FILM STUDY: Georgia Tech defense should give Shannon Dawson plenty of opportunities to make plays on Saturday
The Miami Hurricanes kick off ACC play on Saturday at home against Georgia Tech, a team that’s off to a 2-3 start that includes wins against South Carolina State and at Wake Forest … and losses to Louisville in the season-opener by five points, 39-34, at Ole Miss two weeks later, 48-23, and this past weekend against lower level Bowling Green, 38-27.
The Yellow Jackets have shown a solid passing offense behind mobile QB Haynes King …. but the defense has struggled mightily with consistency and should have a lot of problems slowing down the prolific Miami passing offense.
Big picture? This is a defense that is one of the worst in the nation statistically at No. 112 in total defense (427.8 yards allowed per game), and it’s particularly bad at stopping the run with the team No. 128 in that category (224.2 rush yards allowed per game). Bowling Green, which on paper should have been overpowered by a higher level defensive line/linebacker corps, had lead back Terion Stewart run for 137 yards and a TD with a long of 32 yards this past weekend. Overall the team had 175 rush yards and three TDs on the ground. So don’t be shocked if Miami goes to the run quite a bit … and has success with it. As for passing yards allowed, the team is No. 38 in the nation with 203.6 passing yards given up per game.
Something to keep in mind with the above, as well: Opponents have run the ball 61.4 percent of the time, perhaps recognizing the run defense issues. In other words, the pass defense would probably be ranked a lot worse if other teams were focusing more on that area of the game.
Georgia Tech also is a lowly No. 103 in the nation in scoring defense, allowing 30.8 points per game.
Combine that with the Miami offense that averages 43.8 points (No. 8 in the nation), 519.0 yards per game (No. 7 in the nation) and 222.5 rush yards (No. 9 in the nation) and you can see why the Canes should have no problem putting up a lot of points on Saturday.
If you want some further proof there’s probably not a lot Georgia Tech can do to slow down UM: Last weekend Bowling Green entered its game against the Yellow Jackets with a 1-3 record and were averaging 18.8 points and 312.0 yards per game. And the Falcons wound up with a win behind 38 points and 438 yards.
A wildcard could be that the team demoted coordinator Adam Thacker on Sunday, promoting Kevin Sherrer from his prior main role as linebackers coach.
So it’ll be interesting to see if there’s a lot different in the game Saturday.
But it’s still worth taking a closer look inside the film of the Yellow Jackets’ defense to get an idea of how they can be exploited by Shannon Dawson & Co.
This is a good example of, in a tight game late vs. Louisville, how Georgia Tech is defending a third-and-short when the opposing offense spreads the field with five wide. The Yellow Jackets rush four and have six in the box, with one high safety and the nickel defenders are seven and 10 yards off the line of scrimmage. So Shannon Dawson is going to have an easy time converting plays like this if Georgia Tech does the same thing against Miami. At the snap Georgia Tech is keeping it simple, rushing four with the linebackers in zone down the middle and the corners man to man. The receiver at the top simply sprints just past the sticks and turns around and is wide open for the easy first down … but because of the off coverage the slot receiver Jamari Thrash is also wide open on a hook and that’s where Jack Plummer goes with the ball. And then you see some of the issues Georgia Tech has tackling in the open field with three missed tackles.
Here you see Georgia Tech’s defense really fall apart with a play-action fake drawing up the two linebackers. The Yellow Jackets are desperate to dial up some pressure against Louisville (which is 3-wide in this formation with an H-back behind the right tackle) since the Front 4 is giving Plummer too much time. So the cornerback blitzes from the top with the safety taking over the coverage. But a stop and go move has the safety jump up a step and he never recovers. It’s an easy TD by Thrash and a Louisville lead. Miami should be able to feast on plays like this on Saturday given Tyler Van Dyke’s field awareness.
Georgia Tech has South Carolina State in a third-and-seven here and rushes five with one high safety and is playing off coverage against a five-wide look. The pocket holds up against the pressure (note here that the Yellow Jackets had eight sacks against Wake Forest but only one total the prior three games … and two last weekend vs. Bowling Green) and Jaylon King blows the coverage on a stop-and-go cross by Richard Bailey. Miami’s receivers will have opportunities to make plays when the Canes get one-on-one coverage.
Here you see Ole Miss run a three-wide, H-back set out of shotgun with one back, and Georgia Tech rushes four with the nickel at the line vs. the slot man and the other DBs playing off coverage. The RPO handoff goes to Ulysses Bentley IV on the right side, and even with the H-back vacating the spot Bentley runs to at the snap (and no linebacker leaving the gap to deal with the H-back) there’s a huge hole as the right tackle easily shoves the left DE out of the play and the right guard reaches the second level while Bentley is still in the backfield. Watching this it’s not hard to imagine Miami’s physical offensive line opening up some similar kinds of holes.
This is just a reminder that yes, Georgia Tech can also make some plays. Here you see Wake Forest keep seven in protection and the Yellow Jackets are taking a page out of the Lance Guidry book and showing pressure before then dropping two with the MLB coming on the blitz. So four wind up rushing against seven … but because of the confusion with the overload to the left side and with no one open Mitch Griffis is sacked. Oh, and this is your reminder that the Yellow Jackets had eight sacks in this game after only getting one total in the prior three games.
Here’s another example of the pressure that Georgia Tech will try to bring against Miami. In general the team struggles to get pressure from its front 4 alone (one sack in the first three games). In this case both linebackers blitz and simply overwhelm the line. Griffis has no time to look downfield. We would think the team will throw a lot of different blitzes Van Dyke’s way given how good the Miami QB looks when given time. Shannon Dawson needs to take advantage of that … as other opponents have this year.
There were numerous clips you could take from this past weekend’s game against Bowling Green that showcase the issues Georgia Tech has at all level of its defense, but we’ve picked a couple as good examples. In the first above, you see a pretty good example of how not to play defense. On this play Bowling Green isn’t doing anything overly complicated. There are two wide receivers to the left, one back, a tight end attached to the right and an H-back that goes in motion. At the snap the H-back reverses direction and picks up the left defensive end, there’s a play action fake that draws the linebackers. And then Georgia Tech is simply a mass of confusion. The two high safety look provides no back end support, with both floating toward the side of the field that has no receivers running routes, almost anticipating it was going to be a trick based on the formation and the throw would go to the side with no wideouts lined up at the snap. Meanwhile two of the three linebackers have charged forward at the play-action fake and then just stand around when it’s now a pass play. The corner on the bare side has crept up and is spying the QB in the event he runs. So you wind up with seven defenders all past the line of scrimmage after the snap but only one of them (the left end) is actively chasing the QB as he looks downfield. The one linebacker who has not charged up at the play-action fake is now taking the slot receiver, probably not a great matchup in the first place, but then when there is a late release from the tight end after he is initially blocking that linebacker leaves his man to one of the safeties and switches to the tight end. But he’s two steps behind him. Even with that going on there’s still a bigger problem: Nobody has even bothered to cover the running back after that the initial fake handoff. He runs a wheel route up the left sideline and is wide open. Oh, and if you want to add a missed tackle to the miscues by Georgia Tech on this play go ahead and do that, too. Just brutal defense from the Yellow Jackets, and they may simply want to burn their film from this game. If they do this kind of thing against the Canes the Miami Dolphins’ 70 points vs. the Broncos could be surpassed.
As you look at the above plays, you see that Georgia Tech defenders are confused even on these quick hitters and also take bad angles to the ball. In the first, the receiver in motion draws the nickel, but nobody accounts for 6-5 WR Finn Hogan lined up at H-back – he runs across behind the line faking as a lead blocker for the running back. When it’s a play-action fake Hogan is wide open for the big gain. It’s such a bad bust that you can’t see on film who had the responsibility for the tight end with no one near him, although we suspect it’s the weakside linebacker. The first play happened at the start of the third quarter, and the second clip above was with four minutes to go in the same quarter. On this play Bowling Green runs a variation of the first quick hitter. This time it’s the receiver coming in motion from the opposite side, and the QB fakes the handoff to him. Meanwhile the running back who began lined up to the left of the QB is now sneaking to the right. He slips under a defensive end who is slowed down trying to diagnose the play, takes the short pass and is off to the races. The MLB has bitten up on the play-action and then takes a bad angle after he’s too late diagnosing the play. You clearly see here that the Yellow Jackets defenders just really struggled to figure out what the heck play the offense was running and how to stop even these short throws.
As you can see from the above, this simply is not a good defense.
Given Miami’s offensive proficiency this home game should have the Canes find a ton of opportunities to score. The above clips show some of what Miami will see, and there are plenty of things here Dawson can glean to continue to keep Georgia Tech defenders confused when the Canes have the ball.
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