WMD's Liberty Bowl Preview: Defense

[War Machine Dawg]

Gents, my Liberty Bowl preview wraps up at FWTCT. Part II: The Defenses is available for your enjoyment. You know the drill. Let's talk defense!

[Todd4State]

Enjoyed both articles.

Our game plan is obvious- stack the box on defense and RTDF. Perkins needs to have a big game. I suspect that we will start him and run him at least 20 times between the tackles. That worries me.

As far as defense, I noticed that Rice had a WR/TE that was 6'5" that they seemed to like to go to in clutch situations. Having a taller guy like Cox on him who has played a lot of corner should be beneficial to us. Wells is key also- he's our hybird defender- and for us to win, he needs to be solid as he usually is.

[War Machine Dawg]

Enjoyed both articles.

Our game plan is obvious- stack the box on defense and RTDF. Perkins needs to have a big game. I suspect that we will start him and run him at least 20 times between the tackles. That worries me.

As far as defense, I noticed that Rice had a WR/TE that was 6'5" that they seemed to like to go to in clutch situations. Having a taller guy like Cox on him who has played a lot of corner should be beneficial to us. Wells is key also- he's our hybird defender- and for us to win, he needs to be solid as he usually is.

I'd be shocked if that wasn't the plan defensively, Todd. I don't expect us to go Air Raid offensively, but I'd be surprised if we don't try to be balanced. I may have an aneurism if we run Perk up the middle that much.

I'm not worried about their TEs in the pass game. I think the kid you're thinking of is a freshman, Connor Cella. I feel comfortable that Wells can win against him 1-on-1.

I'm a whole lot more worried about safety, to be honest. Other than Market, I have no clue what the hell we're going to do back there. And Cox will have only had 15 practices to pick up the scheme, so I'd expect him to be limited. Random thought here, but would we consider a 4-4 look? Put Richie in the middle with B-Mac and have Market as the lone safety? Might be a good move with Rice being so run heavy.

[Todd4State]

Knowing Dan, I bet we use Deontay Evans and Kivon Coman a lot at safety for this game. Logic says to use Cox- but that's usually not how Dan rolls.

I don't know about a 4-4 since they are a spread team. If it were me, I'd probably go with a nickle look with a secondary of:

CB- Love
CB- Redmond
CB/S- Cox
Nickle- Calhoun
S- Market
LB- Wells
LB- McKinney

And then whatever D-line. Autry, Jones, Preston, PJ.

But I think that secondary is our best all around group as far as coverage and tackling. I want our best tacklers out there since we know they are going to run it about 65% of the time and they have big backs.

[War Machine Dawg]

What you just said is why I think a 4-4 may work. Since we KNOW they're going to try to run it, I want Skinner on the field at all times. He's been a beast stopping the run, and as I pointed out, finished second to B-Mack in tackles this year. No way could I justify taking him off the field. And while they're a "spread" team, we know that with the big backs, they're going to want to pound it inside. Thus, why not put another good tackler like Richie or Beni on the field? With Beni's speed, he'd almost work as another safety, if we wanted to put him outside in the 4-4 and move Skinner inside with B-Mack.

Something else to think about is maybe using Jiles at S. He's got good size and tackles pretty well, but seems to struggle a little in coverage. Why not put him at SS and let him play the run? It frees up Market to be a traditional FS and play CF for when Rice tries to take the inevitable deep shot off the play action.

The one thing I WOULDN'T do is what you suggest: Take a LB off the field for an extra DB. We're just too beat up in the secondary and I want ALL my big body run stuffers on the field. Hell, I would mind a 5-3-3 with Smith, Eulls, PJ, CJ, and Autry all on the field together. The good news is that we seem to have lots of options. And fwiw, those who've been to a couple of bowl practices (such as C34) have said that Cox was practicing at S.

[War Machine Dawg]

Shameless self-promotion bump for Defense