We beat a ranked conference opponent on the road in an absolute dogfight. I just hope that's the lens by which we all review the tape because there's a lot of good and a lot of bad. So off we go...
Talk about getting off on the right foot. We've made a huge priority out of TE movement and formational flexibility. On tons of snaps, we've had some type of shift or motion from the TE and they almost always move across the formation which makes the defense adjust for numbers. Here you see Davis pull #21 out of the box. The mirrored bubble screens on each side draw in both safeties and now #21 is a couple steps too far. Great job by Shipley making himself skinny and working high knees to get those feet up. It's really easy to get tripped in tight spaces like that. After the DL shifts, look at how Putnam is no longer directly on a guy so he chips and immediately starts looking for work at the second level.
A couple snaps later Beaux Collins identifies the cat blitzer but gets caught. This is a tough play for him because Williams is covered up, but the blitzer is headed right to him. Neither of our guys are really positioned to block him. If this guy takes off on the snap I can't blame Beaux, but the blitzer hesitates giving Beaux a chance to get to him. An argument can be made for block in the back here, but if we seal that guy off, Shipley is on the edge 1v1 with Mustapha. Maybe it goes for no gain, maybe it goes for a TD. We went back to it later on with a nice result. And again for a couple. Oh, and again.
Who is this guy and what has he done with DJ? You'll notice a smash concept to the bottom of the screen. Beaux sits underneath, Shipley occupies the flat, meaning there's supposed to be 1v1 on the corner route for Briningstool but Wake does a really nice job passing guys off and covering it up. I hate that Allen & Collins got so stationary in the middle of the field here because DJ does a great job scanning back to his right only for them to still be flatfooted. To put this throw where he did while moving left and leading a target moving right is really impressive. Plenty more to come from DJ and Streeter.
I'll be the first to admit that I didn't give the Wake OL nearly enough credit coming into the game. This is the recipe we've killed them with for years. You show A-gap pressure, you bring it, then try to twist and stunt outside. Their RB was FANTASTIC in taking on free rushers all day and their OL latched onto our guys and stood them up snap after snap.
Streeter, you dirty dog. This is the original RPO play and it's unstoppable. It's one we should be running a handful of times a game. Typically you throw this weakside as to avoid an overhang defender. As a QB you're taught to immediately ID both reads. To the left you see Allen attached to the line and how Wake has to stack their backers to the strongside meaning that there's only 2 people to the weakside - Bothroyd at stand-up edge (run) and the safety playing shallow (pass). Post-snap you see both of your reads crash on the inside zone so you toss it in behind them. It seems so simple, but if your QB isn't confident in what coverage he's seeing, who he's reading, and then having the wherewithal to actually execute it in about a 10-second window it's going to be a disaster. DJ has come a long way. Here it is again, but you see the DE hold his ground so we have to take the dive. To start the second half, we go right back to it with a little motion. For all the handwringing about Streeter, lack of motion, same offense, no throws to the middle of the field, not using TEs, etc. we sure saw DJ and this offense come alive Saturday doing a little bit of all those things.
After a couple empty drives to start the game, Wake saw that we had been running cover 1 basically every play. That means we're only dropping a single guy to play deep centerfield. Wake uses a ton of PA posts to attack that deep middle area. It makes all the sense in the world to run. Allows you to blitz or have a single LB sitting in another middle zone - as is the case on this play. @MaxCalifornia started a thread on this exact thing. When we went to a cover 2 and chose to give help overtop to both CBs, they stopped launching 50/50 balls. And by 50/50 I mean 50% chance of DPI and 50% chance of Wake coming down with the ball. I'm not going to beat the dead horse here, or here, or here, or here, or here, or here from what appears to be cover 2, or here out of cover 0, or even here when they let the backup throw a bomb at us. While we're on the topic of coverage, look at this from the drive after their first TD of the game. We switched into some cover 2 shell and took away the homerun and forced a thee-and-out. So for all the blame that will go to Goodwin for the 3rd quarter, we did bounce around and try different things. Just that none of them worked and frankly nothing will ever work when you get worked the way our corners did.
As the season goes along, you'll hear me talk about 3rd down conversion rates. Coming into this game, Clemson was around 46% (19/41) conversion. That's pretty strong over the course of a season, but we went 16/23 on Saturday. Plays like this 3rd & 21 completion, this 3rd & 9, or this big 3rd & 3 are how you win football games. It was interesting to note how far away we were on 3rd down - average of 6.52 yards over 23 tries. Lots of 3rd and short, but lots of medium and long distance conversion too.
Another great play by Antonio Williams and doesn't it look similar to last week? Just with a little Briningstool window dressing. Notice the field position and that they're both 3rd and medium. Hell just look at the clock and the quarter. Copy and paste. The 3rd and Renfrow moniker is going to become 3rd and zero in due time.
I love Davis Allen. Still hurts me that we let Galloway take so many empty snaps away from him. Lets start here and appreciate some athleticism from the big man. Box out and rebound. I talked last week about our guys taking more ownership of the ball in the air and Allen (among others) clearly got the memo. Box out and rebound on them again on what wound up being the game-winner.
It was pretty clear to me that we tried to get Shipley more involved in the passing game. Lets start with this one. You see, just get the ball his hands in space and let him work for you. But with that said, I came away with more examples of DJ not wanting to throw that. Look here just two plays later. Unload this and it's an easy 5 to stay ahead of the sticks. Or what about this from earlier in the game? Just get it to your guy. I have no earthly explanation for why DJ needed to look any further than #1 on either of these plays. It's 2nd and long, get a playmaker the ball with blocking and put yourself into 3rd and more manageable.
Will Shipley embodies everything Clemson football says it's about. This is relentless effort. This right here makes me want to run through SEVERAL brick walls. I might shed a tear when I see this on the 4th quarter video vs NC State.
BT Potter is a freak. When he lined up for this kick, I was nervous, but not really. College kickers aren't supposed to drill these but BT does it a handful of times every year. Absolute nails. It wasn't a time-expiring kick, but everybody knew the importance of this attempt.
By this snap, I was starting to come to the realization that we were going to be 3-1. But nope, more relentless effort. Tyler Davis played his rear end off all game. So did Myles Murphy. I thought there were a lot of times as a DL where we didn't finish the play - letting a RB fall forward, letting Hartman climb the pocket, not making the tackle on first contact, etc. - but right here 13 and 98 made a play.
Dime. Enough said.
Like I said in the beginning - lots of good, lots of bad. Yes, the secondary looked atrocious and it literally couldn't have been worse during stretches of this game. The defense as a whole will only continue to improve. Will they live up to the preseason hype? Almost certainly not, but this is still a good unit top-to-bottom. Wake's scheme is tough as it mitigates the DL and forces your LBs and S into lots of conflicts. Remember that Hartman threw for 312 last year too. We had 6 DPI calls and a couple of them were on underthrows where if we simply get our head around there's a good chance of a pick. I'm sure there will be plenty of "Fire Rainman" and "This won't be popular but..." threads between now and Saturday night, but the reports of the death of Clemson's defense will be greatly exaggerated. Now that we've properly addressed the elephant in the room, let's talk about this offense. We're still 100% in the redzone this year and have scored more combined points through the first four games than ever before. Pass protection has been nearly flawless and the run game continues to find a way. Seriously though, who is this QB we got? Doesn't even look like the same person from a year ago. After all the talk of Watson/Lawrence regression under Clemson/Streeter, DJ is writing a wild comeback story to the contrary. If he keeps it up, he's going to get paid.
Talk about getting off on the right foot. We've made a huge priority out of TE movement and formational flexibility. On tons of snaps, we've had some type of shift or motion from the TE and they almost always move across the formation which makes the defense adjust for numbers. Here you see Davis pull #21 out of the box. The mirrored bubble screens on each side draw in both safeties and now #21 is a couple steps too far. Great job by Shipley making himself skinny and working high knees to get those feet up. It's really easy to get tripped in tight spaces like that. After the DL shifts, look at how Putnam is no longer directly on a guy so he chips and immediately starts looking for work at the second level.
A couple snaps later Beaux Collins identifies the cat blitzer but gets caught. This is a tough play for him because Williams is covered up, but the blitzer is headed right to him. Neither of our guys are really positioned to block him. If this guy takes off on the snap I can't blame Beaux, but the blitzer hesitates giving Beaux a chance to get to him. An argument can be made for block in the back here, but if we seal that guy off, Shipley is on the edge 1v1 with Mustapha. Maybe it goes for no gain, maybe it goes for a TD. We went back to it later on with a nice result. And again for a couple. Oh, and again.
Who is this guy and what has he done with DJ? You'll notice a smash concept to the bottom of the screen. Beaux sits underneath, Shipley occupies the flat, meaning there's supposed to be 1v1 on the corner route for Briningstool but Wake does a really nice job passing guys off and covering it up. I hate that Allen & Collins got so stationary in the middle of the field here because DJ does a great job scanning back to his right only for them to still be flatfooted. To put this throw where he did while moving left and leading a target moving right is really impressive. Plenty more to come from DJ and Streeter.
I'll be the first to admit that I didn't give the Wake OL nearly enough credit coming into the game. This is the recipe we've killed them with for years. You show A-gap pressure, you bring it, then try to twist and stunt outside. Their RB was FANTASTIC in taking on free rushers all day and their OL latched onto our guys and stood them up snap after snap.
Streeter, you dirty dog. This is the original RPO play and it's unstoppable. It's one we should be running a handful of times a game. Typically you throw this weakside as to avoid an overhang defender. As a QB you're taught to immediately ID both reads. To the left you see Allen attached to the line and how Wake has to stack their backers to the strongside meaning that there's only 2 people to the weakside - Bothroyd at stand-up edge (run) and the safety playing shallow (pass). Post-snap you see both of your reads crash on the inside zone so you toss it in behind them. It seems so simple, but if your QB isn't confident in what coverage he's seeing, who he's reading, and then having the wherewithal to actually execute it in about a 10-second window it's going to be a disaster. DJ has come a long way. Here it is again, but you see the DE hold his ground so we have to take the dive. To start the second half, we go right back to it with a little motion. For all the handwringing about Streeter, lack of motion, same offense, no throws to the middle of the field, not using TEs, etc. we sure saw DJ and this offense come alive Saturday doing a little bit of all those things.
After a couple empty drives to start the game, Wake saw that we had been running cover 1 basically every play. That means we're only dropping a single guy to play deep centerfield. Wake uses a ton of PA posts to attack that deep middle area. It makes all the sense in the world to run. Allows you to blitz or have a single LB sitting in another middle zone - as is the case on this play. @MaxCalifornia started a thread on this exact thing. When we went to a cover 2 and chose to give help overtop to both CBs, they stopped launching 50/50 balls. And by 50/50 I mean 50% chance of DPI and 50% chance of Wake coming down with the ball. I'm not going to beat the dead horse here, or here, or here, or here, or here, or here from what appears to be cover 2, or here out of cover 0, or even here when they let the backup throw a bomb at us. While we're on the topic of coverage, look at this from the drive after their first TD of the game. We switched into some cover 2 shell and took away the homerun and forced a thee-and-out. So for all the blame that will go to Goodwin for the 3rd quarter, we did bounce around and try different things. Just that none of them worked and frankly nothing will ever work when you get worked the way our corners did.
As the season goes along, you'll hear me talk about 3rd down conversion rates. Coming into this game, Clemson was around 46% (19/41) conversion. That's pretty strong over the course of a season, but we went 16/23 on Saturday. Plays like this 3rd & 21 completion, this 3rd & 9, or this big 3rd & 3 are how you win football games. It was interesting to note how far away we were on 3rd down - average of 6.52 yards over 23 tries. Lots of 3rd and short, but lots of medium and long distance conversion too.
Another great play by Antonio Williams and doesn't it look similar to last week? Just with a little Briningstool window dressing. Notice the field position and that they're both 3rd and medium. Hell just look at the clock and the quarter. Copy and paste. The 3rd and Renfrow moniker is going to become 3rd and zero in due time.
I love Davis Allen. Still hurts me that we let Galloway take so many empty snaps away from him. Lets start here and appreciate some athleticism from the big man. Box out and rebound. I talked last week about our guys taking more ownership of the ball in the air and Allen (among others) clearly got the memo. Box out and rebound on them again on what wound up being the game-winner.
It was pretty clear to me that we tried to get Shipley more involved in the passing game. Lets start with this one. You see, just get the ball his hands in space and let him work for you. But with that said, I came away with more examples of DJ not wanting to throw that. Look here just two plays later. Unload this and it's an easy 5 to stay ahead of the sticks. Or what about this from earlier in the game? Just get it to your guy. I have no earthly explanation for why DJ needed to look any further than #1 on either of these plays. It's 2nd and long, get a playmaker the ball with blocking and put yourself into 3rd and more manageable.
Will Shipley embodies everything Clemson football says it's about. This is relentless effort. This right here makes me want to run through SEVERAL brick walls. I might shed a tear when I see this on the 4th quarter video vs NC State.
BT Potter is a freak. When he lined up for this kick, I was nervous, but not really. College kickers aren't supposed to drill these but BT does it a handful of times every year. Absolute nails. It wasn't a time-expiring kick, but everybody knew the importance of this attempt.
By this snap, I was starting to come to the realization that we were going to be 3-1. But nope, more relentless effort. Tyler Davis played his rear end off all game. So did Myles Murphy. I thought there were a lot of times as a DL where we didn't finish the play - letting a RB fall forward, letting Hartman climb the pocket, not making the tackle on first contact, etc. - but right here 13 and 98 made a play.
Dime. Enough said.
Like I said in the beginning - lots of good, lots of bad. Yes, the secondary looked atrocious and it literally couldn't have been worse during stretches of this game. The defense as a whole will only continue to improve. Will they live up to the preseason hype? Almost certainly not, but this is still a good unit top-to-bottom. Wake's scheme is tough as it mitigates the DL and forces your LBs and S into lots of conflicts. Remember that Hartman threw for 312 last year too. We had 6 DPI calls and a couple of them were on underthrows where if we simply get our head around there's a good chance of a pick. I'm sure there will be plenty of "Fire Rainman" and "This won't be popular but..." threads between now and Saturday night, but the reports of the death of Clemson's defense will be greatly exaggerated. Now that we've properly addressed the elephant in the room, let's talk about this offense. We're still 100% in the redzone this year and have scored more combined points through the first four games than ever before. Pass protection has been nearly flawless and the run game continues to find a way. Seriously though, who is this QB we got? Doesn't even look like the same person from a year ago. After all the talk of Watson/Lawrence regression under Clemson/Streeter, DJ is writing a wild comeback story to the contrary. If he keeps it up, he's going to get paid.
