Virginia Tech Exploited UVa's Corners and Picked Up Some Clutch Yards in the Air

It feels much better to watch film on a Sunday afternoon after a win against the hated Wahoos from Charlottesville. While this season has been a disappointment for most of Hokie Nation, the win over Virginia featured everything that Hokies hang their hats on in bragging rights discussions with alumni of the school up north: guts, determination, physicality and execution in the biggest spots. Any attempt to thoroughly analyze the Hokies 24-20 win with anything short of a novel wouldn't do it justice. Tech's defense played an outstanding football game led by a dominant performance by the defensive line (including a re-energized Nigel Williams and one huge goal line stop by Ricky Walker), and outstanding run support by seniors Chase Williams and Kyshoen Jarrett. Michael Brewer, J.C. Coleman and a battered Virginia Tech offense managed to generate big plays at clutch moments against a Virginia defense that may have as many as six future NFL players. BeamerBall finally made a return when C.J. Reavis blocked a punt right into the Bucky Hodges fantasy score column. Most significantly, when things were most dire, instead of tucking their tails and quitting, the entire Tech team responded each time they faced adversity to win a damn tough football game against a determined foe.

It's difficult after a game like this to write a detailed film review without it turning into a highlight real of great kids delivering gutsy efforts that have little to do with X's and O's. After facing two months of crushing criticism, embattled offensive coordinator Scot Loeffler found a way to attack Virginia's defense, and a lucky break gave him the opportunity to exploit that advantage for the plays that ultimately won the football game for the Hokies.

Attacking the Corners

Against Virginia, Loeffler again showed his creativity in developing a game plan designed to wrong foot a strong defensive unit. The Brenden Motley Wild Turkey package featured three different running backs aligned in multiple formations. Motley didn't just run quarterback powers and inverted veers. Loeffler used Motley on a variety of draws, leads, counters and even ran a speed option to J.C. Coleman to secure a critical first down.

However, as I noted in my preview, the key for Virginia Tech to move the football against UVa was to exploit the soft man coverage that UVa employs in order to allow their safeties to support the run at the line of scrimmage. Virginia Tech's receivers would have opportunities to break back underneath that deep soft coverage, but the offensive line had to give Michael Brewer time to get rid of the football. While there were some breakdowns (Brewer's fumble came on a play action pass where J.C. Coleman was left to block Max Valles one-on-one, and Valles forced the fumble) that left Brewer battered, when the Hokies needed big plays, the offensive line delivered enough protection so Brewer could deliver them.

The Hokies ability to run the ball with some success allowed Brewer some extra time via play-action on some of those longer-developing routes. Early in the game, Brewer hit Isaiah Ford on a deep out route after faking a zone lead to J.C. Coleman.

Isaiah Ford has time to plant to the inside, and then break to the outside against deep coverage. Brewer fakes the inside zone lead to Coleman. Sam Rogers does an excellent job of forcing blitzer Henry Coley to the outside to create a nice throwing lane for Brewer. Tim Harris can't get out of his back pedal quickly enough to contest the throw. This is a beautifully timed route, throw, catch and play call for the Hokies.

I also highlighted in my game preview how the Hokies could have success by running inside safety leverage off with Bucky Hodges, and then hitting slant and in routes by the outside receivers. On a critical third down on the Hokies second drive, Willie Byrn had a wonderful catch and run on a similar concept.

At the snap, Hodges runs straight at the Cavalier safety to prevent him from jumping any inside breaking route. Byrn first heads to the flat, then breaks back to the inside on a slant, leaving the UVa corner Maurice Canady looking for his jockstrap. Canady is so aggressive because he expects help to the inside, but Hodges has safety Anthony Harris all tied up on the go route. The only part of this play I don't like is Sam Rogers route. Rogers checks the blitz and then runs to the right flat. Both UVa linebackers go with him, and he runs them almost directly underneath Brewers throw to Byrn. This means that Rogers probably vacated the backfield a bit early. If Rogers stays for a second longer, Brewer has an easier throw to Byrn, or if Coley and Romero drop back under the slant route, Rogers will then be open as the safety valve in the right flat.

Despite some success moving the football, the Virginia Tech offense found themselves staring down a six quarter stretch of not reaching the end zone when a seemingly innocuous play at the end of the first half completely changed the complexion of the game. With Motley out, Brewer returned to the game with an injured shoulder in an effort to try to score points before the half closed out. On a designed roll out, he again found Ford on a deep comeback route.

The nice completion ended up leading to a missed Joey Slye field goal attempt, but UVa nickel corner Tim Harris was injured on the play. I noted in my preview that Demetrious Nicholson and Brandon Phelps were already out for the game for Virginia, leaving Jon Tenuta with only three healthy corners. Without Harris, Tenuta was forced into making some difficult choices with his coverage, and Loeffler found ways to exploit them.

In base looks, Tenuta resorted to shifting his best pass rusher, outside linebacker Max Valles, out to cover the Hokie slot receivers, most often Bucky Hodges. To protect Valles, Tenuta often slid strong safety Anthony Harris over the top to provide deep help for Valles.

With Valles out in the slot and Harris deep, two of Virginia's best run defenders were taken out of the box, which opened some things up in the running game.

Here, the Hokies align in twins to the right, with a tight end left. Notice that Valles is aligned over Cam Phillips in the right slot to the bottom of your screen. With Valles out of the box, Loeffler calls an inside zone to the boundary.

The Hokies have a numerical advantage play side. Laurence Gibson throws down Eli Harold like a stale french fry, and J.C. Coleman cuts outside of his block to follow Wyatt Teller and Rogers up the sideline for a nice gain.

Loeffler threw an additional wrench into Tenuta's defensive plan by aligning in base personnel, then flex his two tight ends out wide to force Virginia to move Harris and Valles out of the box. On this play, the Hokies aligned up in a two tight end formation. The pre-snap activity is critical, so watch closely.

Valles aligns himself on the outside shoulder of Malleck. After a hard count, Malleck and Hodges flex out to the sideline. That eventually draws Valles all the way out to the sideline with Malleck while Anthony Harris aligns on Hodges. Behind the motion, Loeffler calls a simple inside zone read play with a packaged screen to Hodges. With two of Virginia's best run supporting defenders flexed out, the Hokies have a numerical advantage (three blockers, the back, and the quarterback on a keeper) against three Virginia defenders to the play side. Brewer occupies Romero by riding the mesh point with Rogers and selling the fake. Gibson delivers a textbook scoop block with his head to the inside of Eli Harold, then turning Harold to the sideline. Wyatt Teller road grades Dontae Wilkins into the Lane Stadium turf. Harris is late angling in because of the Hodges screen threat, and Rogers makes the 2013 All-American hug air. This is a beautifully designed and executed big boy football play.

When Tenuta needed to move Valles to defensive end and play nickel, the Cavaliers brought reserve safety Wilfred Wahee (No. 28) as a third corner. Loeffler and Brewer correctly identified the match up advantage, and went after Wahee on the two biggest drive of the game.

The Hokies first offensive touchdown drive in two weeks started with a key third down conversion, and the conversion came by Brewer identifying the matchup of Cam Phillips against Wahee.

Phillips aligns in the right slot against Wahee in man coverage. Loeffler has Malleck dragging from the right side, and Phillips drags underneath from the left slot. Malleck's defender, Henry Coley, is in Wahee's path, causing Wahee to shallow out just enough to give Phillips a step. The offensive line keeps Brewer upright, and Brewer lays a pretty ball into a tight window that allows Phillips to run after the catch.

After several nice plays moved the Hokies into UVa territory, Brewer again found Wahee matched up without safety help against Phillips.

Phillips releases off Wahee's outside shoulder on a go route. Wahee reads the play as one of those comeback routes that the Hokies had success on the entire game. After getting numerous chunk plays on those deep curls, Wahee jumped a curl route that wasn't there. Phillips slips behind him and Brewer has just enough on the ball to get it to Phillips for the touchdown.

After UVa inexplicably scored on Bud Foster's defense to pull ahead late, Loeffler again found a way to get a match up against Wahee. This time, Wahee found himself on Bucky Hodges. Loeffler used a variation of the same smash route concept that Brewer threw crushing interceptions on against East Carolina and Georgia Tech, but this time, Brewer read the play correctly.

On the play, Isaiah Ford runs a curl route, causing the UVa corner to bite up. This leaves Wahee with no potential help to the outside. Hodges delivers a little stutter step that causes Wahee to slow his back pedal in case Hodges breaks to the post. On the replay, you can see Hodges freeze Wahee and then blow right past him. Beautiful.

What Does It All Mean?

After the game there was a great deal of discussion on TKP about whether or not it afforded Loeffler another year in Blacksburg. Given how good Virginia's defense was, and how banged up the offense was, Loeffler and his offense delivered an outstanding performance in the fourth quarter to pull out the win. Supporters will point to the victory over Ohio State when Loeffler had his full compliment of offensive weapons coupled with this victory to call for another year. Detractors will note Loeffler seemed disinterested in establishing a running game for most of the season and made plenty of head scratching decisions. The offense was at it's best when it was at it's most diverse and complex, as you saw in the second half against Virginia and against Ohio State. However, that same complexity, and the lack of a power running game seemed to bamboozle his own offense.

Despite all these pending questions and potential off season changes, for one night, for all those beleaguered players, coaches and fans who suffered through this roller coaster of a 2014 season, everything was alright with the world. The Hokies will go bowling and get the critical extra 15 practices needed to get their young playmakers ready for 2015. The Wahoos slinked back to Jefferson State College with their tails tucked between their legs; postseason aspirations evaporated. For one night in 2014 college football was fun. Here is to those players who put it on the line Friday night. Thank you for making Black Friday 2014 a day to be thankful.