When any football team enters a bye week, the coaching staff will spend time evaluating personnel and schemes. For many coaches, this involves studying future opponents, or simply focusing on specific weaknesses. Last week, head coach P.J. Fleck and his staff took a different approach.
They spent time game planning against each other.
Instead of studying another team, they spent time looking at their own tendencies and players. The coaches took an entire day to analyze every player, personnel grouping, formation and tendency.
“I remember, I told our staff, and they’re sitting they’re going, ‘you want us to game plan – shouldn’t we be doing something else?’ I’m like, listen, we’re going to game plan, we’re going to take a whole day and just like we would game plan an opponent on first and second down and third down, we’re going to game plan each other,” head coach P.J. Fleck said Tuesday. “It will take a lot less since we know each other’s personnel, but we can evaluate that.”
All of the coaches sat in a room and wrote scouting reports like they normally would for an opponent. Instead, they simply applied the process to their own team.
“[We looked at] all the schematics, all the formations, all of the tendencies,” Fleck said. “It’s an uncomfortable meeting. Joe [Rossi is] talking to Kirk [Ciarrocca], Kirk’s talking to Joe, Coach Wenger is talking to himself. It’s one that we all had to hear.”
Many coaches fall into the trap of continually trying to compare their schematic and personnel philosophies to another team. Without taking time to truly assess what is working with their team, they don’t identify their own strengths and weaknesses. Fleck and his staff have used this game-planning technique before, but thought it would be even more effective with this team.
“It’s really healthy for me to hear what other people’s perspectives are. And if you never take time to look at yourself, you’re always comparing yourself to someone else,” Fleck said. “Listen, my responsibility is this football team, not somebody else’s, so I have to make sure that our staff, our coaches, our players, they are all on the same page. That was one of things we did. I thought it was a wonderful exercise.”
Many top coaches use different strategies to game plan and prepare each week. For example, Patriots head coach Bill Belichick, teaches his coaching staff how to “pad” games. This process involves watching All-22 film, while charting every single play. He asks coaches to show what is happening on every play, including alignments and specific assignments of each player. This book is really fascinating and highlights this philosophy in detail.
By executing this process, coaches better understand tendencies, play-calling flow and the mental processing responsibilities of every player on the field. Belichick even has coaches chart the responsibilities of each opponent aligning against them. This is a large and elaborate way to break down games, but many coaches execute the same process on a smaller scale.
This is an exercise coaches, including Belichick, use to evaluate their own team in the offseason. During the bye week, Minnesota’s coaches were essentially applying the process of padding. They audited all of the formations, groupings, and plays to develop a strategy for the next nine-game stretch. Now, we will see some of the modifications and strategies as the team travels to Purdue on Saturday.
Overcoming the odds
On the final drive of Minnesota’s 35-32 win over Georgia Southern, the Gophers faced 3rd-and-29 from their own 6-yard-line. With less than three minutes remaining, they trailed by four points and had no timeouts. Quarterback Tanner Morgan found redshirt sophomore wide receiver Demetirus Douglas twice to convert an improbable down-and-distance situation. Morgan connected with four different wide receivers on Minnesota’s 13-play, 94-yard scoring drive. After the game, P.J. Fleck had to catch his breath.
“When we got done with that drive and we got back in the locker room and usually after I get done with [the media], I sit in my locker room and I just sit there. I leave the stadium pretty late and I usually talk to Gerrit Chernoff and Heather [Fleck],” Fleck said. “I told Gerrit, I said, want that 3rd-and-30 in my office some how, some way.”
The next day, general manager Gerrit Chernoff had a framed photo sitting on his desk. Now, Fleck can remember how his team handled an improbable situation.
“It’s a powerful picture, because at that moment, there were a lot of people that thought we were going to lose that game. People always say, ‘what’s the hardest thing about the University of Minnesota’s job?’ I say, changing people’s thoughts, perceptions and ideas. And that’s what I mean – that it is isn’t over, that’s it’s not time to leave yet,” Fleck said.
“I appreciate our fans sticking around and staying. And I hope people see that this team has something to them. What that is, we’ll find out over the course of the next ten weeks, but they have something to them and it’s special.”
Previewing Purdue
Fifth-year senior quarterback Elijah Sindelar has been battling a concussion and remains in protocol, Purdue head coach Jeff Brohm said Monday. If he is unable to play, redshirt freshman Jack Plummer will start. Head coach P.J. Fleck said no matter which quarterback plays, the Boilermakers’ offense will remain similar.
“Whether it’s Jack, or whether it’s Sindelar, they are both really good quarterbacks. Sindelar obviously has more experience, played a lot more games and probably has a little bit more comfort with the system. They spread you out from sideline-to-sideline and goal line-to-goal line,” Fleck said.
During the Boilermakers’ first three games, six of their ten passing scores have spanned more than 30 yards. All of those scores have come through the air and are often a product of play design. Head coach Jeff Brohm has found ways to maximize his playmakers, including wide receivers Rondale Moore, David Bell and Jackson Anthrop. This year, Purdue has rushed for the fewest yards among all FBS programs. They have also tallied the fewest total attempts in the country. Most of their offensive success has been centered around the passing game.
“They do a great job of creating explosive plays. I think they are top-40 in the country in explosive plays. Whether it’s flea-flickers that might be trick plays to some people, they will run it four times a game,” Fleck said. “Whether it’s reverses, or screens, or gadgets, they are going to find ways to move the football. That offense is designed that way.”
This week, Minnesota will be tasked with trying to slow star wide receiver Rondale Moore. In last year’s 41-10 win over Purdue, Moore had just eight catches for 76 yards and a touchdown. In nickel looks, defensive coordinator Joe Rossi matched up Rondale Moore with defensive back Chris Williamson. We can expect to see more of this during Saturday’s game.
“Rondale Moore is going to get his touches no matter what. Some how, some way, he’s going to get his touches. You cannot just take him out of the game,” Fleck said. “He is going to touch the football. You have to rally around him and tackle really well.”