The Situation

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It’s near halftime with your opponent at the 50 yard line in a Spread Shotgun set with trips on the right side and a single WR on the left. There’s time for one more play before halftime and it looks like a ‘Hail Mary’ is coming. You’ve been in a 4-4 defense but must adjust to a potential trick play or long pass.

How would you defend this offense?

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Travis Cossey, Defensive Coordinator and Tim Schipper, Head Coach, Fennville HS, MI. AFM subscriber since 2005.

Tim Schipper is the son of legendary coach Ron Schipper, a member of the College Football Hall of Fame. Ron Schipper was the head coach at Central College in Pella, IA from 1961-1996 and amassed an overall 287-67-3 record with 36 consecutive winning seasons. He helped develop the ‘Last-Play Defense’ when he joined his son’s staff in 1997.

Every Thursday in our pre-game practice we take time to substitute, line-up and play a “LAST-PLAY DEFENSE.” We call this when we know the offense will NOT get another play off. Our kids know what to do and when to call it. We go to our 5-man front to force the quarterback to throw it before he wants to and before receivers get deep. It’s called our ‘Basic 5 Go Sally’ for a last play situation. The assignments include:

DE: He contains outside rush.
DT: He aligns head-up on the OT with his inside rush through B-gap.
NG: He picks gap then rushes inside.
LB: He’s eight yards deep, covers the short zones and delays receivers when possible. He also looks for crossing routes and laterals over the middle.
C: He lines up at 20 yards and backpedals on the snap, covering the outside third receiver.
FS: He shades to the trips side and plays middle third.
F2: We sub in an extra Free Safety that lines up at 40 yards, reads the QB and goes to the ball.

Basic 5 Go Sally-Last Play

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Steve DeMarino, Assistant Coach, Arcata High School, CA. AFM subscriber since 2007.

Depending on personnel, we may rotate in pass coverage, guys into the Sam and Jack (OLB) positions, but we often have ‘tweeners’ at those spots to begin with... so we often won't need to change up our manpower. Our attitude in this situation is going to be to make it difficult for the QB to have time to throw deep. We don’t intend TO LET him sit back and try to find his receivers. Coverage is a 1/4, 1/4, 1/2 roll towards the trips side with corners taking an outside eye technique to try and take away the easy fade. Our line takes an aggressive up field attack with tackles slanting to the trips side (strong call). Sam (Strong OLB) will drop to the flats, who we specifically coach to watch for bubble screen and a halfback screen. Mike is in a hard ‘go’ blitz with no responsibility other than the quarterback. Will is in a ‘spy’ zone; that is, reading the QB’s eyes and drifting, specifically responsible for a draw or middle screen. He is also responsible for the QB in the event of an option. The Jack (OLB) for us is the key... he runs a ‘read’ blitz, keying off the halfback. If he squats, or rolls out for a swing pattern, Jack blitzes off the inside shoulder of the tackle. If the halfback steps towards him, Jack breaks down and reads the flow with a quick check that the single receiver isn’t dragging. (In other words, our Jack linebacker has to be our smartest guy). We know that this method can leave us vulnerable down field, but we would rather attack the QB and see how good he is, rather than try and cover all contingencies, especially with another half to play.

Defending the Hail Mary

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Coming in August: You're on defense and have been using a 4-3, cover 2 defense for most of the game. Your opponent is in a Power I formation with one receiver on each side. The ball is on your 30 yard line on the near hash mark and you're facing a fourth and two situation late in the third quarter. As the ball is snapped the quarterback is in play action, the tight end on the right side flares out and both wide outs look to be in a crossing pattern. How do you cover this fourth down play and stop your opponent's offense from making a first down? Go to www.AmericanFootballMonthly.com/thesituation or send your response and play diagram to AFM's Managing Editor Rex Lardner at rlardner@lcclark.com. Deadline is June 20th.

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