the quarterback and runningback read a playside defender rather than a backside defender as with the zone read. This lets the offense get more double teams at the point of attack. But they made  a nice adjustment: they didn’t really run it as the true “veer,” where you read the defensive end (five technique). Instead they ran the “midline” — they read the defensive tackle. A couple diagrams will (hopefully) better illustrate this. (See here for some “midline” info from a true flexbone look.)
  
  
• This is not the true, true midline because there is only one read and from the gun the mechanics are different, but it is an effective move. Remember that the old option adage applies to the spread offense too: if you can’t block him, read him. Florida went to this play several times late in the game and the read man, the three technique defensive tackle, took the runningback and Tebow stepped around for big gainers.

In the end, Tennessee had an excellent plan, but Florida had enough juice with its powerful line and powerful quarterback. And Urban Meyer is right that Tennessee does not really lack talent on defense. I don’t necessarily buy his argument that they throttled the offense back. Maybe they could have been more aggressive but the passing game had been very shaky, and in the second half it was all read plays and options for the most part as UT had bottled up the basic zones and powers. It’s not clear whether this is a blueprint for future teams or just an example of an off game for Tebow with a fired up Tennessee defense (and a mediocre Tennessee offense not worth the risk?), or if, with Florida’s personnel weaknesses at receiver, we will see these schemes repeated.

And let me conclude by just saying this. I think these schemes were important, but Monte Kiffin coaches a disciplined defense. His defenders tackle well, fly to the ball, read their keys properly, and take good pursuit angles. If you do those things, you will have a good defense, no matter the scheme.

For help I want to thank Art of Trojan Football Analysis and Jerry Gordon for their insights, and the invaluable Brophy for the game film that launched a thousand (or more) words. And for more nitty gritty, TFA has a nice series. See parts one, two, three, and four.