Penn State Snowflakes: The Defense

Iowa had a much better defensive game plan for Penn State than Michigan did.

Sometimes you do not match up well wtih single coverage.

Does Don Brown have any pitch but a fastball down the middle?  Can he change it up at all?

Can he go to a Plan B when he needs to?

 

Why was Don Brown's scheme successful against, for example, OSU last year and so completely exposed tonight?  (PSU was still integrating the Moorhead offense when we played them, so I won't use that as a comparison.)  Is the absense of Jabrill the difference?  

I just looked, and even in their lowest scoring game (21-19 over Iowa), PSU still put up nearly 600 yards of offense, so it's not like they held PSU in check either.  

 

None of us actually thought we would lose this game because of our defense.

I realize it's a high risk/high reward D but Brown blitzed his D into some bad situations and McCRAY ON BARKLEY IS NOT A GOOD THING

Don Brown was completely outschemed tonight. LBs and safeties were atrocious. Atrocious. Very young group and good to see Kwity play even if he made mistakes.

our defense couldn't match up with PSU. A mobile QB and can run and pass, plus an all-star RB. Can't spy both in the backfield. Plus there were mismatches on the back end.

Defensive Line & Linebackers

They looked fine, but disappointing as we have become spoiled with their greatness. As I predicted, after Barkley went nuts early, he was contained on simple runs. However, trick plays have really been working on us, and we run out of players. Not their best today, but they still looked good.

DBs

This is why we lost, and the only thing that really frustrated me all night! DBs were nonexistant, providing no pressure on PSU recievers at any point in the game (especially the 2nd half). I was expecting adjustment, but it never came. While some of this is because they needed extra help to stop potential big runs, they can't be covering recievers THIS badly. If we had contained PSU recievers on short passes even slightly more, this would have been a game. Don Brown has got some serious work to do with these guys.

It seemed that in the last two games the pass rush has sort of disappeared.  There was too much time to make throws.  We seemed to blitz a lot and it never got there.  I'm wondering if the lack of depth is catching up and our Dline is just wearing out faster.  Agreed it seems like we had no answer to about anything PSU was doing.

What defense?

As dynamic in their playcalling as ours was again vanilla.  We threw away the first two series for some reason.  The defense played hard.  Can't expect any LB to cover Barkley out of the backfield.  Their calls bear our defense.  Hard to blame the defense.

The defense will bounce back for sure.

GO BLUE!!

If the defense is getting tired. Not a lot of snaps for backups so getting this late in the season might be catching up

Metellus was destroyed. Honestly, I think he was culpible for at least 200 yards of offense or so on numerous big plays. All 3 big yardage gains on the first two drives looked to be on him based on the first watch.

 

McCray, I mean, thank you for your time as a Michigan Wolverine. The limitations are obvious, but honestly, I think that's more RPS than McCray. If you've got McCray on Barkley in space, the play is lost before the ball is snapped. Not a good game for Don Brown. 

 

Not sure quite sure what to make of Hudson. He got used a bit, but that might have been RPS too. 

 

Kinnel...yeah, he's got some holes in his game too. 

 

Didn;t think the CBs were too bad actually. Line didn;t quite get there a lot of the time but was close. I do think the fanbase was probably a bit too high on the defense considering that the best offense we'd played is...Purdue? Who just lost to fucking Rutgers. Defense is good but not best defense besides Alabama good. Still optomistic for the future though we'll sure miss Hurst next year. Need to clean some things up. Anyway, we match up better with Wisconsin so we;ll have a better chance to win that game. 

Man that was a bummer.

Well, at least I don't have to worry about us wasting an historically good defense this year while the offense flounders.

.

First time Don Brown has been outcoached in his time here. It happens, but it still sucks. Safety play is officially a problem and Metullus must be hurt or something because he looks like ass trying to tackle. We can't keep letting teams put McCray in man coverage on the rb. Also, our LB core isn't great at getting depth on zone drops which is probably why we don't run much zone even when man isn't working well.

Really, badly overrated coordinator/DL. Safeties playing man coverage. Your slowest linebacker covering the best RB in the country. DL being single blocked majority of the time very easily. Not getting off blocks. Only pressure generated was from blitzes. Hallmarks of a bad defense.

McCray got burned all night, but that’s not really his fault. He was given an impossible task, given his skill set, of covering Barkley. It’s unfair to ask him to do something he just doesn’t have the skills to do.

First time since Brown has been here that I felt like he got out-coached.

Disappointing.  PSU's offense played with a chip on their shoulder from last year's beat down.  Our defense and the play calling therein played like we were up four scores.  McCray on Barkley was a bad joke.  Can't blame the pass rush because the ball was out before the DL could get to the QB on just about every play.  PSU came with an excellent game plan and played like their season depended on it.  We played the game like it was business as usual.  Slants killed us.  We have mucho problems in 5 to 10 yard pass plays over the middle.  Lavert Hill is the only player in the secondary that inspires any enthusiasm for the future.

I guess I'm happy they didn't beat us as bad on the scoreboard as we beat them last year.  FML for having to resort to that bullshit.

Coming into the game we were hoping the D would be good enough to give us a chance, but they gave this team absolutely no chance of winning the game regardless of what happened with the offense.

I've been saying this since the beginning of the year: the 3-3-5 base allignment gets murdered against the power spread! When we unveiled it against Florida, it looked great against a  pass-first team with little run threat. Just run Furbush into the A gap, then unleash Devin Bush for QB pressure. Pass-first spread teams? Same thing. Zone running schemes? Our linebackers are too quick. But against power rushing outfits, we need the 4-2-5 base--Don Brown's breat-and-butter. Why? When Mone (or Solomon or Dwumfour) are also in the game, Hurst, Gary, and Winovich receive less double teams and blow up more plays at the point of attack. With only a 3-man front, we're asking our linebackers to read and react to every run play or get home on exotic blitzes during a pass. Against gap attacking power teams, that's expecting too much from the linebackers since they're meeting pulling guards in the hole or having to check the RB coming out of the backfield on passing downs. Penn State and Ohio State may be in spread formations, but they're attacking gaps, not zone running. 

Secondly, since Penn State's passing game is predicated on chucking and praying, man-to-man coverage in the secondary with only a single high safety means the secondary cannot help on run plays and must win the track meets/get heads turned/challenge the catches. Our corners can do all that. Mattellus, Kinnel, and Hudson... not quite. By going zone, you allow the entire 5 to 6 man secondary to play centerfield, watching the QB's eyes. When he chucks, you pick off. When he takes off for a run you're there for run support. (No way Saquan gets that first long TD run if we're in zone coverage. And no way he gets McCray one-on-one in any passing situation). 

Last year, Michigan destroyed this EXACT SAME PSU OFFENSE. Why? 4-2-5 base defense! The four man line blew everything up at the point of attack. Linebackers only had to play cleanup. If we continue in a 3-3-5 against Wiscy, we'll definitely get killed. I think our coaches know that with power I teams (hence why we eventually got Mone in there against MSU). But I hope this game also showed why a 3-3-5 against a power spread like PSU and OSU gets our linebackers ate up with gap attacks and misdirection. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, RELEASE GARY AND HURST! Go back to a 4-2-5 or even a 4-1-6 with an extra corner for coverage and Kheleke Hudson (instead of McCray or Furbush) playing the Peppers backer. That is all. 

This teams defense was exposed by michigan state Dantonio rolled up 200 yards by halftime. Wish i remembered the 3 morons i aas arguing with

No mistaken that PSU was the best offense our D played so far and they got schooled. I now worry about any team with a decent QB. WI and OSU will be sure losses by multiple points.

OSU's running QB and team speed will give our D fits. About what I thought this season would be like. 4 or 5 losses.

You’re a pussy or an apologist if you won’t start questioning/challenging Harbaugh and this staff.

They had better players with more experience. Not because Don Brown is all of a sudden not a good coach.

when i saw barkley line up with mcray in coverage, and our backup safety in, i said to my wife: "watch barkely catch a touchdown pass in about 5 seconds." then he bobbled it and i thought "oh no i might be wrong for the first time in my life" but then he caught it so my streak continues.

 

Game overinflated everyone’s expectations both on offense and defense. All of this talk of firing Pep or Drevno or even the idiots talking about Harbaugh is because of those inflated expectations. Florida was not good. We are rebuilding this year, but the defense has a lot to work on. We have tremendous talent coming up the pipeline but it’s not developed with experience yet. Patience will be a virtue