DEFENSIVE RECAP: 2023 Michigan

The run defense and line play come back to Earth in a big way

Nebraska linebacker Javin Wright tries to make a tackle. Photo courtesy Nebraska Athletics.

Glossary of Terms¹
Link to Viewable Charting Sheet²

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DRIVE 1

11 Plays , 6.8 Yards Per Play Allowed
36% Success Rate
0 Havoc Plays, 1 Explosive Play Allowed

Michigan’s high-efficiency offense lives up to its name, moving down the field with none of its first 10 plays gaining more than 9 yards. The Wolverines’ initial salvo is to get the ground game going, with pure runs or RPOs composing 8 of the first 10 plays. Entering the game, teams had used pure runs or RPOS on just 33.5% of their snaps against Nebraska, for a success rate of 27.9%. Michigan for the game would go 66% for a 60% success rate. The Wolverines’ personnel is just at a different level than Nebraska or anyone it’s faced so far.

On the second play of the game, UM reads an edge defender on a run play, with quarterback J.J. McCarthy pulling the ball for a 9-yard gain. I speculated in last week’s post teams might start doing more reading of Nebraska’s front, with the one-gap scheme leading to a lot of upfield aggressiveness that could get Husker defenders out of position. We see it early here from Michigan, which isn’t afraid to use McCarthy’s legs.

NU coordinator Tony White is mostly conservative early and playing the run, bringing linebackers down to create four- or five-man fronts on 9 of the first 10 plays, with just one snap of pure 3-3 Stack alignment — a first-and-10 from midfield — and bringing just one blitz.

The Huskers do force a couple third downs this drive — both of them short — but Michigan converts one with an overpowering inside Duo run, then does the same on a third- and fourth-down sequence on the next set of downs. Michigan getting short third downs will be a running theme throughout the game; entering this game, Nebraska’s opponents averaged needing eight yards to convert on third downs; the Wolverines’ average was almost half that, at 4.5 average yards to go, and they converted 75% of their attempts.

After efficiently moving down the field on the first 10 plays of the game, on the 11th UM drops the bomb:

Some of what’s happening pre-snap here is pretty interesting. Michigan comes out in a four-wide detached trey formation, likely indicating pass. Nebraska is initially in its four-man, Jack-linebacker-walk-up front, but just before the snap, its Mike and Will linebackers shift down as if on a blitz in the B and C gaps to the same side. Michigan has a check-with-me count on here, with McCarthy simulating a snap before looking to the sideline to see if the play is still on. With the blitz look, you can see Michigan check out of whatever play it was running to get into a quick-game pass in an attempt to burn the blitz.

But Nebraska audibles, too. You can see the Husker defenders also check with White, and the structure shifts back from the four-man front to the 3-3 Tite Stack alignment and the safeties rotating to put NU Rover Isaac Gifford in the deep middle, with boundary safety Koby Bretz rolling down to the flat. At the snap, instead of the blitz look it had on initially, Nebraska now has the opposite on: nine players dropping into coverage with only two players rushing. Expecting the quick pass to come from Michigan to counter the blitz look he initially showed, White has NU’s standard “Drop 8” Cover 3 look on, but is also having the boundary defensive end, Blaise Gunnerson, drop back into a short zone, giving Nebraska six players in coverage in the short area of the field within 5 yards of the line of scrimmage. 

The quick-pass is taken away by NU, and McCarthy has to hold the ball. But the Wolverines line completely eviscerates the two rushers, and McCarthy has about 6 seconds of time in the pocket to turn the play into a second-reaction scramble drill and hit a big downfield pass (with a sick catch). NU’s Drop 8 stuff has been really successful this year — a 65% success rate while being used on over a third of its snaps entering this game — but the downside to that strategy is the lack of pressure on the passer, which shows up here. Other teams NU has played so far have struggled to block NU’s three rushers and it’s been able to organically generate a pass rush, but the Wolverines had no problem with it and would be successful against almost 60% of Nebraska’s Drop 8 looks.

DRIVE 2

3 Plays, 9.7 Yards Per Play Allowed
33% Success Rate
0 Havoc Plays, 1 Explosive Play Allowed

With a short field after a Nebraska turnover, Michigan has two short runs before busting a big play on a third-and-1 to go up 14-0. White still is keeping it pretty generic, using the four-man Jack linebacker front twice on this drive and the Bear front once, with one blitz. On the play that scores, Nebraska is in a heavy/goalline-type front to try to stop Michigan in short yardage, with the field safety (orange arrow) and the Rover (purple) walked down as linebackers in the box, with the field corner (blue) aligned tight to the three-tight-end side Michigan is employing and the boundary corner (green) also pressed up at the line:

This gives Nebraska 10 players inside 4 yards of the line of scrimmage, but it also means there aren’t really layers to the defense. The only player deeper than 4 yards is the boundary safety (white arrow), and he’s at 5 yards, much closer to the line than a deep safety would typically play. This is a good alignment to try to stop short yardage, but if the opposing team is able to get past it (which Michigan does) it means there isn’t really a player who can stop them on the way to the end zone.

DRIVE 3

9 Plays, 10.2 Yards Per Play Allowed
33.3% Success Rate
0 Havoc Plays, 3 Explosive Plays Allowed

Michigan again drives the length of the field to score a touchdown but is starting to get a little bit more explosive. 

White makes two adjustments this drive, the first being bringing a safety or two down into the box more often to counter the run. NU has played with multiple safeties deep on 42.9% of its snaps on the first two drives but would use them on 25% over the next two drives, instead opting for single-high shells on 9 of the next 12 plays. This helped get more closer to the line of scrimmage to stop the run; the Huskers would play with seven or more players in the box on 50% of their plays over the next two drives.

The second adjustment was to start using his nickel defense package, taking a safety off the field to bring on a third corner, sophomore Tamon Lynum (blue arrow), and moving starting outside corner Quinton Newsome (green) to the slot. This is the lineup from NU’s second play of this drive:

Nebraska’s starting boundary safety, DeShon Singleton, was hurt on the second play of the game and didn’t return. For the rest of the first drive and the second drive, Bretz came in as a one-to-one replacement at boundary safety. But for this drive and the next, White would instead just fully take Singleton’s position off the field, switching to the nickel look for the next 12 plays. NU had only used nickel personnel on eight snaps this season, a handful of times in the Minnesota and Colorado games, and hadn’t used it at all against Northern Illinois or Louisiana Tech. Though it did have a 75% success rate in its limited snap count. 

I imagine the thinking here was that if you’re going to be down a starter, a pretty good adjustment option for run defense would be to get Newsome closer to the box. As an outside corner, he’s Nebraska’s fourth-highest graded run defender, behind only Singleton, linebacker Javin Wright, and nose tackle Nash Hutmacher. Especially on the fly in the middle of the game, this makes more sense than bringing on an inexperienced starter.

Michigan loses some efficiency this drive but trades it for explosiveness, with Nebraska getting some nice plays early (60% success rate on early downs in this series) only to watch McCarthy put dots into tight coverage for completions. He converts a third-and-8 early to his tight end on the basic route off a Drive concept with Gifford right on the receiver, then gets a later 20-yard gain on a Flea Flicker where the coverage was tight, too. That’s with Nebraska playing deep zone coverage (Cover 3 on 6 of 8 snaps and Cover 6 on another) for most of this series.

White’s mostly been patient to put bodies in the box and play zone so far, with an occasional one-player blitz, but on a second-and-1 on the 21, he decides to get aggressive and bring six, with man coverage behind it:

Michigan starts in a heavy pistol formation before shifting out into an open doubles formation. Nebraska also motions out but still keeps six players in the box, four down linemen and two linebackers. It looks like a pretty standard 4-2, one-safety-high shell, until just before the snap when the boundary linebacker (green arrow) shifts down into the gap. 

At the snap, NU shows it has a stunt on. The boundary LB crashes into the boundary A gap, along with two of the down defensive linemen, giving the Michigan center and left guard three players to deal with. The boundary defensive end is also running the left tackle up the field, occupying that lineman. This is already four rushers-on-three lineman to this side, and White is also bringing the field linebacker (purple arrow) looping to the same side for what should be a free rush on the quarterback. This is called an “ET” stunt (or “end-tackle” stunt) with the outside player (in this case, the green-arrow boundary linebacker) crashing inside as the penetrator, with an interior tackle (in this case, the purple-arrow linebacker) looping to the outside.

With six defenders being used on the stunt, that means Nebraska has only five players to devote to coverage. The five defenders are playing Cover 0, or straight man-to-man coverage with no safety help. On the outside, the four blue-arrow players are pretty obviously locked up with the receivers opposite them, with three of them playing are tight press coverage. The deep safety, circled in white, is one-on-one with the back, a bit of pre-snap disguise to make the setup look a little less aggressive.