Hindsight 2021: PSU Offense vs. Ball State

In a Beautifully Boring 44-13 Blowout of Ball State, Penn State’s Offense Kept Plenty of Rabbits Tucked Inside Their Hats for Saturday’s Showdown on College Football’s Grandest Stage

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Wait, that’s it?

THAT’s the dreaded, painful learning curve required to master Mike Yurcich’s high-octane, bombs-away offense — 30 ugly, scoreless minutes in Madison?

You sure? Because when Joe Moorhead piloted this ship back in 2016, it took a good five or six weeks – sans the second-half comeback that wasn’t at Pitt — for the offense to sail straight and find the proper course.

And then last year…actually let’s not talk about last year. We’ll leave the subtle jabs at Kirk Ciarrocca’s jalopy, 3-wheel Dale offense to salty Sean Clifford.

Formations

What keeps you up at night?

Bills? Loveless marriage? ‘Are my kids gonna grow up to be a-holes?’ Wondering why co-workers lose their minds when they get to buy lunch prepared by a stranger in a truck?

Pfft, not us. Such trivial matters seldom disturb our evening symphony of snores. Instead, we worry about important stuff – you know, like when is our incessant summer research into Mike Yurcich’s offenses at Oklahoma State and Texas gonna pay off with some sweet, look-how-smart-we-are, concept comparisons between plays run in the past and plays we see now in the present at Penn State?

Finally, that day has come.

In 2018, Yurcich’s final season in Stillwater, Oklahoma State occasionally deviated from its usual two-back ballcarrier/non-ballcarrying Cowboy Back personnel grouping and inserted two running threats – 5-Justice Hill and 30-Chuba Hubbard – into this Shotgun split-back formation that Penn State trotted out for the first time on Saturday.

In this caffeinated sequence vs. Texas, Hill and Hubbard’s presence on the field at the same time creates a ton of defensive confusion both on the ground and in the air (note the Texas DB’s hard trigger on Hill coming out of the backfield on the first play, freeing the slot receiver on the wheel). Tempo intensifies the confusion even more. Impressive and imaginative sequence. Minor detail, but our lone knock was that Hill and Hubbard appeared to be allergic to blocking when the ball wasn’t in their hands.

No such issue on Saturday.

Outside Zone to the boundary.

86-Brenton Strange outweighs Ball State safety 23-Brett Anderson II by 55 pounds, and it shows. Penn State’s sophomore tight end leg-drives the Cardinals’ second-level edge setter/blocking sled with a heartbeat all the way to the invisible yellow first down line while future Transfer Portal dweller 28-Devyn Ford beautifully squares-up Ball State DB-14 J.T. Wahee – the only guy with a shot to stop this short of the end zone — before he can get a hand on Cain in the field of play.

On the sixth play of the ensuing drive, Yurcich lined up in the same split-back formation – this time with 24-Keyvone Lee replacing 28-Ford.

Quarters coverage. The 13-KLS clear-out vertical route draws attention from two of the deep defenders, cracking a tight window for Clifford to hit the wheel route. Lee out-athletes Ball State LB 9-Carlos Albright and creates just enough separation to gather this NFL-caliber throw from Clifford. Best ball of the season – accurate with a perfect blend of timing and touch.

Moving on…

Astute fans of our FTB Film Study series probably noticed that on Saturday Yurcich recycled a familiar, funky triple-option RPO concept that mobile QB Sam Ehlinger ran a bunch at Texas last season.

Texas RPO:

Penn State RPO:

Two reads for Clifford here. First, the fifth-year senior eyeballs Ball State edge rusher 27-Jimmy Daw. He crashes hard, overcompensating on the potential handoff to Cain, so Clifford wisely pulls. Next, Clifford’s vision progresses to our boy 23-Anderson who is stuck in a no-win situation – attack the QB, Clifford dumps it to 84-Theo Johnson, or shade toward the tight end, and Clifford keeps and probably scores. In tune with the Cardinals passive defensive approach all afternoon, Anderson doesn’t really pick a lane, which probably was the best decision.

 Finally, through two games, Mike Yurcich’s up-tempo attack feels like it’s still two or three knob clicks short of reaching 11, but he’s already put on tape plenty for Big Ten defensive coordinators to ponder – spefifically, there’s no real indictator on when he’ll press START on this maddening Merry-Go-Round. It doesn’t matter what personnel is on the field, making tempo impossible to anticipate.

On the first snap of this accelerated two-play sequence, Penn State lines up in ACE ‘Trident’ – 3 TE, Single Back, QB Under Center – and rips off a decent 8-yard run. Now it’s 2^nd and 2 — on schedule. Activate tempo, [ON] OFF.

Penn State switches to Shotgun Trips and clusters all 3 TEs at the bottom of the screen on this RPO. Huge bummer that unfavorable numbers – 4 defenders lined up south of the B1G logo vs. Strange, Johnson, and Warren – took the screen option off the table, robbing us this impending elephant parade. Clifford hands off…which is the correct read. Unfortunately, Cardinals DT-90 Joshua Tarango fights through an uninspired C-RG double team and dumps Cain for a forgettable two-yard gain.

Tempo ON [OFF].

Substitutions

 68-Eric Wilson has every right to ask us (presumably in some mangled Fargo/Fenway hybrid accent) whether or not we like apples. Why, you ask? Well, um, right after the senior announced his transfer plans we slammed his decision to not enroll at Penn State immediately, skip spring practice, and wrap up an Ivy League education he coulda got for $1.50 in late fees at the public library.

Oops.

Not only does Wilson possess a fancy piece of paper proving he’s wicked smaht, he also shut up our loud mouth and silenced the preseason debate on who should start at left guard. Thirteen plays deep against Wisconsin in Week 1, Wilson grabbed the baton from overmatched JUCO product 55-Anthony Whigan and hasn’t let go.

In fact, through two games we haven’t seen any non-garbage time rotation/substitution packages along the offensive line like we did in every contest last season – specifically at the guard spot. In the 4^th quarter, 72-Bryce Effner replaced Wilson for two series (although Wilson was eventually reinserted, which was odd). 73-Mike Miranda and 70-Juice Scruggs flip-flopped Center/Right Guard assignments late. 74-Olumuyiwa Fashanu tapped out starting LT 53-Rasheed Walker for the final 8 plays.

For the first time in 651 days, backup QB 2-Ta’Quan Roberson threw a pass. Two of them, in fact.

21^st Century Jim Thorpe, 8-Marquis Wilson, caught a pass that wasn’t exciting enough to clip. Hardluck senior 6-Cam Sullivan-Brown caught a pass that WAS exciting enough to clip – a tough, contested, off-target 16-yard grab in the middle of the field – but for some reason we never clipped it. Sorry Cam. Our bad. No other non-starting wide receiver was targeted.

24-Keyvone Lee finally stopped impersonating your drunk friend in a Dizzy Bat contest, which was a step in the right direction (pun intended). At the beginning of the second half, the new and improved slimmer/faster Lee ripped off more than 40 of his team-best 68 rushing yards on four consecutive carries.

Offensive Line

After setting the bar lower than Gary Coleman’s knees last week, Penn State’s offensive line couldn’t help but clear it against a risk-adverse Ball State defense that rarely pressured the passer with more than 4 rushers.

 Still, for Penn State, the same communication issues that granted rushers free access at Sean Clifford in Camp Randall persisted seven days later against rather rudimentary twists and stunts from Ball State.

Gotta fix that.

After literally bulldozing half of Illinois defensive line off the TV screen during a Will Levis touchdown run in Penn State’s rousing ‘Champions Week’ thumping of the COVID-depleted Illini, Juice Scruggs was a popular 2021 breakout candidate among media and fans. And, hey, he still could be. But it hasn’t happened yet.

However, on Saturday, Scruggs flashed an intoxicating mix of strength and athleticism – the two traits that fueled the left guard’s preseason hype train — on Jahan Dotson’s screen for 6 in the second quarter. Scruggs punctuates this 25-yard score with a Pete Weber-esque ‘7-10 split’ block on 1-Nic Jones who slides across the slick alley into 14-Wahee.

 Quarterback Play

 Two charts, one post. Don’t worry, it’s SFW.

*Does not include 3 Throwaways, but does include throws negated by penalty.

Instead of belaboring Clifford’s inaccuracy or Dance Dance Revolution footwork in the pocket, let’s do something a little different this week: Crawl inside the mind of Penn State’s QB and see what he sees.

Several pundits – including our film study guy – put this first-quarter scramble under the microscope already, pointing out that Clifford hesitated too long and failed to hit 86-Brenton Strange over the middle on the crossing route. After re-watching the sequence, IDK, hard to tell on TV but it does look like Clifford’s passing window was obstructed and in an instant that black-and-white striped back judge could be confused for a defender. To us, the egregious miss on this play was Clifford cycling through his progressions but not finding 6-CSB all alone in the flat. Count with us – one…two…three…13! – 13 yards of well-manicured Beaver Stadium turf stand between CSB and the closest Ball State tackler. Yet, Clifford never bothers to look to the left.

Second play:

Dotson running a short out is Clifford’s first read. Dotson should be Clifford’s only read because he’s wide freaking open. Snap. Step. Throw. Simple. But for some reason – perhaps Clifford failed to recognize coverage or falsely felt non-existent pressure – Clifford’s eyes move on from Dotson before the Big Ten’s best playmaker cuts outside. Clifford turns chicken**** into Chicken Cosmo and runs for the first down on a play that shouldn’t have required so much effort.

Third play:

Similar objective/different design to the Orbit cheese Wisconsin nibbled at on Sean Clifford’s underthrown 4^th quarter bomb to Jahan Dotson. By similar objective we’re referring to the fact that in an ideal world this concept would cause several defenders to take false steps toward the screen, thus freeing Dotson over the top. Obviously, no such luck. Pass Pro affords Clifford time to swing his head to the other side of the field and flip the ball to hard-to-tackle last resort 21-Noah Cain. So here’s an example of Clifford working through his progressions…at arthritic tortoise speed.

Baby steps.

Designed QB runs – the science-fair engine of Ciarrocca’s 2020 “offense” – reappeared twice on Saturday.

Oh, almost forgot, here’s the clip of 2-Ta’Quan Roberson’s first collegiate TD for all the irrational skyscreamers campaigning for the backup to start over Clifford. Enjoy your cookie.

Pass Catchers

*Does not include 5 uncatchable passes

Content to lose by four touchdowns, Ball State’s ridiculously deep zone drops nullified Yurcich’s vertical concepts and forced the Dale Earnhardt Jr. doppelganger to find other ways to get Dotson the football.

 3-Parker Washington’s Year 1 to Year 2 leap continued on Saturday with these two tough grabs.

Note to self: harvest clips for this section in the future. It’s been thin two weeks in a row.