Much of Nebraska’s season has felt like an old western movie, with the Husker program playing the damsel in distress, roped up to the train tracks, crying out for the protagonist (Coach Frost of course) to come swooping in and save them before they meet their demise. The train is nowhere near closing in on Nebraska program and coach Frost’s rebuild effort, however Husker fans are hoping this nightmare would end soon.

Coming into the game against Purdue, Nebraska was very much aware of the offensive weapons the Boilermakers had and most figured the Huskers would have a tough time trying to stop their offense. The Blackshirt defense surrendered 512 total yards to Purdue’s offense (328 yards passing and 188 yards rushing) and 42 points, seemingly unable to defend Purdue regardless of what they ran. Let’s take a look at several schemes that gave the Huskers problems during their homecoming loss.

Nebraska has received a heavy dose of the “Power G” run scheme in the previous two weeks, taking advantage of the aggressiveness that defensive coordinator Erik Chinander demands from his defense. On this 1st down and 10, Nebraska calls a zone blitz, looking to take advantage of the slow developing play by sending ILB #5 Mo Barry on a cross blitz to the A-gap. Looking at the rotation of safety #14 Tre Neal, it appears Nebraska is running a cover-3 “cross dog” blitz with the two ILBs, however #5 Dedrick Young does not blitz on the play and scrapes over the top, because he reads pullers. Young is obviously in a great position to make the play after doing a great job getting off the block while keeping his depth, however he is not able to make the tackle on Purdue’s RB D.J. Knox, resulting in a touchdown run.

One thing I would be interested to hear from coach Chinander on this particular play, is how OLB #12 Luke Gifford should fit on this trap block concept by Purdue. In the video, you can see Gifford gets up the field two yards and “boxes” (take on the puller with outside arm free, push the ball inside) which makes CB DiCaprio Bootle an inside force player against a pulling guard. Not a great matchup.

In the diagram below, the red dotted lines represents the run fit or “flow” if Gifford were to “spill” (take on the puller with his “wrong arm” or outside shoulder and underneath). In essence, Gifford would squeeze (with hands on) the blocker going to block Young, taking on the puller underneath and forcing the ball to bounce outside to Bootle. Young is in a fairly good position already to make the play and should, however if Gifford squeezes down and spills the first puller, he could possibly take out the second puller, thus giving the Huskers a +2 advantage in the run fit. Nebraska’s defensive line did not help much here on this play, getting walled off from stunting to their play side gap, creating an even larger hole for Knox.

This happened frequently when Nebraska was confronted with the Power G scheme and going into this week against Wisconsin, they must figure out how best to stop this play because they will see every variation of it from the Badgers.

Nebraska found themselves in positions to get off the field on third downs against Purdue’s offense and did not do a good enough job of getting stops when they needed it most. Purdue converted 7-16 (44%) of their third downs and when looking back at the game, Nebraska had numerous opportunities to flip the field position for their offense.

Late in the first quarter with Purdue on their own 32 yard line, the Huskers had the Boilermakers in a 3rd down and 7 situation. Purdue aligns in a Trips formation to the field, with freshmen WR #4 Rondale Moore lined up as the #2 WR. Nebraska is aligned in an obvious pre-snap man coverage, bringing safety #14 Tre Neal down in into th box to cover the #3 WR. Up front, defensive coordinator Erik Chinander brings a perfectly designed pressure against the Boilermakers protection scheme, sending ILB #31 Colin Miller on a three gap cross into the field side B-gap, away from the RB in protection. Despite the clear path that Miller has to the QB, Miller goes backward first instead of forward, creating a looping angle in his blitz, thus giving QB David Blough just enough time to find his TE/WR Brycen Hopkins on an out route.

Nebraska had a difficult time stopping Purdue when playing man coverage, allowing Blough to complete 17 out of 23 passes against man coverage (74%), while giving up an average of 16 yards per completion. With as much man coverage coach Chinander likes to call, it is essential Nebraska’a corners and safeties continue to work on their technique and leverage when playing man against Trips. This would eventually comeback to hurt the Huskers, putting the preverbal “nail in the coffin” on their efforts to get back in the ball game.

Fast forward two plays on this drive and Nebraska is caught in a numbers disadvantage against Purdue’s running game, which resulted in a highlight reel finish for RB D.J. Knox, just short of the end zone.

In this redzone situation, defensive coordinator Erik Chinander puts the Blackshirts in a bracket call on the #3 WR (#4 Rondale Moore) in Trips formation, aligning ILB #3 Will Honas on the low inside leverage of Moore and safety #14 Tre Neal on the high outside leverage. Purdue’s offensive coordinator knew the Huskers would key in on Moore, especially in the slot positions, and used that to his advantage when calling both run and pass plays.

Looking at the diagram above, it is clear to see Nebraska is either misaligned or in a bad play call, leaving only one ILB in the “box” (area from tackle to tackle) to defend the “GT Dart” (inside zone, tackle-guard pulling scheme) back to the “bubble” (the open B-gap in defensive front). Nebraska has 7 of its 11 defensive players committed to the Trips side of the formation, leaving little run support to the boundary.

OLB #12 Luke Gifford uses a spill technique, instead of the box technique used in the first quarter touchdown run, but goes too flat and is only able to take out one of the pullers. This would not be so much of a problem for the Huskers if they did not have both of their LBs aligned to the strong side.

Because of the option threat of the QB, ILB #7 Mo Barry is forced to hesitate before tracking over the top to the ball, giving the offensive linemen the proper angle to make Barry a non-factor on this play.

The boundary safety, #41 Deontai Williams, does invert into the B-gap on the snap, but is crack blocked by the WR, leaving a trailing Lamar Jackson in a bad position to contain leverage. This blocking scheme on the perimeter is very similar to Michigan’s outside zone, taking advantage of Nebraska’s CBs “man eyes” (eyes on the man to follow them everywhere he goes) and forcing the Husker corners to be immediate run support players, which they have struggled to do early on this season.

Late in the 2nd quarter and Nebraska again has Purdue backed up on their own side of the field for 3rd down and long. The Husker defense is aligned in man coverage again, bracketing WR #4 Rondale Moore in the slot to the two WR side. The Blackshirt secondary do a great job of playing with leverage and understanding where the first down marker was, but despite the excellent coverage on the back end, freshmen OLB #4 Caleb Tannor makes an inside move on the offensive tackle, running into fellow defensive linemen #96 Khalil Davis. I cannot be certain if either Tannor or Davis ran the wrong movement in the rush pattern, nevertheless, this blunder allows for Blough to escape the pocket to his right and pick up the first down. This again was an opportunity for Nebraska’s defense to get the ball back to the offense with great field position but they were unable to get the stop.

After a disappointing roughing the passer earlier on in the drive, the Husker defense was forced to defend yet another long drive by the Purdue offense. As stated earlier, Blough had little trouble completing passes against the Husker man to man coverage and this play was no different.

The Blackshirts were aligned in a cover-1 look and added ILB #5 Dedrick Young to the pressure, but it provided no impact on Blough. The Huskers were running a 5 man pressure against a 5 man protection, so I would assume Young and Freedom should have a two-way rush against the guards, reading their leverage and going opposite. If the guards blocks out on Young or Freedom, as they both did, they should cross the guards face and go underneath (see the diagram below). Instead, they continued up the field and because the nose tackle gets stuck at the line of scrimmage, there is no pressure in front of Blough to at least occupy the throwing window.

CB #6 Eric Lee was brought in to replace the inconsistent Lamar Jackson late in the 2nd quarter and the Boilermakers liked their matchup on this play, going to Isaac Zico on a well run dig route for a first down. As you look at the bottom of the screen, Lee started off in great inside leverage at the line of scrimmage, however Zico did a great job getting to Lee’s “blindspot” (backside of DB in a open-45º shuffle) with a great release, thus shifting Lee’s leverage to the outside. Zico does a great job at the top of his route, giving Lee a solid 1, 2, 3 step fake to the out route and then breaking in for the catch. I hope Lee continues to get more reps as the seasons continues because I believe he can be a great option opposite of DiCaprio Bootle.

When looking at the Purdue tape, it was film that was disappointing to watch because you see small glimpses of what the Huskers can do. It is obvious the Blackshirts are going to play bracket man coverage and they must find a way to get a more consistent pressure with just four rushers. Defensive coordinator Erik Chinader will have to continue to scheme up blitzes until one of his rusher emerge as a guy who can take advantage of a 1v1 matchup.

Getting a pass rush would be a quicker remedy to alleviating the problems the Huskers are having against the pass. I like the combination of Bootle and Lee at corner, and the safety trio of Tre Neal, Deontai Williams and Aaron Williams to give the Huskers the best balance at defending the run and pass.

The front seven has to be the most surprising/disappointing group so far, despite the early success in the sack numbers. The defensive line is having a hard time maintaining their gap integrity, especially against double teams. This is allowing guards and tackles to get up to the next level and occupy the linebackers, leaving vertical seams in the Husker defense. Moving Carlos Davis from defensive end to nose tackle this week against Wisconsin, I would expect to see a more explosive looking interior than the previous weeks.

With no Will Honas, Dedrick Young will need to improve his play this week. Mo Barry and Luke Gifford will need to continue to be leaders for this unit going into Madison. Camp Randall Stadium will be an electric environment regardless of the Huskers record and the Blackshirt defense needs to feed off that energy to have a great night.

Look for my breakdown and expectations for the Blackshirt defense against Wisconsin on Friday morning at 9:00 am. Also, listen for me on ESPN 1620 Omaha with Damon Benning and Gary Sharpe at 10:30 am to talk about the Wisconsin breakdown and all things regarding the Huskers. GBR !