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   - More Solutions to Problem #6

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Continued from:
32 Solutions for the 12 Biggest Problems You'll Face this Season

Problem 6: Tackling issues – the team’s consistency in missing tackles..how do you improve this problem?

We go back to the basics as a team to reinforce the proper fundamentals of tackling. In defensive individual time we also spend a lot of time on various tackling drills.

Keith Wheeler, Offensive Coordinator/QB Coach
Holbrook Roadrunners (AZ)


The solution: my experience is to return to fundamentals after reviewing tape/video and meeting with all defensive coaches regarding tackling. Tackling is DESIRE equipped with technique. Many components are in tackling, so proper teaching with THUD (stay-up) drills will help see the breakdowns in tackling. You need to work it every day and continue to re-inforce to gain confidence as a team? Learning strong pursuit drills and rallying to the ball will also help."

Ron Price, Assistant Coach
Santa Rosa High School (CA)


We have come full circle in the area of tackling. We found ourselves spending all our time teaching form tackling with head up, bulled neck, face on the numbers and all that good stuff. However in the course of a game we were rarely getting into position to make these types of tackles. Now we spend all our time working on angle tackling preventing cutbacks and using the sideline as our friend. We practice getting our head across at waist level, rolling our chest across the legs and grabbing the back of the legs and rolling onto our back. This technique has improved our tackling significantly. Again we are usually the smaller team and have had to adapt many techniques to make our players successful.

Randy Pinkowski, Head Football Coach
C.B. Aycock H.S. (NC)


Poor tackling usually has to be fixed from the ground up. One of the biggest fundamental flaws I find myself constantly correcting is footwork. Many players feel that the longer step they take prior to contact will equate to a bigger hit. Others leave their feet completely and feel that diving through the air will result in a bigger hit. Both of these will lead to missed or inconsistent tackles. To me, the timing of tackling is much like hitting a baseball or boxing. The step prior to contact should be a short one, getting in the ground just prior to contact. If that step gets in the ground too early, the tackler will usually overextend and will wind up with his head down or lunging too far forward. If contact is made prior to the step getting in the ground, there is no power. The timing of the step can be practiced very easily. If you have a sled that has pads that can be extended upward (hinged), you can have the athlete start from 3-4 yards away and hit the first pad, fit and roll hips, and then retreat back. Then attack the next pad and repeat the process. After going through the sled, he will get from 5-7 reps within 25 seconds with you right in front of him. This is a very efficient way to isolate and coach their footwork.

David Edward Prince, Defensive Coordinator
South Florence High School (SC)


We have a tackling circuit that we do everyday during pre-season. We set up four stations and rotate. Everyone on the team is involved including the QB. We do angle tackling, eye opener to the right, eye opener to the left, and shedding a blocker and tackle. The DB's will also do open field tackling drills during their individual periods. During the season we do this twice a week. Tackling is an attitude that you can develop.

Sam Harp, Head Football Coach
Danville High School (KY)


Tackling issues are issues that develop early on and thus you as the coach must go back to the basics and teach tackling from the beginning. Unfortunately, many tackling problems can be attributed to high school age kids watching poor tackling techniques from higher levels and the emphasis our culture puts on the “de-cleater"! Tackling is instinct and an art that can be learned through repetition after repetition after repetition. We practice tackling every week and the kids go through a tackling circuit where we break our kids up into four groups into four stations of tackling: Eye-opener Drill--where the defender meets the ball carrier in four holes and wraps up on contact and runs through the tackle; Popsicle Drill--where the defender tackles a one-man sled and drives his feet. The coaches stress hip movement on contact and exploding upward through the sled and grabbing cloth/wrapping up; Sideline Angle Tackling Drill--where the defender takes an angle on a ballcarrier and drives through the tackle emphasizing getting their head in front and driving the ball carrirer and using the sideline as an extra defender; Form Tackling Drill- -where the coaches run the defender through the step-by-step process of making a proper tackle emphazing pad level, proper head/shoulder placement and use of arms/hands"

Jared Van Acker, Head Varsity Football Coach
Galax High School (VA)


I love studying the misses and look for a common thread. Are they open field, hanging on, slow feet, dropped head? Sometimes you can coach them into confidence.

Bob DeLong, Offensive coordinator
Xenia High School (OH)


Fundamentals are the building blocks of everything you do. It is a big mistake to allow “that's pretty good" to be the optimum. You have to have a standard that everyone meets. The coach has to be consistent just as much as the players. In my experience teaching a skill by backward chaining works best. That way the final step in the process is always the same. For example, assume you teach tackling to your players in these parts: step on the ball carrier's toes, dip, chest hit, wrap and drive. Backward chaining begins with the ball carrier wrapped up and the tackler ready to drive him down. Rep this a lot then go to wrapping the arms and driving the ball carrier down. "

Larry Payne, Assistant Coach (retired)
North Bend H.S. (OR)


Practice, practice, practice! We will rep more tackling drills in practice and really do our best to get the 11 most aggressive kids on the field.

Zak Bessac, Head Coach/OC
Warner Park, Madison (WI)


Missed tackles are a result of poor fundamentals and lack of effort. We address our tackling in a number of ways. They are: (1) have an entire Form Team Tackling Drill as a part of our daily stretch; (2) each position group tackles from various angles as a part of their daily position work; (3) extensive team pursuit drills daily where every player must get to the ball in pursuit within a specified time frame; (4) intense work on fundamentals, including the proper tackling position and form; (5) position group speed and quickness drills; (6) and teaching running to and through the ball carrier. Team tackling is generally a matter of effort. We do not tolerate a lack of effort in any aspect of our game. Players are motivated to always do their very best, and do take pride in great effort. Our motto is “eleven men to the ball."

Ron Stolski, Head Football Coach
Brainerd High School (MN)


Tackle, tackle, tackle. We do use the crash pads for tackling rotations and form tackle first through and onto the pad withaccelerating the tempo. But, in all honesty, we add more tackling to the ground to our drills and more simple eye-opener type of periods in practice. Strength, agility, etc. often are key, but we also want the confidence and attitude improvement that occurs by having success in tackling. We break it down to the fundamentals - we spend more teaching time, but most of all we have more live drills without open field collisions, but in controlled spaces to improve tackling and finish. Finally, we must get more men to the ball so our pursuit and team tackling progression has to improve. We are adopting a secnd whistle drill for every team period this season - picked it up from CMSU (now the University of Central Missouri), and have used it at times, but we are committed this year to making it a staple of our team periods.

Steve Hopkins, Head Football Coach
Basehor-Linwood H.S. (KS)


Tackling should be a basic part of everyday practice. It’s a basic fundamental, so how do you not practice it every chance you get. It’s a foundation of basic football that has to be drilled over and over everyday at practice.

Gerald Aubrey
Asst. Coach


There is only one way to improve tackling and that is to tackle. We have faced this problem in the past and the only way to turn things around was to increase the number of tackling drills that the team does. We would run a tackling drill in the beginning of practice, one in the middle, and one at the end of practice. We made sure to vary the drills and find ways to challenge the kids including letting them choose who they would tackle in the drill. This is also a great way to find out about the kids on your team.

Josh Stern, Asst Coach, DC
Cass City High School MI)


Tackling is a body control and desire skill. We work on body control, and insist that desire comes from within.

J. Gawen Stoker, former HFC
Indian Valley HS (PA)


Practice- Practice- Practice!! Get back to the basics and work on the actual steps to making a proper tackle and practice it until they are sick of it. Beforehand, however, you want to analyze exactly why the tackling is so poor. Are they not wrapping up, are they dropping their heads, are they stopping their feet? Determine what the problem is and address it directly- then....Practice- Practice- Practice!!!

R. Scott Thompson, Head Football Coach
Montgomery Lonsdale JHS (AL)


I don’t have a good answer other than go back to fundamentals. I will look forward to the answers to this question. Some groups are natural hitters, others not so much.

Allan Amrein, Head Coach
Kennedy Middle School, Hays (KS)


Being a foundation of successful defensive football, we teach and rep tackling in our individual periods daily. We also incorporate a tackling circuit for our defensive players. Like any other skill in football, tackling can be taught, critiqued, and improved. I believe it is important to have a method of teaching tackling that is uniformed throughout all defensive positions. It is also imperative that defensive coaches use the same terminology in teaching and correcting tackling. Building this into your fundamentals will ensure that players understand how to tackle well, and can self-correct when they make a mistake. Another factor is to constantly preach gang tackling. Getting “hats to the ball" is a mantra we preach in playing successful defensive football. Accomplishing this gang tackling philosophy can help to diminish the failures of a single missed tackle by outnumbering a ball carrier."

T. Brandon Carpenter, Special Teams Coordinator / Linebacker Coach
Klein Forest High School – Houston (TX)


Practice, practice, practice-- one way we have found to get good reps is to video tape the players who are having problem with tackling. View tape with the kids---not the whole team--but maybe 3 or 4 kids who need extra teaching. Identify what needs to be corrected and then “bird dog" the tackling. Bird dog means to do the tackling by the numbers in slow motion. It has been effective for us.

Jerry Parrish, Retired Head Coach
North Kitsap High School (WA)


More tackling circuit work. Not all live, either. You don't want to kill them or cause injuries. Start at the basics. Slow motion - step by step. Work them daily on form tackling. Work them on each other, on the sled, on dummies. Kids can tackle but they need to work on it if they are not great athletes. We tackle every defensive practice. At least two drills, more if we are having problems. Also, work on pursuit and team tackling. Some kids will never be great tacklers but they can hang on until the posse gets there.

Thomas Taylor, Teacher/Football Coach
Weir High School (WV)


My best man is on it! The defensive coordinator is responsible for this and everyone knows it. It makes him take great pride in this and he promotes tackling year round.

Fred Wieck, Head FB
Clear Lake High School (IA)


Tackle every day in some form. Football looks very complicated but it all boils down to blocking and tackling. Use a period of practice everyday to hone these skills.

Bob Reeves, Offensive Line Coach
New Hope High School (MS)


We have a tackling circuit that we use, but isn't tackling really desire?? My experience has been that most missed tackles have as much to do with the legs as they do the arms, so I have them go full-speed to the point of collision. Then bring the legs and finish the play. We used to do drills in “thud" mode where we just wrapped up to the whistle. We developed tackling problems so now when we do team "D" we tackle everyone. Nothing below the waist though--we teach chest to chest. We do our best to replicate game speed (even though it's impossible).

Barton W. Miller, Offensive Coordinator
Trinity High School, Camp Hill (PA)


A tackling circuit before the defensive practice begins is a must. Also, if you are having kids ‘stay up’ during hull and team time then set aside some preiods for full take down periods. Personnel the scout team and make sure the defense ends every play."

Ron Moore, Defensive Coordinator
Azle High School (CA)


We tackle twice a day. Our whole team tackles shortly after our warm-up. We put everybody through a 5 or 6 station tackling station where technique is enforced. Then, all defensive position coaches are instructed to tackle during their individual periods. Hint: free safeties should tackle with the linebackers.

Anthony, Defensive Coordinator
Lawrence High School


We run a tackling circuit every week in practice which has six different stations, and everyone participates! All of it is under control and technique is stressed.

Louis Farrar, Head Coach
Charter Oak High School (CA)


Technique and fundamentals need to be practiced until the players are blue in the face. Not because this is going to make your players great tacklers, but because it will instill a sense of confidence in making tackles. In games there rarely is a situation where a player makes a great form tackle. In games, tackling has to do with confidence, aggression, and a want to get the job done. I believe that technique and fundamentals in practice helps with the players' mentality.

Andrew Cotter, Head Football Coach
Moreau Catholic High School (CA)


We had this issue a few years back. Before we would do tackling drills by position (DL with DL, etc). Now we have implemented a tackling circuit that involves the entire defense. This let’s us concentrate as a unit on a particular goal of not missing tackles together. We try and not match-up positions if possible on the circuit. This allows, for instance, the DL to open field tackle on a LB or a DB, which is a better simulation of game speed. Not very often is a RB or WR the size and speed of a DL.

Scott Farison, Defensive Coordinator
Robert Morris University


Every Tuesday we conduct a tackling circuit that we borrowed from the University of Maryland right after we warm-up. The circuit usually has five or six stations. 1) Tackling the tackling stick to the ground; 2) tackling a two-man Crowther sled form tackling; 3) angle tackling; 4) sideline tackling ; 5) downhill ( stepping over) tacklin; and 6) open-field tackling and strip drills. We believe this has helped us become a better tackling team. We have had to "ratchet" up the intensity of this drill from time to time but it has worked well for our team."

Joe Bosley III, Assistant Football Coach
Hereford High School (TX)


We do a tackling circuit from day one in pre-season camp. In all our defensive fundamentals periods we have our position coaches work a least one or two drills which involve some type of tackling skill. Over the years I have found it's harder teaching skills to the younger players especially if they developed bad habits at the youth leagues. So I guess we empahsize tackling at all grade levels but stress it more with our younger athletes.

Ed Sadloch, Head Football Coach
Cedar Grove High School (NJ)


We believe that you never have to return to the basics if you never abandon them. We try to identify the reason for the missed tackles and then we focus on that specific fundamental flaw in our tackling technique. The best drills are often one’s we invent to correct a specific problem. Controlled speed to half or three quarter speed to full speed works for us, too. "

Thomas A. McDaniels, Head Football Coach
Massillon Jackson H.S. (OH)


This has always been the first fundamental we teach to our football team and we start every practice with our tackling circuit. We will spend 15 minutes each day working on just tackling.

Danny Gouin, Head Football Coach
King


As far as I'm concerned you cannot practice tackling enough. There are plenty of ways to do this without incurring injury. We use a vareity of close-quarters tackling drills, as well as form tackling drills. Making it a point of emphasis in practice on a daily basis is the best way to deal with a team that isn't tackling well. Also, we would show the team (video) examples of great tackling - return to fundamentals, etc.

John R. Mackay, Director of Athletics/Head FC
St. George's School (RI)







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