Sep 07 2007
Stop the big play, stop the Bruins
I sifted through the play-by-play chart of the UCLA/Stanford formality (not so much a game, really) to try and get an idea of how the Bruin offense operates. The one thing that stood out to me was that UCLA won the game almost entirely on big plays. Let’s examine:
- Three touchdown drives by UCLA involved plays of 49 yards or above (49, 59, 77)
- Of the seven scoring drives by UCLA, five drives had a pass play gain the most yards (21, 49, 77, 27, 15) and had two run plays gain the most yards (59, 24)
- Those seven top plays accounted for 43.6% of UCLA’s total offense. That’s seven plays out of 79.
- The last scoring drive featured only running plays, yet the Bruins still had plays of 16, 18, and 24 yards. The drive resulted in a touchdown.
BYU’s defense should absolutely be licking their chops in light of this, as their scheme is designed to take away the potential for big plays. Another huge positive for BYU is that UCLA also showed in that game that they could not sustain drives if faced with 3rd down plays. Let’s examine:
- UCLA faced 3rd down 15 times, resulting in 7 punts, 2 missed field goals, 3 first downs, and 2 touchdowns (both inside the red zone).
- When analyzing down and distance, the magic number for BYU’s defense appears to be 3rd and 5. (UCLA only faced two third downs of less than 5 yards.) Both red zone TDs mentioned above came on 3rd and 5, but aside from those, UCLA’s 3rd and 5+ plays went like this: incomplete/missed FG, inc./punt, 2 yd. pass/punt, inc./punt, inc./punt, 8 yd. pass/missed FG, inc./punt, intentional grounding/punt, inc./FG, sack/punt, 18 yd. run/1st down. That’s two positive results out of 11 plays (4 of 13 counting the red zone TDs, to be fair) against Stanford’s pu pu platter defense. I mean, it’s a no-brainer that teams want to avoid 3rd-and-long, but UCLA really wants to avoid 3rd-and-long.
- UCLA appears to be as suspect at place-kicking as BYU. UCLA’s place-kicker, Kai Forbath (does that sound Star Wars-ish to anybody else? Just checking…), was 1 for 3 on field goals. He connected from 39, but missed from 42 and 28 yards. Two bad kickers have the potential to send both fan bases into cardiac arrest (remember the Penn State/Florida State Orange Bowl a couple of years ago? I don’t know how JoePa survived three OTs in that one). Let’s hope it doesn’t come down to the kickers, for both teams’ sakes.
To summarize: it seems a few of the keys to this game would be to just force third down and make UCLA execute a high volume of plays in order to move the ball.
So there’s an evening’s worth of geek-level Internet work for the Legion to digest. I hope it was enlightening.
8 Responses to “Stop the big play, stop the Bruins”
My first question is… where did you get the play-by-play chart of the UCLA/Stanford game? And second, thanks for digesting it, helping us understand what it said, and what it might mean for the Cougars as they prepare to beat UCLA.
For the fan that wants more info, this was great!
Kimball,
I’m not entirely sure where Josh got his, but this link will take you there:
http://web1.ncaa.org/d1mfb/driveSummary.jsp?expand=A&acadyr=2007&h=674&v=110&date=01-SEP-07&fn=null
I got it at ESPN.com from UCLA’s team page. I clicked on the score of the game and then you have the option to look at the box score, play-by-play, drive summaries, photos, etc.
I had a lot of fun breaking it down, actually. My wife thought I was a total dork, which I am, but anything that shows BYU’s got a really good chance of winning this game was worth the effort to find.
Likewise, if UCLA does the same (and their coaches already have earlier this week like any coaching staff does) they will find that there were only about two running plays (by Unga) and 2-3 passing plays that were over 20 yards for us against Arizona. So they will scheme their defense to take away our run first (I am not worried about that because the late Bill Walsh passed first to set up the run rather than the traditional other way around) and keep everything in front of them which will be easier for them than for us.
By the way, someone at ESPN has us ranked as the 10th best defense in the country and UCLA the 8th. So anyway you look at it, this will be a close game and the team that executes best (I think we are better prepared) should win. I also think we will be better offensively because of Tonga.
See you at the Rose Bowl (I predict we will have a huge crowd there because within a 50 mile radius (this is not counting people coming from Utah) there are probably a 100,000 members).
LET’S GO COUGS!
Kai Forbath, hmmm… we shall see if he is more fitting as an Imperial Senator or a bounty hunter employed by the Empire.
BYU’s defense is definitely set up to succeed against this team. If they are inconsistant in their execution, and based on the breakdown Josh provided us with they show that they are, our defense is going to wear them down.
Our offense will be boosted by the insertion of Manase Tonga, and our receivers are ready for the chance to strut their stuff (they had some good touches Saturday, but I think we will see more from them, especially Mahuika).
Does anyone know the status of Matt Allen’s finger? That has been kept under wraps pretty well. I am fine with finding out on Saturday as it will not change anything between now and then if I know or not. Just curious…
Haven’t heard or seen anything about Matt Allen yet. Getting Matt Allen at full strength is doubly important since he is the #1 holder on extra points and field goals. His return to special teams will help stabilize the kicking game. Let’s hope that return occurs tomorrow!
@ Josh: good call re: Allen stepping up. I’m also banking on a good game from Collie, since he was not much of a factor (stats-wise) against AZ and should be able to get open a few times against corners that aren’t quite as good as Cason.
And I’m SOOOO excited to have Manase back. W00t! Go Cougs!
Yeah I am excited for Manase to get back. Manase does so many little things well: catch the key third down pass, block the blitzer, get that little extra burst through the line. With Manase, Fui, and Harvey I can honestly say we have a running game that can win championships! And the funny thing is that I havent seen a defense that has done anything but contain these guys…You just cant stop them.