Auburn coach tailors offense to fit players

[ScionOfSouthland]

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. - It's the spread, or smashmouth. It's about big passing numbers, or off-the-charts run stats.
All those descriptions can be fairly accurate for the hurry-up, no-huddle offense designed by Auburn coach Gus Malzahn back in his Arkansas high school days. They can each be totally off-base, too.

"All he's ever said is, 'We're a hurry-up, no-huddle team that takes advantage and is going to play physical football,' " said Chris Wood, Malzahn's former offensive coordinator at Shiloh Christian and Springdale High. "He didn't say we were going to throw it or run it. He lets his personnel define the team and define the offense.

"I guarantee you he loved running the ball in the SEC. That's how he is; he just wants to win."

Malzahn has won at every stop of the way with an offense he adapts to fit the personnel instead of the other way around.
The No. 2 Tigers (12-1) effectively switched styles four games into this season, and rode Nick Marshall and the running game all the way to Monday's BCS national championship game against No. 1 Florida State (13-0). The zone-read, where Marshall can either run or hand off based on what he sees from the defense, became the staple of Auburn's offense after a loss to LSU.

The offense then took flight, or more appropriately was grounded.

The result is the nation's top rushing team at 335.7 yards per game, an average just a few yards shy of the two games before the metamorphosis combined.

The offense that used to give Arkansas prep foes fits bedeviled the mighty Alabama defense and roughed up Missouri for 545 yards rushing and 52 points in the Southeastern Conference championship game.

Florida State defensive coordinator Jeremy Pruitt, whose defense yields the nation's fewest points, said the Tigers are just "doing a better job of executing than everybody else."

Part of Malzahn's philosophy is being willing to do what his quarterback does best. Marshall has run for 1,023 yards to complement Heisman Trophy finalist Tre Mason (1,621 yards), Corey Grant (650 yards), and Cameron Artis-Payne (609).

Auburn offensive coordinator Rhett Lashlee was an eighth-grade quarterback in Springdale, Ark., when Malzahn started running this no-huddle offense, and ran it for two years in junior high before taking over the reins at Shiloh Christian. He believes Malzahn "is the best play-caller in the country." Adaptability based on the personnel of the moment also sets Malzahn apart.

"I think so many times in our game you may see people that try to make a square peg fit in a round hole and make guys do things they want them to do but maybe they're not best at, and we just try to take the opposite approach with that," Lashlee said Thursday.

This season is a perfect example.

The Tigers have run on 70.7 percent of their plays, counting sacks as passes, far more than any offense in Malzahn's eight seasons as a college offensive coordinator or head coach. The next highest was the Cam Newton-led Auburn team that won the national championship in 2010 (66.4 percent), according to Stats Inc.

The 2010 team posted easily the highest percentage of run plays by a national champion since the 1997 Nebraska option offense ran 80 percent of the time.

Newton and Marshall are his only college quarterbacks to rush for 450 yards or more, although every one of his college teams has had at least one 1,000-yard rusher.

Malzahn's first Tulsa offense in 2007 ran just 47 percent of the time, and quarterback Paul Smith set an NCAA record with 14 consecutive 300-yard passing games. The Golden Hurricane led the nation in total offense in both of Malzahn's seasons as coordinator.

Current Tulsa coach Bill Blankenship said the running game was a key part of those offenses, too, whatever the perception.

"I think there's an illusion that it's always been pass," said Blankenship, also a member of that staff and like Malzahn highly successful in the high school ranks. He and Malzahn attribute that flexibility to the necessity of building around the available playmakers in high school.

Blankenship and Malzahn became acquainted when both were in the prep ranks.

Then Blankenship got more familiar with Malzahn's offense and its misdirection plays, sweeps, and reverses at Tulsa's football camps.

"It was this creative kind of mad-scientist look," Blankenship recalled. "When you get to know what's going on in the inside, there's a lot more systemic approach than what you realize.

"It's not just a collection of plays. It's really a pretty good system that he's developed over time, and he has answers and he builds on top of a play and on top of a play on top of a play."

http://www.philly.com/philly/sports...urn_coach_tailors_offense_to_fit_players.html

 

[TheTaxJacket]

I am so tired of this boards right now. It's going to be a really ööööty offseason.

How many times do I have to say here that PJ TRIED TO GIVE VAD LEE more passing. Vad Lee could not execute it accurately. How many times did PJ run the diamond with Tevin or Josh? Hmmm....let me think....ZERO!!!!

How many times did PJ let TW or JN take snaps from the shotgun not in a two minute drill situation? Rarely.

How many more pass attempts did PJ give Vad Lee per game? 6 more attempts and 30 more total for the season. How was Vad Lee's success with these extra attempts? 10% LOWER completion rate than TW with 30 less attempts in his 2012 season.

You guys once again don't want admit you all were wrong about Vad Lee. Pure and simple.

 

[GTEE3]

I will admit it. I was wrong when I thought Vad was >> Tevin.

Something just did not click here, maybe it was Vad, maybe it was CPJ, maybe it was the OL. Who knows.

Hopefully Vad will find a place to be successful and hopefully GT will find some rhythm
of offense.

At this point, it is what it is.

 

[cincytechie]

I am so tired of this boards right now. It's going to be a really ööööty offseason.

How many times do I have to say here that PJ TRIED TO GIVE VAD LEE more passing. Vad Lee could not execute it accurately. How many times did PJ run the diamond with Tevin or Josh? Hmmm....let me think....ZERO!!!!

How many times did PJ let TW or JN take snaps from the shotgun not in a two minute drill situation? Rarely.

How many more pass attempts did PJ give Vad Lee per game? 6 more attempts and 30 more total for the season. How was Vad Lee's success with these extra attempts? 10% LOWER completion rate than TW with 30 less attempts in his 2012 season.

You guys once again don't want admit you all were wrong about Vad Lee. Pure and simple.

Exactly. Vad couldn't run the TO and couldn't pass. That's not a good combination. Crazy that people on here still think he could be a good QB. Inaccurate QBs aren't successful. You could put him behind the Niners' O-line, run the spread, and he would still be awful.

 

[ramble on]

So why did we not run more diamond or pistol? VL was obviously not making all the option reads...

 

[76tornados]

Vad was not successful because of the OL, so CPJ stayed with his stuff most of the time. If we were blocking, he would have connected more. He still can't run the TO, which I was OK with. Not a fan of it anymore.

As long as Paul is here, I say run it. JT hopefully will take charge of it.

 

[ramble on]

It just kills me that when we did pass it was long, low percentage passes most of the time- which means you have to protect longer! Why the hell wouldn't you put in more intermediate/short routes!

 

[JJacket]

Auburn has way more talent than us. They got a lucky bounce against UGAg and Saban screwed the pooch against them. Sometimes, you catch a break. Right now, everyone is getting their rocks off over Auburn.

 

[aeromech]

It just kills me that when we did pass it was long, low percentage passes most of the time- which means you have to protect longer! Why the hell wouldn't you put in more intermediate/short routes!

We often had guys running routes underneath and the QB chose the deep guy regardless of coverage. I saw it happen more than once.

 

[TheTaxJacket]

So why did we not run more diamond or pistol? VL was obviously not making all the option reads...

Because he wasn't ööööing accurate enough at it!!!!

Why do you run something that will net you zero yards rather than use your running game that more than not gets you at least 3 yards when your QB isn't making the wrong reads, also another Vad Lee shortcoming.

Some of you seriously did not watch the games I think.

We aren't successful at this, so let's keep trying it. Yeah, because that makes sense.

 

[JJacket]

We had open receivers many times this season that Vad simply did not see or did not go through his progressions. On the series against UGAg where Godhigh caught the ball on about the 9 or so for a first in goal we has a wide open receiver, no one covering him, in the middle of the field that just had to catch the ball and it is a TD. He missed crap like that all year. The UN seats are great seats for seeing junk like this. A skilled QB would have punished VT and UGAg. Their corners often would just ignore the wideout, cheat in, and play 100% run. A good QB rains TD's on öööö like that until they adjust back, but we couldn't do it.

VT makes us prove we can pass. They play almost exclusively run until we show we can pass the ball. If we don't, they just stuff our run all game long.

Syracuse made the mistake of playing two deep safeties. We ate them up because we can run on that. I pointed it out to my dad all game long. They won't make that mistake next season. At times, VT or UGA looked almost like they were in a goal line defense, just daring us to pass. We couldn't effectively. I know he is a great QB, but put Manziel in our offense and he probably passes for triple the yardage or more than Lee. Teams would have to back off to watch the pass and we would eat them up running.

 

[msejacket]

I am so tired of this boards right now. It's going to be a really ööööty offseason.

How many times do I have to say here that PJ TRIED TO GIVE VAD LEE more passing. Vad Lee could not execute it accurately. How many times did PJ run the diamond with Tevin or Josh? Hmmm....let me think....ZERO!!!!

How many times did PJ let TW or JN take snaps from the shotgun not in a two minute drill situation? Rarely.

How many more pass attempts did PJ give Vad Lee per game? 6 more attempts and 30 more total for the season. How was Vad Lee's success with these extra attempts? 10% LOWER completion rate than TW with 30 less attempts in his 2012 season.

You guys once again don't want admit you all were wrong about Vad Lee. Pure and simple.

1. Then why not find something he can do well? Zone-read out of shot-gun/an occasional slant route out of shotgun, anything…(he hit a fairly nice slant route against UGA for a TD if I remember right, I didn't see a whole lot of those during the season.
2. And he if couldn't do anything well in the third year in the system--whose fault is that? Did he give himself a scholarship to Georgia Tech? Was he coaching himself?
3. If PJ is such a genius and as OC why hasn't he taken more of a proactive approach coaching the Quarterbacks in his system (and identifying their strengths) ?

 

[GEETEELEE]

1. Then why not find something he can do well? Zone-read out of shot-gun/an occasional slant route out of shotgun, anything…(he hit a fairly nice slant route against UGA for a TD if I remember right, I didn't see a whole lot of those during the season.
2. And he if couldn't do anything well in the third year in the system--whose fault is that? Did he give himself a scholarship to Georgia Tech? Was he coaching himself?
3. If PJ is such a genius and as OC why hasn't he taken more of a proactive approach coaching the Quarterbacks in his system (and identifying their strengths) ?

Johnson built the offense around Joshua's physicality, he changed it to take advantage of Tevin's more cerebral style. He designed the offense to use Vad's arm and athleticism and gave him the entire season to make it work. Vad is transferring because he wouldn't be starting next year...

 

[TheTaxJacket]

1. Then why not find something he can do well? Zone-read out of shot-gun/an occasional slant route out of shotgun, anything…(he hit a fairly nice slant route against UGA for a TD if I remember right, I didn't see a whole lot of those during the season.
2. And he if couldn't do anything well in the third year in the system--whose fault is that? Did he give himself a scholarship to Georgia Tech? Was he coaching himself?
3. If PJ is such a genius and as OC why hasn't he taken more of a proactive approach coaching the Quarterbacks in his system (and identifying their strengths) ?

Sometimes you just have busts. Recruiting is not a perfect science. Duke and NC State wanted him just as much as we did and David Cutcliffe is a QB guru.

Quit trying to find someway to blame the coach for something the kid didn't turn out so good at.

Vad Lee knew exactly what Paul Johnson likes to run when he committed here.

I mean it isn't like he was a five star recruit. He was a high 3 star or low 4 star by the three major services. He had very solid high school film and was undefeated his senior year at high school.

Also, look where Vad Lee spent his efforts over the summer. He was at multiple QB camps across the country. One if the camp coaches said he needed work on his mechanics. After year 3, he just didn't have it.

There are busts in every sport at every level. Recruiting is no science and some if you need to learn that.

 

[TechRush]

I did not see a whole lot of skills to tailor to. The fall down before you get hit skill, the throw a screen pass ten feet over your receivers head skill, or the stop and dance and turn a no gain into a 5-yard loss skill? Oh wait I almost forgot the get a 10 yard gain only to fumble skill.

 

[johncu]

Vad's failure was as much about attitude as anything. He was extremely hesitant running the option and we had to basically take the midline out of the play book because he was such a soft runner. That was our bread and butter with Josh and even Tevin at times, and Vad just couldn't do effectively, despite being plenty big and fast enough to get it done.

 

[lonestarjacket]

Johnson built the offense around Joshua's physicality, he changed it to take advantage of Tevin's more cerebral style. He designed the offense to use Vad's arm and athleticism and gave him the entire season to make it work. Vad is transferring because he wouldn't be starting next year...

I was going to post something similar but your version is more concise.

CPJ has adapted, and at times dumbed down, his offense to suit the strengths or weaknesses of the QB. He was never going to change it entirely.

 

[gtfan088]

I was going to post something similar but your version is more concise.

CPJ has adapted, and at times dumbed down, his offense to suit the strengths or weaknesses of the QB. He was never going to change it entirely.

And therein lies the problem. Like most coaches, he sticks with what he's used to. This would be okay if the system wasn't a turn off to most recruits.

When we initially hired him, I disregarded the claims made by outsiders (as well as some of our own fans) that he wouldn't be able to recruit the players for this offense because 1) I highly underestimated the style/substance evaluation that goes through the heads of 17/18 year old kids, and 2) I thought he had the same type of offensive mind that a guy like Friedgen had, where he could always come up with new ways to shred defenses.

So the recruiting issues have turned out to be greater than I thought they would (ratings haven't been that different than under Gailey, but we basically saw no improvement from winning the ACC) and PJ has been more married to his system than I figured him to be.

 

[AE 87]

1. Then why not find something he can do well? Zone-read out of shot-gun/an occasional slant route out of shotgun, anything…(he hit a fairly nice slant route against UGA for a TD if I remember right, I didn't see a whole lot of those during the season.
2. And he if couldn't do anything well in the third year in the system--whose fault is that? Did he give himself a scholarship to Georgia Tech? Was he coaching himself?
3. If PJ is such a genius and as OC why hasn't he taken more of a proactive approach coaching the Quarterbacks in his system (and identifying their strengths) ?

While I appreciate your zeal, people aint game pieces.
1) We had zone read plays from the diamond and he missed those too. Yes, he threw pretty passes, but he also overthrew a lot of pretty pass too and threw a lot of ugly stuff off his back foot.

2) He did stuff well but nothing great. He was still our best QB, and our offense was still decent. According to footballoutsiders opponent adjusted (no garbage time or game in hand data) rankings, we were still the #24 offense.

3) He did. That's why we ran so much rocket-toss during the last month or so.

 

[goldbybirth]

And therein lies the problem. Like most coaches, he sticks with what he's used to. This would be okay if the system wasn't a turn off to most recruits.

When we initially hired him, I disregarded the claims made by outsiders (as well as some of our own fans) that he wouldn't be able to recruit the players for this offense because 1) I highly underestimated the style/substance evaluation that goes through the heads of 17/18 year old kids, and 2) I thought he had the same type of offensive mind that a guy like Friedgen had, where he could always come up with new ways to shred defenses.

So the recruiting issues have turned out to be greater than I thought they would (ratings haven't been that different than under Gailey, but we basically saw no improvement from winning the ACC) and PJ has been more married to his system than I figured him to be.

He's been a system coach since he left UH and became a head coach. He has his 20+ years of comfort zone running his offense and adjusting to what the D shows early.

Why would he stray from what he knows to try something very different and then have to completely abandon his comfort zone and figure out a different way to coach.

If some school right now floated to their fanbase that they would hire CPJ right now for the same money, but with the condition he run a different offense, what would be the response?

It is what it will ever be.