"If you're gonna be great, you can't ever be satisfied." - Dabo Swinney
"I just want to win by one more point. If that ever gets to where that’s not enough, then it’s time for me to move on somewhere else." - Also Dabo Swinney
Look, the thing about Dabo's rant is that, quite frankly, it misses the point. No one is complaining about being 12-0 or winning by 21 points. Clemson fans are smart enough to know that a performance like the one we had on Saturday is not going to be good enough to accomplish the greater goal of winning the national championship. Its consternation that in game 12 we turned in our poorest performance of the year on defense. This is the time of year that we should be at our best.
Dabo says that its disrespectful to the players and the program to be frustrated after a win over South Carolina. But I'm not sure that it isn't disrespectful to the fans and the donors and the season ticket holders to tell them that they aren't allowed to be frustrated or voice that frustration. To tell them that to be critical of that performance is "shameful" is a bit of an insult. He points out all the accomplishments the program has had over the last several years, but Clemson fans are spending record amounts of money (and happily so) to support that program.
The icing on the cake, however, is the insinuation that he might leave Clemson. Some have said that he's referring to the fans, telling them to go somewhere else. But he pretty clearly uses the word "me" and unless there's been a change in Webster's dictionary lately that means he's referring to himself. Now I know it wasn't a terribly serious threat, I know he's not really going to leave on account of fan criticism, it was more of just a saying, kind of like saying "that win felt like a loss" would be.
But even with it not being serious, the suggestion is that he is bigger than Clemson, that Clemson needs him more than he needs Clemson. That fans need to straighten up and get in line if they want to have the privilege of Dabo Swinney for much longer. Suggesting he might just take his ball and go home was inappropriate and put distance between himself and the fanbase.
At the same time, that's just who Dabo is. That's who he's always been. He's always recoiled at criticism and been very thin skinned. Dabo likes to create a foxhole mentality. That him and the staff and the players are just all hunkered down in their foxhole together and its them vs the world and everyone is against them but they're going to fight for each other. That's kind of the mentality Dabo lives with and has built the program around, with great success. My guess is that's what he was doing here. He knows his players are going to see and hear a lot of the criticism, so he goes to bat for them and fights for them.
There was just probably a better way to do it.
So the South Carolina game is in the books and the Tigers get bragging rights for another year. It was really a backwards game compared to what we're used to seeing. We're used to our more competitive games being the result of a struggling offense and then leaning on a dominant defense to help us get by with the win. But this time, man, the defense just got lit up while the offense was dominant.
Now to be fair, going back and watching the game it wasn't as bad as I remembered it. There was a stretch in the game where we didn't give up any points and built a 49-21 lead. But we clearly gave up too many big plays, we weren't great on 3rd down, just a lot of busts over the middle of the field. A lot of the things that the Clemson defense has been so great at over the years they simply weren't very good at on Saturday night.
Offensively though, it seemed like we couldn't do anything wrong. The offensive line was dominant, Trevor was zipping it all over the place. It was just a fantastic performance, bell to bell.
I think when we talk about the defense, the M.O. of Brent Venables has been that the team improves after a bad performance. There's a track record there with BV as our defensive coordinator and with Dabo as our head coach that its really rare for us to have multiple poor performances in a row. These guys really know how to "get it fixed" and we have to trust that track record going forward. As I mentioned a couple weeks ago, we had our worst performance of the year defense against Pitt in November of 2016, yet that defense went on to shut out Ohio State and stifle an elite Alabama running game. So one bad performance is not an indicator that we don't have a championship caliber team.
That said, there were some concerning developments. Mostly the regression of Tanner Muse and Isaiah Simmons. These are both guys that we've given props to for coming a long way and really turning into good players beyond just their athletic ability. But on Saturday these guys looked really lost and kind of out of it. It wasn't an effort problem, but these guys clearly weren't sure what they were supposed to be doing a lot of the time.
Some of it was the result of some tricky formations. On the very first drive South Carolina lines up in the polecat formation. This is kind of an old school gimmick formation that you still see every now and again on all levels, including the NFL. Steve Spurrier used to use the polecat every so often. There are different versions of the formation but really its just about creating space in the defense's alignment. They hand the ball off here which isn't a winning play but I'd bet they really just did this to see how we'd line up and where there might be an advantage.
Typically what you see out of the polecat are going to be quick screen passes, and if you watch back the long touchdown they had to Deebo out of this, Wallace looks like he thinks Deebo is coming to block him. Wallace kind of just stands there and watches Deebo run by him so they really took advantage of us probably anticipating a screen. They then came back to it and did run a screen out of it and had some room because, as you might expect, our safety stayed back. I'd be interested in how much they used this formation throughout the year and how often they took a deep shot out of it.
We did an awful lot of blitzing early, and I can't say that I blame BV for this. Bentley's M.O. the last couple years has been buckling when he so much as gets breathed on. It made sense to come after him early and try to rattle him. But to his credit, Bentley was prepared for it and did a pretty good job of getting the ball away before the pressure could get there. I found that most of our success against them came when we played coverage and only rushed 3.
Here's an example. Can someone explain to me how this isn't intentional grounding? Bentley is still in the tackle box, its obviously an uncatchable ball, there's no receivers in the stands to my knowledge. A similar play happened in the Alabama/Auburn game and Tua was flagged.
Another example. Here they protect with 7 vs our 3 rushers and we get the sack. Its amazing how quickly all 3 guys get back there with such a numbers disadvantage.
One more example. Again just 3 rushers. Big Dex in hot pursuit here and you can see Bentley makes a potentially dangerous throw into traffic.
This back was simply not ready for XT. This play doesn't really have anything to do with anything, I just wanted to include it.
Here's their first touchdown. So this isn't really a bust, but it is an error in technique by Terrell here. He's got Deebo here, one on one, and he's playing press man. His number one priority should be to maintain inside leverage. You've got to force the receiver to the outside and force the QB to make a more difficult throw.
You know that pressure is likely to get to the QB quickly, so the only way he can make an accurate throw under duress is if he can throw one across the middle. If he has to try to throw to the corner, that's one hell of a tough throw. If they make that throw and catch, then tip your hat and move on, but by all means don't let them inside where there's a better chance for the QB to complete one. As you can see, he loses inside leverage and Bentley is able to connect. There are some zone drops here as well, and Joseph damn near gets over to make the play. Force him to the outside, and chances are low Bentley is getting a completion here.
I'd also point out that Shi Smith, who has several catches on this opening drive, is a really good example of why we shouldn't take South Carolina's recruiting too lightly when they give out a large amount of scholarship offers. Smith is a guy that Clemson recruited - not terribly aggressively - and ultimately moved on from when Higgins and Rogers committed. So he fell to South Carolina. And that's really what Muschamp should be doing, he should be out hunting these guys that just don't quite make the cut for Clemson or Georgia or Alabama and getting them on his roster because Shi Smith is still a good player, he's a very good player and has a very bright future.
If you can get enough of those guys, you'll find that your roster is significantly upgraded, you're more competitive and can even win games against Georgia/Clemson, and that will attract more elite recruits and off you go. Its the right strategy and slowly but surely you can see its working for them.
One issue we had was giving up 3rd down plays. South Carolina was 7 of 14 on 3rd down against a Clemson team that ranks 7th in the country in 3rd down defense at 29%. Its plays like this one that allowed them to continue to convert even in 3rd and long scenarios. This is just a straight up busted coverage. Someone has to be responsible for that area. I'm not sure who but it looks like either Joseph or Muse should have this zone and its these kinds of critical mistakes that made this game so frustrating and also has Clemson fans biting their nails heading into the post season.
Here's the long touchdown with a coach's film view. This is a good look from ESPN. Now I should admit that I've never played/coached/etc DB so I'm not an expert on coverages. I'm sure there are others here who can make more correctly identify the problems on these plays. But To my only slightly trained eye this looks like a bust on Davis's part. I believe this is a Tampa 2 where he is supposed to be getting depth into the middle 3rd. You can see how wide the safeties get here and clearly someone is supposed to get that middle 3rd. I suppose it could be Joseph but it looks like Davis's responsibility to me. You can see the "oh shit" moment when he realizes his mistake.
Lots of pre snap issues on Saturday. I'm sure @Larry_Williams is going to hit on this in his review this week. Here you can see Simmons just does not know where to line up. Joseph is trying to correct him but the snap happens too quickly and it leaves Edwards wide open for an easy throw and catch. Again, this is what Clemson fans were wringing their hands about. Clemson fans weren't upset at the 21 point win, but Clemson fans know that if that's Jerry Jeudy instead of Bryan Edwards, that's probably a much bigger play.
Again the defense simply doesn't know how to get lined up. I have to put this one on Muse. It looks almost certainly like he is supposed to cover that middle area and just doesn't here. He looks confused from the get go. We also end up with Davis covering the split end here which seems odd but perhaps speaks to the job that South Carolina did in mixing up their formations and personnel to force confusion and create more desirable match ups.
On this one the defense is looking at the sideline as the snap happens. This is something we've seen a lot from Venable's defenses against hurry ups but perhaps what's perplexing here is that this wasn't a hurry up. This was the first play of the drive. This looks to be on Muse as well as at the snap he runs completely into someone else's area. This looks like a quarters coverage and he's got half of the deep middle.
On the issue of the defense looking to the sidelines, I don't know, it just seems like that's something we're going to have to live with. Venables likes to call his defense that way and it has its strengths and weaknesses and obviously its vulnerable against hurry up offenses. And South Carolina did a really good job with their hurry up and that created a lot of problems.
Speaking of Muse, he's an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty waiting to happen. I just don't get why he does this kind of thing. He did it against BC after a tackle as well. I know its a small thing, but it just takes one time, one ref, and all of a sudden you've got a critical penalty. I like tough guys but I don't like dumb guys.
So defensively, I mean look, our D-line was still dominant, they had no chance of running the ball. I think we have to also admit that South Carolina played really well. I mean, hell, they might have played their best offensive game of the year on the same night we played our worst defensive game of the year and we still won by 3 touchdowns. That was definitely as good a performance as I've ever seen Jake Bentley have.
But we do have to acknowledge that we need to improve. We've got a Pitt team coming up that ranks 119th in passing, so not exactly a juggernaut in the passing game there. Then we've got 15 practices to get things shored up before the playoff where we will most certainly play a much better offensive team than Pitt.
Unlike the defense, our offense played its best game of the year. That's saying a lot, given we've kind of run roughshod over the whole ACC. But this game was really dominant against a team that, unlike Louisville or even FSU, brought a ton of effort. You wonder if South Carolina didn't have the rather ridiculous amount of injuries they have whether the game could have been closer. I'd say probably not.
Their big tackle inside, #95, really wasn't impressed with him much. He's a big guy but that's about all he is. He was dominated most of the night. Kinlaw #3 is a good pass rusher. He's very long and uses his arms well, gave some of our guys some problems. He has an issue with getting his hands up in the face. He got flagged for it once and it probably could have been called on him a few more times.
Belk did play a solid number of snaps. I think he's clearly more talented than their #95 and will be a better player in time. I think he's obviously overweight but if he can slim down a bit he's got a chance to be a pretty good player. There's a reason we recruited him.
One thing we didn't do on offense Saturday night was rotate offensive linemen. Pollard didn't play until late, I don't know if Stewart played at all. Carman got it late. That was about it. These are the 5 guys we're going to go into the playoff with. We didn't rotate a lot of guys in general, ETN got the bulk of the snaps. I think, again, this is the team that we're going to go to war with.
Just as South Carolina used some different formations to create space for their offense, Clemson used some new formations and schemes as well to help create more offense.
Here you can see we actually put Williams in the slot with Renfrow flexed down inside. This is a personnel/formation combo I've not noticed before this year. Possible I've missed it, for sure, but I don't remember it. It looks to me like the design is actually to get a mismatch for Renfrow where he can beat his man to the corner of the end zone. Its covered well but all that means is that the flat is open for ETN.
I personally think we need to find more ways to get the ball to ETN in the flat. I don't think he has the greatest hands but the more we can find ways to get the ACC Player of the Year the ball in the open field, the better off we'll be.
Here's another new little formation. This is 10 personnel and a 2x2 formation. As we've discussed here before Clemson doesn't use a lot of 10 personnel with the exception of obvious passing situations. As a result Clemson almost always throws downfield out of 10 personnel. And as we learned against BC, teams are usually expecting a downfield pass in a 2x2 look, however the Tigers have been breaking tendency and running out of 2x2.
Watch how passively their defense plays this. The linebacker here #44, he can't aggressively play the screen, he can't come up hard for the run, he can't immediately drop back into coverage. So as a result he kind of just becomes stagnant and by time he diagnoses the play, its too late. There's already a ton of space for Ross.
This is a really beautifully executed play. Ross has great vision and takes the screen inside his blockers. Cervenka covers up #44 who more or less has taken himself out of the play. Simpson picks up a block, and let me tell you, when you're 330lbs, getting out there in the open field and getting on a smaller, faster guy is no easy task.
But watch Falcinelli here, just boogying down the field trying to make every block he can. This is a different cat than the one we saw in the first 3-4 games this year. I was wondering if Falcinelli even knew the games counted early in the year, but here he's playing with so much more confidence, so much more effort. He's really, really improved. This is why its really hard for me to jump on board with the idea that we need a change at OL coach. I can see this improvement over the course of the year, and you've got a guy like Falcinelli who isn't the most talented guy in the world, but here he is and he's a significant part of our offense now. That's good coaching.
Here's a really good look at how the RPO works. Most of you guys are probably already familiar with lot of this, but I think this is a really good opportunity to talk about the concept that has taken football by storm.
South Carolina here is playing the run. They've brought a safety down strong side, and they've got one safety high in the middle. This is the way most defensive coordinators are going to try and stop the run. So to counter that, what Lawrence is going to do here is watch that low safety, that's where his eyes are the entire time. If he comes up to play the run, you throw it over his head to Ross. If he drops, you hand it off to the back. Its really that simple. But its a big problem for defenses especially when you have a guy as talented as Ross or Higgins and a QB that can get the ball out in a hurry like Lawrence. Its almost impossible to stop. A big advantage that Lawrence brings is you can also run the RPO to more depth. Instead of needing the route to be 6-8 yards, it can be 12-14 yards.
Its been fascinating over the last five years or so to watch the RPO evolve and how it is now pretty much the most common offensive play in college football. Its even started to show up in the NFL as well. Just like the read option before it, the RPO has become the dominant offensive concept and until defenses learn to stop it, it'll be around for a while.
Another new wrinkle that I don't think I've seen this season. And let me tell you guys, I am super excited to get to talk about this. This is the outside zone. Now we've talked here before this year about the inside zone techniques which we (and most other programs) use with great regularity. However we don't see as much outside zone blocking. We've seen Clemson run the zone stretch to relatively little success. But this is actual outside power zone blocking. This scheme was popularized by Nebraska in the 90s and was the blocking they'd use on their sweeps and other outside running plays.
So you have two simple rules: If there's a down lineman on you head up to play side you are covered, and if you're covered you rip and release. If there's no down lineman on you then you are uncovered and if you're uncovered you pull and overtake. There's a real good look at it in the middle with Falcinelli and Cervenka. Falcinelli is going to take a reach step with his playside foot and engage the 1 technique here and hold him up/slow him down for Cervenka. Cervenka is going to take the same step he would take as if he were pulling, he's going to open up and get depth with his playside foot while keeping his backside foot planted, but then instead of taking a lateral step to go down the line, he's going to get even more depth with his second step and attack the one technique as Falcinelli rips through him and picks up the linebacker. It is done absolutely perfectly by these two and its a thing of beauty.
Hyatt and Simpson do the same thing, the difference is the play side linebacker shoots and Hyatt has to get off in a hurry to pick him up. This play is supposed to be a sweep type play to the outside, but ETN sees a backside gap and takes it. The gap is there because they really didn't pursue very hard from the backside, which I think is owed to the amount of running Lawrence has done over the last several weeks.
This was executed so well its a wonder we haven't run more of it. But I think its really scheme related. South Carolina runs that 30 shade front a lot and it makes it easier to get those blocks.
Our offensive line really had their way with South Carolina for the bulk of the night. Here's a good look at us just mashing their defensive front. John Simpson is really coming on strong now, he's starting to play with much better functional strength and power, he's put himself in position to be an All-whatever guy next year and get some looks from the NFL. Falcinelli helps move the nose out of there but Simpson just drives him in the ground. Hyatt has a great block here also. Love the way he just drives that guy back. Sometimes Hyatt gets criticized for not being physical enough, but man, not on Saturday. Dude has some gravel in his spit on Saturday.
Hyatt absolutely had his best game of the year on Saturday. He was dominant out there. It was great to see him really bear down and have a great, physical game for his last home game. He's meant quite a lot to the program for the last 4 years and is arguably the best offensive lineman to ever play at Clemson. He's started more games than any Tiger in history and that in and of itself is admirable. He's kind of been the unsung hero during the most successful run in program history, he's been steady and dependable and he went out with a bang on Saturday.
Watch Hyatt just obliterate his man here. Great short yardage blocking here. No zones here man, just fire out and beat your guy. Watch how we establish the LOS, no penetration whatsoever. Its just a great job by everyone but especially Hyatt. He gets low, has tremendous leverage and just knocks that dude 3 yards off the ball and opens it up for ETN. Hyatt was called for holding on this play which I....yeah I don't know guys.
I don't complain about refs much but boy they were ticky tacky on Saturday. The OPI call on Rogers, I just don't know how you make that call. The DPI on Turner, I don't know if Turner even made contact with him.
The unsportsmanlike on Wilkins was really 50/50. Maybe it didn't deserve the penalty but he shouldn't put himself in a situation where it could be called on him. Again, doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of that game, but what if it happens against Alabama? So I thought Dabo was right to nip it in the bud and get after him a bit. That's sending a message to the entire team. The thing I really didn't like about it was Wilkins separated from his teammates. He's there celebrating with them then pushes them away to do the pose. It was definitely a look at me moment. But hey, maybe he’s earned a look at me moment.
More great work by Hyatt here. Great blocking all around. Bockhorst in on this one, you can see he does fine but he's not as powerful as Simpson and isn't going to generate as much push. But he's got an offseason coming up to work on his functional strength, I fully expect him to be in the starting lineup on opening day 2019.
I could do a whole My Thoughts (Long) just showing our line whipping them. People think about the mismatch our DL has with opposing OLs but honestly the biggest mismatch on the field Saturday night was our OL vs their front. It wasn't even close.
And Trevor was great as well. He had a unbelievable throw to Renfrow I think on a 3rd down play over the middle. Trevor is only getting better and better. Same with Higgins and Ross and now Kendrick has become a weapon. Don't want to think too much towards next year but the 2019 Clemson offense is going to set some records.
ACC Championship up next. I'll be in the building so crossing my fingers that we don't get a lot of rain. Will probably be my last chance to see the Tigers this year as I don't think I could make a trip to Miami/Dallas jive with my work schedule that time of year and the trip to San Fran will probably be just a smidgeon out of my budget.
So I'll be there loud and proud to see Another Clemson Championship.
Go Tigers!
"I just want to win by one more point. If that ever gets to where that’s not enough, then it’s time for me to move on somewhere else." - Also Dabo Swinney
Look, the thing about Dabo's rant is that, quite frankly, it misses the point. No one is complaining about being 12-0 or winning by 21 points. Clemson fans are smart enough to know that a performance like the one we had on Saturday is not going to be good enough to accomplish the greater goal of winning the national championship. Its consternation that in game 12 we turned in our poorest performance of the year on defense. This is the time of year that we should be at our best.
Dabo says that its disrespectful to the players and the program to be frustrated after a win over South Carolina. But I'm not sure that it isn't disrespectful to the fans and the donors and the season ticket holders to tell them that they aren't allowed to be frustrated or voice that frustration. To tell them that to be critical of that performance is "shameful" is a bit of an insult. He points out all the accomplishments the program has had over the last several years, but Clemson fans are spending record amounts of money (and happily so) to support that program.
The icing on the cake, however, is the insinuation that he might leave Clemson. Some have said that he's referring to the fans, telling them to go somewhere else. But he pretty clearly uses the word "me" and unless there's been a change in Webster's dictionary lately that means he's referring to himself. Now I know it wasn't a terribly serious threat, I know he's not really going to leave on account of fan criticism, it was more of just a saying, kind of like saying "that win felt like a loss" would be.
But even with it not being serious, the suggestion is that he is bigger than Clemson, that Clemson needs him more than he needs Clemson. That fans need to straighten up and get in line if they want to have the privilege of Dabo Swinney for much longer. Suggesting he might just take his ball and go home was inappropriate and put distance between himself and the fanbase.
At the same time, that's just who Dabo is. That's who he's always been. He's always recoiled at criticism and been very thin skinned. Dabo likes to create a foxhole mentality. That him and the staff and the players are just all hunkered down in their foxhole together and its them vs the world and everyone is against them but they're going to fight for each other. That's kind of the mentality Dabo lives with and has built the program around, with great success. My guess is that's what he was doing here. He knows his players are going to see and hear a lot of the criticism, so he goes to bat for them and fights for them.
There was just probably a better way to do it.
So the South Carolina game is in the books and the Tigers get bragging rights for another year. It was really a backwards game compared to what we're used to seeing. We're used to our more competitive games being the result of a struggling offense and then leaning on a dominant defense to help us get by with the win. But this time, man, the defense just got lit up while the offense was dominant.
Now to be fair, going back and watching the game it wasn't as bad as I remembered it. There was a stretch in the game where we didn't give up any points and built a 49-21 lead. But we clearly gave up too many big plays, we weren't great on 3rd down, just a lot of busts over the middle of the field. A lot of the things that the Clemson defense has been so great at over the years they simply weren't very good at on Saturday night.
Offensively though, it seemed like we couldn't do anything wrong. The offensive line was dominant, Trevor was zipping it all over the place. It was just a fantastic performance, bell to bell.
I think when we talk about the defense, the M.O. of Brent Venables has been that the team improves after a bad performance. There's a track record there with BV as our defensive coordinator and with Dabo as our head coach that its really rare for us to have multiple poor performances in a row. These guys really know how to "get it fixed" and we have to trust that track record going forward. As I mentioned a couple weeks ago, we had our worst performance of the year defense against Pitt in November of 2016, yet that defense went on to shut out Ohio State and stifle an elite Alabama running game. So one bad performance is not an indicator that we don't have a championship caliber team.
That said, there were some concerning developments. Mostly the regression of Tanner Muse and Isaiah Simmons. These are both guys that we've given props to for coming a long way and really turning into good players beyond just their athletic ability. But on Saturday these guys looked really lost and kind of out of it. It wasn't an effort problem, but these guys clearly weren't sure what they were supposed to be doing a lot of the time.
Some of it was the result of some tricky formations. On the very first drive South Carolina lines up in the polecat formation. This is kind of an old school gimmick formation that you still see every now and again on all levels, including the NFL. Steve Spurrier used to use the polecat every so often. There are different versions of the formation but really its just about creating space in the defense's alignment. They hand the ball off here which isn't a winning play but I'd bet they really just did this to see how we'd line up and where there might be an advantage.
Typically what you see out of the polecat are going to be quick screen passes, and if you watch back the long touchdown they had to Deebo out of this, Wallace looks like he thinks Deebo is coming to block him. Wallace kind of just stands there and watches Deebo run by him so they really took advantage of us probably anticipating a screen. They then came back to it and did run a screen out of it and had some room because, as you might expect, our safety stayed back. I'd be interested in how much they used this formation throughout the year and how often they took a deep shot out of it.
We did an awful lot of blitzing early, and I can't say that I blame BV for this. Bentley's M.O. the last couple years has been buckling when he so much as gets breathed on. It made sense to come after him early and try to rattle him. But to his credit, Bentley was prepared for it and did a pretty good job of getting the ball away before the pressure could get there. I found that most of our success against them came when we played coverage and only rushed 3.
Here's an example. Can someone explain to me how this isn't intentional grounding? Bentley is still in the tackle box, its obviously an uncatchable ball, there's no receivers in the stands to my knowledge. A similar play happened in the Alabama/Auburn game and Tua was flagged.
Another example. Here they protect with 7 vs our 3 rushers and we get the sack. Its amazing how quickly all 3 guys get back there with such a numbers disadvantage.
One more example. Again just 3 rushers. Big Dex in hot pursuit here and you can see Bentley makes a potentially dangerous throw into traffic.
This back was simply not ready for XT. This play doesn't really have anything to do with anything, I just wanted to include it.
Here's their first touchdown. So this isn't really a bust, but it is an error in technique by Terrell here. He's got Deebo here, one on one, and he's playing press man. His number one priority should be to maintain inside leverage. You've got to force the receiver to the outside and force the QB to make a more difficult throw.
You know that pressure is likely to get to the QB quickly, so the only way he can make an accurate throw under duress is if he can throw one across the middle. If he has to try to throw to the corner, that's one hell of a tough throw. If they make that throw and catch, then tip your hat and move on, but by all means don't let them inside where there's a better chance for the QB to complete one. As you can see, he loses inside leverage and Bentley is able to connect. There are some zone drops here as well, and Joseph damn near gets over to make the play. Force him to the outside, and chances are low Bentley is getting a completion here.
I'd also point out that Shi Smith, who has several catches on this opening drive, is a really good example of why we shouldn't take South Carolina's recruiting too lightly when they give out a large amount of scholarship offers. Smith is a guy that Clemson recruited - not terribly aggressively - and ultimately moved on from when Higgins and Rogers committed. So he fell to South Carolina. And that's really what Muschamp should be doing, he should be out hunting these guys that just don't quite make the cut for Clemson or Georgia or Alabama and getting them on his roster because Shi Smith is still a good player, he's a very good player and has a very bright future.
If you can get enough of those guys, you'll find that your roster is significantly upgraded, you're more competitive and can even win games against Georgia/Clemson, and that will attract more elite recruits and off you go. Its the right strategy and slowly but surely you can see its working for them.
One issue we had was giving up 3rd down plays. South Carolina was 7 of 14 on 3rd down against a Clemson team that ranks 7th in the country in 3rd down defense at 29%. Its plays like this one that allowed them to continue to convert even in 3rd and long scenarios. This is just a straight up busted coverage. Someone has to be responsible for that area. I'm not sure who but it looks like either Joseph or Muse should have this zone and its these kinds of critical mistakes that made this game so frustrating and also has Clemson fans biting their nails heading into the post season.
Here's the long touchdown with a coach's film view. This is a good look from ESPN. Now I should admit that I've never played/coached/etc DB so I'm not an expert on coverages. I'm sure there are others here who can make more correctly identify the problems on these plays. But To my only slightly trained eye this looks like a bust on Davis's part. I believe this is a Tampa 2 where he is supposed to be getting depth into the middle 3rd. You can see how wide the safeties get here and clearly someone is supposed to get that middle 3rd. I suppose it could be Joseph but it looks like Davis's responsibility to me. You can see the "oh shit" moment when he realizes his mistake.
Lots of pre snap issues on Saturday. I'm sure @Larry_Williams is going to hit on this in his review this week. Here you can see Simmons just does not know where to line up. Joseph is trying to correct him but the snap happens too quickly and it leaves Edwards wide open for an easy throw and catch. Again, this is what Clemson fans were wringing their hands about. Clemson fans weren't upset at the 21 point win, but Clemson fans know that if that's Jerry Jeudy instead of Bryan Edwards, that's probably a much bigger play.
Again the defense simply doesn't know how to get lined up. I have to put this one on Muse. It looks almost certainly like he is supposed to cover that middle area and just doesn't here. He looks confused from the get go. We also end up with Davis covering the split end here which seems odd but perhaps speaks to the job that South Carolina did in mixing up their formations and personnel to force confusion and create more desirable match ups.
On this one the defense is looking at the sideline as the snap happens. This is something we've seen a lot from Venable's defenses against hurry ups but perhaps what's perplexing here is that this wasn't a hurry up. This was the first play of the drive. This looks to be on Muse as well as at the snap he runs completely into someone else's area. This looks like a quarters coverage and he's got half of the deep middle.
On the issue of the defense looking to the sidelines, I don't know, it just seems like that's something we're going to have to live with. Venables likes to call his defense that way and it has its strengths and weaknesses and obviously its vulnerable against hurry up offenses. And South Carolina did a really good job with their hurry up and that created a lot of problems.
Speaking of Muse, he's an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty waiting to happen. I just don't get why he does this kind of thing. He did it against BC after a tackle as well. I know its a small thing, but it just takes one time, one ref, and all of a sudden you've got a critical penalty. I like tough guys but I don't like dumb guys.
So defensively, I mean look, our D-line was still dominant, they had no chance of running the ball. I think we have to also admit that South Carolina played really well. I mean, hell, they might have played their best offensive game of the year on the same night we played our worst defensive game of the year and we still won by 3 touchdowns. That was definitely as good a performance as I've ever seen Jake Bentley have.
But we do have to acknowledge that we need to improve. We've got a Pitt team coming up that ranks 119th in passing, so not exactly a juggernaut in the passing game there. Then we've got 15 practices to get things shored up before the playoff where we will most certainly play a much better offensive team than Pitt.
Unlike the defense, our offense played its best game of the year. That's saying a lot, given we've kind of run roughshod over the whole ACC. But this game was really dominant against a team that, unlike Louisville or even FSU, brought a ton of effort. You wonder if South Carolina didn't have the rather ridiculous amount of injuries they have whether the game could have been closer. I'd say probably not.
Their big tackle inside, #95, really wasn't impressed with him much. He's a big guy but that's about all he is. He was dominated most of the night. Kinlaw #3 is a good pass rusher. He's very long and uses his arms well, gave some of our guys some problems. He has an issue with getting his hands up in the face. He got flagged for it once and it probably could have been called on him a few more times.
Belk did play a solid number of snaps. I think he's clearly more talented than their #95 and will be a better player in time. I think he's obviously overweight but if he can slim down a bit he's got a chance to be a pretty good player. There's a reason we recruited him.
One thing we didn't do on offense Saturday night was rotate offensive linemen. Pollard didn't play until late, I don't know if Stewart played at all. Carman got it late. That was about it. These are the 5 guys we're going to go into the playoff with. We didn't rotate a lot of guys in general, ETN got the bulk of the snaps. I think, again, this is the team that we're going to go to war with.
Just as South Carolina used some different formations to create space for their offense, Clemson used some new formations and schemes as well to help create more offense.
Here you can see we actually put Williams in the slot with Renfrow flexed down inside. This is a personnel/formation combo I've not noticed before this year. Possible I've missed it, for sure, but I don't remember it. It looks to me like the design is actually to get a mismatch for Renfrow where he can beat his man to the corner of the end zone. Its covered well but all that means is that the flat is open for ETN.
I personally think we need to find more ways to get the ball to ETN in the flat. I don't think he has the greatest hands but the more we can find ways to get the ACC Player of the Year the ball in the open field, the better off we'll be.
Here's another new little formation. This is 10 personnel and a 2x2 formation. As we've discussed here before Clemson doesn't use a lot of 10 personnel with the exception of obvious passing situations. As a result Clemson almost always throws downfield out of 10 personnel. And as we learned against BC, teams are usually expecting a downfield pass in a 2x2 look, however the Tigers have been breaking tendency and running out of 2x2.
Watch how passively their defense plays this. The linebacker here #44, he can't aggressively play the screen, he can't come up hard for the run, he can't immediately drop back into coverage. So as a result he kind of just becomes stagnant and by time he diagnoses the play, its too late. There's already a ton of space for Ross.
This is a really beautifully executed play. Ross has great vision and takes the screen inside his blockers. Cervenka covers up #44 who more or less has taken himself out of the play. Simpson picks up a block, and let me tell you, when you're 330lbs, getting out there in the open field and getting on a smaller, faster guy is no easy task.
But watch Falcinelli here, just boogying down the field trying to make every block he can. This is a different cat than the one we saw in the first 3-4 games this year. I was wondering if Falcinelli even knew the games counted early in the year, but here he's playing with so much more confidence, so much more effort. He's really, really improved. This is why its really hard for me to jump on board with the idea that we need a change at OL coach. I can see this improvement over the course of the year, and you've got a guy like Falcinelli who isn't the most talented guy in the world, but here he is and he's a significant part of our offense now. That's good coaching.
Here's a really good look at how the RPO works. Most of you guys are probably already familiar with lot of this, but I think this is a really good opportunity to talk about the concept that has taken football by storm.
South Carolina here is playing the run. They've brought a safety down strong side, and they've got one safety high in the middle. This is the way most defensive coordinators are going to try and stop the run. So to counter that, what Lawrence is going to do here is watch that low safety, that's where his eyes are the entire time. If he comes up to play the run, you throw it over his head to Ross. If he drops, you hand it off to the back. Its really that simple. But its a big problem for defenses especially when you have a guy as talented as Ross or Higgins and a QB that can get the ball out in a hurry like Lawrence. Its almost impossible to stop. A big advantage that Lawrence brings is you can also run the RPO to more depth. Instead of needing the route to be 6-8 yards, it can be 12-14 yards.
Its been fascinating over the last five years or so to watch the RPO evolve and how it is now pretty much the most common offensive play in college football. Its even started to show up in the NFL as well. Just like the read option before it, the RPO has become the dominant offensive concept and until defenses learn to stop it, it'll be around for a while.
Another new wrinkle that I don't think I've seen this season. And let me tell you guys, I am super excited to get to talk about this. This is the outside zone. Now we've talked here before this year about the inside zone techniques which we (and most other programs) use with great regularity. However we don't see as much outside zone blocking. We've seen Clemson run the zone stretch to relatively little success. But this is actual outside power zone blocking. This scheme was popularized by Nebraska in the 90s and was the blocking they'd use on their sweeps and other outside running plays.
So you have two simple rules: If there's a down lineman on you head up to play side you are covered, and if you're covered you rip and release. If there's no down lineman on you then you are uncovered and if you're uncovered you pull and overtake. There's a real good look at it in the middle with Falcinelli and Cervenka. Falcinelli is going to take a reach step with his playside foot and engage the 1 technique here and hold him up/slow him down for Cervenka. Cervenka is going to take the same step he would take as if he were pulling, he's going to open up and get depth with his playside foot while keeping his backside foot planted, but then instead of taking a lateral step to go down the line, he's going to get even more depth with his second step and attack the one technique as Falcinelli rips through him and picks up the linebacker. It is done absolutely perfectly by these two and its a thing of beauty.
Hyatt and Simpson do the same thing, the difference is the play side linebacker shoots and Hyatt has to get off in a hurry to pick him up. This play is supposed to be a sweep type play to the outside, but ETN sees a backside gap and takes it. The gap is there because they really didn't pursue very hard from the backside, which I think is owed to the amount of running Lawrence has done over the last several weeks.
This was executed so well its a wonder we haven't run more of it. But I think its really scheme related. South Carolina runs that 30 shade front a lot and it makes it easier to get those blocks.
Our offensive line really had their way with South Carolina for the bulk of the night. Here's a good look at us just mashing their defensive front. John Simpson is really coming on strong now, he's starting to play with much better functional strength and power, he's put himself in position to be an All-whatever guy next year and get some looks from the NFL. Falcinelli helps move the nose out of there but Simpson just drives him in the ground. Hyatt has a great block here also. Love the way he just drives that guy back. Sometimes Hyatt gets criticized for not being physical enough, but man, not on Saturday. Dude has some gravel in his spit on Saturday.
Hyatt absolutely had his best game of the year on Saturday. He was dominant out there. It was great to see him really bear down and have a great, physical game for his last home game. He's meant quite a lot to the program for the last 4 years and is arguably the best offensive lineman to ever play at Clemson. He's started more games than any Tiger in history and that in and of itself is admirable. He's kind of been the unsung hero during the most successful run in program history, he's been steady and dependable and he went out with a bang on Saturday.
Watch Hyatt just obliterate his man here. Great short yardage blocking here. No zones here man, just fire out and beat your guy. Watch how we establish the LOS, no penetration whatsoever. Its just a great job by everyone but especially Hyatt. He gets low, has tremendous leverage and just knocks that dude 3 yards off the ball and opens it up for ETN. Hyatt was called for holding on this play which I....yeah I don't know guys.
I don't complain about refs much but boy they were ticky tacky on Saturday. The OPI call on Rogers, I just don't know how you make that call. The DPI on Turner, I don't know if Turner even made contact with him.
The unsportsmanlike on Wilkins was really 50/50. Maybe it didn't deserve the penalty but he shouldn't put himself in a situation where it could be called on him. Again, doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of that game, but what if it happens against Alabama? So I thought Dabo was right to nip it in the bud and get after him a bit. That's sending a message to the entire team. The thing I really didn't like about it was Wilkins separated from his teammates. He's there celebrating with them then pushes them away to do the pose. It was definitely a look at me moment. But hey, maybe he’s earned a look at me moment.
More great work by Hyatt here. Great blocking all around. Bockhorst in on this one, you can see he does fine but he's not as powerful as Simpson and isn't going to generate as much push. But he's got an offseason coming up to work on his functional strength, I fully expect him to be in the starting lineup on opening day 2019.
I could do a whole My Thoughts (Long) just showing our line whipping them. People think about the mismatch our DL has with opposing OLs but honestly the biggest mismatch on the field Saturday night was our OL vs their front. It wasn't even close.
And Trevor was great as well. He had a unbelievable throw to Renfrow I think on a 3rd down play over the middle. Trevor is only getting better and better. Same with Higgins and Ross and now Kendrick has become a weapon. Don't want to think too much towards next year but the 2019 Clemson offense is going to set some records.
ACC Championship up next. I'll be in the building so crossing my fingers that we don't get a lot of rain. Will probably be my last chance to see the Tigers this year as I don't think I could make a trip to Miami/Dallas jive with my work schedule that time of year and the trip to San Fran will probably be just a smidgeon out of my budget.
So I'll be there loud and proud to see Another Clemson Championship.
Go Tigers!
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