By Will Vandervort.
When 17th-ranked Clemson plays Oklahoma in the Russell Athletic Bowl on Dec. 29, it will see something that it has only seen once all season – an Okie Front.
The Sooners like to play out of 3-4 defensive front that has their down linemen playing “2-gap” technique, which allows their linebackers to come up and make plays. It’s a scheme that has allowed Oklahoma to have the 10th best rushing defense in the country, yielding just 109.6 yards a game.
So what is the Tigers’ goal on offense? They have to find ways to find movement.
“They are just sitting there. They are not pressuring or nothing. They are just holding their gap and they are watching so they can break off the block,” Clemson left guard David Beasley said.
The Tigers (9-3) have seen this alignment before. Louisville runs the same scheme and the Cardinals run it as well as if not better than the Sooners. They held the Tigers to 72 rushing yards on 33 carries in their Oct. 11 meeting.
Louisville ranks third nationally in rushing defense at 93.7 yards per game.
“Louisville is a good comparison and also Virginia when Al Groh was at Virginia,” co-offensive coordinator Jeff Scott said. “They play that odd and Okie front so we definitely have seen it before, but I will say the linemen they (Oklahoma) have up front are probably bigger than some of the guys we have seen in the past play in those positions.”
Those linemen up front are nose tackle Jordan Phillips (6-6, 334), left side defensive end Charles Tapper (6-4, 281) and right side defensive end Chuka Ndulue (6-3, 289). Phillips has 32 tackles and seven tackles for loss, including two sacks, while Tapper has 36 tackles, 7.5 tackles for loss and three sacks. Ndulue has recorded 45 tackles, five tackles for loss, including 3.5 sacks.
“They are not trying to rush up the field and trying to make plays, they just sit there,” Beasley said. “They are going to pick a gap and then peek back and try to make a tackle inside the two-gap… They are just trying to stop you from running the ball.”
The 3-4 Okie front wants the nose tackle and the defensive ends to sit inside and force the offense to bounce the ball either outside to their linebackers that will be coming off the edge or up inside where the inside linebackers will be filling in the gaps.
The ends are lined up over the offensive tackle and are responsible for playing the B and C gaps, while the nose tackle lines up over the center and plays both A gaps.
Both inside backers, which are called the MIKE and JACK linebackers, align over the uncovered linemen—the two guards—and they will be responsible for filling in the A and B gaps.
“They are going to play seven guys around the ball on every snap,” Scott said. “They have big guys that like to two-gap and really hold you up so those linebackers can come up and make plays.”
With the two defensive ends and the nose tackle playing their alignments, the two outside linebackers will be on the ball and will try to make plays in the backfield. The weakside (WILL) backer will be looking for cutbacks and bootleg action, while the strongside backer (SAM) will try to contain his side of the field.
“We have to find ways to take care of the guys on the edge. They do a really good job of having their linebackers up on the edge in an Okie front,” Scott said. “Always having an answer for those guys and keeping them out of the backfield is the biggest thing.”
Screens, counters and cutbacks are ways to answer that. When Clemson had success moving the ball against Louisville in the second half, it used all three elements. After gaining just 70 total yards in the first half, the Tigers gained 156 in the third and fourth quarters.
Adam Choice, who tore his ACL a week later, rushed for 48 of his 61 yards in the fourth quarter, most of those coming on counters and cutbacks. Artavis Scott caught eight of his 10 receptions for 59 yards in the second half on wide receiver screens.
Clemson will also try to get their guards—Beasley and Reid Webster—up the field so it can take out a linebacker at the second level, opening up running lanes for running backs Wayne Gallman and Tyshon Dye.
Oklahoma (8-4) will try to beat this with blitzes and/or stunts. They will slant their defensive ends from time-to-time, stunt them with the outside linebackers or cross the inside backers up, all ways to protect the inside linebackers from both guards, who are uncovered.
The Sooners do a good job of this considering both inside backers are the top two tacklers on the team. Dominique Alexander leads the squad with 98 stops and Jordan Evans is second with 87 tackles.
“They also have really good athleticism. Their linebackers are former safeties so they are athletic guys that can really run,” Scott said. “They definitely present some challenges, but we play in a really good league here, too. We have played some really good defenses throughout and obviously we get to practice against a pretty good one every day.”