3rd Drive- the Golden Boy gets a shot
I won't argue whether he should or shouldn't have come in here- let's look at this drive.
1st Play: 1st and 10 O41
Form: I from, strong right, double Flanker left.
Defense: 5-man front, 2 LBs, 1 safety spread to weak side 4 yards off ball. CB's on Flankers about 7 yards off. other safety in run support to strong side.
Let's face it, everyone knows this will be a wasted play. A simple snap and hand off to get the kid into the game.
Straight hand-off (fairly quick, too). O-line opens hole to left, FB runs right, again to the hand-off side of QB. HB misses block which causes hole to seal quickly. No gain.
Blame this on the predictable run play AND a poor read by the FB. Still, O line gave a hole, but the hand-off and poor read by RB kill the play.
2nd Play: 2nd and 10 O41.
Form: Balanced single-set I. flankers split.
Def: 5 man front, 2 lbs tight inside. Cover Two. Defense is playing pass and looking for draw play.
Straight 7-step drop (long developing play when defense is looking pass to begin with), but blocking is perfect. Deep routes are covered, Hall slips out of backfield, Zwick hits him for nice little pick-up. Good execution and better job of looking off deep routes to open up short pass. Would have been better on 1st down.
3rd Play: 3rd and 6 O46
Form: identical to previous play
Defense: Identical, but 1 safety has crept up to LB row pn left side of offense to cover LTE on pass.
At snap, 7-step drop, great blocking, Both TE's go out on routes, Ross ambles left to Qb's vision side for dump-off if needed. Carter (Right Flanker) runs a 15 yard curl vs. man CB. Zwick locks on on Carter (cluing CB) and fires a bullett. It appears the DB hits Carter before the ball arrives (not appears, he DOES hit Carter before ball)- no call. INcompletion. Zwick had shown on his first pass the ability to look off a receiver and go to a second receiver. He had Ross open on a dump-off that would have netted the 1st down, but maybe he felt he could hit Carter, who had the inside position on the DB. It was interference, but coverage was there. Go to open man.
Punt.
Not a bad series- perhaps a poor read by a RB on the hole or maybe he was just going where the play was designed. However, it is the second time that the hand-off, following a 270-degree spin by the QB forces the RB away from the hole for big yardage gains. Maybe the left side of the OL is that much better- either way, the holes are there and the plays seem more to be the problem than the execution or blocking.
If the PI is called on third-down, maybe this doesn't look like such a poor drive. Each play was well designed and executed, but sometimes it seems to be called in the wrong order? On 2nd and 3rd-and-long plays,
OSU runs long developing plays against a defense that is already looking for a pass. THIS is where that damn draw play MIGHT come in handy.