Defensively Speaking: Michigan State

Someone who only looked at the box score might think Ohio State had an incredible defensive performance in their Big Ten opener against Michigan State. However, those of us who watched the entire game know that the defense was quite shaky at times. Let’s take a look at what Ohio State did schematically on Saturday.

Jim Knowles was quite multiple in coverage. You saw a fair amount of Cover 1 Lurk on Saturday where every defender is in man coverage except for a linebacker in the low hole and a deep safety (below):

Additionally, Knowles called for a good amount of Tampa 2, as usual. See an example below:

Note how both corners are playing the flats, there are two deep safeties, and the Mike linebacker is the “pole runner” who falls back to the high hole. I also think something worth mentioning about this particular rep is that Michigan State goes with a max protection scheme (meaning they keep 7+ players in for pass protection). Upon seeing this and recognizing that there are only two downfield threats, Sonny Styles abandons his zone to become an extra rusher.

Additionally, I think there was a little more creativity with the pressure calls on Saturday. As he did against Western Michigan, Knowles once again called a 5-man pressure with a 2-steal coverage variation behind the pressure that resulted in a sack:

On this blitz, Ohio State plays Cover 2 to the field with Denzel Burke in the flat, Caleb Downs in the deep half, and Lathan Ransom rotating over to the seam. To the boundary, Davison Igbinosun is locked in man coverage on the tight end, while JT Tuimoloau is “hug rushing” the running back (meaning he is allowed to insert as an extra rusher if the running back either stays in to block or releases to the opposite side as he does here).

Additionally, Knowles called for fire zones (5-man zone blitzes with 3-deep / 3-underneath coverage) a few times. Below, for example, Knowles called for one of his staples – blitzing the boundary safety (Ransom) through the B-gap. However, instead of pairing this blitz with Cover 1 as he often does, Knowles instead paired it with fire zone coverage:

Obviously, the blitz did not get home on this play and Michigan State had a solid gain. However, it is still important to acknowledge that Knowles is trying to diversify the scheme and pressure the quarterback in more creative ways than just a standard 4-man rush.

Unfortunately, there were some noticeable problems defending the run on Saturday. The most glaring example of this came on the first defensive snap of the game. Michigan State ran Duo, and Ohio State ran a double cornerback blitz out of 4-3 personnel. However, Styles as the Sam linebacker got himself caught too far inside and was not in the gap he was responsible for:

I do also want to point out a positive about the run defense from Saturday. On a couple of occasions, Jim Knowles called for “pinch’ stunts on the defensive line, which means every defensive lineman is shooting to the inside gap thus closing both A-gaps and B-gaps. Against zone run schemes, this forces the ballcarrier to bounce outside to unblocked defenders. See an example below:

Given how good Ransom and Downs are at coming downhill and making plays in the run game, I like seeing defensive concepts that spill the ball outside and allow them to make plays.

All in all, it wasn’t a bad defensive performance. I still feel a little uneasy about Ohio State going 4-3 and I think there are a lot of things that better teams can exploit. However, there are also some reasons to feel positive about the defense at this point. All we can do as fans is sit back and see how things unfold.