Five Plays: Stanford Third Quarter

It took until the second half, but Louisville started to get more aggressive with their linebackers. On this play, Stanquan Clark times up the snap before shooting the gap to make a play in the backfield. He’s just unlucky because the play goes to the other side, which leaves him grasping for air. Stanford uses motion again on this play with a full shift of their tight ends across the field. Louisville tracks the motion, but you will notice that no one picks up the running back coming out of the backfield. So, on this play, Stanford takes advantage of two different issues UofL had in coverage earlier in the game. They don’t identify their responsibility after the motion, and they don’t account for the running back out of the backfield on a short-yardage pass. This is a nice play design and call by Stanford, but it would be nice to be able to say that the play just beat Louisville as opposed to the defense not even giving itself a chance. Lincoln Kienholz had his weekly instalment of “Man, it’s nice to have a quarterback who can do this” in the second quarter with his arm, but he does it with his legs on this play. I especially love the spin move that wasn’t really needed. I wrote about Louisville needing to attack the edges of Stanford’s defense in the What To Watch For post last week, so I was really happy to see them try to get outside a lot in this game. The first drive of the game was edge runs and swing passes, and they came back to it in the third quarter for this nice touchdown. As good as Isaac Brown is in space, he should buy dinner for Jaleel Skinner and TJ McWilliams for their blocking on this play. McWilliams is the outside receiver to the top of the screen. He gets up to the outside linebacker, who is flowing towards him before passing him off to Skinner, who gets outside after going in motion. McWilliams then moves up to the cornerback to create a tunnel for Isaac to run through. This is teach tape. I’m a bit of a broken record on this, but I don’t really understand why they can run this defense as often as they run Cover 3. Situations will dictate a lot of things, but the only real difference is that they are a little more spread out. But if this were first down, you would not be blitzing Kaleb Perry, who loops around on a stunt on this play. He would be right in the middle of the field to play the run. Ben Perry would also not be in press coverage in the slot. He would be backed off a bit and could react to a run play. If they were playing well in zone coverage, this wouldn’t be a problem, but at this point in the season I can’t understand why they haven’t adjusted. This was one of the dumbest calls I’ve seen in all the years I’ve been doing these film reviews. Stanford had just scored on the previous drive, and they had already shown that they could get explosive passing plays and chunk runs against this defense. A screen pass or a draw play to try to get a cheap first down makes much more sense here. Instead, they give the Cards an opportunity to get a true momentum-shifting play for a defense that had been gashed all day. It was really great to see everyone on defense make the right play here. Perry closes on the initial receiver, while TJ Capers immediately reacts to the pitch and makes a big hit on the receiver even though he didn’t make the catch. Tayon Holloway looks like he’s running a scoop-and-score drill, too. It looks easy, but picking up a fumble on the run like this gets bungled a lot. He does well to bend his knees and drop his butt, which is where a lot of guys get it wrong. They keep running while trying to grab the ball in stride. Secure the ball, then take off. Jabari Mack is good for one or two good plays a game, and this was a really good one. He is in man coverage on this play, but because he opens his hips at the beginning of the play, he is able to keep up with his man while also having an eye in the backfield. When Davis Warren commits to throwing the wheel route here, Mack breaks off of his man to get over the top and pick off the pass. This was also a really nice catch for a defensive back. He high-points the ball over the receiver, who is in position to catch the ball. Mack snatches it away before it hits the receiver’s hands. Louisville attacks the edge again, and Isaac Brown just does what he does. There are maybe five guys in the country who could score on this play, and it’s always nice to have one of those few.