Man coverage example vs. Indiana

As I continue my crusade to see more man coverage from the Michigan defense, I want to take a look at a specific play from the Indiana game on which Michigan was successful running it and why it was successful.

Indiana is in a three-wide pistol look with with a half back and H-back in the game. Michigan is in their base formation with base personnel. Michigan is going to play straight man coverage with cover-2 safety help over the top. Jordan Kovcas is covering the weakside deep half and Cam Gordon is over the strongside deep half. JT Floyd and James Rogers are covering the wide receivers with Rogers playing six yards off the line of scrimmage and Floyd play bump and run coverage. Carvin Johnson is shaded over the slot receiver and will play man coverage against him. Roh is rolled up to the line of scrimmage and is responsible for the H-back. Jonas Mouton and Obi Ezeh are spying Chappell and the running back.

On the snap, the H-back releases right away. This is Roh's man to cover. The half back will step up in the pocket to help block. Floyd has jammed his receiver at the line while Johnson and Rogers are playing softer coverage and waiting for their receivers to head upfield.

Roh is engaged with the H-back and has defensive help from the other linebackers. Floyd is still jamming his receiver. Johnson is close to the slot receiver and in good position to make a play on the ball if the pass comes. Rogers looks like he's out of position but he's not: he's baiting Chappell to make a throw from across the hash to the other sideline, a long pass that he should be able to pick off. Ezeh and Mouton continue to spy the men in the backfield.

This is where the play  really comes together. Indiana had been running plays like this all game to great effect. They'd send multiple receivers into Michigan's defensive zones and have them sit down or cross through them (as the H-back is doing here). When Michigan finally broke that tendency, Chappell was caught by surprise. He was expecting to be able to find one of the various soft spots in Michigan's zones and pick up five yards.

Because Chappell was caught off guard and was unable to make the timing throw he expected, Michigan's three-man front is able to get pressure. Mike Martin gets off his block and into the backfield forcing Chappell to roll out to his right where Ryan Van Bergen is waiting. Though it looks like the wide receiver that Rogers is covering is still open, Rogers is actually continuing to bait Chappell to make the cross-field throw. In the end, Chappell throws the ball away.

This is a perfect example of why Michigan needs to play more man coverage: it's not necessarily that it will be more effective than the zones that they currently play, but it will make Michigan's defense less predictable, forcing QBs to go through more reads and give the pass rush more time to deliver. Imagine if a team ran an I-formation halfback iso on every single play on offense. They do it over and over again, game after game, and defenses start to adjust to it. Despite opposing teams figuring out the play and stopping it effectively, the offense keeps running it. Suddenly they run a play action pass and catch the defense off guard. It's the same concept here, except surprising an offense with man coverage once every 8-10 plays isn't going to get a team very many stops, and it's not going to return the same kind of results that a play action pass might. If Michigan can commit to playing man coverage more frequently, I think you'll see the defensive performance spike despite not having the kind of elite-level talent teams need to play a significant amount of man coverage.

Indiana preview

Tomorrow, Michigan heads into Bloomington, Indiana, to take on the mighty (but not that mighty) Indiana Hoosiers. Last year's thriller was one more feather in the Tate Forcier Heisman cap as he led Michigan to a last-drive win with a bum shoulder. Unfortunately, it was Michigan's last win against a I-A opponent. But you know all that. Let's look at the numbers:

Michigan Defense Offense Passing 105th nationally 264.75 YPG 50st nationally 231.50 YPG Rushing 53rd nationally 135.25 YPG 2nd nationally 331.25 YPG Scoring 64th nationally 23.00 PPG 11th nationally 41.25 PPG

Indiana Defense Offense Passing 20th nationally 161.33 YPG 11th nationally 304.33 YPG Rushing 92nd nationally 177.00 YPG 96th nationally 113.00 YPG Scoring 43rd nationally 19.33 PPG 10th nationally 41.33 PPG

Indiana has one of the more potent passing attacks in the country, led by senior quarterback Ben Chappell. Chappell is completing 72% of his passes and has thrown 9 touchdowns to zero interceptions. The point being that he's been remarkably efficient running Indiana's pistol offense. Unfortunately for Michigan, despite the hot start, their defense (particularly the secondary) is just as cavernous as we all feared. UMass shredded Michigan through the air and Notre Dame would have too if Dayne Crist wouldn't have been horribly concussed on the first drive of the game. But alas, karma is just and Michigan is 4-0.

On the other side of the ball, Indiana's rush defense is horrendous, especially given the cupcake schedule they've faced (Towson, @Western Kentucky, Akron). If Michigan can't run rings around what appears to be the worst rushing defense in the Big Ten, 2010 is going to shape up to be something ugly. Granted, Michael Shaw is out for the game, and much of the non-Denard rushing duties are going to fall on Vincent Smith and Michael Cox's shoulders, but that shouldn't make too much of a difference against what should be a really poor defense.

Prediction: I'm much more pessimistic about this team than most of the Michigan blogosphere and see this as a very real trap game. Though Indiana's offensive numbers are definitely a little better than they should be given the strength of their schedule, completing 72% of your passes is not something to toy with. Michigan is going to be in for a serious fight in this game, one that they could, in my eyes, very easily lose.

Then again, Indiana's defense looks to be even worse than Michigan's, and given Denard's ability to run roughshod over, well, everyone, Michigan should be able to score at will. As always for this team, winning the turnover battle will be key. If Michigan gives Indiana too many chances to score, they will lose this game. Michigan will have to score on basically every possession because I don't see them getting a whole lot of defensive stops. On the other hand, if they can get a few bounces in the turnover department, this game could get out of hand and see playing time for Forcier and Devin Gardner.

Expect a lot of the nickel package we saw last week with Courtney Avery and Terrence Talbott in the game, trying to defend the mass of deadly Indiana receivers. Offensively, expect more of the same. I suspect Michigan will show one or two different plays/sets that work resoundingly, but otherwise, it'll be a lot of QB off-tackle and bubbly bubble screens.

Michigan will get a stop or two in the first half and go into the second with a decent lead. The inability to kick field goals is probably going to make this game a little hairier than anyone would like, but in the end, Michigan pulls it out and wins, albeit closely. Michigan 42-38