OK, as I strive to catch up, before I post last Wednesdays game recap between us and our arch rival Tolleson in "The war for the west side" I will go over some things we needed to get fixed before the game.
Special Teams - This is something we take seriously and our shortcomings here the past 2 games are baffling. Our normal routine is 10 minutes on kickoff and 10 minutes on kickoff return on Saturday. 10 minutes on punt and 10 minutes on punt return Monday. A 25 minute walk through on all special teams Tuesday. Film critique on Thursday after the game and installation/adjustments to any specific areas on Friday in preparation for our next game.
Punt (We have only had to punt 3 times all year) and punt return have been good. Kickoff return is what is killing us so we spent 20 full minutes on it last Saturday, including drilling numerous onside and pooch kicks at the return team, reiterating the proper technique for fielding bouncing kicks and also reminding players in the first or second line to fair catch pooch kicks. Our usual 10 minutes were spent on returns and then it was on to.....
Defense - 88 points in two games is unacceptable. Last year our Freshman gave only 87 points over the entire 9 game season enroute to an 8-1 record. First the areas that are hurting us by position.
D-Line: Trouble generating a pass rush with our front 4 (This is huge) and the inability to work off of blocks effectively to control our assigned gaps. We are also not getting enough upfield push to consistently disprupt running lanes. Our line seems content to stand at a stalement and hand fight with the other teams linemen. This is not what we want from the front so it will be a focus dusing individual Defense periods.
LBers: Our inside backers are not scraping effectively, particularly the Mike LB position, which opens up cutback lanes and creates seams. Our scheme is predicated on precise pursuit angles from our linebackers and it has to happen everytime. Some of it is caused by not reading their keys correctly, I.E staring into the backfield looking for the ball and not reacting to what their keys for the week are telling them. This is especially frustrating against teams that run the I formation as it is the easiest Offense in Football to key IMO. We also need to do a better job maintaining the edge.
Secondary: Short and sweet....we play a base cover 3.....Get your eyes out of the backfield, stay on top of the receiver(s) in your zone and understand we do not want you tackling running backs for no gain, we have 8 other players to do that and our DB's are responsible for secondary run support.
Changes: To improve the D-Line we move Jesse M from starting TE to starting DE. He gives us a big strong body with more athleticism here. This is really important in our scheme as the DE plays a 7 technique and has to able to get across the TE's face on outside runs. We move Cody R from DE to DT where he is better suited for playing the 3 technique. We elevate Jonathon A to starting NG and also start working our FB Jamal D there. At the moment he plays no Defense and the purpose of this is to use him in passing situations only to shoot the weakside A gap and hopefully create havoc for opposing QB's.
Chuks A moves to starting Sam with Antonio A taking over as the starting TE. We also bring Sonny G from the secondary to Rover (Our weakside LBer). He is undersized but brings it and has heart to spare. He was buried on the depth chart in the secondary and was playing scout team LBer the past 2 weeks and caught our attention with his tenacity. He is the epitome of the type of kid I really like. Size be damned he just keeps working, has a great attitude and found a niche on the scout team which forced us to take notice. Heading into the Tolleson game he is now our #2 Rover, which means he will see time on the field.
Tackling has been particularly appalling, even though we work the hell out of technique. So after we were done with special teams Saturday we spend 30 minutes on tackling stations, rotating groups of 3 every 10 minutes. I usually work cutback drills here, focusing on staying on the inside hip of the ball carrier and reacting when he selects one of three holes so the defender does not over run the tackle. This time however I go back to my youth Football days, grab hand shields and stepover bags and break out the splatter drill. I have never used this at the High School level, but we need to work technique and aggressiveness at game speed and this is the best way to do it without getting anyone banged up or having kids be tentative. The upside is the Kids loved the drill and we had a lot of fun with it, so I kept it in yesterdays practice as well.
We also spend 30 minutes each on individual Defense (Footwork, pursuit angles and keys) group Defense (7 on 7 and coverage adjustments for the LBers and Secondary while the D-line worked pass rush and containment) and 30 minutes on Team Defense, getting a lot of reps for our 1st and second string defense against our scout Offense running Tollesons plays.
This basically took up our entire 2 and 1/2 hour practice, no offense at all
I am fine with this however as I recognize our Offense is not broken and we will be ready with our normal Monday routine and Tuesday walkthrough. On a down note however, our starting QB Louis G hurt his neck and it went right up to game time as to whether he would play against Tolleson. He was cleared but I still started Jacob S at QB and stuck with him for the first quarter since Louis had not practiced.
Next up "The war for the west side" VS Tolleson. They have their best Freshmen team in several years and it would be a grueling, physical game against our arch rivals......
Quote:
Originally Posted by Senator
I want this on FILM!
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I burned this film
I will definitely get some clips up when I get a moment