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Counter AttackNorthwestern College’s Counter Gameby: Bryan Johnson Offensive Coordinator, Northwestern College (St. Paul, MN) © More from this issue The past two seasons we have experienced tremendous success as a team and as an offense at Northwestern College. In 2001, we were one of only seven undefeated football teams in the country. Statistically, our best running play for each of the past five seasons has been the counter play. In 2000 and 2001 we averaged 6.9 and 7.1 yards a carry respectively using the counter. When we included all of the plays that came off our counter action, we accounted for 600 yards (14%) of our total offensive production for the year. There are many reasons why we run the counter. Our offensive linemen love to pull, and when it is well executed, it is fun for everyone to observe. From a strategic standpoint, there are three reasons why we run the counter: • It gives us a quality “power” football play. • It incorporates an element of misdirection. • It allows us to play action pass without adding a new protection scheme. Additionally, we have found the counter to be a play that we can run from all of our formations in any situation. We have run the play on the goal line and in long yardage situations. We constantly find ourselves creating new ways to run the play as well as plays that evolve out of the counter action. The basic play concept requires the play-side offensive linemen to get movement at the point of attack and eliminate penetration. To accomplish this, we double team the first down lineman past the center to the play-side. Our double team allows one of the linemen involved in the block to come off on the backside linebacker. The covered offensive lineman’s aiming point is the inside number of the defensive lineman over him. The uncovered lineman’s aiming point is the ear-hole of the defensive player that we are double-teaming. Which lineman comes off depends on what technique the defensive lineman is playing (Diagram 1A & 1B). We tell our lineman to get movement first and to work off late to the linebacker. "Return Stunt" The player with the most difficult assignment is the tight. His blocking responsibilities depend on the defensive front we are up against. We categorize our fronts as 4-4, 3-4, or 4-3, and our offensive linemen will identify the front when they come to the line of scrimmage. Our system allows us to deal with multiple fronts as well, as we will make a call for the play-side and backside offensive linemen. Diagram 2A-2C shows the basic counter scheme against these three defensive fronts and illustrates the tight end’s specific blocking assignment for each situation. Our backside linemen execute pull techniques on the counter play. Our pulling guard is asked to kick out the end man on the line of scrimmage. Our pulling tackle gets depth on his pull so that he can achieve a lead block approach on the play-side linebacker or the first player he confronts. It is necessary for both of the linemen pulling to know what the play-side front is so that they know how far they will be pulling. We like to play our most physical players at guard and taller more athletic players at tackle. These types of players not only lend themselves to the counter play, but also to our pass protection schemes. Formation Formation: Motion Over the past two seasons, we have been incorporating more of the shotgun into our offensive package. This has allowed us to add a few new wrinkles to our counter package. When defenses spread out to defend multiple receivers, they open up inside running lanes. This particular version of the counter play is especially successful versus teams that line their rush ends out wide. Though our linemen lose some power in a two-point stance, we make up for that with quicker pull techniques. This past season we had good success running the play to both our tailback (Diagram 4A) and our quarterback (Diagram 4B). Gun Formation Gun Formation Since we have had success with this play for such a long period of time, defenses have begun to make the proper adjustments to stop it. One way defenses have made the play more difficult to run is by pinching their defensive ends underneath our pulling guards. This wrong arm technique causes the play to bounce or “spill” to the outside and gives the defensive players time to run down the ball carrier. When defenses make this adjustment, we will change the play to a sweep play with just a few adjustments. It is important to note that we will make this adjustment on the sideline and make sure that everyone is now committed to run this play as a perimeter play. "Slide" Formation To run the counter sweep, we ask our pulling guard to log the defensive end to the inside. Since he is pinching, this is not a difficult block, and it takes place right away. Our tight end takes his best release to block the play-side linebacker, and our wide receiver cracks the safety to his side. We ask our pulling tackle to kick out the cornerback or whoever crosses his path. On this particular play, the tackle’s pull technique changes to a kick out block. The key is to get out to the perimeter as quickly as possible. The running back will make the play look like counter but will bounce the play and make his cut off the pulling tackle’s block. This has been a very effective adjustment for us versus this type of defensive adjustment (Diagram 5). I Formation RT I Formation If we are playing a team that likes to bring a lot of outside pressure, we like to run our counter pass “hot” scheme. Each week when we scout our opponent, we look for any tendencies that our opponent may show us on film regarding down and distance or field position. We have the ability to call this play or to check to it when we see a crash stunt coming. The key differences between the base counter pass and the “hot” scheme are we get the fullback out on a flat route and we instruct our quarterback to prepare to get rid of the ball immediately after his play fake. The fullback is taught to release through the line of scrimmage as quickly as possible and run an arrow route to an aiming point of six yards of depth as if he was planning to run out of bounds. He is taught to look for the ball right away if he sees the blitz coming. The quarterback must give a ball fake and prepare to get rid of the ball as soon as he turns around (Diagram 8). FT I Formation Another play that we really like off our counter action is the screen back to the tailback. We call this play by adding the word “screen” to our play call. On the counter pass “screen,” the tailback, after taking the play fake, gets lost in the line of scrimmage and releases to a point approximately three yards behind the line and three yards outside the tight end’s original alignment. The pulling guard and tackle will sell the counter play and then release as our primary screen blockers. We assign the force player to the guard and have the tackle look to the inside for linebackers that may be covering the tailback. The linemen should wait two counts, then release up the field. After selling the fake, the quarterback should sell the bootleg and get two to three yards of additional depth to insure that he can get the ball off (Diagram 9). Northwestern College 9-0: Overall record for the 2001 season. |
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