james ester

Previously: FFFF NIU Offense

Today we flip to the defensive side of the ball with our NIU FFFF. On Wednesday we covered the offense, which while decently mundane in content, had some notable names. This group is the reverse, high on intrigue and filled with generally ugly tape, but also few names to remember. How did this defense beat a power five team and then give up 50 to Wyoming? Let's dive in. 

The Film: Still looking at the Georgia Tech game. The Yellow Jackets were 96th in scoring offense last season at just 23.9 points per game and a moderately better 72nd ranking in yards per game. Those marks rank similarly to such teams as Minnesota and Northwestern. Which is a way of saying that this was not exactly a top tier offensive opponent that NIU was facing in this game. A second note about GT's offense: it definitely looks different than Michigan's. Though they've stopped running the triple option (a massive loss for the CFB world), Georgia Tech still runs a bona fide spread offense, with lots of QB run reads, regularly lining up with 4 to 5 WR's, and almost never playing more than six men at the line of scrimmage. So there are going to be some differences in NIU's strategy when they face Michigan's offense, compared to what you see on tape here. 

Personnel: click for big 

NIU plays a base 4-3, with two defensive tackles who play most snaps, 286 lb. James Ester (Cass Tech product) and 273 lb. Devonte O'Malley. They rotate in Demond Taylor Jr. (his grandparents forgot the "s" in his first name I guess) at that position too. On the edges they roll with Raishein Thomas and Michael Kennedy. Those two guys play pretty differently, as Thomas is a legit end who plays with a hand in the dirt on basically every snap, where as Kennedy is more of an Ojabo type in terms of playing standing up and occasionally dropping into coverage (only a few plays in this game). Measly (235 lb.) DE Ivan Davis (a Canton, MI, product) comes on as a pure rush DE in passing down situations, while Pierce Oppong gets on the field as an end too. 

The LB level sees the least rotation. Lance Deveaux Jr. is the veteran leader of the defense as a RS Sr. and he rarely comes off the field. The same can be said for sophomore LB Nick Rattin, who I think played every snap against GT, but I don't have the time to go back and count it up. NIU uses a spacebacker which they call the "Rover", Daveren Rayner. Rayner made five starts last fall as a true freshman and is back reprising his role. Since GT was a run-heavy offense, Rayner played as a LB more often than not in the game I watched, though his weight (200 lbs.) indicates he may be more DB sized. On passing downs he generally did line up as a DB, but he seldom came off the field. When Rayner comes off, Dillon Thomas comes on the backup rover. 

In the secondary the Huskies have a tandem of Jordan Gandy and Eric Rogers at CB. Gandy is the cover corner who I rarely saw do anything else than shadow his man, while Rogers gets moved around a bit. On plays where GT lined up with 3 WR's all to one side of the field, Rogers would line up on the far side basically as a LB and in fact at first I thought he was the spacebacker before checking the depth chart. As a result of that versatility, he plays more in run defense. The starting safeties were Devin Lafayette and Jordan Hansen, but Lafayette got injured during the Georgia Tech game, which means that CJ Brown is the starting safety now, and I thought he was alright in what I saw of him. CB Zhamaine March rotates into the game as well, sometimes subbing for one of the starting four and other times as the (rare) 5th true DB. 

[AFTER THE JUMP: Moar Huskies!]