Whiteboard Wednesday: Creativity is King

Tomahawk Nation is bringing you more and more analysis about what the Florida State Seminoles are doing under their new staff, breaking it down to each of the important coaches and their philosophies. We will be turning our focus towards the now as we get an idea of what the new staff is doing.

As we dive into the depths, we know there are some concepts that bear explanation. Scheme takes time to be installed and we want to take the time to give our readers an understanding of what is happening. We will take a much closer look at the Mike Norvell and Adam Fuller offense/defense.

One of the exciting parts for our scheme team is to discuss football in the comments section. We always look forward to your feedback and questions. Please don’t be shy to ask follow-up or clarifying questions after reading.

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Last week we looked at the screen game and series football from FSU opening game against Georgia Tech. As Norvell and offensive coordinator Kenny Dillingham continue to install their offense we see more creativity from the Seminole offense. While no one is satisfied with the offensive output thus far the attempt to scheme plays open is there. We have seen quite a bit of creativity in plays. We have also seen diversity in personnel trying to get playmakers the ball.

21 Personnel Shovel Pass

First, take a look at the attached video (sorry we are not allowed to do gifs right now).

Lets unwrap what we see here. The offense comes out in 21 personnel with a wide set twins to the field. Aligned in the backfield are Jashuan Corbin and Jordan Travis. Right away we see the offense using creativity by putting Travis, a dynamic runner, in the backfield as a tailback. Lining up Travis in the backfield is going to cause some confusion for the defense and impact eye discipline. It’s important as an offense that you do things that move defenders eyes. You can move defenders eyes with motion, tempo, ball action, or trickery (like this play).

On 3rd and 1, the defense has to be prepared for anything from the offense. The Seminole offense shows sprint-out action by James Blackman to the field side which helps to create flow by the defense. When defensive end #15 Jaelen Phillips sees Corbin and Blackman sprinting out he widens which creates a lane for Travis to come underneath and follow pulling guard Brady Scott through the hole. Blackman does a nice job of selling the action and flips it to Travis for a first down. Lets take a look at the important parts of the play in GIF form.

It is good to see Norvell and co. using putting the talent they do have in position to be successful. We saw Travis get used in a number of ways that were all very successful.

I want to drop the following clip in also because it was such a great usage of the screen game, which we discussed last week.

Let’s take it to the comment section and talk about the few, brief positives from Saturdays game.

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