Loeffler's Adjustments Help Fuel a Victory in Beamer's Commonwealth Cup Swan Song

While the outcome of a 23-20 win in Frank Beamer's final Commonwealth Cup was satisfying, I imagine most Hokie fans were incredibly frustrated with the performance of the offense through three quarters. Kwontie Moore and the rest of Virginia's penetrating defensive front provided problems for the Hokies' offensive line all afternoon long. Back-side penetration derailed numerous attempts to get Travon McMillian on the edge. Pass protection continued to be a bugaboo. Michael Brewer took several devastating shots that impacted his accuracy and decision-making in the second and third quarter. The offensive ineptitude took a toll on the defense. After having an outstanding half of stopping UVA's running game, minus some quarterback scrambles, the Hokies' defense started to wear down early in the fourth quarter. A huge run by Albert Reid and a beautiful fade route to Canaan Severin put the Hokies behind on the scoreboard twice in the fourth quarter.

Tech's offense responded in crucial situation down the stretch. It delivered two fourth quarter touchdowns and a game winning field goal. Joey Slye's game winning kick finished a drive that drained 5 minutes off the clock. Isaiah Ford outclassed the Hoos' cornerback tandem of Tim Harris and Darious Latimore. Ryan Malleck had an iconic moment when he ran through blue-chip recruit Quin Blanding, which set up a Sam Rogers touchdown catch. Loeffler's late adjustments were critical to exploiting matchups that set up all three scores.

Curl to the Boundary

In my preview, I noted that UVA used a variety of zone and man coverages that required their corners to play very soft outside. The boundary side was particularly vulnerable to quick curl and out routes. The boundary was also exposed to the outside stretch play, provided the Hokie offensive line use pin and pull blocking to cut off back-side pursuit.

Early in the game this strategy showed promise. On the opening offensive play of the game, Loeffler aligned both his tight ends to the boundary side. Corner Darious Latimore (No. 39) gives seven yards of cushion and retreats at the snap.

Malleck runs a curl route to intentionally pick off the outside linebacker from jumping in front of the quick out. Hodges runs a quick curl. When Hodges curls inside, there is nine yards of separation between him and Latimore. Brewer throws the ball well to the outside. I'm not sure if Hodges was supposed to run an out, or if this is a wildly inaccurate throw. A difficult six yard gain should have been close to a first down with a good throw.

UVA conceded this type of route on both the boundary and field side most of the game. Loeffler refused to attack it, especially on key third downs. There were several examples of the route being open on possession downs, but two in particular stood out.

In the second quarter, Bud Foster's defense set up the Hokies offense around midfield on consecutive drives. On this drive, the offense managed to get into field goal range with a pending 3rd-and-4. Even though UVA again concedes the quick out to the boundary, Brewer's first read is a triple slant to the field side.

The play call itself isn't terrible on a 3rd-and-short. Against man concepts, the inside slant gives the quarterback a quick read. Unfortunately, UVA has inside leverage to take away the quick slant/inside curl patterns that Loeffler loves to call on third downs. Brewer forces a throw to Hodges despite a defender on Hodges' inside shoulder. Fortunately for the Hokies, the defender is face-guarding Hodges and doesn't turn for an easy interception.

Now, watch the clip again and focus on the boundary side. Latimore is playing soft inside leverage and has no help in the short flat. Cam Phillips runs a quick 7 yard out and is wide open. Brewer's first read should have been to the boundary, as this pattern was open almost all game long.

I don't think Loeffler deserves all the vitriol directed his way, yet this is another example of being a bit too smart for his own good. The Hokies have a 3rd-and-2 with Rogers in the backfield. Instead of lining Ford up wide and allowing him to win a matchup, Loeffler uses Ford as a decoy with jet sweep motion.

Off the jet sweep fake, Brewer waggles to his right. His hope is left defensive end Mike Moore (No. 32) crashes hard to chase down the jet sweep from the back-side, leaving Brewer with a run-pass option. If the defender comes forward, throw to Sam Rogers in the flat. If the defender stays back, Brewer can lunge forward for a first down. This is essentially a one-man route. Moore stays at home and pressures Brewer. Linebacker Mark Hall (No. 59) recognizes that Malleck is not a receiving threat on the play and releases him to come up on Rogers' flat route. Brewer has nowhere to go. Misdirection has its place in football. It was necessary when Loeffler arrived in Blacksburg because he didn't have the talent at wide receiver to get players open without misdirection. However, it didn't make sense to me for Loeffler not to exploit a significant favorable matchup — Isaiah Ford and Bucky Hodges aligned against soft coverage on the boundary — in critical moments. With the Hokies' defense was playing well, the offense needed to extend those drives.

Pin and Pull and Counter Sparks a Dormant Running Game

Virginia's defensive line is built around penetration. Their defensive ends wanted to get up field and contain runs back to the inside. The defensive tackles penetrated to cause confusion in opposing blocking schemes. While the defense is vulnerable to runs on the edge, it is challenging to get to the edge with a pure zone scheme because it is so difficult to reach the play-side defensive end and scoop the defensive tackles charging up the field right at the snap.

Yet, Loeffler's offense chose to run the zone stretch at the boundary by zoning it across the board for most of the game. Eric Gallo had a particularly tough time reaching converted defensive tackle Kwontie Moore (No. 34). Moore lined up in a one-technique and was firing straight up field without reading the play at all.

Here is an example. The Hokies run the outside zone to the boundary. Hodges is aligned in the slot, and Malleck motions over to give the Hokies two tight ends to seal the edge. Moore is aligned as a one-technique defensive tackle to the boundary side. The Hokies offensive line zones the play to the right, with Malleck and Hodges tasked to seal the edge.

Gallo has almost an impossible block. Moore is a quick player and Gallo has the added responsibility of snapping with his right hand. As he takes his zone step to the right, he can't bring his hand to Moore's outside shoulder in order to try and turn his pads. To his credit, Gallo does get his head into the proper position. However, Moore is too quick and has too much momentum for Gallo to turn him.

The zone stretch finally popped when the offensive line used a pin and pull blocking scheme, a variant of zone blocking. The play-side guard blocks down on the defensive tackle and "pins" him inside and the center pulls around. This adjustment works against a one-technique DT because the guard is aligned between the DT and the path of the football, instead of the center having to loop completely around and seal the DT inside after the football is snapped. (This exchange isn't exclusive between guard and center, it can happened between other covered and uncovered blockers.)

On the game winning drive, this subtle adjustment paid off. The Hokies run outside zone to the boundary. Jonathan McLaughlin and Ryan Malleck execute a pin and pull on defensive end Trent Corney (No. 43). Malleck cracks down on Corney. McLaughlin takes a bucket step and pulls around Malleck to get to the edge. On the inside, Wyatt Teller blocks down on one-technique DT David Dean (No. 55) and Gallo pulls around the edge.

The down blocks of Teller and Malleck seem to mess up the keys of mike linebacker Micah Kiser (No. 53). Kiser comes up to the inside of the seal blocks, even though Corney also goes inside. To me, this suggests Kiser was reading Malleck's inside step. Kiser got sucked inside just enough for McLaughlin to seal him inside. The Hoos don't have any alley defenders to the outside. McMillian gets to the edge for the best gain on an outside zone all day.

Part of Kiser's hesitancy to get to the corner may be attributed to the very successful counter that Loeffler utilized earlier in the fourth quarter. On the play, Malleck motions over to the boundary, just like the previous play.

At the snap, the offensive linemen (minus Teller and Malleck) all takes a zone step to the left side, just like a zone stretch. Teller pulls to the right and kicks out the defensive end. Malleck pulls back to his right and leads up on the inside linebacker. McMillian takes a lead step left and then a counter step back to the right. To the top of the screen, Hodges runs a bubble screen package that freezes UVA's secondary. McMillian has a huge hole until Blanding comes up to meet him after a 10-yard gain.

Ford Outclasses Soft Corner Coverage

Loeffler also began to attack the soft corners more in the fourth quarter. He didn't just focus to the boundary. He also managed to get Ford loose on the field side with similar route concepts. One of the adjustments Virginia made prior to the game was benching Demetrious Nicholson, moving Tim Harris to field corner, and playing redshirt freshman Darius Lattimore on the boundary. I noted in my preview that Harris had struggled tackling on quick curl routes. Loeffler attacked Harris on this play and Ford handled the rest.

The design is identical to the Hokies' opening pass of the game. Cam Phillips in the slot curls up with the intention of shielding the nickel corner to prevent the nickel from jumping underneath Brewer's throwing lane to Ford. Harris is in soft off-coverage on the outside, even though Blanding is also retreating deep before the ball is snapped. Ford curls at the first down marker. Harris doesn't break down and Ford shrugs off his attempted tackle and turns to the outside to burst out for a 20-yard gain.

While Harris was still playing soft, Lattimore was starting to anticipate the curl on the boundary in the second half. He still played soft, however he was much more aggressive than Harris in terms of committing to plant and charge the curl before the ball had been thrown. Loeffler recognized it and caught Lattimore with a double move.

At nine yards, Ford gives a subtle shoulder turn, indicating that he will break an out route off the Brewer play-action fake. Lattimore bites, and Ford glides past him. Brewer puts the ball on the money. While the Hokies have had plenty of great receivers, I can't recall any former Hokie that had such a knack for using his body to get corners to bite better than Ford. Later on Ford's deep touchdown, Ford was able to sell a deep in (also known as a "dig" route) to Harris despite the Hokies having a third-and-16. Harris bit up, and Ford slide behind him for an improbable wide open touchdown that harken back to Jermaine Holmes game clinching touchdown in Charlottesville back in 1995.

The "Good" Interception?

The low point for the Hokies' offense came in the third quarter. Tech's defense had just forced another punt. With the score tied at 6-6, Loeffler called a play-action pass from the I formation on first down. After faking an inside zone lead, Isaiah Ford ran a deep out pattern, while Bucky Hodges ran a post behind the mike linebacker.

I was infuriated with the play call. At that point, the Hokies only handed the ball off to their running backs twice in the entire third quarter. The play incorporated a deep drop for Brewer, despite the offensive line struggling to protect their QB the entire game. Brewer tracked Ford the entire way. Ford runs a 15 yard deep out pattern to the wide side of the field. Given the 10 yard drop and the throw to the wide side, this throw tested the very limits of Brewer's arm strength. Brewer's follow through was disrupted by pressure in his face and on his blindside. This play was a disaster ready to happen.

Despite the disastrous outcome of the play, Loeffler found a silver lining. Kiser bit up on the run fake, and Bucky Hodges was wide open behind the stout linebacker. Loeffler took note and came back to that route concept after Virginia took a 13-6 lead. This time, he used an ace formation (one tight end, three wide receiver, and single back alignment). Ford runs the deep out. Hodges (in the field side slot) runs a vertical route with an outside release. Brewer fakes the power to Rogers, and Teller pulls to surprise the defensive end.

Loeffler made a critical adjustment. He shortened Brewer's drop to minimize the pass rush threat on his blind side. This time Hall bit on the play fake, and Malleck popped open behind him. UVA did have deep safety help, but Malleck delivered a tremendous individual effort to shake the tackle of Quin Blanding, and Bucky Hodges busted his tail to come across and deliver a block that helped extend the play.

It appears that Loeffler's last game as the offensive coordinator for Virginia Tech will be the impending bowl game. Loeffler's tenure has been divisive. Many are thrilled that he is not being retained (in all likelihood), and I certainly felt that a change was necessary on offense. Much like this game, he often over-complicated his plan of attack and seemed to stubbornly try to deceive defenses instead of sticking with play concepts that were clearly working. He never was able to establish a dominant Virginia Tech rushing attack.

At the same time, Loeffler deserves some credit. He developed terrific game plans and understood how to get matchup advantages for his receivers. With minimal contributions from the running game and a collection of receivers that would be challenged succeeding at FCS schools, Loeffler made the offense effective enough to get 8 wins in his first season. It is important to note that his top two running backs and one of the top three receivers from that group were on the roster this season, yet all have been surpassed on the depth chart. From the ashes of 2012, Loeffler established Isaiah Ford and Bucky Hodges as bona fide NFL draft picks and Travon McMillian looks like a future superstar. Loeffler fully devoted himself through sleepless night to improving Tech's offense. He gave Hokie Nation his best, even though his best ended up not being good enough.