Dial ‘M’ For Methodical
For the Penn State offense, it’s starting to feel like 2020 again, boys and girls. And, believe it or not, that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
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We were promised fireworks – the big, loud, colorful, explode-y sort; the kind your Instagram followers (or Facebook friends if you’re 55) insist on posting every July 4th for reasons that escape us – but through four weeks our hands are starting to burn from holding sparklers too long.
We were told this would be a thrill ride in a Ferrari – fast, exhilarating, the ultimate six-figure neutralizer of height and physical appearance – and instead we’re stuck in a Ford Fiesta Uber with a driver who won’t stop talking. Yeah, sure, we’re reaching our desired destination but the journey from Point A to Point B has been several galaxies shy of glamorous thus far.
All off-season, pundits gabbed we’d see the best of Mike Yurcich. You know, deep balls flung all across the yard. Rainbows. Points-a-plenty. Home run carries. Pixie dust. Puppy dogs. Exotic formations that feel like your first kiss. Tempo. Smashmouth spread. Taco Bell at 3:14 a.m., eight drinks deep. And yet, if anybody had the gumption to tug at the third-year PSU OC’s five-o’-clock shadow, it wouldn’t shock us if the guy pulling the offensive levers is really Kirk Ciarrocca in a Scooby Doo “bad guy” mask.
Statistically speaking, the 2023 Penn State offense makes zero sense. Blue and White bizzarro world.
Roughly 1/3rd of the way through a season that feels really, really special, the stacked Nittany Lions have eked out nine (9!) plays from scrimmage that have amassed 20+ yards, good for a 129th place tie nationally with Navy. Yet, Penn State’s current streak of 11 consecutive games scoring at least 30 points is the longest running in FBS.
Penn State is averaging 5.2 yards per play this season vs. non-FCS competition. That’s worse than Minnesota (Ciarrocca’s old stomping grounds) and Rutgers (Ciarrocca’s current place of employment). But despite that modest per snap output, the Lions are somehow averaging 449.8 total yards per game, ranking a respectable 33rd overall in FBS.
Among non-service academy institutions, Penn State tops college football in time of possession at 35:21 per contest this season — for those curious, that’s 3rd overall behind Army and Air Force. In 2022 and 2021, Yurcich’s Penn State offenses ranked 51st and 114th in time of possession, respectively. In fact, in Yurcich’s previous nine seasons as a P5 offensive coordinator his squads had never cracked the Top 50 in T.O.P and finished 6 of those years ranked in the 100’s.
Up is down. Left is right. Finkle is Einhorn.
So what’s the deal?
Well, lazy transition device, like a disgruntled significant other who sat you down for one of those “We Need To Talk” Talks, it’s not just ONE thing. It’s a lot of things.
Sans a few WOW outliers (like this one), Penn State QB Drew Allar has mostly been pre-broken arm Henry Rowengartner in Weeks 2-4. Versus Delaware, Illinois, and Iowa, Allar threw two passes that traveled 20 or more yards through the air. For the season, his average depth of target has been a paltry 6.0 yards. Among 14 Big Ten quarterbacks who have reached a minimum threshold of 48 dropbacks this season, Allar’s average depth per target ranks last – a full two yards and a few inches (2.1 yards, to be exact) behind 13th place Tanner Mordecai of Wisconsin.
For comparison, Sean Clifford’s average depth per target was 8.6 in 2022 and 8.8 in 2021. During Yurcich’s Tee-It-High-And-Let-It-Fly prime at Oklahoma State – 2016 through 2018 – the Cowboys starting QBs’ average depth per target was 11.1, 12.1, and 12.4.
Of course, you don’t have to chuck the ball deep or be reckless/careless to generate big plays in the passing game…but you do have to bypass the temptation of always plucking the lowest hanging fruit.
For instance:
Nothing wrong with Allar’s choice here. You’ll never go broke taking a profit…except if you fumble the bag like 11-Malik McClain does on this play. Anyway, you get the idea: Allar exploits soft coverage and tosses a low-risk, decent-reward, free-access throw that should have moved the chains.
HOWEVER, rewatch this clip and peep what Yurcich has cooking on the opposite side of the field. Specifically, focus on 10-Nicholas Singleton.
Since Bret Bielema’s arrival in 2021, Illinois has thrived as a predominantly Cover 1 defense – underneath defenders in man coverage with a centerfield safety lined up in East St. Louis most downs. On this play, that’s 10-Miles Scott, the guy on the midfield logo who backpedals off camera post-snap. He’s the defense’s only ‘help.’ Everyone else not rushing the QB has a strict man-to-man coverage assignment.
For Penn State, the most tantalizing mismatch to exploit in this Shotgun Splitback formation is the All-Conference RB tandem 10-Singleton and 13-Kaytron Allen vs. Illinois linebackers 39-Kenenna Odeluga and 28-Dylan Rosiek
The Penn State offensive line slants in the opposite direction of the run action, a ploy that causes Odeluga to take an ill-advised step away from his coverage assignment, Singleton. Basically, 0.5 seconds into this play, Odeluga is toast. To keep the free safety from floating to the field side and capping Singleton’s rail route, 1-KeAndre Lambert-Smith runs a hard-charging skinny post to occupy the deep centerfielder.
Unfortunately, Allar is in such a rush to deposit the ‘sure thing’ he hurries through the play fake and never looks at the potential gimme touchdown developing to his right.
Later in the game, presumably after communicating with Yurcich and Danny O’Brien about the untapped mismatch he ignored earlier, Allar makes the same safe decision when presented with the same scenario – rushing through a sloppy play-action fake to get the ball to the perimeter fast. Batted ball. Incomplete.
Here’s one more example:
Three-pronged levels concept to the boundary involving 13-Allen and a pair of ACES (84-Theo Johnson and 44-Tyler Warren). Fearing an early-game safety or worse, Allar panics and flips the ball prematurely to Allen instead of waiting to read whether he should throw short, medium, or far. Given the field position and stage of the game, this decision is somewhat forgivable.
Turning our attention to the run game, the Lions rank 2nd in the Big Ten averaging 210.0 rush yards per game but dip to 9th in the conference with a click of the ‘yards per carry’ tab. What’s worse, Penn State’s season average of 4.4 yards per rush receives a helpful nudge thanks to the garbage-time excellence of backup QB 9-Beau Pribula and third-string RB 23-Trey Potts – 5.3 and 5.9 yards per rush, respectively.
Two weeks ago, Coach Codutti shared his hypothesis why Penn State wasn’t ripping off long runs at the same rate it did a year ago, so we won’t rehash those previously-recorded observations…but we’ll toss in a few extra.
Are we sure the off-season ‘Return Of The Fatman’ was the right move? According to the official 2022 PSU roster, Allen weighed 201 pounds as a true freshmen. This year, he weighs 222 pounds. And while the S&C staff categorized those #gainz as “good weight” it’s still extra baggage that hasn’t equated to any real statistical benefit thus far.
The new, bigger Allen hasn’t pushed the pile any better, slipped more tackles, or required additional defenders to bring him down. Through 4 games, PFF credits Allen with 8 ‘Missed Tackles Forced’ in 63 total carries. Through 4 games in 2022, Allen had 10 ‘Missed Tackles Forced’ in 36 carries.
While it’s still early, we’re also seeing fewer examples of Allen’s elite vision and lateral bounce in traffic than we did a year ago. Instead, we’re getting a lot more of THIS (below) – Allen running into his own blockers at the second level, unable to maneuver through congested quarters like before and squirt free and find daylight.
Example 1:
Example 2:
Example C:
For Singleton, it’s quite possible that the glowing, positive offseason narrative of his in-season development as a runner (a narrative we helped foster, admittedly) has tipped the gifted back’s decision-making scales too far in the other direction. If anything, Singleton’s been too disciplined as a runner this season, too rigid in staying within the designed construct of the play, reluctant to freelance like he did as a freshmen.
Singleton’s also been a tad unlucky, as some of his best touchdowns runs have occurred near the goal line.
Singleton could have run to infinity and beyond on that play. Instead, he’s credited with 16 yards.
So should we be worried that Penn State’s offense is more tortoise than hare at this point?
Not necessarily, lazy transition device.
There’s a new, ‘it’ metric when deciphering whether a college team is a legit CFP contender or not: Expected Points Added, or EPA for short. According to PFF, “EPA is a measure of success which defines the value of each play by the effect it has on the offense’s likelihood to score.” Dumbed down, EPA is a slightly fancier way to determine offensive and defensive competency using situational factors like down, distance, and field position.
Surprisingly, despite its plow horse persona on offense, Penn State has fared well in EPA this season, especially when measuring Total EPA Margin: an advanced metric that combines Offense and Defense EPA. According to our friends at cfb-graphs.com, Penn State ranks 1st in the Big Ten and 9th in FBS in Total EPA Margin (0.354).
Individually, Penn State’s Offense and Defense both top the Big Ten in EPA – Offense 37th nationally (0.201), Defense 8th nationally (-0.153).
