Breakdown Sports

The defense du jour against modern spread attacks is what is commonly known as the “Tite” front. Over the past couple years, you’ve seen Big 12 teams run it increasingly often, and SEC and other teams start to incorporate variants of the look more often as well as they begin to deal with an increasing number of spread formations. But what exactly is the “Tite” front? Like any front, say, a 4-3 Under, it isn’t necessarily any one thing. You can have single-high, two-high, or even three-high safeties. You can attach your overhangs differently. And with Tite, it may even mean different box numbers. And of course, there are multiple techniques that can be employed along the way. This post is a primer to the Tite front. At the end, I’ll link some of the better articles that get into greater depth for those interested, but for now, we need to understand the basics, so that we can understand how to attack it.

Going a bit more in depth with Don Brown's scheme

Two different B1G teams ran the exact same zone blitz scheme on Saturday, and both teams successfully got to the QB. The scheme: Over Gut 6. This is a scheme that Monte Kiffin loved to run dating back to his time with the Bucs, and more than a decade and a half later, it’s still working in major college football (it’s probably more accurate to say Tony Dungy loved to run it with the Vikings, but I don’t have proof of that). Let’s first go over how it is run and then show examples of both PSU and Michigan running it successfully.

Originally posted at Bucky's 5th Quarter on Oct 3, 2013 Because Wisconsin has such run game prowess, many of its passing concepts attack the sidelines, away from the box area. In this area, the Badgers will often run "route adjustments" depending on the coverage. These adjustments allow the Wisconsin offense to attack multiple coverages with limited receivers, as other eligible receivers tend to be used to sell the run fake or help out in pass protection. They rely on the quarterback and receiver seeing the same thing, and if they don't, it often leads to bad things. In this post, I'm going to try to piece together where these issues were made and talk about why you have these adjustments within your offense.

I’m a huge proponent of bunch sets and stack sets. They overload zones, they provide nature rubs against man coverage, they attack vertically but are also utilized in space, they force the defense to make concessions to their coverage in the way of post snap adjustments (like in-out adjustments) which force defenses to have consistent eye discipline and great post-snap communication and feel. On top of that, they help to define the coverage so that, as an offense, you can see how to take advantage of a defense. So this is a powerful advantage. Against Miami, Nebraska utilized a bunch set from the #2 and #3 receivers and combined it with a familiar passing concept to leverage Miami and get a wide-open touchdown.

I've compiled a decent amount of work focused on these two teams this year. For those interested in some of the X's and O's and schematic things. Here's the links: Ohio State Thought I'd start a thread for those interested in what OSU runs, and that sort of thing. I should have two more posts come out today/tomorrow sometime, which I will link on here. I'll give a brief breakdown of each link so you know what you're clicking before you click it. Hopefully this is alright, and if you have any questions for me in regards to breaking things down, feel free to ask. Apologize as well for linking previews, but again, it helps me track readership better than I can on SBNation, and my goal is to start writing more non-Michigan-centric content and start getting further in depth with the other B1G teams. Here's a general look at OSU's Flood play, which is probably their favorite way to attack defenses deep, something like this will be a play OSU will like...

For how basic much of MSU’s defense is, on third downs when the offense is behind the sticks, the Spartan’s defense is anything but. Much of the focus is on Narduzzi’s blitz package, and often rightfully so. But what I took away from Saturday’s game against Michigan was a very interesting coverage on the back end. In this post we’ll look at how Narduzzi pulled out a very unique Cover 3 look (some have called it an inverted Tampa 2 defense, which it kind of is, but I honestly think it’s closer to a cover 3) and we’ll discuss why this is such an effective context within the scheme that MSU often runs. MSU’s Cover 4 I’ll briefly discuss the Cover 4 just to give a primer of what it looks like. Basically, the cover 4 will look like a flat back. Two safeties will be even about 10 yards off the LOS and will not retreat on the snap. They have responsibility for the #2 receiver, while the CBs on the outside will essentially be playing man coverage on the #1 receivers. Tampa 2 ...

Introduction Last time I showed how MSU played a cover 3 look on 3rd and long against ND. This time, we'll look at how they can give that same look, still play cover 3, but manage to confuse the offense nonetheless. The Set Up Just a reminder of the set-up: it's third and long and here is the defensive formation. Same Coverage, Different Look This is something that MSU didn't run, but may in the future. The initial look is the same and it will still be a cover 3. However, now MSU will only bring 5 man pressure and will adjust the coverage behind the play to take away any routes. Now MSU has built in the adjustment to any route concepts into their coverage. Both defenders are playing soft near the first down marker. If the #2 receiver decides to attack the seam on a vertical route, the seam defender will check #1 and have time to determine if he needs to carry the #2 deep or break off to his sideline curl/hook underneath zone. This allows, theoretically, for...

If you followed along Saturday, you know I had some issues with the way Wisconsin's cornerbacks were playing. Much of it is being young, but there are things that you need to learn or else you'll eventually die by fire, which was the case Saturday. It's not they aren't good enough athletes; it's that their technique is still raw and they aren't doing the little things to help themselves out. Let's take a look. The short stuff Wisconsin played a lot of Over 4 and mixed in some Cover 3 against Ohio State. That's fine. Cover 4 is a great defense against the spread that allows the safeties to get involved in run support. Seriously, it's not a passive defense , but the Badgers didn't necessarily run it like some other teams do. That's fine, too. There's more than one way to skin a cat, as they say. But it does tend to put a tall task on your outside linebackers, who have to defend against the run and also cover the entire hook/curl/flat...

Introduction On normal downs and distances, it’s safe to say that MSU isn’t the most creative defense. While they are obviously still very good, they typically do a limited amount of things and do those things extremely well. But once you get behind the chains, well, that’s a different matter. Against Notre Dame, Narduzzi and Co pulled out an interesting formation and scheme. We are going to look at it briefly and how it is supposed to be run and why. Formation Here, the Spartans clearly line up in a single high look, and with the depth of the defenders in the slot, it’s almost surely going to be a 3 high type of defense. The question for the QB is: “Are the CBs going to drop into deep thirds?” or “Are the seam defenders going to drop into deep thirds?” Coverage Turns out that it is a basic cover 3 zone but with a few tweaks with the way that it looks. And the underneath coverage follows the eyes of the QB. Video Concept and Theory The scenario is third an...