Vs Mizzou: Rushing Three Did Not Kill Nebraska

by corn blight on Oct 9, 2007 5:28 PM CDT in Football Comment 7 comments

Rushing three guys against Missouri didn't work, did it? It reminded me of the defenses I've seen here in Minnesota for the past 20 years - drop back and hope you can slow down the other offense instead of constantly giving up the big play.

On nearly every one of Missouri’s offensive snaps Saturday, Nebraska was content rushing quarterback Chase Daniel with a three-man front. The Huskers consistently dropped eight defenders into coverage, daring Daniel to thread passes between their zones.

Neither end of the strategy worked. Daniel wasn’t sacked on 47 pass attempts and recalled just one time he was hit. He completed 33 of those attempts for 401 yards, two touchdowns and zero interceptions.

Two days later, Huskers defensive coordinator Kevin Cosgrove’s strategy still puzzled the Tigers.

"I was a little bit surprised that they went just about the entire game getting pressure on us with a three-man rush," Missouri offensive coordinator Dave Christensen said. "Obviously, it didn’t work very well. I don’t foresee Oklahoma doing that or at least making a living doing that."

Daniel was less subtle in his reaction to Nebraska’s game plan.

"They’re very stubborn," Daniel said. "Cosgrove’s a very stubborn guy. It’s always been that way. ... That’s just how he is, that’s how they are. They’re a bunch of confident guys in what they do, and they felt they had the best chance doing that, so they stuck with it."

"You can’t just play one defense the whole entire game," Daniel added. "That’s like high school stuff that I faced in high school, so it’s nothing new for me."

We already knew our defense sucked going into the Missouri game. The idea behind the defensive game plan wasn't that we were going to stop Missouri's offense, but hoped to slow them down somewhat and it did work on some occasions where we stopped them and forced a punt. It isn't like the Husker defense was magically going to a pull a massive pass rush out of their butts when none has existed yet in the season.

What we didn't know was that our offense was going to lay down and die, failing to get into the end zone. If your offense can't run the ball against a defense that was previously ranked 93rd against the run, you're pretty much screwed regardless of what your defense is going to do.

The idea was that these two teams would trade scoring, with the Husker defense getting more stops than the Missouri defense.

Given that information, is it really that shocking that we used a 3-3-5 for the entire game?

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Punts

"and it did work on some occasions where we stopped them and forced a punt"

They punted a total of 2 times, both in the 4th quarter. I'd have to say it was a complete failure.

by rockandroll on Oct 9, 2007 7:20 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

2nd quarter

they punted at 14:50, we got the ball on the 19.

i thought they punted twice in the first half. my bad.

Go Big Red!

by corn blight on Oct 9, 2007 9:37 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

What Daniel said

is symptomatic of one of the very big problems facing the Huskers.

"They’re very stubborn," Daniel said. "Cosgrove’s a very stubborn guy. It’s always been that way. ... That’s just how he is, that’s how they are. They’re a bunch of confident guys in what they do, and they felt they had the best chance doing that, so they stuck with it."
"You can’t just play one defense the whole entire game," Daniel added. "That’s like high school stuff that I faced in high school, so it’s nothing new for me."

Stubbornness has been part of the problem since Wake Forest. The Huskers have not been able to make adjustments at halftime, let alone on the fly when it becomes clear that their carefully-laid out plans aren't worth a hoot. The old saw about the definition of insanity being doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results comes to mind.

In principle, this is changeable. One can become less stubborn simply by attempting to recognize when their tactics aren't working and by attempting to try something new. But that's difficult to do in practice, especially for people who love to stick to their plans. The result is what we've been getting with the three-man front offense.

GBR!

by Nous on Oct 9, 2007 7:44 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

Stubbornness has always been with this staff

Remember 2004 when Callahan boasted "we take what we want"??? Except for Missouri 2005, when the Pinkel Factor took over, Coz has been unable to defend spread offenses. He keeps trying 3 man rushes and gets burned almost every time. Against Tech in 2005, he did mix in some blitzes and held Tech in check for about half the game. But that's Coz's best against the spread.

by Husker Mike on Oct 10, 2007 9:25 AM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

very true...

but I found myself watching Mizzou's offense wondering "How do you defend that?" When both your tight ends are 6-6 and have hands made of rubber cement, you can pretty much chuck the ball anywhere you want.

Maybe someone with more X's-and-O's knowledge can tell me how this scheme differed from what we did last year (which, Pinkel factor or no Pinkel factor, seemed to be pretty effective). Did we do the same thing but have more success due to a better d-line? Were our LBs better in pass coverage last year? Is Chase Daniel that much better now?

I'll be interested to see how Venables schemes for them this week. He's always been able to keep TTech in check, but they've never had a mobile QB like Daniel. Should be interesting.

Can you hear this, Denver, or shall I turn it up for you?

by Ignignokt on Oct 10, 2007 2:37 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

We did

a 3-3-5 last year too, which should tell you how much we miss Carriker and Moore.

The pass rush from the outside was nearly non-existent, and I can recall at least one play (on which I went nuts at home) our right DE went straight inside after a fake instead of playing contain to the outside. Mizzou went out and gained a crapload of yardage (I haven't had time yet to pull up video of that, and it's about time to focus on Oklahoma State).

I still maintain that the problem against Mizzou wasn't that our defense got destroyed but that our offense failed to score.

You had a lot of things snowball and the game got away from us early.

Go Big Red!

by corn blight on Oct 10, 2007 10:24 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs

I dont know...

where you got the article from Jon, but the one in the Omaha World Herald had a quote from Potter in which he stated that the Huskers had practiced the 3 man front all week and that it would have been too hard to change in the middle of a game. Even though the base defense we run is a 4/3 it would have been to hard to change during the game. HUH??!!! Wow what are we doing down there if we cant make a simple adjustment to our base defense? Either the coaches arent doing their job and making sure the kids know the base defense inside and out or we have some really stupid kids playing there right now. That is just ridiculous. Hell our local Jr. High team can switch defenses during a game, I have seen them do it.

by taflorom on Oct 11, 2007 9:14 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs