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Having read the article on Kaaya and Richt and seen Lu's recent post on the FB position and pacing, I went back and watch a bit more film on Rich'ts UGA offenses from the early 2000s. Specifically I looked at 2005 (DJ Shockley's year), 2007 (Stafford's sophomore year) and 2012 (Murray's junior year.) I wanted to get a feel for his offensive philosophies under different QBs, and while we can debate all day who was actually calling plays, some definite tendencies can be found.
In 2012 Georgia went 12-2 with losses to South Carolina (28 pts) and Alabama (4 points in the SEC title game.) It's that SEC Championship game that I watched most closely:
The Game Itself
It should first be noted that, as the coach himself has stated many times, Mark Richt was not the primary playcaller during this season. However, whatever influence he did or did not have over direct playcalling, I think it's still worthwhile to look at the overall offensive philosophy for this game and how it impacted his players (particularly Murray.) Whoever was actually calling plays, this was still Mark Richt's team, and I believe we can still draw some conclusions and projections from this game.
Right off the bat, UGA comes out in shotgun, 3 WR with a TE and a RB (Gurley) in the backfield. The first play however is either a designed QB run or more likely, a broken play and Murray scrambles for a couple yards (big game jitters maybe?) Next play from the same formation is a quick draw to Gurley for 4 more yards. On 3rd and 2 Murray fakes the handoff to Gurley and throws a 4-yard out towards his WR but misses low.
Already we see a different overall strategy from the previous two games I've examined. In this game, it appears the strategy is to try and spread out that tough Bama defense and loosen them up with quick passes and runs.
Georgia's second series begins much the same way - shotgun, 3 WR - but a false start by Gurley pushes them back. On 1st and 15 Murray goes under center - single back, 3 WR. A quick inside zone run gets a few yards. On second down it's right back to the shotgun for Murray. Bama sells out on a blitz and Murray dumps a nice screen to Gurley for good yardage, but it's called back for a block in the back. On 2nd and long Murray lines up in the Pistol, goes playaction and rolls out to hit his crossing WR for a nice pickup. On 3rd down UGA lines up with essentially 4 WRs (the TE is in the slot) - Murray goes over the middle on a crossing route and picks up the 1st down. This is actually a really nice route tree against Bama's zone defense - the far side WR runs a streak to clear out some space, the near side WR runs a hitch to freeze the CB and the slot WR is left one-on-one on the crossing route.
Georgia goes single-back, 3 WR and back to the ground game. I should also note here that at this point, UGA is using a lot of no-huddle, trying to speed up the tempo and chip away at the defense early. A badly incomplete fade pass and a sack end the drive, however.
The next series, UGA goes to that 21 formation (I formation) and Gurley picks up good yardage. A playaction rollout rolls Murray right into a blitzing LB for a sack, but on the very next play Gurley bounces it outside and picks up another 1st. Back to shotgun formation (2 RBs in the backfield now) and Murray is pressured into a bad incompletion.
Another side note - at this point, UGA is still running no-huddle, but also doing the whole "check with me" thing that Richt has already said he WON'T use here. So that's already one difference...
On 3rd down, Bama shows blitz and then backs off into zone. Murray drops a dime on a corner route to his WR for a nice gain (it was actually an off throw but the WR adjusted nicely.) Next play is another screen pass to Gurley that gets snuffed out in the backfield - to me, it seems the hurry-up is making UGA/Murray a little frantic and he's rushing some throws/reads. On 2nd down, they go back to that 4 WR tight formation crossing pattern and Murray finds Gurley out of the backfield for about 5 yards. Murray misses high on 3rd and long but a fake punt by UGA keeps the drive going. (Was that the OC's call or Richt I wonder...)
Back to the hurry-up and now a bunch formation from UGA. Murray changes the play and they shift to an I formation and Marshall gets a few yards. 2nd and 9 - Murray goes playaction and finds his TE on a cross for a TD. This was another "zone-buster" route - all 4 pass-catching options were flooding the nearside zone on crossing routes ("levels") leaving a nice gap for the TE to catch and run it in. Regardless of who called it, that's a vintage Mark Richt play based on what I've seen.
After an INT gives Georgia the ball back, once again they're in shotgun, 3 WR. First play from scrimmage is tipped, but once again it was a "levels" crossing play to the TE that would have picked up good yardage. Murray is zeroing in on his TE Lynch now and telegraphs a pass on 3rd down that's broken up.
Bama punts and Georgia gets the ball deep in their own territory. They come out in I formation and go back to work with Gurley. Another run out of the Pistol makes it 3rd and 5. They run that same 4 WR tight formation, this time using out routes, but Murray is flushed and throws incomplete.
After a Bama TD it's tied at 7 late in the 2nd quarter. On 1st down Murray has a WR wide open on a streak but underthrows him badly for an INT and the half ends 10-7 Bama.
Georgia ball to start the 2nd half and they're back to pounding Gurley. UGA is also now using a huddle and slowing things down a bit. On 3rd and 1 they come out in I formation with the TE motioning across and back (like we saw all game in 2005 and 2006), Murray goes playaction and finds his WR one-on-one on the outside for big yardage. (This to me is another Richt special.)
Now they're back to hurry-up and Gurley goes off-tackle from the I for 8 yards. After picking up the first on the ground, Murray goes playaction for his WR in the endzone but it's well covered and incomplete. Back to Gurley on the ground and he is GASHING the D at this point and pushes the pile for a Georgia TD.
Bama tries a field goal but it's blocked for a TD - it's now 21-10 UGA, but on the ensuing drive a pass interference call and a whole lot of Eddie Lacy leads to a TD. Saban goes for 2 and gets it making it 21-18 Georgia deep in the 3rd.
Georgia comes out back in the I formation and continues to ride the Gurley train, but an underthrow on 3rd and 4 makes it 3-and-out for UGA. Bama punches it in again to take the lead 25-21.
UGA is now back to the 4 WR tight formation - WRs run a "sit down" route against the zone and Murray finds his man on the sideline for 15 yards. Same formation and this time the slot WRs run streaks while the boundary WRs run short outs - Murray finds his man deep for another big gain. Very nicely drawn-up play which builds off of the previous plays from the same formation. Back to Gurley on the ground and he scored from 10 yards out on a Pistol handoff.
UGA's next few possessions get very little as Bama's defense stiffens (giggidy.) Another Bama TD makes it 32-28 Bama.
Georgia gets it back with 3 minutes left to play. They come out in the 4 WR tight formation again and try to run that same combination route but Murray gets buried before he can even complete his drop. On 3rd and long Murray has all day but wildly overthrows his WR. They punt, but UGA gets it back with a minute to play.
They come out in 4 WR, but no longer are the WRs tight to the formation. A quick-hitch to the TE gets 9, then Gurley picks up the 1st and scurries out of bounds. An apparent INT on the next play would have ended it, but it was reviewed and called incomplete. Another quick out to the TE picks up a 1st down and UGA is driving. Murray finds a WR deep over the middle but the clock is ticking and UGA has no timeouts. Another seam pass to the TE in the middle gets them to the 8 yard line. And then the weirdness happens - the ball is tipped at the line right into the WR's hands who catches it falling down at the 5...and the clock runs out, ending Georgia's championship dreams. **** of a game.
Offensive Philosophies
Rather than look at the running and passing games separately as with my previous posts, I want to examine how this game compares to the previous ones I've looked at in overall offensive scheme and philosophy.
First off, it was apparent from the get-go that this was no "let's protect the QB and run the clock" kind of game. Georgia came out in many different formations early on and the pace of the playcalling was much faster. That said, the focus of the gameplan was still very much on Gurley, to the tune of 23 carries for 122 yards and 2 TDs. Runs were mostly quick-hitting inside zones with a few off-tackle runs and one or two short-yardage counters. The runs came from the I formation, pistol, shotgun, and single-back, though the blocking schemes remained fairly consistent throughout.
The passing game was varied, but sporadic. Murray was 18-33 (54%) for 265 yards, 1 TD and 1 INT. He looked uncomfortable at times - but against Bama's defense that's somewhat to be expected. Most of the routes were combination routes - crosses, streaks/outs, levels, etc. - designed to poke holes in Bama's zone defense and when Murray connected they worked. They ran a couple RB screens, but they were snuffed out early and Georgia never really went back to them.
The playcalling in general seemed a bit hit-or-miss as well. Though relatively balanced, everything seemed a bit too dart-board for me. UGA used WAY more formations in this game than in the others I watched - 3 WR, 4 WR, bunch, trips, pistol, I form - and in some ways I feel it worked against them. Often when watching them line up in a particular formation I'd think "here comes the quick hit to Gurley" or "there's the TE out route again..." For me, I prefer running more plays from fewer formations - then again, they came within 5 yards and 13 seconds of winning the SEC so who am I to judge?
Similarly, Georgia used a mixture of no-huddle, hurry-up, and traditional huddle pacing. The opening scripted drives were no-huddle and hurry-up. I thought this was wise given the overall gameplan of trying to come out fast and loosen up Bama's defense a bit. They huddled only briefly during the game - usually after a turnover, timeout, or after halftime. Occasionally the faster pacing got away from them forcing either a timeout, false start, or delay (or near-delay.) I also noticed quite a few "check-with-me" plays as I mentioned before. I do think Richt will want Kaaya to run plays himself and, like Shockley and Stafford, give him liberty to check at the line as needed rather than look to the sideline.
Conclusions
This was such a great game to watch. From an offensive standpoint, I'm very curious to see how this version of UGA's offense influences Miami's offense this year. The group was prolific (nearly 38 ppg and 7.1 ypp) and Murray put up some insane numbers - nearly 4000 yards and 36 TDs without a real go-to WR (Tavarres King was their leading pass-catcher with 42 catches for 950 yards.) Murray also had many more route options at his disposal than I saw from Shockley or sophomore Stafford - slants, crosses, hitches, seams, etc.
Having now seen a few of Mark Richt's teams from the last 10 years, I think we can put together some consistent tendencies for the offense and for the team itself:
- He maximizes his best players in his gameplans. When it was Moreno, they leaned on him. When it was Murray, they let him loose. Look for Kaaya, Coley, and Njoku to put up big numbers in this offense.
- He will not abandon the run game. Even in losses or when he doesn't have a feature back, the run game will always be present in the offense.
- His run game philosophy is mainly quick hitters - inside/outside zones with some power concepts, but very few slow-developing counters or traps. Good news for Yearby and Walton, IMO.
- Passing game consists of very "smart" routes that build off of previous plays. Crosses, hitches (and later hitch-and-gos), and seams at various levels and using various personnel packages. Again, think multiple plays out of fewer formations, IMO.
- He will run what works until the defense adjusts. We saw this especially early on in the 2005-6 seasons.
- He will not re-invent the wheel. This is not Urban Meyer or Chip Kelly - we'll see I form, single back, shotgun, and maybe a couple wrinkles but his main plan is to line up and beat you with execution. I think I saw maybe two or three "trick" plays total - a flea-flicker and the occasional non-QB pass. Nothing in a blizzard, though...
- Playaction is a hallmark of the passing game in all formations.
- Pacing for the games I've watched varies, but the word I keep using is "deliberate." When he wants to move, he moves, and he trusts his players to get to the line and execute. When he wants to settle things down, he does it well - I saw very little panicking. I do think abandoning the "check with me" offense is a good call, as it allows the QB to dictate the pacing without the confusion of getting a second opinion with a ticking clock in your face...
- The first 3 games will probably be a snooze-fest. Prepare yourself now - we're going to see a lot of I form, run-heavy, playaction football until we hit October, IMO. Even the GT game I'd wager Richt plays keep-away for as much of the game as he can. While I'm not big on "saving" your offense for big games, if there's any year to do it, it's this one.
Of course, all of this is based off of nothing but old game film so I could be completely wrong and Richt is gonna come out 5-wide and go all Air Raid on us, but at least it maybe lends a little context to what we may or may not see this season. As always, I welcome any and all discussion!
In 2012 Georgia went 12-2 with losses to South Carolina (28 pts) and Alabama (4 points in the SEC title game.) It's that SEC Championship game that I watched most closely:
The Game Itself
It should first be noted that, as the coach himself has stated many times, Mark Richt was not the primary playcaller during this season. However, whatever influence he did or did not have over direct playcalling, I think it's still worthwhile to look at the overall offensive philosophy for this game and how it impacted his players (particularly Murray.) Whoever was actually calling plays, this was still Mark Richt's team, and I believe we can still draw some conclusions and projections from this game.
Right off the bat, UGA comes out in shotgun, 3 WR with a TE and a RB (Gurley) in the backfield. The first play however is either a designed QB run or more likely, a broken play and Murray scrambles for a couple yards (big game jitters maybe?) Next play from the same formation is a quick draw to Gurley for 4 more yards. On 3rd and 2 Murray fakes the handoff to Gurley and throws a 4-yard out towards his WR but misses low.
Already we see a different overall strategy from the previous two games I've examined. In this game, it appears the strategy is to try and spread out that tough Bama defense and loosen them up with quick passes and runs.
Georgia's second series begins much the same way - shotgun, 3 WR - but a false start by Gurley pushes them back. On 1st and 15 Murray goes under center - single back, 3 WR. A quick inside zone run gets a few yards. On second down it's right back to the shotgun for Murray. Bama sells out on a blitz and Murray dumps a nice screen to Gurley for good yardage, but it's called back for a block in the back. On 2nd and long Murray lines up in the Pistol, goes playaction and rolls out to hit his crossing WR for a nice pickup. On 3rd down UGA lines up with essentially 4 WRs (the TE is in the slot) - Murray goes over the middle on a crossing route and picks up the 1st down. This is actually a really nice route tree against Bama's zone defense - the far side WR runs a streak to clear out some space, the near side WR runs a hitch to freeze the CB and the slot WR is left one-on-one on the crossing route.
Georgia goes single-back, 3 WR and back to the ground game. I should also note here that at this point, UGA is using a lot of no-huddle, trying to speed up the tempo and chip away at the defense early. A badly incomplete fade pass and a sack end the drive, however.
The next series, UGA goes to that 21 formation (I formation) and Gurley picks up good yardage. A playaction rollout rolls Murray right into a blitzing LB for a sack, but on the very next play Gurley bounces it outside and picks up another 1st. Back to shotgun formation (2 RBs in the backfield now) and Murray is pressured into a bad incompletion.
Another side note - at this point, UGA is still running no-huddle, but also doing the whole "check with me" thing that Richt has already said he WON'T use here. So that's already one difference...
On 3rd down, Bama shows blitz and then backs off into zone. Murray drops a dime on a corner route to his WR for a nice gain (it was actually an off throw but the WR adjusted nicely.) Next play is another screen pass to Gurley that gets snuffed out in the backfield - to me, it seems the hurry-up is making UGA/Murray a little frantic and he's rushing some throws/reads. On 2nd down, they go back to that 4 WR tight formation crossing pattern and Murray finds Gurley out of the backfield for about 5 yards. Murray misses high on 3rd and long but a fake punt by UGA keeps the drive going. (Was that the OC's call or Richt I wonder...)
Back to the hurry-up and now a bunch formation from UGA. Murray changes the play and they shift to an I formation and Marshall gets a few yards. 2nd and 9 - Murray goes playaction and finds his TE on a cross for a TD. This was another "zone-buster" route - all 4 pass-catching options were flooding the nearside zone on crossing routes ("levels") leaving a nice gap for the TE to catch and run it in. Regardless of who called it, that's a vintage Mark Richt play based on what I've seen.
After an INT gives Georgia the ball back, once again they're in shotgun, 3 WR. First play from scrimmage is tipped, but once again it was a "levels" crossing play to the TE that would have picked up good yardage. Murray is zeroing in on his TE Lynch now and telegraphs a pass on 3rd down that's broken up.
Bama punts and Georgia gets the ball deep in their own territory. They come out in I formation and go back to work with Gurley. Another run out of the Pistol makes it 3rd and 5. They run that same 4 WR tight formation, this time using out routes, but Murray is flushed and throws incomplete.
After a Bama TD it's tied at 7 late in the 2nd quarter. On 1st down Murray has a WR wide open on a streak but underthrows him badly for an INT and the half ends 10-7 Bama.
Georgia ball to start the 2nd half and they're back to pounding Gurley. UGA is also now using a huddle and slowing things down a bit. On 3rd and 1 they come out in I formation with the TE motioning across and back (like we saw all game in 2005 and 2006), Murray goes playaction and finds his WR one-on-one on the outside for big yardage. (This to me is another Richt special.)
Now they're back to hurry-up and Gurley goes off-tackle from the I for 8 yards. After picking up the first on the ground, Murray goes playaction for his WR in the endzone but it's well covered and incomplete. Back to Gurley on the ground and he is GASHING the D at this point and pushes the pile for a Georgia TD.
Bama tries a field goal but it's blocked for a TD - it's now 21-10 UGA, but on the ensuing drive a pass interference call and a whole lot of Eddie Lacy leads to a TD. Saban goes for 2 and gets it making it 21-18 Georgia deep in the 3rd.
Georgia comes out back in the I formation and continues to ride the Gurley train, but an underthrow on 3rd and 4 makes it 3-and-out for UGA. Bama punches it in again to take the lead 25-21.
UGA is now back to the 4 WR tight formation - WRs run a "sit down" route against the zone and Murray finds his man on the sideline for 15 yards. Same formation and this time the slot WRs run streaks while the boundary WRs run short outs - Murray finds his man deep for another big gain. Very nicely drawn-up play which builds off of the previous plays from the same formation. Back to Gurley on the ground and he scored from 10 yards out on a Pistol handoff.
UGA's next few possessions get very little as Bama's defense stiffens (giggidy.) Another Bama TD makes it 32-28 Bama.
Georgia gets it back with 3 minutes left to play. They come out in the 4 WR tight formation again and try to run that same combination route but Murray gets buried before he can even complete his drop. On 3rd and long Murray has all day but wildly overthrows his WR. They punt, but UGA gets it back with a minute to play.
They come out in 4 WR, but no longer are the WRs tight to the formation. A quick-hitch to the TE gets 9, then Gurley picks up the 1st and scurries out of bounds. An apparent INT on the next play would have ended it, but it was reviewed and called incomplete. Another quick out to the TE picks up a 1st down and UGA is driving. Murray finds a WR deep over the middle but the clock is ticking and UGA has no timeouts. Another seam pass to the TE in the middle gets them to the 8 yard line. And then the weirdness happens - the ball is tipped at the line right into the WR's hands who catches it falling down at the 5...and the clock runs out, ending Georgia's championship dreams. **** of a game.
Offensive Philosophies
Rather than look at the running and passing games separately as with my previous posts, I want to examine how this game compares to the previous ones I've looked at in overall offensive scheme and philosophy.
First off, it was apparent from the get-go that this was no "let's protect the QB and run the clock" kind of game. Georgia came out in many different formations early on and the pace of the playcalling was much faster. That said, the focus of the gameplan was still very much on Gurley, to the tune of 23 carries for 122 yards and 2 TDs. Runs were mostly quick-hitting inside zones with a few off-tackle runs and one or two short-yardage counters. The runs came from the I formation, pistol, shotgun, and single-back, though the blocking schemes remained fairly consistent throughout.
The passing game was varied, but sporadic. Murray was 18-33 (54%) for 265 yards, 1 TD and 1 INT. He looked uncomfortable at times - but against Bama's defense that's somewhat to be expected. Most of the routes were combination routes - crosses, streaks/outs, levels, etc. - designed to poke holes in Bama's zone defense and when Murray connected they worked. They ran a couple RB screens, but they were snuffed out early and Georgia never really went back to them.
The playcalling in general seemed a bit hit-or-miss as well. Though relatively balanced, everything seemed a bit too dart-board for me. UGA used WAY more formations in this game than in the others I watched - 3 WR, 4 WR, bunch, trips, pistol, I form - and in some ways I feel it worked against them. Often when watching them line up in a particular formation I'd think "here comes the quick hit to Gurley" or "there's the TE out route again..." For me, I prefer running more plays from fewer formations - then again, they came within 5 yards and 13 seconds of winning the SEC so who am I to judge?
Similarly, Georgia used a mixture of no-huddle, hurry-up, and traditional huddle pacing. The opening scripted drives were no-huddle and hurry-up. I thought this was wise given the overall gameplan of trying to come out fast and loosen up Bama's defense a bit. They huddled only briefly during the game - usually after a turnover, timeout, or after halftime. Occasionally the faster pacing got away from them forcing either a timeout, false start, or delay (or near-delay.) I also noticed quite a few "check-with-me" plays as I mentioned before. I do think Richt will want Kaaya to run plays himself and, like Shockley and Stafford, give him liberty to check at the line as needed rather than look to the sideline.
Conclusions
This was such a great game to watch. From an offensive standpoint, I'm very curious to see how this version of UGA's offense influences Miami's offense this year. The group was prolific (nearly 38 ppg and 7.1 ypp) and Murray put up some insane numbers - nearly 4000 yards and 36 TDs without a real go-to WR (Tavarres King was their leading pass-catcher with 42 catches for 950 yards.) Murray also had many more route options at his disposal than I saw from Shockley or sophomore Stafford - slants, crosses, hitches, seams, etc.
Having now seen a few of Mark Richt's teams from the last 10 years, I think we can put together some consistent tendencies for the offense and for the team itself:
- He maximizes his best players in his gameplans. When it was Moreno, they leaned on him. When it was Murray, they let him loose. Look for Kaaya, Coley, and Njoku to put up big numbers in this offense.
- He will not abandon the run game. Even in losses or when he doesn't have a feature back, the run game will always be present in the offense.
- His run game philosophy is mainly quick hitters - inside/outside zones with some power concepts, but very few slow-developing counters or traps. Good news for Yearby and Walton, IMO.
- Passing game consists of very "smart" routes that build off of previous plays. Crosses, hitches (and later hitch-and-gos), and seams at various levels and using various personnel packages. Again, think multiple plays out of fewer formations, IMO.
- He will run what works until the defense adjusts. We saw this especially early on in the 2005-6 seasons.
- He will not re-invent the wheel. This is not Urban Meyer or Chip Kelly - we'll see I form, single back, shotgun, and maybe a couple wrinkles but his main plan is to line up and beat you with execution. I think I saw maybe two or three "trick" plays total - a flea-flicker and the occasional non-QB pass. Nothing in a blizzard, though...
- Playaction is a hallmark of the passing game in all formations.
- Pacing for the games I've watched varies, but the word I keep using is "deliberate." When he wants to move, he moves, and he trusts his players to get to the line and execute. When he wants to settle things down, he does it well - I saw very little panicking. I do think abandoning the "check with me" offense is a good call, as it allows the QB to dictate the pacing without the confusion of getting a second opinion with a ticking clock in your face...
- The first 3 games will probably be a snooze-fest. Prepare yourself now - we're going to see a lot of I form, run-heavy, playaction football until we hit October, IMO. Even the GT game I'd wager Richt plays keep-away for as much of the game as he can. While I'm not big on "saving" your offense for big games, if there's any year to do it, it's this one.
Of course, all of this is based off of nothing but old game film so I could be completely wrong and Richt is gonna come out 5-wide and go all Air Raid on us, but at least it maybe lends a little context to what we may or may not see this season. As always, I welcome any and all discussion!
