This is the defensive play-by-play analysis for the Akron game. I started this series after the Oregon game because it was fun to look at each individual play and grade the individual players to see what was working and what wasn’t. Also, this format is borrowed from MgoBlog, though I have made several adjustments already. Last week’s post can be found here.

I also want to thank people for reading and commenting on this series so far, as it really does mean a lot to me. I do read all of the comments, and even if I don’t respond, I do appreciate all of the kind words. Doing this series has been a lot of fun for me, so I am glad other folks can get to enjoy it as much as I have.

For a quick recap of what the talk has been for the defense, the biggest storyline has been the disaster that was the defensive performance against Oregon, and what changes, if any, the Buckeyes have been making with the new coaching arrangement. The other big storyline this week was the K’Vaughan Pope situation, which I don’t really feel the need to talk about, as it has been talked about enough elsewhere.

Here is the Play-by-Play:

One of the first things about the new defense is how often they are lining up with 2 high safeties, which basically never happened when Coombs was at the helm. Barnes does it fairly frequently, and at the beginning of the game, was running more 2-high sets than 1-high sets. Through the first ten plays, they lined up with 2 high safeties eight times, which is more than I have seen them do in years. Throughout the game, they ran 1-high safety 35 times, and 2-high safeties 37 times. Compare this to the Oregon game where they were 1-high 63 times and 2-high 8 times, and even when they were 2-high, they would just “disguise” a formation so they could send a corner blitz and move right back into 1-high. It was ugly. This has become a much more balanced team with regard to where the safeties are positioned, with Ronnie Hickman now being used as more of a traditional strong safety. They also disguise the coverage they are going to run on the play, and Matt Barnes has been clear that he thinks disguising coverage is essential to having an effective defense. So far, so good, though we won’t know really how well it works for another couple of weeks.

Also, I started adding more information to the fronts that they were running. While they almost always have 4-2-5 personnel, occasionally mixing in 3-3-5 and 4-3, they change the look of their defense often. For example, even if they have the 4-2-5 package out there, they might line up in a 4-3, or sometimes, they will stand up a defensive lineman or two and show a 3-4 or a 2-4-5. The defense is now creative in how they line up and the looks that they show opposing teams. While I didn’t point it out this week, I will try to point out when they give blitz looks as well, as they have been running simulated pressures, which they did not do against Oregon at all.

Speaking of blitzes, they didn’t reveal any new ones this week. They still ran the double A-gap blitz that they ran last week against Tulsa, but that was really it from what I saw. They also ran a zone blitz where one of the defensive ends would run out to cover the flat, and they ran that last week as well. I am curious to see if they expand on what they have done so far, or not. I am thinking they will, but they figured that Akron was a good opportunity to practice the stuff that was installed last week so they can build an identity on defense.

I noticed too that the defense was much more cohesive before the snap than last week, which in turn was much less confused than against Oregon. Against Oregon, it seemed like there were always problems lining up before the snap, where I don’t think I ever saw that against Akron, even with all of the motion that Akron was running. That would have eaten Ohio State alive a couple of weeks ago, but they knew exactly where they needed to be for every type of motion on Saturday, which was good to see. It has only been two weeks, but the quality of coaching looks to be dramatically improved.

Perhaps the best thing I saw were the adjustments that have been made from week to week. Against Oregon, they had no answer for the unbalanced stuff that Oregon was running. Against Tulsa, they looked much more comfortable against unbalanced, but they really struggled dealing with Bunch sets in man-to-man. Against Akron, they seem to have fixed that issue as well, playing well against unbalanced, and playing better technique against the bunch set to avoid pick routes. Ohio State never adjusted last year to the RPO, which had been ripping off big chunk plays every week after Penn State started exploiting it in the second half of that game. It all culminated with Alabama, whose offense is almost entirely based off of the RPO, had nearly no resistance to scoring over 50 points in the national championship game.

This all makes me feel more confident in the coaching staff, which I think greatly benefitted from the shakeup after the Oregon loss. How did the individual players do? Here is the defensive chart:

The defensive line really stood out. Between that pressure number, and the individual scoring, that was spectacular. These are the kinds of numbers that are expected when you get nine sacks. They got pressure for the first time this year. There is still concern though. Out of the nine sacks, only one of them was done by a defensive end, which was Jack Sawyer at the end of the game. The others were done by defensive tackles. Now, Haskell Garrett is an All-American, and Tyleik Williams will be a Freshman All-American if he gets more playing time, but I would like to see more production from the defensive ends. Zach Harrison did get consistent pressure today and would have had a sack if it were not for defensive holding on Sevyn Banks. While I thought he played well (many of his pressures resulted in the QB stepping up right into Garrett), I want to see that performance against Big Ten teams. Tyreke Smith has also done a nice job of getting to the quarterback, and in my opinion has been the best defensive end by a pretty good margin. With those two on the field at the same time, you might be able to get more pressure against drop back teams. And to be fair, we haven’t seen those two playing together against a non-RPO team, so they might be great. We just don’t know, which is a weird position to be in this late in the season.

Tyleik Williams, as I just mentioned, can be a Freshman All-American this year. I would like to see him play more as the 1-tech, but the coaches seem pretty set on playing him at the 3-tech, where he has to compete for playing time with Garrett and Vincent instead of Antwuan Jackson and Jerron Cage. I don’t care where he goes, but he needs to be on the field more. I think he has the size necessary for 1-tech, and I wouldn’t mind seeing what he has there.

If Williams isn’t a 1-tech, though, Jackson and Garrett are probably the best starting pairing. Haskell Garrett is excellent, and Jackson is decent as a 1-tech. It’s hard with all of the double teams you get, but I would like to see more disruption from that spot. Williams/Vincent might be a good second team pairing, if they would be okay playing Williams at 1-tech.

As for the linebackers, there looks to have been improvement across the board. Cody Simon is clearly a starter at Mike, and won’t come off the field unless he is injured, which, unfortunately, has happened a couple of times this season. He isn’t scoring amazingly, but he is solid and occasionally spectacular. I don’t expect the Mike to be a great coverage guy; he’s doing fine.

The Will spot is a little more interesting. Steele Chambers for the last few weeks has consistently been the best linebacker by my grading, and I think I am finally at the point where I can say that he deserves to start. He makes a ton of plays, looks to be the best athlete out of any of the linebackers, and consistently gives outstanding effort. It looks like the coaches are noticing his improvement as well, as he is not only playing more sound with the responsibilities that he does have, but he is given more responsibilities every week with regards to the coverages that he is asked to play and the formations that he is inserted into. He is being asked to do more and is delivering. He made multiple stops at the line of scrimmage, with his tackle with 2:49 left in the third quarter being a tackle for loss. I have said this before, and I will say it again: even when Steele Chambers is wrong, his effort and athleticism help the defense and disrupt the offense. I love that he is getting more playing time. I don’t think he will start, even if I think he maybe should, though. Mitchell is playing fine, and is a senior captain. I could see this being a 2014 situation, where Curtis Grant (who played pretty well) rotated with an extremely talented youngster with Raekwon McMillan. That rotation worked out just fine throughout that season. I think that a similar rotation could be in store this year. Between Chambers, Mitchell, and Simon, the main linebacker rotation looks to be set.

I want to give a quick shout out to Tommy Eichenberg, though, who played his best game as a Buckeye. He didn’t play as much, but on the first four defensive plays of the third quarter, he made three great defensive plays, one in coverage, one against the run, and one blitzing. He didn’t miss an assignment that I saw. This was after Simon’s injury. While I hope that Simon isn’t out long-term, as he is the best option, Eichenberg looked decent. Eichenberg’s problem usually hasn’t been a lack of athleticism or size, at least that I’ve noticed. He has just been consistently in the wrong spot, especially in the Oregon game. Now that he looked to be in the right spots, he may be a much more option.

There were a couple of interesting things about the secondary. The biggest change is that Lathan Ransom has moved from the slot cornerback/nickleback to the deep safety/free safety. I thought that this would be a good change to make after the Oregon game, so it is good to see them make it. While I don’t think he was horrible at slot-cornerback, I have thought that Williamson and Martinez have been much better, and considering he was recruited to play deep safety, where Shaw had struggled against Oregon, the stars seemed to be aligning for a position change. In this game, he split time with Shaw, and I expect him to be the full-time starter by the end of the year. Both of those two played fine in this game, though Akron didn’t test them at all.

This move was also made easier because of the play of Cameron Martinez and Marcus Williamson. Martinez is clearly a play-maker, and while I gave him a negative score, much of that was because he missed a sack against an athletic quarterback. Because the game got out of hand early, and because Akron never tested him, it was hard to make up for that mistake. He has been a big bright spot for the defense though, especially in coverage.

If there is one issue where Martinez has struggled, though, it is with tackling in the open field. I mentioned this last week, but Martinez gets juked way too often to be considered a great tackler. He is quite good in coverage, and he does make plays. I would like to see him make more tackles. This is where Marcus Williamson has excelled. He was my highest graded player in the secondary for this game, mainly due to his consistent open field tackles, and his willingness to play aggressive when hitting an offensive player. If you ask me, he is the best tackler on the team right now. I don’t know how the coaches will use him in the future, but I think a platoon between Martinez/Williamson might make sense, depending on the type of play they are expecting or depending on the team they are playing. He has been a revelation for the depth at that spot, and he is allowing them to move Ransom to deep safety. This is all of the sudden a secondary with depth, which is not something I would have said at all two weeks ago, and Williamson is a huge reason for this.

I also want to highlight two other guys, one bad, and one good. I want to end on a good note, so I will start with the bad. Sevyn Banks had a rough day. He extended a couple of drives with poor coverage and tackling (Mesh with 8:12 in the first quarter), poor effort (the very next play, the Jet Motion Counter Flat thing for a touchdown that Bama ran with Devonta Smith in the NC game), and penalties (defensive holding on third down with 3:58 to go in the first quarter on the very next drive. It was a rough time for him out there. I don’t know if he played after that, but it wasn’t good. At first, I thought that the touchdown pass on the motion was just a good play design, as Banks never seems to get there, but then I saw Lathan Ransom play the exact same play, and he almost always stops it immediately. I even think Denzel Burke had a similar play, and he stopped it too. Banks isn’t even close on these types of plays. I still think he is talented; he played better than anyone else last year. This was not his best game, though.

The second guy that I need to highlight is Demario McCall, who played really well. He broke a couple of passes deep down the field, one with him breaking up a well-thrown ball, and the other, while the receiver probably could have caught it, he had tight coverage on him. He also came down and got a huge hit on the running back with 14:10 in the fourth quarter on the play when Williamson forced a fumble. He played with a lot of effort, and he was fun to watch. He looks competent. I think he played better than Cavazos and Banks, who have been getting playing time ahead of him. It could be a one-off; I believe that practice says a lot more than one game, but it was interesting nonetheless.

Overall, I don’t think this game against Akron can tell us much good about the overall effectiveness of the defense, as Akron is genuinely bad. Great individual performances, especially when it comes to execution, may not translate to better competition. Bad individual performances, absolutely may translate to better competition. It is hard to tell if the defense is actually better based on just the performances.

But from watching the defense, especially before the snap, it is clear that so much work has been done behind the scenes in the last two weeks. They are communicating much better, they are lining up in the right spots, and they generally know what their assignments are now, which is not something that was true against Oregon. Not only are they executing better, but the coaches are throwing more at them as well, so the complexity and the quality of the defense has improved, which is something that I didn’t expect at all. It is hard to put into words how big of a difference there is between the defense against Akron and the defense against Oregon. There are more coverages, disguised coverages, and overall better execution of whichever play is called.

Most shockingly, the only really significant change in personnel has been with the coaching staff. A reshuffling of the coaching staff has genuinely produced an entirely different looking unit, and I have no idea how they pulled this off. I have always said that the quality of coaching is the single most important thing in improving the quality of play. So far, this looks to be correct, though Rutgers should tell us a little bit more. Even though Rutgers is not a good offense, they do put defenders in conflict a lot with read options and RPOs, which is the first time this defense will have really seen an offense like this since Oregon. Their performance in this game will be telling. Rutgers is still more of a quiz though, where Maryland will be a genuine test considering the play of Tagovailoa. The next two games will be essential to the development of the defense into a Big Ten Championship caliber defense.

Thank you for reading. As a side note, I may be a little late next week due to some of this weekend’s activities, but I will still be doing this series. Thanks again!