A tale of two halves.
The first was an epic fail.
Second? Poetry.

I’m so mad at June Jones right now.

This week was shaping up so nicely for me. I finished the writeup for the Rice game on Monday night instead of Tuesday, so I was already ahead of the curve. By Tuesday night I was just about done with the SMU preview, too. Everything was all laid out. I wrote all about how this year’s SMU game would be nothing like last year’s 34-7 Navy win. There was no way that there would be anything to take from that game, right? I mean, the game was played in a monsoon, with winds gusting to 36 mph. The wind kept Jones from being able to unleash his full playbook on the Mids. Bo Levi Mitchell finished with only 157 yards passing, 56 of those yards coming on one play. That wasn’t even a long pass either; it was more of a catch-and-run. Forcing the defense to cover the entire field is what makes the run and shoot work, and the wind made that impossible. With the weekend forecast for Dallas calling for clear skies and light winds, the SMU offense figures to look a lot different compared to a year ago.

Two days ago, I thought their defense would, too. Navy didn’t even attempt a pass against the Mustangs in 2008. They didn’t have to. The Mids ran for 404 yards, 224 of them coming from Ricky Dobbs. The Navy QB tacked on 4 TDs as well, and he didn’t even play the whole game; Jarod Bryant was the starter. Bryant was on his way to a monster game himself, running for 50 yards on only 6 carries before leaving the game for the second time due to injury. Ricky carried the ball 42 times, and SMU didn’t stop him. With that kind of a beating, defensive coordinator Tom Mason would be sure to scrap last year’s Navy game plan and go with something else, right? Besides, SMU switched from a 4-3 to a 3-4 this year, so there isn’t any reason to even bother looking at last year’s game, is there?

Then I hopped onto the internet Wednesday morning and read this:

The Mustangs defense will adjust to a four-man front this week in preparation for Navy’s triple-option, defensive coordinator Tom Mason said.

and this:

SMU will also revert back to some of the schemes it used in last year’s 34-7 loss at Navy, with new wrinkles designed to better limit quarterback Ricky Dobbs. Dobbs ran for 224 yards and four touchdowns against the Mustangs last season.

Part of me thinks that this has to be some kind of trick. There’s no way that SMU will revert to the same defensive plan that led to last year’s thumping, is there? Apparently, that’s exactly what is going to happen, so now I have to scrap everything I already wrote and hit the DVD player. Way to kill my family time, SMU. I’m not sure this revelation is all that helpful to the Navy coaches, either, since it could easily just be an attempt to spread misinformation.

It won’t take us long to find out. The coaches weren’t really sure how SMU was going to line up going into last year’s game, either. In situations like that, it’s common for Coach Jasper to call a designed handoff to the fullback on the game’s first play. He’ll send a slotback in tail motion to make it look like the triple option, but it’s really just his way of seeing the defense’s game plan. That’s how he started the game last year, which you can see on the first play on the clip. SMU used a variation of the same free-safety-takes-the-pitch-man defense we see all the time. In this case, with the corners playing tight in man coverage, it was really a cover 1 look as opposed to a cover 3. After seeing that, Jasper started calling the triple option. The corners were in tight coverage on the wide receivers and not playing run support, so Coach Jasper let his receivers run them out of the play. The playside A-back would load from the linebacker to the safety. What that means is that he’d first look to block the first linebacker out of the count. If the LB was playing the fullback dive, he’d move on to block the safety instead. With the safety blocked, the pitch was wide open.

Now, pay special attention to that last play. The really unusual part about SMU’s defense last year was that they used their outside linebackers to match up man-to-man with the slotbacks (personnel-wise, one of them was a safety, but where he was lined up made him a de facto LB). Eventually, SMU started occasionally firing their corners in run support. When that happened, Coach Jasper changed the blocking scheme. Now, the wide receiver would block the safety, while the playside A-back would arc block the cornerback.

The man coverage on the slotbacks is why Ricky Dobbs had so many carries in last year’s game. When the playside slotback went out to make his block, the man covering him would follow right along. Of course, the LB covering the slotback was also the quarterback’s pitch key, so when he kept running outside to cover his man, he was basically giving Ricky the read to keep the ball. So Ricky did. A lot.

This coverage scheme opened up opportunities for misdirection, too. The linebacker following the tail motion resulted in a numbers advantage on the vacated side of the field. Coach Jasper used the fullback blocking the inside-out linebacker pursuit, which left a lot of space outside for Ricky to run.

Once in a while, SMU would switch from a 4-man front to a 5-man front. Whenever they did, Jarod and Ricky would audible to the midline option:

The question now is what “wrinkles” the SMU staff intends to add “to better limit quarterback Ricky Dobbs,” and how to do it without opening up other plays. I’m not sure that’s possible in this defensive scheme. Don’t be surprised if, unlike last year’s contest, Coach Jasper airs it out a bit if he once again finds himself playing against cover 1 with the safety dedicated to run support. I don’t know if June Jones and defensive coordinator Tom Mason really do intend to use the same basic defense as last year, but we should hope that they do.

It’s hard to imagine that SMU would want to imitate anything from their dreadful 1-11 campaign of 2008, especially considering how well the 2009 season has gone so far. SMU is 3-2 and off to their first 2-0 start in conference play since receiving the Death Penalty in 1987– a span of three different conference memberships (Southwest, WAC, and Conference USA). The three wins are more than they had in their last two seasons combined. It hasn’t always been pretty– the Mustangs lost to a horrible Washington State team and were outgained by Stephen F. Austin in their opener, 460-355– but when you’re coming off of back-to-back one-win seasons, pretty is the farthest thing from your mind.

As the quarterback of one of only a pair of I-A schools that feature the pure run & shoot, it’s no surprise that Bo Levi Mitchell is among the nation’s top passers, averaging nearly 300 yards per game through the air. That’s up from the 238 yards per game he averaged last year, but Mitchell isn’t really throwing that much better…  He’s just throwing that much more. Like last season, he’s completing about 58% of his passes, and with 10 interceptions he’s well on his way to matching the 23 he threw in 2008.  He’s completing passes at about the same rate, but he’s had more opportunities to throw, completing 25 passes per game. That’s up from a little more than 19 per game a year ago, and it’s thanks mostly to the SMU defense. The unit, led by standout linebackers Chase Kennemer and Navy transfer Pete Fleps, is definitely better this year, although I wouldn’t exactly call giving up 391 yards per game good. They do, however, lead the country in interceptions with 13, and have forced 19 turnovers overall. When you average almost 4 turnovers per game, you give your quarterback more chances to throw the ball. Mitchell’s favorite target is wide receiver Emmanuel Sanders. A 5-11, 180-pound senior, Sanders is already SMU’s all-time leader in receiving yards and TD catches, and needs just one more catch to tie the SMU career mark in receptions as well. He had 18 catches for 178 yards against Washington State, and leads all of I-A in punt return average. He is as legitimate a threat as you’ll find anywhere.

Navy is favored for a reason, but this is going to be a different game than last week. Rice was a downtrodden, defeated team. After beating perennial Conference USA contender East Carolina on Saturday, SMU has to feel like they’ve turned a corner. They are going to be confident, and the Mids are going to get their best shot.

The Gansz Trophy

Saturday’s game will be an emotional one, especially for SMU. The teams will be playing for the newly-created Gansz Trophy honoring Frank Gansz, the SMU special teams coach that passed away on April 27. Gansz was sort of the football version of this guy. A 1960 graduate of the Naval Academy, he didn’t letter, but was a member of the first team to play at Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium in 1959. Upon graduation, he received a commission in the Air Force, where he served for seven years. After leaving the Air Force, Gansz spent 38 years roaming the sideline. He coached at all three service academies, was the head coach of the Kansas City Chiefs, and won a Super Bowl ring coaching special teams with the St. Louis Rams. He retired in 2001, but came out of retirement last year to coach with June Jones at SMU.

A traveling trophy series with SMU is a great idea for a lot of reasons. A regular series enhances Navy’s visibility and coverage in Texas, a key recruiting state. It’s also one less date on the schedule that Navy has to fill– a task that is becoming more difficult as the Mids are more successful. The current series ends in 2011 and resumes from 2015-2018, with additional dates in the works. Plus, if SMU improves under June Jones they way many people expect them to, this could become a marquee game on the Navy schedule, and one of the better non-BCS matchups every year.

I doubt we’ll see any people leaving comments on Wagner’s blog this week complaining about Navy’s offense.

The Mids cranked out 537 total yards, including 471 on the ground, to dismantle the Rice Owls on Saturday, 63-14. Fourteen players carried the ball for Ivin Jasper’s offense, led by Ricky Dobbs’ 104 yards and 4 touchdowns. Reserves got most of the carries in the second half, and #2 QB Kriss Proctor made the most of his playing time with 83 yards and 3 TDs of his own. Rice remains winless, while Navy moves to 4-2 and one step closer to a return trip to Houston for the Texas Bowl.

I probably should have seen this coming. Even in 2008, when Rice was a 10-game Texas Bowl winner, their defense still couldn’t handle the triple option. Army ran for 461 yards on the Owls last year, and Army’s offense was terrible. I’m not sure if it was that game or David Bailiff’s earlier experience with Georgia Southern and Cal Poly that tipped him off, but Ken Niumatalolo knew exactly what was coming. In his radio interview with Bob Socci before the game, Coach Niumat mentioned that Rice would be looking to force the ball outside, counting on the free safety to make the stop. Hmmm… Now where have we seen this before? Coach Jasper tested this on Navy’s first play from scrimmage, faking the toss sweep and throwing deep over the middle to Marcus Curry. The safety bit on the fake just enough to allow Curry to get behind him for a 51-yard gain. After the game, Bailiff commented on his defensive plan: “Every adjustment we made, everything we did, nothing worked. We will put the film on.”

Coach, at Rice, you never end a sentence with a preposition! But when he does put the film on, he’ll see that the defense did exactly what it was designed to do. Rice safety Andrew Sendejo had 17 tackles, more than twice as many as the next closest Owl. Rice switched between odd and even fronts, but the one constant was Sendejo following the tail motion and making a beeline for the pitch:

You can see in the clip how the tackle tried to make the block, but couldn’t. Over the course of the game, Coach Jasper went after the safety in a few ways. In the tight formation, he used the playside wide receiver to block the safety. This left the cornerback unblocked, but he was lined up so deep in the cover 3 that he couldn’t make the tackle until the ball carrier was already nine yards downfield. Next, he continued to use the tackle to block the safety, but instead of releasing inside of the quarterback’s read key, he had him release outside in order to give him a clearer path to his assignment. It worked well enough. Finally, he had the slotback take the safety, and Mike Stukel laid a textbook cut that carved a path for Ricky to get to the end zone.

Coach Jasper did other things too. There was the pass to open the game, of course. The counter option had some success as well. He also tinkered with the trips formation. Take a look at this next clip. In the first play, the tackle releases inside and isn’t able to get to the next level of the defense. The playside linebacker and safety are both unblocked; one takes the quarterback, the other takes the pitch, and the play is blown up. The second play is the same, only this time the safety is blocked by the wide receiver. The tackle arc blocks the cornerback, and Bobby Doyle runs for a first down:

Despite the considerable output, it was hardly a flawless performance by the offense. There were missed blocks, mixed assignments, and missed reads, although they still turned into 2-3 yard gains against the Rice defense. On the flip side, there were also some immediate improvements in the wake of the Air Force game. In the next clip, you’ll see Ricky make a tough– and correct– read against a mesh charge. You’ll also see Vince Murray make two great runs. In the first, Murray makes a nifty move to take advantage of his blockers and find some open field. The second play is a designed handoff to the fullback. Instead of trying to plow through an unblocked linebacker, Vince runs around him. Against Air Force, that play is a 2-yard gain. This week, it’s a touchdown.

Perhaps an Air Force linebacker makes that play. Still, you have to appreciate the progress.

The pyroclastic flow of offensive destruction is the most eye-popping item from the Rice game, but don’t let it overshadow another excellent performance by the Navy defense. The Mids are 29th in the country against the run after holding Rice to 21 rushing yards. Of course, 2009 Rice isn’t exactly 2004 Rice when it comes to running the ball, but after performances against Ohio State, Pitt, and Air Force, it’s clear that this ranking is no fluke. Naturally, Navy’s remaining schedule features four of the country’s top 16 passing offenses. Figures. Fortunately, the Mids got a good tune-up for these games on Saturday from a pass-happy Rice team and their sophomore quarterback.

Rice has high hopes for quarterback Nick Fanuzzi. The transfer from Alabama appeared to be turning a corner when, earlier this year, Rice actually outgained Oklahoma State in a 41-24 loss. A shoulder injury forced him to miss the last two games, but he was back in action against Navy. Fanuzzi finished with 242 yards passing and 2 TDs, including a pretty incredible toss to Patrick Randolph at the end of the first half. But the Mids were able to pick off two of Fanuzzi’s passes, and neither of Rice’s drives that started in Navy territory resulted in a score.

Fanuzzi could have blamed those fizzled drives on being rusty after being hurt for two weeks, and I don’t think anyone would have blamed him. To his credit, he didn’t:

“I felt great after this week of practice. I was confident with what I could do with my arm. I’m not putting how I played based on my shoulder hurting, that’s not the case today. I think we just had missed opportunities and we’ve just got to fix them and look forward to next week. I felt prepared, I thought we were ready to go out and play Navy this week, but I give them all the credit. They played a great game offensively and defensively. We’ve just to keep grinding.”

One of Fanuzzi’s two interceptions went to Ram Vela, who had a stellar game. On top of the interception, Ram also led the team with 5 tackles, two of which were made behind the line of scrimmage. Kevin Edwards grabbed the other interception and broke up another pass. Perhaps the most impressive performance of the day came from Michael Walsh, who filled in at nose guard while Jordan Stephens, Chase Burge, and Shane Bothel were out with injuries. Walsh usually plays defensive end, and at 251 pounds, is a bit undersized when compared to other nose guards. Someone forgot to tell him that on Saturday. Walsh consistently drew double-teams, but was still able to push himself into the backfield and even knocked down a pass. Rice’s sophomore linemen had their hands full– sometimes literally– with the Navy senior. Like the offense, Buddy Green was able to rotate in several reserves, with players like John Angelo, Max Blue, and Mason Graham making plays in the second half.

My favorite defensive play came in the first quarter, with Navy up 14-0. What looked like an option run in one direction became a pass to the tight end running in the other direction:

Clint Sovie didn’t overpursue the option look. Instead, he recognized the play action, recovered, and held the play to a minimal gain. One or two years ago, this kind of misdirection would’ve resulted in a big gain. Now, the Navy defense is much more disciplined.

As exciting as it was to see the offense explode the way it did, I’m not sure how much there is to learn from this game. When a team full of freshmen and sophomores carries out a mediocre game plan that the other side is prepared for, obliteration happens. By the end of it, Coach Jasper had to be thinking to himself, “We run the option, and our backups are in the game! How are we supposed to keep from running up the score? Pass?” But hey, there’s nothing like a good blowout to cleanse the soul. Just don’t let it go to your head.

Rice versus Navy:
Great seats still available
For blowout central.

The more you have invested in a game, the more difficult it is to move on afterward. Here we are, still e-yelling at each other about the offense almost a week after the Air Force game… And we’re just fans. Imagine how hard it must be for the people who actually invest time and effort preparing for it. (No, remembering to set your DVR doesn’t count as “effort”). No matter how physically and emotionally drained they might be, the players have to suit up, focus, and start practice again on Monday. So it goes for the Navy football team as they enter another crucial stretch in the schedule.

On paper, Rice and SMU would seem to be two of the less daunting teams the Mids have to face this year, entering the weekend with a combined record of 2-7. Not that there’s any team that Navy can chalk up as an automatic win, obviously, but one would figure that the Mids would have a better chance against the Owls and Mustangs than they would with some of the other luminaries on the schedule. Then again, each game isn’t played in a vacuum; they’re played as part of a larger season, and timing doesn’t exactly favor the Mids. Navy is following up a physically and mentally exhausting rivalry win with a pair of long road trips back and forth from Texas, in a season where the Mids have yet to win on the road. When placed in that context, the next two weeks figure to be as challenging as any other. First on the docket in Navy’s Texas two-step is Rice.

Playing in Texas helps Navy’s recruiting efforts, and as such Rice has been a regular on Navy schedules since the ’90s. The two teams last met in 2005, when Matt Hall ran for 91 yards and 2 TDs to lead Navy to a 41-9 victory. It’s hard to imagine a program being so different after only four years; no team in the country has had a more roller coaster existence than Rice. The story actually begins a year earlier, when the future of Rice football and the entire athletics program came into question. I started following the situation when a Rice message board linked a piece I wrote for Scout.com regarding the role athletics play in fulfilling the Naval Academy’s mission. While Rice and the Naval Academy don’t share the same mission, they do face many of the same pressures and misconceptions regarding athletics and the benefits they bring to the school. In April of 2004, the Rice faculty commissioned a study that concluded that a de-emphasis of athletics, including an end to the football program, would be best for the school. In response to this report, the Board of Trustees commissioned a study of their own by McKinsey & Co. to examine its findings and make a recommendation to the Board; options on the table included doing away with football, dropping to Division III, or dissolving the athletic department altogether. When word of these studies were leaked to Rice fans and alumni, their reaction was immediate. Rallies and a massive letter-writing campaign organized by a newly formed “Friends of Rice Athletics” group overwhelmed the Board of Trustees. Bobby May, the Rice AD at the time, talked about the campaign’s effectiveness:

“The Board was totally taken aback; it was knocked off balance by the efforts of those who took the time to write – not just because of the volume, but because of the quality and the logic of the response.”

The other side was overwhelmed, outworked, disarmed and outclassed. One Board member remarked that the work of the Friends of Rice Athletics, and those who wrote, was far better than that put forth by McKinsey.”

With that, Rice football had new life. Rather than drop the program, the school launched a renewed effort to make it better. Rice left the WAC in 2005 in favor of Conference USA. As a member of the C-USA, Rice is able to play most of their games in Texas, maintain some of its old Southwest Conference rivalries, and compete in a West division that consists primarily of private schools (Rice, Tulsa, SMU, and Tulane). It’s a win for the program. In 2006, one of the more underappreciated old venues in college football, Rice Stadium, underwent renovations that included a new playing surface and a modern scoreboard. The most significant changes, though, have come on the field. Ken Hatfield, who had coached on South Main for 12 years, resigned after a 1-10 season in 2005. Hatfield had strayed a bit from his pure wishbone roots, but still employed a running offense based on wishbone power running principles. His replacement was Tulsa defensive coordinator Todd Graham, who hired Major Applewhite to be his offensive coordinator. Graham said at the time,

“We want to spread the field and throw the football, and every quarterback and receiver in this state will be interested in Rice with Major as our offensive coordinator.”

Sounds great, but probably not the easiest transition after running the wishbone. Not surprisingly, the team got off to a 1-5 start. Soon, though, Applewhite found his answer in a pair of sophomores: quarterback Chase Clement and wide receiver Jarett Dillard. A last-second pass from Clement to Dillard lifted Rice to a dramatic 34-33 win over UAB and sparked a six-game winning streak that put Rice at 7-5 and gave them their first Bowl berth in 45 years. Although the Owls lost in the New Orleans Bowl, the program appeared to be headed in the right direction. It was… Until Graham’s former employer came calling. Steve Kragthorpe left to take the Louisville job, and Graham returned to Tulsa to take his place after only a year at Rice. This time Rice tuned to the I-AA ranks to find their new coach, hiring David Bailiff away from Texas State. Bailiff was a former defensive coordinator at TCU, and led Texas State to an 11-3 record and a berth in the I-AA semifinals. Year one of the Bailiff era wasn’t exactly the stuff of dreams. Rice fell back into despair, finishing 3-9 and giving up a ridiculous 42 points per game. Year two, on the other hand, couldn’t have gone much better. The Clement-Dillard combo led Rice to a 10-win season, including a win in the Texas Bowl– Rice’s first bowl victory since 1954.

By the looks of the 2009 season, you’d never guess that the 2008 season was one of the most successful in Rice history. The graduation of Clement and Dillard have returned the sine wave of Rice football back to the trough, as the Owls enter the Navy game at 0-5 and giving up 40.6 points per game. A lot of that has to do with playing Oklahoma State and Texas Tech, of course, and in fact the team is coming off of its best defensive performance of the season against a prolific Tulsa offense. Of course, when a 27-10 loss is your best game of the season, you’ve probably seen better days. The constant turnover has hurt Rice recruiting, leading to some thin classes and forcing them to start younger players. Four of Bailiff’s five starters on the offensive line are sophomores, and the defensive two-deep features 15 freshmen or sophomores. Only eight seniors were listed on the depth chart last week against Tulsa. The few upperclassmen they have, though, include some talented players, particularly on defense. Scott Solomon, a 6-3, 265-lb. defensive end, had three sacks last week and is fifth all-time in that category in Rice history. Preseason all-conference safety Andrew Sendejo is a dual threat, having led the team in tackles for two consecutive years and sitting sixth in the country in punt return average. Still, it hasn’t been enough to overcome youth and injury, with the Owls playing three different quarterbacks this year.

Not that there’s no reason for hope, though. Bailiff has seen the spread option before. Actually, he’s had a bit of success against it; his 2005 playoff run included wins over both Georgia Southern and Cal Poly. The defense is coming off of its best performance of the season, and injured quarterback Nick Fanuzzi is set to return. Fanuzzi led the Owls on three TD drives against Oklahoma State, but missed the last two games with a shoulder injury. Does all this, plus hitting a soft spot on the Navy schedule, have the makings of an upset? Probably not. But Rice will spread out the Navy defense, and their 4-2-5 scheme on defense will give the Mids a look they haven’t seen yet this year. There’s no rest for a weary Navy squad.

Two Fridays ago, the NAPS squad traveled to Annapolis to take on Navy’s JV Football team. The weather conditions were much more favorable for the 2:30 kickoff than they were two weeks prior vs. Hargrave. Temps were in the upper 70’s, skies were blue, and the wind was a non-factor most of the day.

Continue reading “DOWN ON THE FARM: JV VS. NAPS” →

After laying an egg against Pittsburgh a week ago, the Navy football team was hoping to get that bad taste out of their mouths. The defense played well against the Panthers in a lot of ways, but gave up some big plays through the air; the offense didn’t do much of anything right. They could put that performance behind them by putting together a complete game against the Hilltoppers of Western Kentucky. The Mids, led by Ricky Dobbs’ 143 rushing yards and 5 total touchdowns, won the game comfortably, 38-22. Whether that exorcised the demons of the previous week, however, is up for debate.

Offensively, it probably did. Ricky dominated the stat sheet, but he wasn’t the only Mid to have a good day. Bobby Doyle had 104 total yards from scrimmage, including a 24-yard streak down the sideline and a 47-yard pass reception. Marcus Curry chipped in 70 yards on only 5 carries, and Cory Finnerty added a touchdown reception. Vince Murray, who stepped in for an injured Alexander Teich, picked up 54 yards. Overall the Mids had a that’s-more-like-it 373 rushing yards, their highest total of the season. All is well, right?

We’ll see. Honestly, I’m not sure how much we really learned about the offense in this game. WKU is one of those rare teams that don’t physically outmatch the Mids, with players like a 5-11, 270-pound nose guard up front. Being smaller doesn’t mean that they can’t play, of course; it’s just not typical of what Navy is going to see for the rest of the season. On top of that, the WKU game plan wasn’t nearly as good as I thought it would be. Let’s take a look at Ricky’s first touchdown, a 29-yard option run. WKU came out in a similar double eagle-type look that we’ve seen all season. What that means is that they had 4 men on the line of scrimmage, but instead of being balanced on both sides of the center, they had a nose guard over the ball, two on one side of him, and one split wide on the other. Before the snap, one of the safeties comes down in run support and lines up within 5 yards of the line of scrimmage. When he does so, he enters the count. This creates a numbers advantage on the other side of the formation. Ricky sees this, audibles, and runs the other way. The remaining safety spies the tail motion A-back, meaning there’s nobody to catch Ricky when he turns upfield.

WKU was doing this all afternoon. The safety biting on the tail motion is what made Cory Finnerty and Bobby Doyle so wide open on their pass plays. Eventually, the safety stopped spying the A-back and took the quarterback. He clocked Ricky, who might not have even seen him coming, but that left Marcus Curry free to run all over the field on the pitch. In the end, Navy’s offense had a big day… But they should have had a big day. The defense just wasn’t that good. Then again, after the Pitt game, a little confidence can’t hurt.

One can only hope that the defense doesn’t lose any. After being the strength of the team for the first three games, the unit did not exactly impress. Western Kentucky entered the game having a hard time moving the ball on anyone. I mean, Central Arkansas held them to 287 yards, so for the Mids to give up 434 yards to the Hilltoppers is a bit disturbing. Fortunately, with a fumble at the goal line, a missed field goal, and 10 (!) penalties, WKU did a pretty good job stopping themselves, and in the process demonstrated why they are 0-4.

The most troubling thing, given Navy’s next opponent, is that the play that the defense struggled the most against was the option. When WKU was running north-south, the Mids were their usual, immovable selves. When the Hilltoppers started running the zone read, though, the defense looked lost.

I say “zone read” because I’m not sure what else to call it. On the usual zone read play, the last down lineman on the back side of the play is left unblocked. If he heads for the mesh, the QB hands the ball off to the running back. If he starts running down the line to take the running back, the QB keeps and runs towards the space that his read vacated. That’s not really what WKU was doing, though. They blocked everyone at the line of scrimmage. The quarterback read a middle linebacker, and simply sent the ball wherever the ILB didn’t go:

This left the linebackers so preoccupied with the run that they bit hard on every run fake. Notice on this next play how the linebackers play the run. By moving to the line of scrimmage instead of dropping into coverage, it leaves a huge gap in coverage between the LBs and the secondary. The primary beneficiary was the tight end, Jack Doyle, who not only caught this pass, but five more for 80 yards. The TE would usually be covered by a linebacker.

Opposing quarterbacks looking like the second coming of John Hadl have been an all-too-frustrating trademark of the Navy defense over the last two years. Kawaun Jakes is a freshman, but against the Mids you wouldn’t have known. Now, you can’t mention the performance of the defense without also mentioning how depleted the unit was. Ram Vela, Clint Sovie, and Jabaree Tuani all either played sparingly, or played hurt. That forced Wyatt Middleton to play out of position, and he did not look comfortable at all at linebacker. If you asked me if this was just a bad day or if it was a sign of things to come for the defense, I’d take the former. And Blake Carter is still awesome on wheels.

Still, it’s not really a note of confidence on which to head into the Air Force game. That doesn’t mean it’s time to panic, either. Yes, the Mids stunk on option plays, but that’s not really the kind of stuff that Air Force runs. Actually, you could say there is a bit of silver lining in all this. We’ve seen the defense pick up the slack to help carry the team until the offense got in gear. We sort of expected that this year. But now we’ve seen the offense carry the game when the defense struggled, which can only boost that unit’s morale. Yeah, it was only Western Kentucky. But we should know by now that any win at Navy is a good win. I’ll take it.