Duck Tape: Film Analysis Update of Indiana 2025

Special thanks to L.C. Norton of SB Nation’s Indiana coverage for joining me on this week’s podcast to discuss the Hoosiers’ roster:

Nota bene: This article is an update to my earlier in-season preview of Indiana, and assumes a familiarity with the team’s roster and tendencies from the first part of the year. There have been a number of significant changes since then that this article will contrast, and it would be exceedingly lengthy to re-create the entire first part of the season here for comparison. While I’ll give a brief refresher of the salient points throughout, it may be helpful for the reader to review that article first.

Throughout conference play in 2024 and the first three Big Ten games in 2025, Indiana operated an RPO-heavy offense, peaking with a nearly 80% RPO rate against Illinois in week 4 of this season. The offense completely tore apart most Big Ten defenses which almost robotically step down on the run and can’t help but give up quick throwing lanes to inside routes.

However, more sophisticated defenses gave the Hoosiers some trouble for a variety of reasons – not just their couple of losses, but also Michigan last year and Iowa this year in tough wins. Against Oregon in week 7 of this year, Indiana modified their base RPO plays to attack the sideline, exploiting corners who were leveraged inside expecting the standard RPO playbook.

In talking with L.C., we agreed that OC Shanahan had seen the writing on the wall and wanted to make a more fundamental change to the offense so that it was more “January-ready” – not just one that would work against middle-power conference foes but also defenses which were growing keen to the same bag of tricks.

Starting in week 8 against Michigan State, we noticed the same skunkworks project of trying out a new passing playbook and deliberately avoiding throws to their top receiver that Coach Cignetti had done during the non-conference slate over the last two years (I also learned in my interview with the Purple Antics Podcast that Cignetti did something similar at James Madison during his time there, and L.C. told me this week that he’s made this a pattern going back to his days at IUP and Elon).

The playbook which has emerged from week 8 onward defies easy description exactly because it’s far more versatile and less dependent on the RPO … in fact those key pair of inside RPO routes which dominated 2024 and first part of 2025 are now down to just 15% of the offense, and in one recent game as few as 6%. The base formation is 11-personnel shotgun spread, though with quite a bit of tighter formations which typically signal a run. There’s nothing particularly exotic about the playbook; it shares the same core concepts which have permeated modern college football offenses for the last 15 years, but it can’t be pigeonholed or contained simply either.

There’s another major change to the offense, which is the passing distribution. After the skunkworks period this year was over and they’d settled into their stable phase in weeks 4-9 (and even with the change to the offense for the last two weeks of this period), Indiana had a very regular distribution each week: a little over a third of targets to #13 WR Sarratt, a little under a third for #3 WR Cooper, about 15% for #7 WR Williams, and the last 20% divided up as dumpoffs to the TEs and RBs. Then for a three-game period in weeks 10-12, Sarratt was unavailable with injury, and the distribution went into flux each week as they tried different solutions – it wasn’t until week 11 at Penn State that they discovered the transformative figure of #80 WR Becker.

L.C. and I are both baffled as to what took Indiana so long to recognize what a weapon Becker is — he’s much more of a fit for the new offense than the RPO-based one, but in weeks 8-10 they weren’t throwing him the ball despite apparently being healthy and available — because he’s every NFL scout’s dream of a receiver. Becker’s height, speed, catch radius, body control, and blocking ability are all excellent, and in the last five games he’s re-ordered the distribution to become the most targeted and effective receiver. Becker has essentially eliminated Williams’ targets, cut Cooper’s in half, and even taken about seven percentage points away from Sarratt.

The result of these changes to the offense on the garbage time- and field position-controlled stats that I track from charting all of Indiana’s games are that the offense has become significantly less explosive and somewhat less efficient on 1st downs, and they’ve become more conservative on 2nd downs as they lean into what remains a very high short-yardage rush conversion rate … but they’ve skyrocketed in key 3rd down performance metrics of short-yardage explosive plays and long-yardage conversions. Indiana now uses 3rd & short as their “money down” opportunity (curiously, not 2nd & short) on which to take shot plays, and they’ve increased their 3rd & long conversion rate to an elite 50% – the same figure that Michigan had in 2023 when they won a national championship.

The emergence of Becker is key to both of these upward trends – he’s caught the singular defining catch for massive yardage which broke the game open in each of their competitive games since week 11, and he’s supplanted Sarratt as the go-to guy for clutch 3rd down conversions when #15 QB Mendoza is in trouble. Some examples:

(Reminder – you can use the button in the right corner to control playback speed)

1. :00 – The blitz has overwhelmed the 7-man protection and hits the QB as he’s releasing a prayer ball – by all rights this should be incomplete or even picked off, but Becker’s astonishing vertical and body control saves the day. (NB: the all-22 camera operator at PSU games this season stood on the home sideline instead of the visitors’ as usual, so these clips are going to look upside down and backwards.)
2. :30 – Some extraordinarily efficient Big Ten blocking here. The corner presses Becker on the line and gets wrecked, and the field safety refuses to help over the top which is an absolute mistake, though I’m not sure if it’s schematic or execution.
3. 1:01 – Several elements indicate this is the designed throw – the rollout, Mendoza’s eyes, his release prior to the breakout. The corner is riding Becker with inside leverage and no outside help so there’s no way to defend this. It could be covered better if the low safety left the inside receiver to the high safety as a decoy and instead bracketed Becker with the CB to the outside.
4. 1:26 – This G5 squad calling itself Alabama sends a six-man pressure and gets stoned, and is playing cover-0 on the back end. The DB over Becker has outside leverage as though there’s a safety on top, but naw man that’s what the zero means.

Almost all of the personnel trends in the passing game that I observed in my previous article have continued in the second part of the season, though they require re-mapping onto the new offense and redistributed target levels. The two exceptions, both positive for the Hoosiers, are that the primary running backs, #8 RB Black and #1 RB Hemby, now grade out equally well in pass protection, and #37 TE Nowakowski has climbed from an occasional dumpoff target with good per-target numbers but too few for quality evaluation to now about two serious downfield targets per game with a sustainable 59% success rate and 9.1 adjusted YPT (he got an extra couple against his former team, Wisconsin … L.C. told an entertaining story about it on the podcast).

As we discussed on the podcast, the change in the offense has somewhat cut against Sarratt and Cooper’s previous roles, though they remain important parts of Indiana’s production. During the time Sarratt was out but before defenses really understood the threat Becker was, opponents put a lot of effort into taking Cooper away and his per-target numbers have really collapsed over the last five weeks, down to a 42% success rate and 4.1 adjusted YPT (ironically, his heroic catch at the back of the endzone against Penn State during this period arguably won Mendoza the Heisman).

Sarratt’s skillset is made for the RPO in that he’s an excellent after-the-catch receiver, but in two years of charting him I’ve seen him win virtually no contested balls, and the new offense builds a lot more of those in. Williams’ body type is a better fit for the new offense than the RPO one, but unfortunately for him Becker is an even better fit so he’s still getting the short end of the stick.

The offensive line dealt with an injury issue to #62 LG Evans for four games, weeks 10-14. In the first of them they replaced him with their 6th man from jumbo sets, Ohio State transfer #75 OL Michalski, but they thought better of this in the next three games because redshirt freshman #72 OL Ajani played left guard instead. Periodically, #67 RT Benson has missed some time with various dings and they’ve tried Michalski out as a replacement, including as starter during the conference championship, but this didn’t last very long and Benson was back in before halftime. They made another change in the championship, replacing starter #74 RG Lynch with Ajani in the 2nd quarter due to, L.C. and I believe, ineffectiveness.

In the quarterfinals, Lynch was back at right guard but Ajani started at right tackle — the third position the freshman has now started at for the Hoosiers — with Michalski coming in for jumbo sets and Benson replacing Ajani in the 4th quarter during garbage time. The conclusion I drew, and L.C. agreed, is that Ajani is simply better than Lynch, Benson, or Michalski, and the dilemma for OL coach Bostad is that they only have one of him for two problematic spots on the right side. L.C.’s prediction was that in the semifinals Indiana would start Ajani at RG and Benson at RT, because Benson has faced Oregon before and the weakest link they’ve needed to shore up for a long time is at RG.

While the left side is more solid in comparison, overall I don’t have much higher than average pass protection grades for the offensive line as a whole. Pocket penetration during the second part of the season with the new offense is much higher than before with the quicker passing RPO offense, a 31.8% rate of sacks/scrambles/throwaways per dropback.

Here’s a representative sample of unsuccessful passing plays during this time:

1. :00 – No presnap motion here (another trend that’s continued despite the offensive change-up), that might have revealed the linebacker is assigned to the tailback and the boundary DBs are stacked up, indicating the blitz is coming. Regardless, I think the blocking choice would be the same – they simply don’t slide or drop to take wide rushers, they take the inside guy and try to speed up the throw. It doesn’t work here because the hot is covered and the RT is also beat.
2. :24 – Note that all the WRs are open here: Williams has a step with the CB’s hips flipped, Becker has a big cushion on the comeback, and Cooper has a big lead on the drag despite slipping. But the initial read is Nowakowski and he gets jammed, which is all that’s necessary once pressure gets past the tackles – Mendoza bails and has a hard time placing this ball on the hoof. No flags, naturally.
3. :41 – This was the 24th pass break-up I’ve charted in two years on a Sarratt target.
4. :55 – Becker’s not in on this 3rd down; Ohio State rushes three, leaves a spy on the QB, and plays c-2 man. That hedges their bets and it’s the right call – nobody in this set is finding an opening, Sarratt has two guys collapsing on him five yards short of the sticks, and three rushers have pretty good odds of getting through somewhere.

By far the strongest continuing personnel trend which survives the transition to the new offense and indeed has an even more powerful effect in the statistical regression is the reduction in the passing game’s effectiveness under pressure. This applies to every stat I have the ability to measure – per-play success rate, YPP, drive efficiency, a-EPA, Eckel rate, etc. I think L.C. bristled a bit at the suggestion (he may be a little tired of hearing it) and dismissed it as routine that every QB’s performance suffers under pressure, but the numbers are very clear that the effect is greater than average in Indiana’s case.

The paradox here is that one of the reasons 3rd down conversions have risen is that Mendoza has pulled off a number of breathtaking escapes from pressure, and L.C. brought up some miraculous plays Mendoza has made against blitzes which made the opposing DC look foolish. Some examples:

1. :00 – We had a good laugh about this one on the podcast. It went from “oh man he’s in trouble” to “I guess it’s UCLA that’s in trouble” real quick.
2. :28 – Here the QB is flushed as the RT is beat and the backup LG has lost his mind. The LT gives the new PSU DE the Abdul Carter treatment, and now the CB has a Hobson’s choice – stay on his assignment and give up the scramble 1st down, or come off and risk a throw. He chooses the latter, and Mendoza and Becker make a wild connection.
3. :50 – This is definitely championship-level Big Ten officiating. The defense is bailing an end into zone and are overleveraged to the boundary, that personnel is better used spying the QB so the DB on Becker isn’t in tension.
4. 1:17 – Five hitches, I’d be grossed out too. Mendoza easily weaves through a defense that the Bruins had the self-respect to fire their coach for.

The throughline in failed blitzes has been using cover-0, that is, no help if the pass gets off or Mendoza escapes because everyone not blitzing is locked up. A far more effective defensive strategy on 3rd downs has been to identify the quick outlet or escape lane first, then bring extra bodies or a sim from what’s left to maximize pressure. This becomes simpler when Becker is in, because as L.C. and I discussed, he’s actually on the field somewhat sparingly — only about 22% of reps are 11-pers with Becker, Cooper, and Sarratt — and it’s something of a tell when he is that the play will feature him as a primary target or blocker. Some examples:

1. :00 – The way that Indiana solves their tackles’ vertical drop issue is that they don’t … they throw into the pressure with hots that have diversified compared to 2024 but nonetheless aren’t difficult to crack, such as this presnap creep by the back. The defense identifies it, moves the safety in advance, jams Becker on the longer route, and effectively baits the failed conversion.
2. :18 – The one team Becker didn’t get a big reception against was Purdue, in a stirring but ultimately unsuccessful bid for the Bucket. Coach Odom had clearly identified Mendoza’s tendency for seeking Becker out and holding the ball too long waiting for him — note that Sarratt and the back are open for better shots — and pressure gets through, affecting the throw into coverage.
3. :41 – Becker’s not in, Ohio State sends three again. The outside receivers break free of the corners late in their routes but two high safeties can handle that. Note the spy monitoring the front door, the boundary DE maintaining outside leverage to close the back door, and the third edge rusher demolishing the RT.
4. 1:08 – We discussed this one on the podcast – former Indiana DC Womack likes throwing the kitchen sink at QBs, here the late overload doesn’t get an adjustment in the pickup strategy (the graphic on the reverse angle is useful for once), which should have had the RB take the new insert and the left side each slide in one for a throw to Nowakowski. Becker has cooked the DB who falls down but Mendoza has no time to hit him.

The rushing offense has become, at the risk of cliché, more Big Ten-like in the second part of the season, going from 49% frequency but 67% success on 1st downs before to 55% frequency and 48% success now (the trendline continues the closer to the present we examine; in the last five games it’s 60% frequency and 44% success). The explosiveness rate of the rushing offense is on a downward trend as well, from far above Big Ten norms during the 2024 season to well within them in the last few games at just 8%.

The reason for this, as L.C. pointed out, is that Shanahan is using the running backs’ toughness to solve opposing defenses’ blitz habits. Black and Hemby are consistent and reliable at getting 4-6 yard gains even against extra bodies, and can punish defenses by breaking through if there are no linebackers left at the second level. Indiana has been comfortable waiting out defenses by putting together long drives of grueling short runs and occasional passes until the defense relents and they can break off a big play. Some examples:

1. :00 – The defense sends the backer and nickel around the strongside, which is too much, and the other backer sticks his nose in due to Black’s pathing where the interior of the line is getting enough push to catch him up. Even without control by the blockers, there’s no one in the big B-gap except some arm tackles he can power through for this conversion.
2. :07 – I give full credit to Black for recognizing what Evans is doing here, buying him a split second of time and getting through a hole that doesn’t really exist until he hits it.
3. :20 – The yards after contact here are just exceptional. He’s contacted a yard before the line to gain and winds up gaining six.
4. :38 – The defense just wasn’t prepared to accept Becker as an H-back blocker but that’s what he’s become, effectively supplanting the actual second-stringer #19 TE Staes. The DT and DE playside are combo’d and outleveraged with the backers filling the interior gaps, the defensive design has the nickel stopping this play and Becker wrecks him.

The two most significant contributors to run game problems are the offensive line shuffling mentioned earlier, and that the design of most run plays is still structured around reads that are for the most part no longer live and defenses have begun ignoring. Here’s a representative sample:

1. :00 – It’s become evident the read isn’t live (and even if it were the perimeter blocking isn’t leverage well) so the OLB just ignores Mendoza and the defense has a numbers advantage. The linebackers stay back and react to the play, which is smarter since it’s pretty rare that these guys get up to the 2nd level … here the center gets crushed and it’s an easy kill.
2. :11 – Here we’re starting to see communications issues with the line shuffling, the backup LG and center collide when the DT and LB move unexpectedly (this is contrary to their zone blocking assignments, they should block their spots, not lock onto specific guys). Meanwhile the right side just gets the normal kind of destroyed.
3. :23 – Again Becker is in at H-back, lead-blocking in split-flow zone, but even he’s not skinny enough to get through because the d-line is … well, smushing everybody.
4. :35 – This would be a great play to throw an RPO out of, but that’s kaput I suppose. Alabama’s solution to everything at this point is to throw more bodies at it which sort of works under these conditions, they just tackle the mesh and there’s no live read to worry about.

There haven’t been any structural or schematic changes to DC Haines’ squad in the second part of the season, though injuries have tested their depth. There’s one backup at each position who’s gotten substantial garbage time play, most with at least one game of meaningful play, so if something happens to a starter they won’t be left completely in the lurch, but the staff evidently has very tight preferences about playing only the topline guys while the game is competitive.

Prior to a couple of season-ending injuries to a pair of defensive ends, there were only 15 of these topline players – no substitutions in the secondary or linebackers, just a swapout of the SAM or nickelback, and a defensive line rotation made of four defensive tackles and three ends. In the most recent game it was down to 14, with a reshuffle of some defensive line spots and a backup (arguably two) getting a major increase in playing time.

The two starting defensive tackles who are unaffected by all this are #95 DT Tucker and #0 DT Wheeler – both are excellent and remain highly effective. They’re built relatively similarly, about 6’1” I would say (regardless of the roster billing) and just north of 300 lbs. On the podcast L.C. liked the comparison I made to Oregon’s Ja’Maree Caldwell last year – there’s something brain-breaking seeing guys this size moving as fast as they do, like they’re warping space.

The third player I would have characterized as a primary defensive tackle prior to the injury situation is #97 DL Landino, though his body type is somewhat different at 6’4” and 285 lbs. Landino formed a three-man rotation with Tucker and Wheeler where one of them would be at 1-tech, one at 3-tech, and the third took a break, meanwhile a fourth tackle, #91 DT Ratcliff, came in during meaningful time but much less often in what I thought of as relief or for situational packages.

At end, there weren’t much of any rotational distinctions, other than something of a preference to keep #6 DE Kamara on the weakside while #8 DE Daley or #13 DE Wyatt were on the strongside (though meaningful reps when all three were available came out to essentially equal among them so they were fine flipping that around), and each have very simliar body types at around 6’1” and 270 lbs.

In week 8 against Michigan State, Wyatt suffered a knee injury which has kept him out all season. For the most part, Indiana went with just Kamara and Daley on the edges, though they also added a bit of meaningful play for a backup, sophomore #17 DE Ndukwe, and they tinkered a bit with moving Landino over and increasing Ratcliff’s reps to fill in. Then in a heartbreaking freak accident after the conference championship game, Daley was injured celebrating with fans. This accelerated the changes already in place but didn’t cause anyone else to be promoted up – Ndukwe became a fulltime member of the end rotation, Ratcliff is now getting equivalent reps to the other tackles, and Landino is now playing something like a 5-tech. L.C. relayed that sadly, both Wyatt and Daley are expected to be out for the entire postseason as well.

I have enough meaningful reps charted against a variety of quality opponents — which is to say, Big Ten teams — for Ndukwe and Ratcliff in their new roles to comment on their performance: they aren’t liabilities but they simply don’t grade out as plus values like the starters at their positions do. Ratcliff’s block destruction and havoc rate is slightly below FBS median and Ndukwe is still underweight at 240 lbs. Landino is harder to assess as he qualitatively played a different spot in one game against a hopelessly overmatched opponent who hasn’t had good line play since their offensive line coach left for a better-heeled program.

The linebackers remain unchanged, though if anything the trends I noted earlier regarding versatility for the SAM #46 LB I. Jones and the simulated pressure prowess from #21 LB Hardy have increased with the defensive line situation. The excellent #4 LB Fisher was out for one game in which they moved Jones inside and had a backup play SAM, but he returned the next week and everything has been back to normal since.

Here’s a representative sample of successful rush defenses:

1. :00 – This is the 4-3, note the SAM playing up on the line of scrimmage taking on the block of the H-back in 12-pers and the boundary safety walked down into the box on 2nd & long, correctly anticipating a run. Wheeler clears out the center single-handedly and keeps the RG from getting the backers, leaving both Fisher and Hardy free to knife in.
2. :22 – Wheeler is shaded on the LG’s outside shoulder but still beats him inside to get the TFL on his own, the get-off is just amazing.
3. :38 – After going through my own experience early this season of not believing my eyes with Penn State’s own-goal of switching their rush offense to a wide zone they couldn’t execute, this tape was pretty hard to watch. The direction of the play is easy to guess from RB alignment and Indiana’s d-line is just faster and better than their counterparts.
4. :51 – Again note the boundary safety in the box to the weakside, who just comes around the LT unblocked. He’s not necessary though, none of the frontside blocks are winning.

And unsuccessful rush defenses:

1. :00 – In this alignment, the defense has the DL slant weakside and the backers/safeties go strongside in case it’s a pass. The penetration speed works against them here, they let the OL bypass them and get up to the second level fast for a clean array of blocks.
2. :25 – Good patience from the back out of the pistol, waiting for the blocking to develop on this press & bounce run on a finally not-stupid play design from the Penn State OC. The SAM is frozen backside, the middle backers bite inside on the press, so only the LT and WR need to win their blocks and the back just has to run over the nickel.
3. :41 – The multiple redirects from the H-back into a frontside kickout use defense’s aggression against them: the DL and LBs slant in the same direction so the one layer doesn’t have the other covered, and with the hole open and backers vacated the cutback gets to daylight.
4. 1:14 – Here’s the configuration with Ndukwe standing up and Landino inside of him, so Kamara has to shade inside the tackle. Again with this RB alignment the DL initially slants against the passing strength so Kamara and Tucker are going to attack the guards. That means the LT is free to get up to Fisher and the center up to Hardy. Ndwuke gets kicked out hard by one receiver and the nickel is put on skates by another. If the RB had simply cut to the sideline instead of trying to play Saquon he’d have a touchdown.

Other than one game missed for one of the cornerbacks in the first part of the season, there’s been no rotation at all during meaningful play for any of the secondary spots. They continue to use a very strict field/boundary roles, with #5 CB Ponds and #7 DB Moore on the boundary, while #22 CB Sharpe and #1 DB Ferrell are to the field. The nickel, #12 DB Boykin, aligns to the passing strength, which during this stretch of play has effectively meant he’s been a fieldside player only as virtually none of these opponents lined up with the formation into the boundary.

There was a very rare alternate configuration that Haines used when opponents went to very heavy personnel groups which looked like a 5-3-3: pulling both safeties, using Boykin as the single high, and flipping Ponds and Sharpe’s sides of the field, but I don’t know if it’s survived the defensive line changes.

Discussion on social media of a video I’d made earlier about the relative strengths of the field vs boundary defensive backs led me to run further correlation analyses on Indiana’s reps in which they used non-standard personnel, to see if the effect was about the personnel or the structure. Now that I have a full season’s data, I’m more confident than earlier in saying: it’s both. I think the zone scheme intrinsically puts the field safety in tension, but also that Ponds and Moore are simply more talented than their counterparts on the other side. L.C. agreed with that suggestion on the podcast, and brought up several adjustments Haines has made to compensate.

The video linked above is a nine-minute compilation throughout the season of opponents taking advantage of the overlap to hit big plays against the field (often times the QB doesn’t discover this until after scrambling, leading me to question what Big Ten OCs are getting paid to do). I’ll select a few examples of the fieldside levels concept, against which Indiana has an 11% defensive success rate, to narrate:

1. :00 – Short route is the late TE release, intermediate is the Z on the in-cut, deep is the slot on the post. With Fisher and three DBs this should be no problem but all four hesitate – Moore and Boykin don’t know who goes deep and who stays at the 35, Sharpe doesn’t know if he chases the in or stays wide, Fisher doesn’t know if he drifts into the midfield hole or takes the TE (the answer is the latter for all).
2. :16 – Variation, the slot goes deep, the X cuts in, the TE runs to the flat. Moore doesn’t know which route is going to break off and is stuck in an endless backpedal. It’s impossible for the nickel to cover the X’s route so Sharpe letting the receiver get behind him is the problem here.
3. :34 – This throw is late, it should be out at the top of the QB’s drop because play action gave him exactly what he wanted. Moore has to cover the post route so Sharpe has no help at all, not over the top or underneath, and of course the corner himself is way too late reading the receiver’s drift.
4. :50 – It’s an awkward throw since the QB has to step up to avoid pressure, but that’s okay, the receiver is super open because of course he is. It’s a c-1 blitz and Sharpe gets spun around like a top covering the in-cut, and the high safety can’t help because he’s occupied with the deeper route.

Since opposing offenses during conference play — including Oregon in week 7, to my irritation — seemed uninterested in exploiting this disparity and indeed had on average 71% of the QB’s first read look to the boundary during meaningful play, the biggest determinant of pass play success or failure was actually the protection.

While Indiana has standard numbers in long yardage — 58% success on 2nd & long, 72% on 3rd & long — their 1st down pass success rate is only a mediocre 51% and their 2nd & medium rate is a very poor 29%. However, I’m unable to run comprehensive situational or differential analyses because of the absolutely appalling ignorance of elementary game theory which permeates the Big Ten. In 13 FBS games of meaningful play, the Hoosiers have defended against only eight 3rd & short dropbacks and six (!) 2nd & short dropbacks – opponents have elected to run the ball at close to 90% frequency in short yardage.

This leaves me with no methodologically rigorous way of assessing how much the pass rush vs the secondary is contributing to 3rd down stops. From watching tape and talking to L.C., my feeling is that the pass rush has the balance of it, and the secondary is mostly playing to prevent big gains rather than all-out, high-risk attempts to break up everything.

Here’s a representative sample of successful defenses of passing plays:

1. :00 – Here’s the problem passing offenses face with getting terrorized by the pass rush – they leave everybody in to block and release only two into the pattern, one to the field who then gets quadruple covered over and under (can’t mess that up) and one to the boundary. The boundary route looks more tempting since it’s solo and shorter, but it’s much easier for Ponds to react to and he’s stickier anyway.
2. :20 – Watch the reverse angle on this one, the protection knows what’s coming and the QB has the RB assigned to Fisher in the big gap. Hardy’s creep is obvious but the line is still too slow to stop him get through the much smaller gap between Tucker and Wheeler. Note the multiple 1st down throws available if this were picked up. (I had a play that looked almost identical to this in every game, I chose this one because the presnap comms were great.)
3. :44 – Now given the above compilation in regards to the fieldside coverage, I was baffled that OC Hartline came with this gameplan – it’s exactly backwards. Their Biletnikoff-level WR is stopping short against Sharpe with the QB reading Ferrell, while their NFL first rounder is running a 10-yd in from the boundary while none of the RB and TEs are staying in to protect or out in a levels or stretch, rather three useless hitches. If I were trying to design a pattern that was more likely to be eaten up by this defense I don’t think I could.
4. 1:00 – This is a cool sim by the defense, they crowd then line then bail Landino and Ndukwe to the same side to help with short route coverage and QB escape, but then don’t overload the other side – the RB is wasted going the wrong way. Of course the ostensibly talented LT stands around woolgathering, the TE who followed the coach from UW gets done just as much, the QB tries to throw a pick, and the WR congratulates himself for finally accomplishing something in breaking it up.

And unsuccesful pass defenses:

1. :00 – I can’t say how much this will happen with the current defensive line situation but it was a frequent enough cause of boundary-side pass defense breakdowns during the stretch of games being examined that I needed to include an example for representation – that is, bailing an end into zone coverage and then there being confusion about how the coverage is handed off when targets crossed zones. Here the end is locked onto the RB wheeling out instead of just dropping into what (I think) should be quarters. Ponds is supposed to have the widest part of the field and thus the RB while the DE gets the throwing lane for this slant before it’s handed off to Moore, but it’s open because he’s drifted too far wide. The reader can see Ponds’ frustration.
2. :18 – Here’s an example of the rare 5-3-3 configuration (Maryland has skinny TEs, this is 13-pers, the previous play they were in tight for a run and haven’t subbed). Ponds is to the wide side of the field now, and look at how big this cushion is even with only one guy to cover since the SAM isn’t in conflict. A basic throw into the flat gains 15 yards with everyone this far off.
3. :38 – I have an algorithmically determined decay curve for defensive effectiveness the longer a game gets drawn out based on years of charting data, and Indiana is square on model for a team that rotates this little playing competitive games deep into the 4th quarter. It’s also apparent on just watching on film – look at how Jones and Sharpe are being blocked out, and how Ferrell and Boykin miss their tackles, they’re all exhausted.
4. :56 – Ohio State’s line getting smashed to pieces on the blitz is no surprise, and I like the fight and recovery from Ponds to get this tackle on the big receiver, but the cushion he gives as a spot-drop corner allows these kinds of modest gains even with problems like the slip.

The FanDuel market sees this as a relatively low scoring game, with an over/under of 48.5 and a point spread of 3.5, implying a 24-21 game. I agree that this will probably be defensively oriented and be competitive late into the 4th quarter. Indiana is currently favored.