ADDING FLEXIBILITY TO YOUR DEFENSIVE GAME PLAN

As high school defensive coordinators, we are challenged on a weekly basis to stop a variety of offensive schemes. Over the course of last season, these offensive schemes included split-back veer, wing-t, fly, zone, pro-style, full-house double TE, and of course the spread offense. Our defensive staff has always prided itself in being able to prepare our players on a weekly basis to stop our opponent’s particular scheme, their most dominant player, and their bread-and-butter plays.

Our base defense has always been a 3-4 with a cover 3 behind it. We feel that the 3-4 with a cover 3 gives us our best package to stop the variety of run and pass schemes we see in our section year-in and year-out. We try to be as multiple a 3-4 defense as we can by employing many shaded fronts, slants, line stunts, zone blitzes, and all combinations of cover 3 to get the eighth player in the box to support the run from our secondary players as well as to cover the pass.

Process:
In preparing for our upcoming opponent, our defensive staff breaks down a minimum of three game films focusing on formation, down and distance, field position, hash-marks or middle, ball carrier, blocking schemes, intended receiver, routes, result of play, and game situation.

Utilizing this information, we are able to develop very accurate tendencies of our offensive opponents and craft weekly game plans that have proven to be very sound. By game day, our players not only have mastered our game plan, but know their offensive opponent’s personnel and scheme very well.

As with any process, our weekly crafting of a defensive game plan has evolved over the years. For many years now, we’ve based our game plan on our opponent’s formational tendencies. I believe that most high school offensive schemes revolve around the formations they use and the tendencies they display for each of those formations. Obviously, personnel, down and distance, and game situations play a role as well, but we have found that our opponent’s offensive formational tendencies give us our biggest defensive advantage.

As most defensive staffs do, we match up what we think is the best coverage scheme for each formation to give us our weekly adjustments, or checks, as we refer to them. In addition to coverages, we do the same for our fronts, stunts, blitzes, run support, and automatic formational checks. As defensive coaches, though, we know that the defensive schemes we use are not sound in every scenario and can be disastrous when used at the wrong time or against certain formations or plays. Think of the call that you send in, and as the offense lines up, you think to yourself, “Please don’t run that play.” Sure enough, the offense rips off a big play. Oftentimes, the answer is to become conservative in your defensive play calling, or even to scrap that particular call altogether.

Another situation arises when the offense finds that one formation that gives your defense fits and you end up being dictated to by the offense. What a helpless feeling. Over the years, there have been two offensive formations that present the greatest challenges to our defensive scheme and personnel: double tight-end formations and one-back trips formations. We found that many of our opponents were utilizing two-TE formations to balance our defense up, and to “pick” on our undersized OLB, who normally plays in space. Secondly, because we tend to be very prepared and are adept at taking away a team’s favorite formation and run plays, we found several teams were forced into pass situations and were using some sort of trips formation over and over. This resulted in us being either in the same coverage and being predictable, or in trying to zone blitz and being outmanned at times.

How It’s Done:
Through these situations, we have learned to make each defensive call in a way that gives our defense the flexibility to best match up our defensive scheme with what the offense gives us each play. We have utilized a systematic approach to our defensive play calling that allows us up to five defensive options for each call. For each defensive call made throughout the game, I am able to call a front, stunt or blitz, type of run support, base coverage check, and two “wild-card” formational checks. A “wild-card” formation is one or two formations each week that present unique challenges to our defense or are the favorite formations of our opponent, and we need to present several looks for that particular formation that week.

Front/Stunt/Blitz Column:
This part of our defensive call refers to the front, stunt, or blitz that we want to execute on that play. As the defensive coordinator, I control this part of the call; it is not dictated by formation. This is very important, as down, distance, personnel and game situation will change during the course of the game. Combining this part of the call with our built-in fronts in our automatic formational checks and “wild-card” formations ensures that we will be in the best front, stunt, or blitz each play. Our fronts, stunts and blitzes are analyzed for each opponent and their particular scheme. We utilize a core set of fronts, stunts, and blitzes and add additional looks as needed for each opponent.

Formational Check Column:
Each week, we present the offensive tendencies to our players and the corresponding defensive scheme adjustments or checks we will make for each significant formation the offense utilizes. Matched with our fronts, stunts, and blitzes, we are able to have enough defensive options to match up with the offensive tendencies presented by each opponent. We use the word check in our call, so our players know this refers to our formational checks.

Wild-Card Formations Column:
These columns are used for specific offensive formations presented by our opponent that present our defense the greatest challenges each week. They can be formations that create bad match-ups for our defense, formations where we want a specific set of blitzes to be utilized, or formations that are important to be in certain schemes tailored for that week’s opponent. We have found that one of the “wild-card” formations we use quite often is the two TE formations.
We play several opponents that have two-TE formation packages and it has proven very beneficial for us to tailor several checks designed for their particular schemes. Another “wild-card” formation we use often is various trips formations. By doing this, we can identify coverages and blitzes that work well for the trips package. Because we are generally a cover 3 defense, this method allows us to potentially incorporate cover 2 or some form of man coverage scheme against these trips packages. We use up to five pre-determined calls for each “wild-card” formation for each opponent. If there is only one “wild-card” formation, this will be identified by a number (usually 1 – 5) or if there are two “wild-card” formations, they will be identified by a number and a buzz word (usually colors).

Automatic Checks:
For each game plan that we create, there are formations that have automatic checks built in. Regardless of our defensive call, if an identified automatic check formation is presented, we check into that week’s auto check. Unbalanced formations generally fall into this category. If our opponent lines up in an auto check formation, we will line up in the pre-determined front, coverage, and/or blitz.

After identifying our opponent’s offensive formations and tendencies for each, we will identify our formational breakdowns for that week’s game plan. We will generate our scouting report to for that week’s opponent.

Additionally, we will identify our fronts, line stunts, zone blitzes, and goal-line package for this opponent and include in our scouting report to be distributed to our players.

Sample Defensive Calls:
Play 1 – Defensive Call: 34 Check Gold 1
Offense lines up in a Pro Formation: 3 34 Black
Pro is a “Base” Formation, we stay in a 34 front and Pro Formation is a Black Coverage Check
Play 2 – Defensive Call: 34 Dog Check Purple 3
Offense lines up in a Flop Unbalanced Formation: 3 43 Red Willy Go
Flop Unbalanced is an “Auto Check” Formation, we get out of the Dog Blitz and Check into our pre-determined defense

Play 3 – Defensive Call: Eagle Check Blue 5
Offense lines up in a Double TE (2 Backs) Formation: 3 61 Slide Blue
Double TE (2 Backs) is a “Wild-Card” Formation and we called 5 in the huddle, we get out of the Eagle front and line up in our 5th Double TE specific front and coverage

Play 4 – Defensive Call: Over Check Bronze 2
Offense lines up in a Trips Open Formation (No TE): 3 Eagle Bronze Loop
Trips Open is a “Wild-Card” Formation and we called Bronze in the huddle, we get out of the over front and line up in our “Bronze” Trips Open specific front and coverage.

Using this method of game planning and defensive play calling has allowed our defense to line up each play in a defense tailored to stop what the offense is presenting to us that play. In making our game plans work, we hand out weekly scouting reports to our players, require our players to meet at lunch on a daily basis to watch film, and we try to maximize our practice time so our defensive players can have as much success as possible. There is no magic to game planning for an upcoming opponent. This is a systematic approach that we use to prepare our players to be successful.