Welcome back to the 18 Stripes Film Room!

In his press conference on September 14 following the opening win against Duke, Brian Kelly dropped this tidbit about the offense:

“We had a running back who was seeing things for the first time. We went to a different offensive blocking scheme. We weren’t a pin and pull team this year and in this game. We were a big pin and pull team last year. We featured the outside zone play as our primary blocking scheme and that requires patience and seeing things and aiming points and you need a live game situation. That requires patience on our part. I thought Coach Rees did a great job of being patient and sticking with the running game after not having the success early on. We had great success in the second half. That is getting the reps and being patient and sticking with it. It was just going to be a matter of time.”

What does Coach Kelly mean when he says the Irish went to a different blocking scheme?  And what is the outside zone play?  Let’s go to the film and find out.

Zone Blocking Basics

Let’s start at the beginning – zone blocking.  You can break almost all running plays into two categories: gap blocking and zone blocking.  Gap blocking means the back is going to run through a certain gap – maybe between the tackle and the guard.  The goal is to get as many blockers as possible to that gap and wall off the defenders.  Zone blocking is both simpler and more complicated.  Despite its name, linemen aren’t really blocking a “zone”.  If there is a defender in front of him, he blocks him.  If not, he either moves up to block a linebacker or safety, or he double teams the defender with the lineman next to him.  But there are tons and tons of coaching points beyond that, from footwork to hand placement to dealing with blitzes and shifts and stunts and on and on and on.

There are two basic types of zone runs – the inside zone and outside zone.  On inside zone runs, the linemen fire straight ahead and the running back aims to run either between the center and guard or between the guard and tackle.  On outside zone runs, the linemen move laterally and the running back either runs between the guard and tackle or bounces it outside.

This gets to something else Kelly said.  The running back plays a big part in making these plays successful.  He has to read the blocks and find the hole to run through.  If the defense overcommits to the inside, he might bounce it outside.  If too many defenders go outside, he might cut back inside through the area they vacated.  That’s the advantage of the zone run plays – if the linemen make their blocks and the back reads it correctly, he should always be able to get positive yards.

Finally, what did Kelly mean when he talked about “pin and pull”?  Pin and pull is similar to outside zone but it involves pulling linemen.  A tackle and tight end will seal off the edge (the “pin” part) and two linemen (usually both guards or a guard and center) will pull around as lead blockers (the “pull” part).  The running back’s job is the same as it is on normal outside zone plays – run outside and find a gap to run through.  This was a staple if the Chip Long offense.  Check out this Josh Adams run against UNC in 2017:

The Outside Zone

The outside zone is very common in both college and the NFL and across the whole spectrum of offenses.  Most spread teams primarily use zone blocking, and even Kirk Ferentz’s traditional “pro-style” Iowa offenses are famous for using the outside zone as their primary run play.  So Coach Tommy Rees is in good company with his decision to use the outside zone as his primary run play.

Let’s look at how the Irish run the outside zone.

The first question the linemen have to ask is “Am I covered?”.  This is easy because South Florida is crowding the line of scrimmage.  Everyone – including tight end Tommy Tremble – is covered except for left guard Aaron Banks.  But he has a linebacker in front of him, so his job will be to double team the defensive tackle with center Jarrett Patterson and one of them will go block the linebacker.

Banks controls the tackle so Patterson is free to block the linebacker.  You can see a hole start to form in front of Patterson.  Kyren Williams originally tries to go outside, but he sees the hole open up and cuts back inside.

The offensive line and Williams all do their job perfectly.  The linemen wall off their defenders and Williams makes the correct read.  It’s an easy 10 yard gain.

Here’s a play from late in the game with a good view of the linemen.  Watch out the linemen move laterally at the snap and how C’Bo Flemister reads the play correctly and runs around the edge to the outside.

Two Back Outside Zone

Tommy Rees also introduced a wrinkle to the outside zone play.  Against Duke, Ian Book lined up with Kyren Williams and Chris Tyree on either side of him.  Tyree will get the handoff and Williams will lead the way as a blocker.

Just like before, we start by looking at who is covered.  And just like before, everyone has a defender lined up directly in front of him except for Aaron Banks.  Williams’ job is a little different.  His job is to act like the running back and find a hole to run through.  Once he does that, his next job to just block the first person he sees.

The offensive line does a great job moving the Duke defenders off the line.  Williams (red circle) leads the way and blocks the safety that came down to keep outside contain.  Tyree easily cuts upfield and picks up a big gain.

Here is the play in gif form:

 

Complimentary Plays

One thing to keep in mind is that just because a team primarily uses zone blocking does not mean they only use zone blocking.  Zone purist will tell you the only two running plays you need are outside zone and inside zone.  But almost every team mixes in some gap schemes with their zone schemes and vice versa.  And the same goes for the Irish.

One example is the counter run.

On this play, the tight end and guard pull around to lead the way for the running back.  The back takes a quick jab step away from the quarterback to throw off the defense.

In this picture, you can see Williams (yellow circle) take a small step to his left while Banks and Brock Wright (red circles) pull around.

The edge is sealed off and Williams turns the corner for a good gain.

But we’ve seen this play before.  It wasn’t used much while Chip Long was OC, but the Irish used it to great effect during the 2015 season.  Here’s Josh Adams ripping off a long touchdown run against Stanford that season:

Another play that Coach Rees is reusing is called “down G”.  In this play, the linemen all block “down,” meaning they block away from the play.  The playside guard (the “G” part of the name) pulls around as a lead blocker.

Tommy has only run this play out of the I formation with Tommy Tremble lined up at fullback.  On this play, tackle Liam Eichenberg and Brock Wright block down on the two linemen to seal the edge, Banks pulls around, and Tremble leads the way for Williams.

Williams has a wall of blockers, but there is one free defender coming through the hole.  This is where having an athlete like Kyren Williams is so important.

Williams jukes the defender out of his shoes and rips off a big gain.  Last season, that’s a one or two yard run.

This is another play we’ve seen before, and not just out of the I formation.  Chip Long called this play quite often when he was the OC.  The Irish ran for a ton of yards using this play against Wake Forest in 2018.  Here’s one example:

Final Thoughts

This feels like the type of offense Notre Dame should be running, doesn’t it?  The Irish have never had trouble recruiting stud offensive linemen and tight ends so it makes sense to build an offense around those positions.  The closest we’ve seen to this style is in 2017, but then Brandon Wimbush got the yips and everything fell apart.

It remains to be seen if Coach Rees will continue to use two and three tight end sets like he did against USF.  Against Duke, we saw a lot of formations with Javon McKinley, Ben Skowronek, and Lawrence Keys/Avery Davis, with Tommy Tremble as the lone tight end.  Rees did sub in Brock Wright or Michael Mayer fairly often, but more often than not Notre Dame had three receivers on the field against the Blue Devils.

Whether it was because of USF’s small defense, the injury to Skowronrek, or an adjustment after the up and down outing in the first game, Rees used a lot of heavy formations against the Bulls.  We’ll have to see if that will be the norm going forward.  But if the goal is to get the best 11 players on the field, I think it would be hard to argue that at least two of those 11 players aren’t tight ends.