Just a little preview on UT's defense, their alignments, what they like to do, and where they can be vulnerable.
Cover 4
UT's DC is Tim Banks. He was the DC last season, too. He worked under Brent Pry at PSU so the defensive coverage and alignments have a bunch of similarities...which is also why in last season's preview I used the Pitt-PSU tape from 2019 to see what UT's defense would probably look like and how Whipple would try to attack it.
This is only a basic representation of Cover 4 but it's a good starting point for understanding where the soft spots are in the scheme.
Pretty easy to identify. The biggest difference here being that UT generally plays with a stand-up (left side of the OL here). He sorta feigns like he's not coming but all you have to do is look at the number of players on each side to figure out that he's coming off the edge.
Using the handy picture from above and comparing it to this in-game shot against Ball St...where do you think coverage looks the softest? Right around the left side of the "T" logo. The OLB's have to cover to the sideline, the secondary has to respect any vertical route. This leaves the MLB to patrol a whole lot of grass. Pitt's solution to this problem with the conventional Cover 4 is playing very aggressively with the safeties and pressing to the outsides and bring tons of pressure. This forces teams to throw low percentage throws deep down the sidelines. Tennessee, on the other hand, plays a much softer Cover 4 shell meaning they are more sound against vertical routes but can be had in the middle of the field if the QB is accurate and has adequate protection.
You can see how coaches like to attack this defense and where the soft spots are when they are in the base coverage.
Pitt's offense really turned the corner when Whip/Pickett started dialing up spread sets and more intermediate routes. The short stuff early just wasn't working mostly because UT WANTS teams to see that softer look and throw quickly underneath so they can attack the ball coming forward.
Different teams. Different years. Same principles. Softish Cover 4 look and attacking the quick throws with speed.
Here's another nice way to attack the UT defense. Flood concepts. Flood, for anyone unfamiliar, means overloading a zone defense with receivers so that the offense players outnumber the defensive players. Against a Cover 4 like UT's, if you can force the CB to run vertical, the hook/flat player has a LOT of territory to defend. The idea being you can get the ball over the head of the underneath defender and in front of the CB/Safeties because they have to honor the vertical throw.
This game also incidentally is when it became clear to me that Pickett could make NFL caliber reads in addition to NFL throws. But you can see the concept. Run off the CB, put the underneath player in a bind, hit the intermediate drag to Mack coming across.
And with Ball St., the RB actually held the backer closer to the line of scrimmage and the outside backer was getting to his sideline drop area leaving the grass between the LB's and the secondary wide open for the TE on the intermediate drag.
That's it for now. I'm already pretty amped for this week.
Cover 4
UT's DC is Tim Banks. He was the DC last season, too. He worked under Brent Pry at PSU so the defensive coverage and alignments have a bunch of similarities...which is also why in last season's preview I used the Pitt-PSU tape from 2019 to see what UT's defense would probably look like and how Whipple would try to attack it.
This is only a basic representation of Cover 4 but it's a good starting point for understanding where the soft spots are in the scheme.
Pretty easy to identify. The biggest difference here being that UT generally plays with a stand-up (left side of the OL here). He sorta feigns like he's not coming but all you have to do is look at the number of players on each side to figure out that he's coming off the edge.
Using the handy picture from above and comparing it to this in-game shot against Ball St...where do you think coverage looks the softest? Right around the left side of the "T" logo. The OLB's have to cover to the sideline, the secondary has to respect any vertical route. This leaves the MLB to patrol a whole lot of grass. Pitt's solution to this problem with the conventional Cover 4 is playing very aggressively with the safeties and pressing to the outsides and bring tons of pressure. This forces teams to throw low percentage throws deep down the sidelines. Tennessee, on the other hand, plays a much softer Cover 4 shell meaning they are more sound against vertical routes but can be had in the middle of the field if the QB is accurate and has adequate protection.
You can see how coaches like to attack this defense and where the soft spots are when they are in the base coverage.
Pitt's offense really turned the corner when Whip/Pickett started dialing up spread sets and more intermediate routes. The short stuff early just wasn't working mostly because UT WANTS teams to see that softer look and throw quickly underneath so they can attack the ball coming forward.
Different teams. Different years. Same principles. Softish Cover 4 look and attacking the quick throws with speed.
Here's another nice way to attack the UT defense. Flood concepts. Flood, for anyone unfamiliar, means overloading a zone defense with receivers so that the offense players outnumber the defensive players. Against a Cover 4 like UT's, if you can force the CB to run vertical, the hook/flat player has a LOT of territory to defend. The idea being you can get the ball over the head of the underneath defender and in front of the CB/Safeties because they have to honor the vertical throw.
This game also incidentally is when it became clear to me that Pickett could make NFL caliber reads in addition to NFL throws. But you can see the concept. Run off the CB, put the underneath player in a bind, hit the intermediate drag to Mack coming across.
And with Ball St., the RB actually held the backer closer to the line of scrimmage and the outside backer was getting to his sideline drop area leaving the grass between the LB's and the secondary wide open for the TE on the intermediate drag.
That's it for now. I'm already pretty amped for this week.
