Bumped. GO BRUINS. -N

Got some time to kill right now, and I got ahold of a Cal-Oregon tape from a few weeks ago, so I thought I'd take a look at the Oregon offense under Chip Kelly. Oregon's offense has been one of the Pac-10's best in recent years, especially their running game. I'll present and break down a few of the things I noticed. Just keep in mind that I only watched one tape, the Cal game, and only really three quarters (game was basically over at that point). However, this should give you an idea of what to expect tomorrow.

Oregon's rushing game has boiled down to a few basic schemes over the past few years - the inside and outside zone, counter, draw, and some option. For all the hype about them as a "spread offense", a lot of their run game is basically the same stuff that our offense uses.

Zone

One of their bread and butter plays has been the zone play. Oregon runs two variants - the inside and outside. I did not see a whole lot of inside zone against Cal, but I know they have run it heavily in the past.  You're probably familiar with zone blocking, as it is one of the most common run plays in every level of football - professional, college, and high school. Here is an example of how Oregon lined up to run the outside zone against Cal.

They line up in Shotgun, Trips, and run the play to the TE side (left). There are 5 linemen and a tight end, who are responsible for blocking 6 guys playside. As it is outside zone, the back takes a very shallow angle parallel to the line of scrimmage and looks to break from end to sideline, rather from hole to cutback (as on the inside zone play). The corner, 3 down linemen, and 2 linebackers in the box are the players to get blocked. TE takes the corner, playside tackle and guard combo on the DE to the first LB, center and backside guard combo from NT to the second linebacker, and backside tackle gets the backside defensive end. The innermost slot receiver, Ed Dickson, blocks the linebacker who has walked out to line up across from him. 

Although many teams use a "zone read" where the quarterback "blocks" a backside player by reading his actions and making him wrong every time, the Ducks often have this decision pre-made and will just hand off every time, until the backside pursuit begins to become a problem, according to a presentation by Coach Chip Kelly. 

In this photo the exchange has been made, the back has the ball heading almost parallel to the line of scrimmage, and is looking for a hole to turn up into. The OL has engaged with the defensive line and are "keeping one eye" on the linebackers, ready to peel off whenever they threaten. The TE will block the corner outside and open up a lane between the hash marks and numbers.

Here you can see the wide open lane that the back has to run through. As you can see, the quarterback also has a lane as the defenders are all forced into the middle of the field. The play ended up as a gain of about 15 or 20.

Bubble

Alignment alone can make or break the bubble/WR screen. In this case, Oregon once again lines up with trips, although Cal only really puts two guys out there. The safety is the third man but it is 4th and 4 and he is about 10 yards deep and is not able to make the play. In reality, the only two threats are the players with red boxes, and Oregon trades two for two and uses two blockers to neutralize all the immediate threats. All they do is sling it out there and let the guy run for a first down. The screen works because defenses have the dilemma of keeping players in the box to stop the run or walking them out to align against trips. The play goes for a 1st down.

Zone Read with Bubble Screen

One new trend in spread football has been the addition of the bubble screen to the zone read. In the original zone read, the quarterback reads the end man on the line of scrimmage (the defensive end on the backside), and pulls the ball from the back's gut if he sees the guy crash down playside. Defenses have begun to fight this by using a "scrape exchange" in which the end always crashes down, with the linebacker over top instead "scraping" to the weakside. The QB sees the end crash playside, pulls the ball, looks to take off, and runs right into the linebacker. Offenses have countered this counter by adding a new wrinkle to the zone read - a bubble screen on the backside. 

In this example, Oregon uses a zone read look (although, as I said, I believe that they are moving away from "reading" and just having pre-called "reads" - might just be Coach Kelly's preference, or possibly just because he does not have as much trust as his quarterbacks as he did with Dennis Dixon - I don't follow Oregon football enough to really know). They once again have the trips look, with the tight end and zone blocking set to run to the right. The QB fakes a handoff (or reads and pulls it out, if they are reading the end man), while the line steps down and blocks as with the outside zone. On the backside the blocking is the same as the bubble screen above. 

Under a traditional zone read look, the quarterback would read the unblocked man on the end - in this case the outside linebacker who is just outside of the DE. In this case, that player steps up but drifts inside. For some reason a player slips through on the frontside to be blocked by the back, which strongly suggests to me that Oregon is not using these "reads" but just predetermining the mesh between back and QB. At any rate, the QB confronts the outside backer, but the flips the ball to the receiver behind the screen.

The play is basically a long option pitch at this point, with a pair of blockers in front of the pitch back. Luckily for Oregon, #30 at the bottom of the screen believed it to be a zone read as well and thought that the QB was going to run the ball - he turns his back to the receiver and is taken out of the play for a big gain. The addition of a bubble on the backside forces defenders to stay disciplined.

Curl/Flat

Curl/flat is a concept that is used by most modern offenses - one route to stretch the defense vertically down the sideline and another to threaten the flat. There are many different route combos that fit this concept - UCLA does a lot of this themselves. It can be a corner above a hitch route, or a vertical route and an out route, or a slant and a post, etc. What makes this work well for Oregon is the pressure that they put on the flat defenders because of their offense (see above). They are often put in a bind since they have to be on the lookout for bubble screens, the read, the option, and other plays. I believe that the flat defenders are the most picked-on guys by this offense, as they have so many things thrown at them.

In this play Oregon runs what looks like just a simple vertical route by the outside man, and has the tight end (Dickson) release to the flat after motion. They use play action of a power play (see below) with the motion to freeze the flat defender.

Dickson runs right by the flat defender who is thinking power play and makes an easy catch.

Power and Counter

These are two basic run schemes that most teams run - UCLA uses them as well as Oregon. The only main difference is that Oregon generally runs them out of shotgun (although they were backed up at one point against Cal and lined up under center to run these schemes). For all the talk of Oregon as a spread-option team, these two were the most common running schemes they used against Cal. I didn't chart plays but I would estimate at least about half of their running game, if not more. 

I'll show power first. Oregon lined up with the gun, motions the tight end playside (just like the playaction pass above), and hands off to the back who basically takes an almost direct route into the line. The playside guard and center block down to open up a hole and the backside guard pulls around to lead through - very basic stuff. 

Above you can see the hole forming as the linebackers get pinned to the inside by the puller and the down blockers.

And the back is off to the races. The only small difference between this and a "traditional" version from under center is that out of the gun, it might hit a little quicker and the back already has his shoulders square to the line of scrimmage - but other than that there isn't anything else really special about it.

As for counter, the concept is basically the same. Oregon likes to pull a backside lineman up and around to lead through, and have the rest of the line just down block. The back lines up offset on the play side, takes a few steps backside and then does about a 90 degree turn and follows the pulling lineman.

Here you can see the play diagram. Again, they motion Dickson to the playside (as they do on playaction).

Dickson heads out to block the corner, and you have the back ready to cut right and follow the pulling guard.

Here you see the guard picking up the linebacker and the back right on his hip.

Final observations
For all I've heard about UCLA struggling to stop "spread" teams, I don't buy it. I don't think that Oregon shows UCLA anything that is truly unique from other teams - as I said, power and counter make up over half of their running game, or it did against Cal. Oregon has been well-coached for years, and they have great talent, but schematically I do not see anything that would specifically cause UCLA problems.

One random thing that stood out to me was the QB, Masoli - he did a great job of faking whenever he did not have the ball. A few times he even fooled the camera man and myself. He looked pretty impressive against Cal, in terms of that as well as when he did have the ball.

Although it doesn't appear that Oregon is "reading" defenders to figure out where to go with the ball on its zone game, the coaches upstairs are no doubt keeping an eye on the defenders to figure out assignments. I don't think it is enough to "play assignment football" and "play disciplined" against teams like Oregon. Teams need to be smart and mix up assignments - playing games like the scrape exchange, in order to either provide "false reads" or to just have players in unexpected positions. I believe that the Bruins need to switch up assignments. Once the Oregon coaches start seeing which guys fly down to stop the pitch man, which guys rally up when they read bubble screen, and which guys press the quarterback on the zone play, they will begin to scheme in-game by switching up blocking assignments and plays in order to take advantage of that knowledge, so defenses have to me multiple and flexible to provide different looks. If you throw a 100 mph fastball every pitch you are still going to get one knocked out of the park - you need to switch things up as much as possible to keep the other guys guessing, and that goes for all aspects of the game.

Since I have that Cal game already and they are off this week before playing at the Rose Bowl, I'll try to get ahold of the Cal-USC game from last week and take a look at both tapes this weekend for a breakdown on Cal.