I'm not an option expert so can someone explain what they were doing that was confusing JT so much?
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Sure.
What matters for the reads is whether the front is 'odd' or 'even.' So a 4-3 alignment has 4 down linemen, so that's an even front. A 3-4 is an odd front. A 3-4 with both OLBs walked up to the line is effectively a 5-2, also an odd front.
So your reads change between fronts, not just in terms of who the option key is, but who we block and who we let through. So not only does the QB have to get the read right, so does the entire line and the leading A back.
Most teams who play against us pick one front they're going to use, and then have different defensive calls they use out of that front. So Miami and Georgia last year used the same alignment, 4-3 even front, deep mike LB. After the first drive, our reads are pretty much the same, so we settle in to running our stuff and everybody's on the same page.
ND is the first team I've seen that legitimately switched the entire front with almost every defensive call. They'd go 4-3, 3-4, 3-5, 4-4, 5-2, 5-3, and then they had maybe 2 or 3 defenses they would pair with each alignment. Mostly this screwed up our line. They would let two people through instead of one, so then we couldn't eliminate the other with the read. That or they'd just get beat on blocks, but a lot of times we weren't getting beat physically, we were not understanding who our man was.
The closest team to this is VT, who shows a 4-3 and then blitzes (or doesn't) an OLB to make it a 5-2 presnap, which would change the read at the last second. But not even VT rolls so many different personnel groupings and formations.
It was a very sophisticated defensive system. And yet, when we made all the blocks we'd still get a 60 yard run. And yet, if we could just block in pass pro and catch, we still could have moved the ball, because they were keyed up to stop the run and our guys were in single coverage most of the game.
