Hindsight 2021: Penn State Offense vs. Villanova

 Judging From What Was Said Right After Penn State’s Never-In-Doubt 38-17 Rubber-Stamp Performance vs. Villanova, Good is Now the Enemy of Great as the Nittany Lions Offense Seeks Balance

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Burned through all our leaf blower material already. Therefore, executive decision: Pithy intros are reserved for FBS opponents.

Let’s get to it.

Formations

The week-to-week evolution of Mike Yurcich’s offense sort of resembles that famous 1965 Rudolph Zallinger ‘March of Progress’ illustration, you know the one where the monkey gradually morphs into early man…but in reverse.

On Saturday, the same modern mind that flung the ball all over the field, challenged refs’ cardiorespiratory capacity with his Meep-Meep tempo, and reduced tough-guy defenders to nothing more than a bunch of injury-faking thespians four years ago at Oklahoma State lined up in what Wikipedia calls “the oldest formation in American football” – the T formation, invented in 1882 by Walter Camp and revived 50 years later thanks to a revolutionary, game-changing innovation…the introduction of the hand-to-hand center-quarterback snap.

Newsreel VO: Ol’ Noah “Swivel Hips” Cain totes the precious pigskin for two hard-fought yards to the delight of the rip-roaring rooters of the Nittany Valley. Boy, I tell ya, the fine folks of the Keystone State haven’t seen a man surge through a line like that since Andrew Carnegie’s ruffians tried to bust the union at Homestead Mill back in 1892.

To learn more about the T-Formation visit Pattee Library (once Yurcich returns the checked-out copy of American Football, c. 1891) or visit your great-grandfather. I’m sure he misses you.

Moving on…

Yurcich featured 2- or 3-tight end personnel packages 27 times against Villanova and didn’t roll out any 3-wide receiver looks until the 10^th play from scrimmage. Yurcich has not shown us any true 4-WR personnel packages – a staple at Oklahoma State –this season. At least one tight end has been on the field for every Penn State offensive snap in 2021.

After googling Famous Warrens, we’ve decided to name Penn State’s Tyler Warren Wildcat goal line package REGULATOR in honor of one-hit-wonder 90’s rapper Warren G. For those who drank themselves into a coma while tailgating two Saturdays ago and just woke up, REGULATOR starts with quarterback 14-Sean Clifford split out wide and no one behind the center to receive the snap. Tight ends 86-Brenton Strange and 44-Tyler Warren shift into the backfield, Warren receives the direct snap and bulldozes forward.

Substitutions

Garbage Time Roster Dump Roll Call 2021! (nightclub airhorn SFX)

Freshman wide receiver 85-Harrison Wallace played. COVID mulligan freshman 19-Jaden Dottin played. Short-lived Podcast sensation 66-Nick Dawkins played center for the final two snaps of the game. Transfer Portal residents-in-waiting 26-Caziah Holmes and 28-Devyn Ford stepped off the sideline in the 4^th Quarter, as did All-Name Team honoree 38-Tank Smith.

21^st Century Chuck Bednarik 8-Marquis Wilson saw a total of 21 snaps (10 on offense, 11 on defense) and actually showed off some decent post-reception wiggle.

(scans chart) What else we got here…oh, 68-Eric Wilson moved to center instead of 70-Juice Scruggs (the backup center vs. Ball State) on the first full drive of the 4^th Quarter.

For the first time this season, all three tight ends – Warren, Theo, Strange – exceeded 30 snaps each. This has to be the zenith of tight end involvement for 2021, right? Can’t imagine Yurcich sticking with these aforementioned Cro-Magnon concepts much longer.

Run/Pass Blocking

Calloused readers of this nearly year-old blog – boy, time flies when you’re repeatedly slamming your work laptop shut as the boss bolts in the office because you’re waxing poetic about zone reads on the company dime, eh? – know that when it comes to critiquing Penn State’s offensive line we are Don Quixote and silver linings are our windmills. Obsessively, we chase after positives even though they’re nowhere to be found.

In fact, the sole snippet of good news to pontificate after rewatching Saturday’s snoozefest was that the Nittany Lions’ rushing attack was so atrocious that it did not leave us the necessary bandwidth (thanks WordPress) to properly lament the fact that Sean Clifford operated from a dirty pocket on 5 of his initial 9 dropbacks.

One-third of the way through a season that suddenly has high-end stakes no one besides Mike The Mailman foresaw four weeks ago, Penn State ranks 13^th in the Big Ten with 113.5 rush yards per game, besting only Purdue. If the season ended today (which it doesn’t, but if it did) the Lions’ 3.4 yards per carry average would be the second worst of any squad in the James Franklin era, topping the sanction-riddled 2014 team’s 2.9 YPC average.

So what’s the problem? And how does it get fixed?

Well, Lazy Transition Device, much like the Facebook relationship status of that person you can’t stand, it’s complicated.

The running game malaise is not attributable to ONE thing, but can’t be blamed on EVERYTHING, either. It’s a missed assignment here, a wrong cut there, a bad RPO read by Clifford, or, like on Saturday, it’s Penn State’s normally block-y trio of ‘ACES’ folding against FCS defenders.

Let’s unpack this sequence of suck:

Play 1: Six Villanova defenders in the box vs. Five PSU OL + 84-Theo Johnson lined up at wing back – advantageous numbers for the good guys. Zone Read. Before and during the mesh, 14-Sean Clifford monitors temporarily unblocked Wildcats playside DE 92-Malik Fisher and correctly hands off to 10-John Lovett when Fisher chooses not to crash hard on the exchange. Pulling RG 70-Juice Scruggs does a serviceable – not stellar — job sealing Fisher as Lovett hits the hole. The other four linemen put a hat on a hat, leaving Johnson one-on-one coming across the formation to dismiss LB 43-Forrest Rhyne…except he doesn’t. Heck, he barely lays a hand on Rhyne. One-yard gain.

Play 2: A+ push from the offensive line. A+ loft from the inflated condom. F- split zone block by 44-Tyler Warren on Villanova LB 4-Qwahsin Townsel.

Play 3: This unbalanced wall of humanity – 5 OL, 3 TE – crumbles when 6-foot-4 Brenton Strange can’t eclipse 5-foot-9 Villanova LB 29-Amin Black. Honestly, I can’t figure out what the heck even happened on this play, but it’s evident it wasn’t good considering Strange ends up on the turf.

As much as we’re addicted to pancake porn, it’s not a requirement to WWE (verb) defenders on every single play. Sometimes – as we see here in Warren v. Black on a decent second-half 9-yard gain – it’s OK to be the flattenee instead of the flattener as long as you create enough interference to prevent the hole from collapsing.

Gotcha. So blame the tight ends?

No, not entirely.

Is it just us, or does it seem like many of Yurcich’s designed runs out of under-center formations are incredibly slow developing? For instance, this counter:

No complaints about the blocking here. All good. But it takes 24-Keyvone Lee FOREVER to get this handoff – more than enough time for a linebacker and a safety to trigger downhill and force Lee to dodge two dudes and lose a shoe before reaching the LOS.

Gotcha. So blame the coaching?

No. There’s more.

A relatively unmentioned fly in the run-game soup has been Clifford’s sporadic ‘Give-Pull-Throw’ choices on zone read and RPO concepts. For as quickly as the 5^th-year senior has picked up new principles of the passing game, he’s still somewhat spotty processing information when it can’t be deciphered pre-snap.

THROW THE BALL TO WARREN! Villanova brings a safety to the line of scrimmage late, but not SO late that Clifford can’t adjust his read and figure out this simple equation: 7 defenders – 5 blockers = 2 unblocked defenders. Warren’s glance back at Clifford reveals there’s a ‘flip-to-the-TE’ option attached to this play that should have been taken. Either that, or Clifford should’ve just pulled and darted off edge with Warren out front like a sled dog.

Here’s another poor read – Clifford nullifies what looks like ironclad outside zone blocking to the boundary and keeps (even though no one crashes) when he should give:

Adding Clifford to the list. Are you done yet?

Almost.

Thus far, Penn State’s square-peg running backs haven’t fit in Yurcich’s round-hole wide/outside zone system. Certain runners have fared better than others, but no one looks entirely comfortable executing this X’s and O’s philosophical shift through four games.

Ahh, OK. So it’s the tight ends/quarterback/play design/running backs that are messing this all up. Pretty much everybody except the offensive line, right?

God no. They stink, too.

 Quarterback Play

Once a gross, ginger caterpillar, Sean Clifford has finally busted through that restrictive, suffocating Ciarrocca cocoon and now flies high as a beautiful burger-endorsing, merch-peddling, football version of Tom Emanski butterfly.

* includes throws negated by penalty.

Really, our lone nitpicky knock on Clifford’s Co-B1G Offensive Player of the Week performance was that he occasionally scoffed at easy completions in favor of low-percentage, BTN Standout tosses Sponsored by Auto-Owners Insurance that would’ve raise his 2021 Heisman odds from 1,000-to-1 to 999-to-1. Like here:

Twins look to the field. Play Action. 86-Strange stays in to block but eventually fans out to the flat when he recognizes Villanova isn’t bringing extra guys. I mean, he’s wide open and isn’t getting less than 15 yards unless he trips, but Clifford has already decided to throw the skinny post to 6-Cam Sullivan Brown. The wayward attempt takes DPI out of the equation. 2^nd down.

Again, it’s nitpicky. But it’s all we got. Clifford didn’t leave much room for criticism, starting with Play 1.

In a vacuum, this was Clifford’s best deep ball of the season. I’d contend his TD to Dotson in the season opener was more difficult (and therefore more impressive) because of the collapsing pocket from which it was tossed, but this 52-yard layup was pinpoint accurate.

Even though Dotson hasn’t cleared the defender when the ball is thrown, Clifford chucks it up skyward anyway and trusts that his soon-to-be millionaire teammate will out-athlete an FCS corner. Good call.

Here’s another clean-pocket dime:

Villanova drops 8 with a spy (for some reason) but Clifford’s impressive velocity cuts through the coverage for a too-easy score.

Even though Clifford has thrown two interceptions this season, the shut-ins at PFF haven’t docked the third-year starter with any ‘Turnover Worthy Plays’ – meaning both picks weren’t his fault. Through four games last season, Clifford recorded 9 ‘Turnover Worthy Plays.’ But despite playing a noticeably safer brand of quarterback, Clifford hasn’t lost his uncanny knack for the spectacular.

Clifford feels pinched by the Nova DEs, so he climbs the pocket, escapes to his right, and baits 29-Black into ditching coverage on 84-Johnson. Once Black commits to stopping the scramble, Clifford halts at the LOS — like plucky Moonlight Graham did on Ray Kinsella’s plowed cornfield when that girl was choking on a hotdog — before dumping it off to Johnson.

This play below is even better. Clifford avoids an untouched outside blitzer, flees other trouble and flings a ball with a supreme mix of touch and velocity to Dotson near the sideline.

One more:

Sweet improv. The Villanova DB koalas (verb) Dotson on the attempted screen out of Trips causing Clifford to pump then tuck the ball away like a runner. But when Wildcats DB 2-Denzel Williams abandons covering the pass and races toward Clifford, the savvy senior quickly untucks the ball and hits 13-KLS on a harder-than-it-looks short toss.

Pass Catchers

For the first time this season, Parker Washington’s average depth of target exceeded 10 yards – 11.0 to be exact – and not coincidentally the sophomore from suburban Houston posted his best stat line as a collegian.

*Does not include 4 uncatchable passes, but does include catches erased by penalty

Last week we dogged Washington’s timid and indecisive nature post-catch, especially on third down receptions that should have picked up first downs but didn’t. Well, problem solved.

Washington toasts his defender but has to hit the brakes and adjust to a mechanically unsound, severely underthrown pass from Clifford. But watch Washington after the catch: Instead of turning and facing the DB – like he did more than once against Auburn – Washington pivots and blindly explodes upfield. No hesitation. No wasted steps. Nothing to criticize.

Granted, it’s Villanova, but Washington’s acceleration and top-end speed on that play you just watched and this play (below) you’re about to watch raised our overgrown eyebrows.