We are basically the same D as Indiana. Hetherman was the brains behind it. There's way more scheme to run here. Hetherman said again and again and again he was keeping things simple last year due to the horrific chaos the year prior. I expect to see some DC genius stuff this year.
I really want to see him integrate match priciples into our defense. Cover 3 Match with this deep, talented, well coached and experienced secondary would be lethal!
@Coach Macho
This is why I said there is actually alot of room for the defense to get better, we know Hetherman stripped the defense down and I didnt really realize it until getting to the all 22 stuff for indiana and seeing how you could see the dna of our defense but how they ran it being in system longer and how we ran it in a more rudimentary way. Alot of those windows or bust coverage on back end that we saw I think will be gone this year. Plus having Bain and Mesi we were able to keep it simple but this year be able to do more things.
If we could eliminate just these things our defense will be even better
-No issue with cover 3 but bailing at the snap to even 12 yards off even in redzone (to point belichek and Saban are like what are you doing lol) needs to be at minimum, we have 5 corners with experience, have confidence in them and let them close that space and still play their assignment. No bailing to 15 yards giving easy underneath throws, the top offenses we play ALL took the easy yards and we caught losses in all 3 of those games with that (UL, SMU, IU)
-eliminate the random busted coverage, guys wide open like in ND TE, SMU TD, Tamu Big play before fg block, game due to mis communication or bust.
-No foot off gas mindset and playing scared shell in 4th qtrs. Let ND and FSU (wont add Ole miss because that was legit operation and if we catch picks it would be over) back in game just playing wayyyy too off, You cannot shut down operations for a qtr plus, run your defense and keep the standard. We dont play scared of big play but let teams back in with easy first down passes.
Those dam draw plays, I know we love our 3rd down nascar package but from game 1 to last game we got burnt even in 3rd in medium with ears pinned back and getting draws popped on us from ND, Louisville, IU, used our scheme against us and got big conversions..
I know we cant take everything away but we have pieces to be elite top 5 defense. Thats what Im looking forward to..