By Keith Sargeant | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

During his introduction as Rutgers head coach, Chris Ash was asked to define his offensive philosophy.

“As a defensive coach, I faced a lot of different types of offenses and I know what I want to see offensively,’’ he said. “I know what hurts defenses. I can tell you this about the offense: we'll have an offense that can score points. It's going to be exciting and it's going to be fun to watch and it's going to be one that players are going to want to be a part of and fans are going to want to watch and show up every Saturday on the field. We're going to be multiple. We're going to have several different ways to attack a defense.’’

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As it turned out, Ash’s first offensive coordinator hire, Drew Mehringer, employed a spread scheme. His second offensive play-caller, Jerry Kill, mixed spread concepts with some pro-style formations.

The results under both offensive coordinators weren’t good. The Scarlet Knights ranked 127th and 121st in the scoring-offense national ranking over the past two seasons.

Can John McNulty improve those rankings? To do so, the Scarlet Knights’ offensive coordinator says he’ll need “to really hone in on what we do well and who does it.’’

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“As we do that,’’ he said, “put those packages together and make it clear to the players: ‘This is what we’re going to major in. We’ll have these as sidebars. But first-, and second- and third-down packages, and in red-zone, we really need to define it for what we do well. Here’s what we’re going to hang our hat on this year and we need to get good at it regardless of what (the defense) does.’ ‘’

It sounds easier said than done, but McNulty has a clear vision for what he wants Rutgers’ offensive identity to be like after spending the past decade in the NFL.

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“We always say, ‘Protect the football, protect the quarterback, run the football,’ ‘’ McNulty told NJ Advance Media in a recent interview. “We’re going to run the ball to set up some of our play-action passes. I think we’re going to be smart on third downs in terms of protecting the quarterback and not leaving him out to dry. I think we have a good scheme for that, and our guys have done a really good job.’’

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John Munson | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com

McNulty made no secret of his plan to scrap Rutgers’ previous offenses and start from scratch, installing a pro-style scheme predicated on an effective running game that sets up the play-action pass.

“There will be a certain brand of football that emerges,’’ said McNulty, who oversaw a Rutgers offense that ranked 39th nationally in scoring in his final season (2008) as offensive coordinator in a previous stint. “Hopefully it’ll be similar to what we did in the past in terms of results and being able to execute. It just depends on how quickly a lot of these young guys can step up and do it.’’

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To that end, McNulty will be relying on a receiving corps that lacks a proven play-maker, a talented running back group and arguably the Big Ten’s best tight ends unit.

“To me, if they’re on scholarship and they’re dressed, if they can do something — even if it’s one thing — put them in the game and have them do something,’’ McNulty said. “I know we’re going to use 11 (starters). If all we have is 11, we’re going to use 11.

“But hopefully we have 18 or 20 guys that can get in the mix. There are different groups of tight ends and different groups of wide receivers that could be in the mix (and) different (running) backs in together. It’s difficult on the defense (trying to figure out) who’s in, what (personnel set) are they in? Judging from the different amounts of backs, receivers and tight ends we can use, I think we’ll have a number of personnel packages we’ll try to roll in and out, particularly early in a game, when you want to keep people off-balanced.

“We’ll try to use all of that to our advantage.’’

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In his two decades as an assistant coach, McNulty has coached every offensive unit except the o-line. He spent the past two years mentoring the tight ends for the Los Angeles Chargers, and he plans to take what he learned and apply it to a unit that includes Mackey Award-candidate Jerome Washington, Travis Vokolek and Nakia Griffin-Stewart.

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"The thing that surprised me — especially having coached tight ends the past two years and going to the combine and saying, ‘Where are the (NFL-caliber) tight ends? — we have a number of really good tight ends here,'' said McNulty, who recently welcomed freshman wide receiver Daevon Robinson (6-3, 220 pounds) to the tight ends group. "We have a number of guys that certainly look the part. We have different levels of experience, and a number of guys that are capable of playing in the game.

"So we’re trying to figure out exactly what we can count on from them. But so far it’s as good of a looking group as I had with the Chargers. These are all legitimate pro-level tight ends.

"So to me we have to use them.''

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Keith Sargeant may be reached at ksargeant@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @KSargeantNJ. Find NJ.com Rutgers Football on Facebook.