Upon Further Review 2013: Defense vs Nebraska

FORMATION NOTES: Michigan abandoned the two-high look for most of this game in favor of seven or seven and a half man fronts depending on whether Nebraska was in standard or three-wide personnel. Against 2TEs and a back:

Against three wide they would often go with a straight up 4-3 under on plausible run downs. This is a four-wide formation on which Michigan has 4-3 personnel on the field (that's Cam Gordon over the slot) and only gets out of their 4-3 under because Nebraska splits a TE.

This is a wide shot of a fairly typical one-high setup:

All of this was great for jamming up Nebraska's inside run game and very bad for option pitches.

SUBSTITUTION NOTES: Avery and Furman started at safety, with Wilson frequently subbing in. He was in the same role Bolden was, essentially a third starter. Thomas Gordon did not play. Countess went out in the first quarter, which put Dymonte Thomas on the field in the nickel and Stribling on the field on all downs. Lewis played only a little early and then was out.

Linebackers were the usual. Ryan/Gordon at SAM, Ross/Bolden/Morgan three guys for two spots at ILB. On the line, Jibreel Black(!) was your starting nose tackle with Washington rotating in. Henry and Glasgow were at the three tech, Clark went almost the whole way at WDE with Ojemudia in a clear backup role, and the same thing happened at SDE with Beyer and Wormley. On nickel packages, Taco Charlton came in as a DT. This was probably not a good move.

[After THE JUMP: 17 points should be good enough.]

Quinoa is terrible.

Amen.

On this we can agree.

We are MGoUnited on this fact.

Mexican restaurant chips are great.

This is the quinoa UFR, not the Mexican restaurant chips UFR, which are terrible.

OUTRA—

We all agree that this is a B defense with personnel that's probably a bit worse than that and that it is basically the same as the other two Mattison defenses and we would like to see a major step forward from them next year but this is basically what it is.

MEXICAN RESTAU—

And we all agree that we wish they would not give up touchdown drives at the end of the game.

We couldn't stop the option to save our lives.

I know it seemed like that; the numbers aren't actually that bad. Two options featured guards leading; those got 11 yards. There were seven speed options; those got 33 yards. Total YPC: 4.9. That's not as bad as it seemed. In fact, since Michigan seemed to be giving those up by scheme and that helped Michigan hold Nebraska to 2.9 yards a pop on their 33 other rushes, that looks like a win. On paper, anyway.

Watching it live it was frustrating.

This is the cost of that single-high-safety look: you do not get a safety who is able to help as you do when you are playing two guys back there, especially in quarters D.* In quarters the playside S will come down hard on run action and he is usually in good position to stop this stuff; the backside guy will play more conservatively into a deep middle and then help clean up. Michigan's single-high look was exploitable in that department. If you remember the Air Force game Michigan had similar struggles from that alignment. The one time Michigan did have a safety to come down to play the pitch man, it was an okie look; that one went for two yards.

Exacerbating the safety issue is that it seemed like Michigan linebackers would find that tackle coming out on them and go upfield of him, every time. That happens above. It happens below. It happens on the final touchdown, about which more later. My best guess is that M was coached to do that with the expectation that the end would prevent the pitch, and the end was supposed to play it in just that particular way that would end up with a keep but only after some delay. Whatever it was, it looked hard as hell.

That scheme also opened up a pretty sweet play by Nebraska that would have made their go-ahead drive one play for 75 yards, shooting their second TE up the middle of the field as Avery attended to deep routes on the exterior:

It may be time to try something else against these option schemes, which Michigan has not done real well with. Maybe next year they'll be more confident in a front six and have that safety flexibility.

But this year, they had a front seven and Michigan's DL straight up won against the Nebraska OL, with most of Nebraska's yards coming on those options or zone-read based misdirection that beat Michigan mentally, not physically.

*[A prediction: Nebraska option pitches get annihilated by MSU.]

But the last one.

Yeah, the last one was pretty bad. Michigan had actually gotten a TFL on third and four on a near-replay of that earlier in the game. That was the Ryan playing two sides play. Ryan gets a hit on Armstrong, the pitch is late and stops the back, and Ross makes a nice play to shoot upfield of his blocker and get to the edge.

Hooray hooray and all that, but that still feels like a disaster waiting to happen since you're asking Ross to take on a tackle with no one else on the edge. On the last play it's a virtual replay down to the late weird pitch and Ross trying to get upfield of the tackle, only this time he cannot.

I think Clark does a pretty good job there and it's still an easy walk-in for Nebraska.

Michigan's been getting torn up on option pitches since Mattison arrived; this game was actually one of their better outings in that department because they did make some plays, but the way they're defending this looks broken somehow. The stats would look worse except Armstrong ate a TFL on Nebraska's first option despite having the pitch man wide open. Once he fixed his decision matrix Michigan had a lot of trouble. It's time to do something different in this department.

But let's look at the

you've never been to a good Mexican restaurant

chart.

[Reminder that DL is a MAKE PLAYS position and being neutral is bad; for a full game you want +4 to break even.]

The DL played pretty well; I don't get Furman playing; the linebackers were very up and down. Do these numbers seem conservative for a 17 point performance and under 300 yards? Somewhat, but Nebraska shot itself in the foot more than MSU did and the game was functionally short: 10 real drives for NU, one of which started on their three with a broken play that lost two yards and another that ended after a first down completion for 12 yards when Cam Gordon incidentally created a fumble.

What the pants was that on the fourth and two?

Ugly, is what it was. Michigan comes out in man press on the short side of the field and then Dymonte Thomas and Channing Stribling are in space cadet mode on the other side of the field.

Nebraska sees this and checks. (A few plays later they will also check to their option after seeing Michigan align in such a way as to invite it to the boundary.) Michigan doesn't respond, and the thing that looks open is then open. This is half infuriating, half typical freshman business, and another half that's what you get for futzing with your D like this. I'm giving 150% in this section.

• FRESHMAN BUSINESS: obvious.
• INFURIATING: Michigan almost never responds to an opponent check by checking in response. They show a blitz, check, blitz comes. They show a formation, check, speed option to where no one is. Here they wave their hands and say soft man coverage on fourth and two, Nebraska is obviously checking, and no one on the D or sideline can communicate with the freshman DBs to get up on the LOS. This is a systematic issue with Michigan's defense.
• THAT'S WHAT YOU GET: It is entirely possible that senior with massive experience Thomas Gordon will tell the freshmen to get their asses to the LOS. Furman's just trying to get his own assignment right.

Now, Mattison at least said that's not the defense they intended and he should have called timeout. It was a screwup, not a really dumb call. But the systematic issue really bugs me. Last year Nebraska got a sweet touchdown on a sideline check that Michigan did not react to. This is a pattern.

I loved their first touchdown:

Pick route, sure, but rubbin's racin'. Nothing Michigan can do as soon as that guy rubs Gordon off. Where'd they get that call?

all your heads in a box to the left

From the sideline after they got lined up with 25 seconds on the clock and Michigan showed man coverage with one high safety. That was not aww shucks luck. It's using the extra information the defense gives you to exploit it. Michigan, meanwhile, is usually still in the huddle with 18 seconds on the playclock and often scrambles to the line with no other option than running what's called no matter what the D shows.

It's frustrating on both sides of the ball that I've identified more excellent checks from Tim Beck in two Nebraska-Michigan games than I've detected in two years of watching Michigan. (I've got the UConn speed option TD and…)

Anyway, once Michigan doesn't react to the check it's over and then there's a double helping of freshman tackle derp. That'll happen.

(I didn't think the near-false start was egregious.)

Wait, Black was a nose tackle?

Yeah, and he did well with it. I know. It's weird. His main technique was jetting upfield and outside of his guy and then changing direction to run down the line behind him. Because he is compact and quick for the position, Nebraska had a hard time dealing with it. That blew up the first play of the game and a number of others besides.

There's a crease there that Abdullah gets pushed out of because Black comes around so quickly.

Unfortunately, that's another thing that seems like it'll be a problem once it gets on tape. Nebraska did occasionally latch onto him when he pulled this stunt and when that happened he was gone upfield and there was plenty of room. They were also a stretch team for the most part. When Michigan faces an inside zone or power team (ie, Iowa or Ohio State) it's hard to see that going nearly as well.

I still don't know what's wrong with Washington, who seems to be doing well when he actually gets in.

I don't detect much difference between his play this year and last year, when he was a starting fixture who probably had more snaps than any other DL. I mentioned it last week but the only thing that makes sense here is that he's got the wheezing mumps or something that makes it hard for him to play much.

What was with the safety switch?

Your guess is as good as mine. Safety is the spot at which we get the least information from the television broadcast, so we're mostly going on assumptions about what happened downfield. My general feel for Wilson and Gordon was that they were like the rest of the defense: good, not great. Gordon getting beat to a well-executed corner route by Michigan State is about the worst thing he's done this year, and that's reason to do a midseason makeover featuring a 175-pound converted cornerback and Josh Furman?

I don't think it paid off. When a safety popped up on the radar it was usually doing something bad, like Courtney Avery getting way out of centerfield here:

Spielman goes right to Bolden on the third and fifteen conversion on Nebraska's first drive but… really? I mean, that ball is caught 25 yards downfield and this isn't something Furman's supposed to handle?

And I can't quite be sure but on the third and nine catch that preceded the WTF goings on on fourth down, I think Mattison had Nebraska dead to rights and Furman blew a pick-six opportunity. Nebraska had been going to short outs against softer coverage all day, and Michigan showed that again. Mattison blitzes Thomas to cut Armstrong off and force a quick throw as Furman moves down into a short zone that if read and pursued aggressively leads to Furman jumping in front of the short out Nebraska went to time and again:

Maybe that's nuts. Furman also caught Abdullah at the two on the first Nebraska TD on a play where it seemed like Michigan could have got Nebraska into a second and goal from the three. He certainly didn't seem like an upgrade.

I'd also heard that Raymon Taylor's job was under threat this week, and that too makes no sense to me. Taylor is not the best player in the history of the world but he seems to be improving week to week and is clearly better than Stribling. In this one he gave up a couple of short things, dominated some long routes, and then was avoided. He was actually at the LOS on the fourth and two, because he's not a freshman. All this secondary rotation smacks of desperation in a location that has not warranted it.

The DL actually beat someone up?

Well… in the run game. And Nebraska was highly run oriented so you can write off some pressure issues to understandable rock-paper-scissors stuff. And Nebraska was getting pretty short on OL by the end of this one. But, yeah, and this is a good rushing offense. I will take it.

Clark turned in a second consecutive strong day highlighted by a leaps-tall-buildings (or at least short running backs) pass rush:

Willie Henry is one game closer to being an established good player, though this offseason will be big for him as he tries to get more consistent with his technique.

That DL play also allowed us to see a flash or two of what we were so hyped up about with James Ross preseason. He is a read and react demon if he's kept clean.

Michgan's DL has not been demanding doubles, and that's meant Ross is fending off guys; he's undersized and that's never going to be a strength. This year's line is bad for his playstyle, what with Jibreel Black replacing Will Campbell and a lot of nickel packages with nothing even resembling a nose tackle. Campbell was not explosive in any way but in his senior year he was a space eater who got pretty good at preventing DL from releasing, and Ross found some profit in that.

If next year's DTs are Henry and Pipkins, that would be an environment in which Ross could take off.

Other new faces?

Charlton is the latest defensive end to get playing time as a nickel DT. He helped force a sack in this one when Nebraska blew a DT twist pickup and he flushed the QB into Cam Gordon; otherwise is impact was not of the good variety. On the winning drive back to back plays featured Charlton having the freshman blues; he got way upfield and out of his lane the QB draw Ross chopped down after six of the 30 yards it looked like it would get. With Nebraska's offense, first and fifteen is a high-alert QB draw down, and that stood in stark contrast to a Nebraska DT going straight back on an ill-fated Gardner draw in their two-minute drill. That was not so good.

The following play was painful. Michigan puts on another DT twist. Henry does an excellent job to bull back through the G and C, there's a big lane for Charlton to come around, and Clark beats the tackle around the edge. Charlton does not stunt.

Brutal missed assignment and probably the difference between a first down and third and long after a sack. Why you have a true freshman out there protecting a three point lead with five minutes left in the game is a mystery.

I just feel so bad. Michigan's watching blitzes tear them apart and they're ultra passive on defense and everything feels like the opposite of what we're told it's supposed to be.

Strong men also cry, bolded alter-ego. The flipside of all those blitzes on which Michigan got eaten are some on which Michigan did the eating, or would have if someone can get a tackle:

Morgan also missed a tackle on a Mattison RPS +3 blitz that would have eaten a midline zone read alive. Michigan was not particularly passive in this game, and that was even with Countess out for most of it and new safeties.

Heroes?

No one really stands out as having had a massive game except I guess Cam Gordon, who helped hold down those runs effectively. Henry, Black, and Clark were major contributors to Nebraska's ugly run game and only Clark can be even vaguely accused of being part of the option issues.

Maybe not so heroic?

I don't get why Furman was playing over Wilson even if Gordon was out. Bolden again came in negative, and rather significantly. Michigan needed more pass rush out of the SDE spot.

What does it mean for Northwestern and the future?

Wilson should re-enter the starting lineup. He has faced more intimidating passing offenses and come out better. Gordon, too, should reclaim his job.

Black is a rotating nose guard now. It's weird; I'm not optimistic about how it'll do against the mashers at the end of the year. Northwestern it seems fine for.

The linebackers could use some space bugger tackling lessons. Big problem for the first time all year. Venric Mark is out for Saturday, and that's a stroke of luck for M.

Freshmen are freshmen. Please for the love of all that is holy let us never play any more ever. Except Jabrill Peppers.