Recipe For Success: How Mike Yurcich Flipped Penn State’s Red Zone Fortunes in One Year
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The Red Zone – a place where elite offenses flourish and also-rans stall out like a 1977 Ford Pinto. To many, it’s puzzling why an offense can be so explosive, fluid and rhythmic in the open field then, suddenly, stub its toe and step on rakes once inside the final 20 yards to paydirt.
It’s an enveloping paradox Penn State offensive coordinator Mike Yurcich couldn’t untangle from during his first season in Happy Valley but did everything in his play-calling power to smooth out and make right in 2022.
As our friend and FTB contributor Nate Wilmot laid out in his end-of-year statistical recap, Penn State averaged 4.2 points per Red Zone visit in 2021 – “good” for a 114th place tie in FBS alongside neutered attacks like Rutgers and UMass. Last year, different story…the Nittany Lions averaged 5.8 points per Red Zone trip, trailing only Tennessee in this vital metric. Red Zone Efficiency represented the biggest year-to-year leap for Penn State in any basic or advanced statistical category.
So what (or who?) changed?
The best way to answer that is to first illustrate how offensive and defensive strategy shifts when teams line up in the shadows of the opponent’s goalpost, AND then analyze a couple of Yurcich’s play designs specifically sculpted to take advantage of a defense’s schematic tendencies inside the 20.
Man Beaters Inside The Red Zone
Oh, oh here she they comes…Watch out boy opposing defensive coordinator, she’ll they’ll chew you up…. Oh, oh here she they comes….She’s a These are manBeaterS.
As those reworked lyrics from Philly’s finest hint at, defenses tend to substantially increase their use of man coverage inside the Red Zone. From a defensive coordinators perspective, the condensed field eliminates the possibility of getting burned deep and encourages them to send more pressure as they have less interest in letting their defensive backs hang out 5 yards deep in the endzone.
To counter this trend, coach Yurcich carries a thick catalog of man-beater passing concepts.
Remember when Keyvone Lee scored the game winning touchdown on that wheel route against Purdue? Of course you do, but for the sake of posterity, here it is again:
So this play is widely referred to as MESH RAIL. The construct of the running back’s route calls for him to expand horizontally toward the numbers before turning up vertically. Against man, the RB is the QB’s primary read.
Purdue calls a Cover-0 Blitz — meaning the Boilers have manned up all the eligible receivers and will blitz the rest of their defenders. Seems like a simple enough assignment…and for many of Purdue’s defenders – like CB 23-Cory Trice who is tasked with following 18-Omari Evans at the bottom of the screen – it is. But for other Purdue defenders, there’s more for them to consider.
On this snap, the edge defender (42-Clyde Washington) plays a “blitz-peel” technique, meaning he supposed to come screaming off the edge to decapitate Sean Clifford unless the running back releases on a route to his side. Even for the most athletic edge rushers, this is a tough task. Now consider the circumstances: this the 5th consecutive play in which Penn State has ran tempo (notice the TV truck almost misses the snap) and Purdue is stuck in a look where the 1,973rd high school prospect from the class of 2020 is left 1-on-1 with a skill player in space. Checkmate.
When facing man coverage in the red area, it’s all about creating matchups and letting your players win.
Zone Beaters Inside The Red Zone
Alright, alright… but what about the rest of the time when the defense is playing zone coverage schemes?
Inside the Red Zone, Penn State also saw a lot of quarters coverage or “Red-4” from defenses. This coverage structurally defends the seams very well as the safeties police both hashes and everything in between. Yurcich combatted this defensive choice with a combination of “FIB” (formations into the boundary) and attacking the sidelines.
For instance:
In the first quarter against Northwestern, PSU aligns in a 3×1 formation with the trips lined up on the short side of the field. Keyvone Lee is also aligned on the right, making this a “4-Strong” formation. At the snap, Clifford and Lee bluff a “Toss Read” look with the center even opposite pulling – away from the fake — to freeze the second and third level defenders. Northwestern’s outside backer (34-Xander Mueller), who has run and pass defense responsibilities, immediately triggers on the fake toss and widens to force it back inside.
The two Penn State receivers – 3-Parker Washington and 5-Mitchell Tinsley — both run clear out posts to occupy the corner and near safety. This allows 86-Brenton Strange to sneak past Mueller, who is now covering Lee in the flat, and trot down the sideline untouched. Not sure if the flip at the end was designed or not, but it was a nice touch nonetheless.
Run Concepts Inside The Red Zone
The truth, while it may sound slightly boring, is that the root of the Nittany Lions’ Red Zone success was their ability to run their base offense from any yard line.
A lot of college football teams that live and die by the spread have to reinvent the wheel (and end up outsmarting themselves) as they get closer to the goal line. As a team who lived in 11 and 12 Personnel all game long, PSU’s advantage of not having to change much scheme-wise in the red area is a huge benefit. It also doesn’t hurt that had an exponential upgraded backfield tandem to utilize in 2022, either.
We’ve obviously talked plenty about the T Formation on FTB, so we can spare another explanation on Yurcich’s only real outlier personnel grouping.
The vast majority of PSU touchdowns from inside the 20 were a product of their offensive identity — the interior run game. Inside Zone, Inside Zone Split, and Inside Zone with one of their “Aces” in the flat as an RPO threat: the same plays they liked to run from midfield.
This prevented PSU from having to create any new tendencies inside the 20 that can make your offense so much more predictable. It also didn’t allow the defense to make any dramatic personnel substitutions either…and if you try to, well, Mitchell Tinsley might walk into the endzone like he did at the end of the 3rd Q vs Minnesota.
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