Warning - Long
I was going to send this in to JAG and TD for their content, but decided I would post it here for everyone to enjoy.
Background: I really thought I had a good shot at the NC last season but was knocked out of the playoffs in the first round by Howard (caly). That was a great gameplan by caly (he blitzed a ton) and won that one straight up. To say the least I questioned my ability to compete in Wilkinson after that defeat. I made it a goal in the off-season to improve my gameplanning skills.
Setup: Season 130 was set up to be another potential run for TSU at the title. Here are the main positive factors for my team beginning Season 130:
1. Second ranked team by GDReports.
2. Senior QB (No. 5 at position).
3. Junior RB (No. 8 at position).
4. Senior WR and Junior WR (No. 4 and 24 at position)
5. Solid OL (23, 58 and 65).
6. Suspect DL
7. Solid LB (25, 65 and 80)
8. Stud DB (4, 27, 31, 48 and 68)
My overall gameplan was to be 1/3 and 2/3 between running and passing and gameplan for particular games based on opponent weakness. I believe I was successful in my overall goal (7736 passing/4000 running).
On defense (as always) my main goal was to deny YAC (that means high TKL DB's and LB's).
Conference Championship: I would be remiss in not mentioning my great conference coaches (dachmann, 1LM, mdodge and panthsho) (P.S. panthsho is the winningest 1AA coach that is active in Wilk). AAM (dachmann) had a very difficult team for Season 130 (Rated 6th by GDReports). However, dachmann had weak linebackers because of a couple of seasons of difficult recruiting. I was able to overcome dachmann by focusing by receiving RB (position 53) and my receiving TE against his weaker LBs.
Round #1 - Florida International (katz)
This may shock some people, but this game worried me more than any other game I played. FI was very solid all around and WIS only had TSU as a 1.5 point favorite. FI was ranked 7th overall by GDReports. Katz had a solid win over Savannah State (rusti). After reviewing his team I determined that FI had stud RB, OL, LB and DB. This was not a good matchup for me overall. However, it appeared katz was weak on the DL.
Gameplan: Pound that DL with my running RB with inside runs.
Overall: 54-24 It worked. TSU produced 153 yards on the ground against a passing rating of 57.1% in the air. The most important thing was TOP with me at 34:41 and katz at 25:19. I did not make half-time adjustments in this game (I was up pretty decent at half).
What won the game: 2 INT by my defense and pounding the rock.
Round #2 - Savannah State (rusti)
Savannah State (GD ranked 16) lost previously to FI, so I had a bit of confidence going into this game. I thought I had a pretty decent talent advantage SS had weak LB's (none better than 250 ranked).
Gameplan: Throw the ball to RB/TE and expose the LB's.
Overall: 30-22 (SS scored 15 4th quarter points). The plan worked by RB/TE combined for 268 yards in the air. I will also note that TSU had 2 fumbles lost (P.S. I hate fumbles are so prevailing). My passing rating was way low at 40.4% which seems odd in light of the mismatch, but that is to be studied on another day.
Round #3 - St. Mary (gt_duece)
St. Mary's was ranked (GD ranked #24) This was really a bad matchup for gt because he likes to toss the ball around and I really had a stud set of DB's this year. GT knocked out Eastern Kentucky with probably the biggest upset of the tourny (in my opinion). A really amazing and well-coached game. Unfortunately for GT, his team did not align real well with mine...so I thought he would have a real challenge moving the ball.
Gameplan: GT had a good secondary, not that great of a defensive line but really good throwing the ball. My gameplan was simple. Pound the ball, play conservative and let my defense win this game.
Overall: 34-9. It worked. My defense held Hancock to a 39.5% completion rate and his best receiver to 38 YAC. Nothing much to say here since GT was just in a bad matchup (or at least a favorable matchup for me).
Round #4 - Maine (chetty)
Maine (GD ranked 20th) has some serious talent in key areas and chetty knows how to exploit that talent. Frazier (RB #5) and English (TE #55). However, English is crazy good (basically a 90/90/90 receiver). Maine wooped my butt in an earlier contest 49-25 and guess who did it? English had 190 yards in the air and 2 TD (most importantly, English had 113 YAC).
Gameplan: Nothing else matters other than stopping English. That TE would not beat me this game. Not understanding how to do this, I reached out to lyonz to help me develop a gameplan to stop one particular TE. Lyonz's theory was that I should put everyone on the line except for my best LB and rotate that LB into the game on downs that I thought Chetty would pass the ball.
This took some serious work on my defensive gameplan. I run the 4-3 defense and I have 4 decent LB's, one of which is much better than the others. I totally re-tooled by LB alignment and placed Patrick (my best LB) in the LB1 slot and made that a unique formation and placed 2 ILB's in the LB2 and 3 slots. I rotated this formation in on passing downs (or my best guess anyway).
Overall: 58-20. I would say it worked. We limited English to 23 yards and 9 YAC. We also limited the passes to the other RB's.
Round #5 - Tenn Tech
nati has a seriously good squad (GD Rated #3) but that squad has a serious weakness at DB (best ranking is 120). Of course, TSU had to also overcome the OVC dominance of the championship game.
Gameplan: Nothing fancy. Pound the middle pass until we beat down the weak DB's. On defense, play conservative and prevent YAC.
Overall: 56-31. The score was 27-21 at half, but I really thought the DB would wear down in the second half. I am glad my theory worked out. Overall made 53 attempts in the air to 19 rushes for 572 yards passing.
Conclusions:
1. Big thanks to lyonz for the help on the Maine game. I would never have thought to set up my defense in that fashion.
2. Pick your gameplan and strategy and stick with it. Had I changed my gameplan at halftime against Tech, I believe I would have lost. Even though it didn't work as well in the first half, the theory proved out in the end.
3. This was my first NC and to win it against such amazing coaches is a feat and a great accomplishment.
4. Maybe this will help someone gameplan or think about the game.
Best of luck in Season 131.
nitros
4/6/2017 6:17 PM (edited)