Oregon no-huddle.jpg

Oregon took the no-huddle offense to a new level several years ago by using signs such as this to signal in plays.

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama -- Gus Malzahn thought his Auburn offense was fairly fast at times in 2010, but nothing like Oregon's. So at the 2010 Heisman Trophy ceremony, Malzahn made a point of telling then-Oregon coach Chip Kelly how impressed he was by the Ducks' operation using odd pictures to symbolize formations.

"He's got us whipped on the sideline," Malzahn said in 2010. "He makes our rinky-dink board look like we're behind the times."

Instead, Auburn and Oregon created a revolution by playing for the national championship that season. Up-tempo offenses are redefining college football entering the 2013 season. They're creating the need for versatile defenders to keep pace, keeping officials on their toes, and even raising ethical questions about faking injuries.

"No one is talking about this, but look for more fake injuries by the defense," ESPN analyst Kirk Herbstreit said. "I've talked to defensive coaches. These guys are actually practicing faking injuries in practice."

Within the Football Bowl Subdivision, plays from scrimmage increased from 67.7 per team in 2008 to 71.5 in 2012. Scoring was up from 27 points per game to 29.5 and total yards increased from 371.6 to 409.

The change is even more dramatic since the Auburn-Oregon game, which ironically was a low-scoring, 22-19 affair. Eighteen teams averaged 80 or more plays per game in 2012, compared to only three teams in 2010. Last season, 82 teams produced at least 70 plays a game, up from 53 just two years earlier.

Plays Per Game by FBS Teams

Year Teams Averaging 70+ Plays Teams Averaging 80+ Plays Leader in Plays 2012 82 18 Marshall, 92.8 2011 76 7 Texas Tech, 85.3 2010 53 3 Oklahoma, 87.6 2009 50 3 Houston, 84.2 2008 47 1 Tulsa, 80.5 2007 100 10 Troy, 83.2 2006 15 1 New Mexico St., 80.6 2005 80 7 Missouri, 82.8 2004 80 4 Boise State, 81.4 2003 90 7 Texas Tech, 85.6

Source: teamrankings.com

Note: The NCAA returned to old clock rules in 2007 that allowed more plays to return.

"We all have had our moments of failure against the tempo offenses because it gets you in disarray," said first-year Kentucky coach Mark Stoops, who has a defensive background and hired an up-tempo coordinator.

Nick Saban made a point of spending the offseason preparing for no-huddle offenses. Saban loves to substitute defensively based on situations and Alabama plays at least seven teams in 2013 that employ a hurry-up.

To combat the no-huddle, "you have to adjust your system so there's not a lot of terminology, that you have quick calls that can get in the game quickly, players can get lined up, get focused on what they need to do to execute," Saban said. "I think that last year just about everybody went no-huddle against us. I think we actually got better as the year went on in defending it."

How do you defend no-huddle?

There's an extremely valuable player in college football these days. His position name may differ at each school from nickel back to strong safety to star to outside linebacker -- this assumes he even exists on some defenses -- but his attributes are similar.

He stands about 6-foot-1, 210 pounds. He can run, defend in space, play man coverage and blitz.

Nick Saban has prepared in the offseason for more tempo and questions whether no-huddle offenses are what's best for football. (Vasha Hunt/vhunt@al.com)

"You're going to see this year more emphasis on the hybrid defensive player," Herbstreit said. "These offenses that go tempo, they're predicated on numbers in the box. Saban can't get six defensive backs on the field on third-and-eight like he wants to. You have to run the same defense with the same personnel. You need versatility, guys who can be physical and run."

Florida had one of those players in 2012 with linebacker Jelani Jenkins, who is now in the NFL.

"He could play in space, cover in the slot," Florida coach Will Muschamp said. "He provided a lot of things for us that not many linebackers can do. He was a very unusual athlete. He's a guy that we certainly will miss."

Recruiting and developing more hybrid players is one possible solution for defenses. Herbstreit is worried about another choice: Faking injuries.

"There's nothing in the rule book at this point that states defenses can't fake injuries," Herbstreit said. "I promise you, in some big game after some crucial second down that sets up a third down, they're going down. It's going to be embarrassing. It's going to be so fake. Nothing prevents it other than being unethical."

The NCAA football rules book simply relies on the integrity of coaches. Officials are instructed that when they see an injured player, the official must assume the injury is real and should not guess if it's genuine. The player must leave the game for at least one play, although the offense's tempo will have been stopped.

The football rules book reads: "Feigning an injury for any reason is unethical. An injured player must be given full protection under the rules, but feigning injury is dishonest, unsportsmanlike, and contrary to the spirit of the rules. Such tactics cannot be tolerated among sportsmen of integrity."

Cal defensive line coach Tosh Lupoi was suspended for one game in 2010 for instructing a player to fake an injury to slow down Oregon's offense. In one case, defensive lineman Aaron Tipoti helped out on a tackle, got to his feet, looked to the sideline and suddenly dropped to the turf, holding his leg.

"If it's obvious, you might get a warning or discipline from the league office after the fact," Herbstreit said. "I'm telling you, keep an eye on this. These guys are practicing it. You have to get down and be comfortable with it so if you fake in a game, you don't look like you can't do it."

ESPN analyst Chris Spielman, a former NFL player, said he "wouldn't go down for anybody" if asked to to fake an injury. If Spielman ran a defense, he would counter offensive tempo with more defensive audibles based on scouting reports.

For example, audibles could be based on the depth of a running back lined up in the backfield, the hashmark where the ball sits, and the formation of the offense. Defenses would have two calls at the line of scrimmage.

"So if I have a blitz on, whatever formation that offense comes out in, the scouting report tells me the percentages they'll do this and you audible if needed," Spielman said. "Another thing that creates stress on offensive linemen is if the defensive linemen move late into a different gap. That puts confusion on the center. There are a lot of things you could do to put a little pressure on those offenses and force them to think and adjust. The whole key is being sound in the back end."

No national champion has averaged more than 70 plays a game since LSU in 2007. Over the past decade, four teams ranked in the top 10 in plays per game have played for the national title and they all lost.

Plays Per Game for BCS Championship Participants

Team Plays Per Game National Rank in Plays BCS champ? Oklahoma '08 79.5 3rd No USC '05 78.5 10th No Oregon '10 78.0 7th No Texas '09 77.4 7th No LSU '07 77.4 28th Yes Oklahoma '04 75.2 34th No Oklahoma '03 74.7 32nd No Texas '05 73.5 39th Yes USC '04 72.8 50th Yes LSU '03 72.2 61st Yes Notre Dame '12 71.2 75th No Auburn '10 69.9 54th Yes Ohio State '07 69.0 105th No Alabama '09 68.9 63rd Yes Alabama '11 67.5 97th Yes Alabama '12 66.3 114th Yes Florida '06 64.6 75th Yes Ohio State '06 64.5 76th No LSU '11 64.1 118th No Florida '08 63.8 110th Yes





Source: teamrankings.com

The trend of the fastest offenses not winning in the biggest game could soon change. Once the four-team College Football Playoff starts in 2014, defenses will have less time to prepare for an up-tempo offense in the championship game.

How do you officiate no-huddle?

The SEC has historically used the no-huddle less than other conferences. More teams are bringing the no-huddle to the SEC, which ran the fewest number of plays per game among FBS conferences in 2012.

Saban and Arkansas' Brett Bielema, pro-style coaches who don't use tempo as much, have questioned whether the no-huddle is what college football wants. They invoke safety concerns that no-huddle coaches say don't exist.

But a more recurring question emerged in the offseason from many SEC coaches, including those who use tempo: How quickly and consistently will officials let offenses snap the ball?

Gus Malzahn once dreamed of averaging 80 plays per game at Auburn. He has his chance now as the head coach.

"You watch time and time again, not everybody is set when the ball is snapped, and they can't officiate like that because they can't keep up with the pace of the game," Vanderbilt coach James Franklin said. "I don't really have a concern with the styles. I just want to make sure we're all playing by the same rules."

Georgia coach Mark Richt believes officials need to let defenders not only get on the field, but have a reasonable amount of time to line up and become set. Richt said he has seen many plays start when even the offense isn't quite set.

"If teams are not substituting fast enough because they're not organized, that's their fault," Richt said. "But if you're highly organized, you're running your guys on the field and they're not even set when the ball is snapped, I think that's the thing that might need to slow down just a tad."

Added Ole Miss coach Hugh Freeze, a frequent no-huddle user, about spotting the ball: "Sometimes I have felt like in games, whether or not it was our officials or another league's officials, that it was different than the week before."

The Big 12 will experiment with eight officials this season, rather than seven, in an attempt to keep pace with the game's speed, spot more fouls and better protect players. The SEC is expanding its wireless communication system to every officiating crew this season in part to develop better pre-snap dialogue among officials.

"We're going to see more efficiency with up-tempo offenses," SEC officiating coordinator Steve Shaw said. "Now the question will be which is better: an eighth official, a crew communication system, neither, or both? And if it's neither, can our crews continue to adapt to the pace of the game?"

In recent years, officials haven't kept up like they need to given more sophisticated offenses, Big Ten officiating coordinator Bill Carollo said.

"It's not just three yards and a cloud of dust and it's not just passing every play," Carollo said. "We have to get deeper into spring football, deeper into their practices and understand what they're trying to do and what they're teaching players so then we won't be surprised by that. The game is so much faster now."

Truth be told, up-tempo football has gradually hit the game for two decades. High school football evolved with no-huddle quicker than college, leaving quarterbacks more prepared for tempo in college than ever before.

Charlie Ward and Florida State won the national title in 1993 with a no-huddle offense that averaged 78.3 plays per game, third in the country. Those Seminoles last year would have ranked 30th in plays per game.

Rich Rodriguez and Tommy Bowden used the hurry-up in the late 1990s/early 2000s at Tulane and Clemson. So did Joe Tiller at Purdue. Randy Walker, Northwestern's late coach, picked up on the hurry-up by watching Clemson and taught it to Kevin Wilson, whose record-setting 2008 Oklahoma offense became pioneers by using the same 11 players in multiple formations.

Malzahn and Kelly (who's now coaching the Philadelphia Eagles) took the hurry-up to a new level. The Oregon team in 2010 that ranked seventh in plays per game at 78 would have been 32nd only two years later.

The game has evolved. Everyone is trying to keep up.