Film Room Video GT vs BC Offense Series 1

RLR

Jolly Good Fellow
Messages
355
Good work Longestday!

Man, that 3-3-1 is pretty clever. . . especially against the counter. Am I wrong or did we see it twice on the opening drive, both against counter runs? (stop stealing CPJ's playsheet, BC!)
 

Faulkner475

Georgia Tech Fan
Messages
39
image.png
When I watched this, something there was something about that 3-3-1 alignment I couldn't quite figure out. I couldn't tell what the keys were for the 1 (I don't know what to call him, is he the Mike? Stack backer? Jack? Dunno.) were. Here are 3 screenshots I marked up. In each one, the player circled in yellow is the rocket motion A back. The green circle is the guard to the boundary side. The blue circle is the non-motion A back. The red circle is this stacked backer we could never get blocked. Looking at the defender's head (and presumably eyes), he looks in the same place on all 3 plays, sees 3 different things, and yet heads to the field side each time. Very odd. If he's reading a key like a pulling guard (normal) or the non-motion A back (very common key for HS defenses against the flexbone), he should be going somewhere different on at least one of the plays. If his rule is to simply scrape to the field, why is he looking to what is the backside of the play? I couldn't figure this out, maybe someone else has an idea.
 

Faulkner475

Georgia Tech Fan
Messages
39
Sorry for the post spam, posting these images from an iPad is a little tedious. After looking at these again, he's scraping to the field, and Devine ends up on that side of the play all 3 times. The field side A back is the motion back all 3 times as well, so maybe that's his key? If the field side A goes in motion, just scrape to the field? Seems like triple to the boundary would clear him out in that case, and maybe it does, I haven't rewatched the whole game. Thanks @Longestday for doing these.
 

New Old Guy

Jolly Good Fellow
Messages
320
Thank you so much for all this effort, LD. I know it takes a lot of time. With your very thorough and detailed analysis, I always feel better about how we did, win or lose. At least I understand so much better. I was at the game, watching closely, but your expertise, added to the slo-mo replay, makes the result much easier to understand.
 

Fatmike91

Helluva Engineer
Messages
1,298
Location
SW Florida
This was a strange series. Watching it live, I thought the counter was bad play calling because the linebackers never took a false step. Then we kept running the counter and I couldn't understand why...

Watching it with the benefit of slow-motion shows we kept missing our blocks and we had a touch-down (or big gain) if we made the block. So our stubborn coach said, "run it again and block someone this time". Not sure we made a clean block or a clean read on this series.

Lucky to get into the end-zone.

/
 

dressedcheeseside

Helluva Engineer
Messages
14,243
This was a strange series. Watching it live, I thought the counter was bad play calling because the linebackers never took a false step. Then we kept running the counter and I couldn't understand why...

Watching it with the benefit of slow-motion shows we kept missing our blocks and we had a touch-down (or big gain) if we made the block. So our stubborn coach said, "run it again and block someone this time". Not sure we made a clean block or a clean read on this series.

Lucky to get into the end-zone.

/
BC is well schooled in our counter play. They're probably told not to step in the direction of the initial motion til the motion back passes the qb or something similar. They're also fast enough not to need a head start on the play even if it's not a counter. Either way, a well schooled fast defense is not going to fall for counter motion, especially if we haven't burned them to the edge previously. Counters work best when a defense feels it needs to 'cheat' on plays. BC obviously didn't.
 

Enuratique

Jolly Good Fellow
Messages
333
BC is well schooled in our counter play. They're probably told not to step in the direction of the initial motion til the motion back passes the qb or something similar. They're also fast enough not to need a head start on the play even if it's not a counter. Either way, a well schooled fast defense is not going to fall for counter motion, especially if we haven't burned them to the edge previously. Counters work best when a defense feels it needs to 'cheat' on plays. BC obviously didn't.
Yeah I came in to make a similar comment. Watching in slow motion, you see they don't start moving until a few beats after the snap, since our countermotion changes so quickly after the snap, they've done the math to determine it's better to wait and see then to move at the snap and then find themselves two or three steps in the wrong direction. Still, good blocking would overcome that.
 

lastoption

Georgia Tech Fan
Messages
62
On those counters against the 3-3-1 set up where Shamire may have taken the wrong guy it seems to me the problem may stem from the play side guard not being able to get any block at all on second level leaving an extra guy. From shamires perspective on the pull he may have felt like he had no choice but to block that guy because it looks like the play side guard couldn't pick anyone up. I thought Shamire was effective on his cut blocks (may or may not have blocked right guy) but agree with DC in that it would be nice to occasionally seem him come around and blow the guy 5 yards downfield instead of going for the cut.
 

Joeb21

Jolly Good Fellow
Messages
146
It seems like if they are not biting on the motion, we could just burn them with a traditional triple option play or rocket toss.
 

gtg936g

Helluva Engineer
Messages
2,142
@Longestday

I think (guess) Shamire took the correct guy. The counter turns into a double option as the motioning AB turns back to stick the corner/safety. The play side DE/LB (#29) should be the option guy (as he was), but the play side guard is supposed to take #13 who was ligned up as the 1 in the 3-3-1.
 

slugboy

Moderator
Staff member
Messages
11,725
It seems like if they are not biting on the motion, we could just burn them with a traditional triple option play or rocket toss.
They seemed to get outside pretty quick, and also they shed WR blocks well in some of the footage.

@Longestday -- thanks for the film break down. Ouch, there were a lot of missed assignments and missed reads.
 

zhavenor

Jolly Good Fellow
Messages
468
Sorry for the post spam, posting these images from an iPad is a little tedious. After looking at these again, he's scraping to the field, and Devine ends up on that side of the play all 3 times. The field side A back is the motion back all 3 times as well, so maybe that's his key? If the field side A goes in motion, just scrape to the field? Seems like triple to the boundary would clear him out in that case, and maybe it does, I haven't rewatched the whole game. Thanks @Longestday for doing these.
From the 3 pictures you posted he his following the pulling guard. Never played ILB but I'm pretty sure it's a pretty standard key.
 

vamosjackets

GT Athlete
Featured Member
Messages
2,156
From the 3 pictures you posted he his following the pulling guard. Never played ILB but I'm pretty sure it's a pretty standard key.
Yes, he ends up going exactly where the pulling OL goes, but I think Faulkner's point is that the direction his head is pointed indicates that he's not actually looking at the OL as his read key. So, either he has superior peripheral vision or it's a coincidence of some sort, and Faulkner is hypothesizing why. The coincidence could be as Faulkner said, we pulled toward the field each time and the stacked backer scraped to the field each time.
 

vamosjackets

GT Athlete
Featured Member
Messages
2,156
BC is well schooled in our counter play. They're probably told not to step in the direction of the initial motion til the motion back passes the qb or something similar. They're also fast enough not to need a head start on the play even if it's not a counter. Either way, a well schooled fast defense is not going to fall for counter motion, especially if we haven't burned them to the edge previously. Counters work best when a defense feels it needs to 'cheat' on plays. BC obviously didn't.
It's probably that they're just coached to see the OG as their primary read key, so they aren't even looking at the motion first. They're just following the pulling OG to the play.
 
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