USC Offense vs Morgan Scalley Utah Defense-Pac 12 Championship Game Part 1

Utah played USC twice in 2022. One was a 43-42 shootout in which Utah won. The other game was a 42-24 victory over USC in the Pac 12 championship. Both games were interesting but the way Utah defeated USC was impressive. I thought it was mostly because of the adjustments Coach Scalley made on the defensive end. Let's look at 2nd game  and you will see the adjustments in closer detail.

In the first game they played, Scalley ran some various coverage concepts and fronts. Surprisingly he stayed away from the odd front and primarily went 4-2 and bear. They played zero snaps of the odd look that was very successful game 2.

Also, in game 2, they brought continuous pressure. This hurt USC run game as well as their great play action game. The game plan of bringing pressure and playing more zone defense was very effective. Game 1 rushing , USC was 27-175 yards  with their tailback getting a big chunk at 15 for 92. The rest came from Williams and Addison on a few jets.

 In game 2, USC was 27 for 56 yards with their half back accounting for 15 carries for 35 yards. The ineffective run game definitely was a major factor as they also got away from their play action game. The constant 5 man pressures gave Williams fits all game.  

The other part that was key was the 2nd half adjustments made by Coach Scalley. They decided to go primarily zone in coverage and it was highly effective. They ran 21 snaps only ran 2 snaps of man concepts and 19 of zone when in odd. They held USC to 7 points in the 2nd half.

Fronts used by Utah in game 1 

Total snaps 65 

Bear 7 snaps   11%          

4-2.  58 snaps 89%.           1i mug looks from the 4-2(zero double mug looks game 2) 

odd. zero snaps!!

IN GAME 2 

Utah  played primarily 3 fronts without subbing and shown below:

Out of the 68 plays on defense they ran the following fronts in game 2

4-2. base      31 snaps.        46%

bear front      8 snaps         11%

odd front      29 snaps.       43%.       

Notes

Of those od fronts  they brought 5 or more 60% of the time! 18/29 was the amount of times they brought 5 players or more.  That is a very high percentage of blitzes.

When they went bear they brought 5 or more 8/8 times which is 100% from the bear front. 

Lets take a look at the fronts implemented.

4-2 front

4-2 was the other front they played a ton of. 21 and 20 are the inside linebackers and #8 is the strong safety. 

#8 is the strong safety.

Odd Front

This was the biggest change that Scalley made in the pac 12 championship game. 

What they did is they lined #91 in that spot for a number of snaps, but always brought him in pressure. It was brilliant and highly effective in their 4, 5 and 6 man pressures throughout the game. They brought him every time and didn't use him in coverage for 1 snap. 

Bear Front

The 2nd odd front was the Bear front. They would kick the DE down away from the strength call and walk the OLB up to the line of scrimmage.

Here are some interesting stats excluding (goal line 10 and in)

Coverage Breakdown by Odd and Bear 

Odd        30 snaps

               Rush                                Coverage          Snaps

               5 man rush.                       cover 2            11 snaps 

              5 man rush.                      cover 3              3. snaps

              6 man rush                        cover 0              4 snaps

             4 man rush.                    cover 4                 3 snaps (late game over)

             4 man rush.                       cover 0               4 snaps

             4 man rush                         cover 2               5 snaps 

Bear    8 snaps

            5 man rush                      cover 3                  4 snaps 

            6 man rush                       cover 0                 4 snaps

This is some of the alignments fronts and coverages they played in the Pac 12 Championship. Part 2 will look more closely at some of the schemes that were utilized. His game plan was very effective as well as some of the adjustments he made in the second half. 

We will look more closely at that in part 2!