Film Study: In Cotton Bowl shootout, Nittany Lions display more firepower

The Penn State football team went to the Cotton Bowl, a game it had not played in since 1975, and put together a throwback performance on offense that featured a two-headed monster at running back and 396 net rushing yards. The performance was enough to give the Nittany Lions a 53-39 victory against Memphis and secure a third 11-win season over the past four years.

How did Penn State get there and how did Memphis manage to hang around all game?

We’ll break it all down, here:

THE SAME OLD SCRIPT

We’ll start on the offensive side of the ball where Penn State once again faced a unique defensive plan from an opponent who had time to study the Lions' attack.

The typical book on how to bottle up Penn State's passing attack starts with taking away deep shots with a cover two, plus doubling the slot threats of KJ Hamler and Pat Freiermuth to force passes to the boundary.

The Tigers added a unique wrinkle to this plan and utilized post-snap rotation in order to confuse Sean Clifford, much like Purdue did earlier in the season.

Here's the result:

Essentially, Memphis was bluffing pre-snap. Its defense fooled Penn State into calling a play to beat a coverage they weren’t intending to play.

It’s a smart strategy, seeing as Penn State has seen the cover two approach more times than not this season. But it’s also a gamble. If Clifford is able to evade pressure, Memphis' defense has one less coverage defender against an explosive Nittany Lion offense.

Defensive coordinator Adam Fuller hedged this by sending pressure from the short side of the field. He also wasn’t afraid to blitz the corner on that side.

It didn’t always create pressure, but it created confusion and uncertainty for Clifford, which is the death of confidence.

It’s not like Clifford hasn't seen exotic coverage schemes in the past. Where he once stood in the pocket, diagnosed and found an open receiver, this game was clearly a regression in pocket confidence and presence.

Let’s look at that previous play again.

Once again, Memphis starts with a cover two look pre-snap but blitzes a safety post-snap. Clifford is unsure of what he is seeing and doesn’t diagnose that Freiermuth will be coming open quickly on a pick-action on the far side. By the time Clifford breaks the pocket, the throw is gone. Luckily for the Lions, Clifford keeps his cool and finds Jahan Dotson on the back side of the play for a first down.

While it worked out, this is not a great play by Clifford. Because he wasn’t confident pre- and post-snap, he had to hold the ball and scramble to find a much harder pass.

However, Memphis was playing with fire by deploying such an aggressive scheme and subsequently got burned a couple of times through the air.

Yet on the whole, it did enough to slow down the Penn State passing attack, giving Memphis a 13-7 lead after the first quarter. Penn State interim offensive coordinator Tyler Bowen called 24 passing plays last Saturday, 10 of which came in the first 15 minutes of play. Part of that was effectiveness on the part of the passing game, but it was also a product of what was available.

POWER FIVE

Despite moving the ball well in the first quarter, Penn State was left trailing entering the second frame. At that point, they came out with a decidedly different approach.

Bowen showed a similar approach with a three receiver set, but then attacked the six-man box with a single high safety.

Repeatedly.

The danger of blitzing so aggressively is not just that you’ll get burned for a big pass. On the previous play, Memphis once again sends pressure on first down. The idea is to create a negative play blitzing the run, or getting pressure on a rusty sophomore quarterback coming off an injury.

The problem is that when the safety times the blitz poorly and Journey Brown cuts back, there is no one left to tackle him.

While Brown and Noah Cain certainly deserve a large portion of praise, the real story of the game is the Penn State offensive line, who opened massive holes against Memphis and set the tone in the game.

By the fourth quarter, it wasn’t about scheme or box count. Penn State was just blowing Memphis off the ball and creating an advantage where there wasn’t one before.

In the end, it wasn’t a perfect performance from the Penn State offense, but it was still a dominant one. The mark of a good team is to be able to win in multiple ways.

During the Cotton Bowl, the passing game took a backseat to a rushing attack that created enough explosive plays to make up for the lack of a deep ball. Penn State should be commended for taking the Tigers’ best shot and still putting up 53 points.

With the news this week that Penn State is moving on from offensive line coach Matt Limegrover, it shows that James Franklin has built a talent-rich offensive line. It'll be fun to see what Phil Trautwein is able to do with this group.

DEFENSE DOES ENOUGH

Clearly, the story on the defensive side of the ball was the play of linebacker Micah Parsons. The rising junior linebacker put on a show and cemented his status as an All-American defender in 2019.

At a risk of being negative, we'll get to Parsons in a moment. Instead, lets focus on what happened that allowed Memphis to hang with Penn State for the better part of three quarters.

Once again, Penn State suffered from a coverage lapse in the secondary early in the game that led to a big play.

While we could guess as to what coverage was called on this play, every single coverage that Penn State would likely run has a deep safety to prevent plays exactly like this. John Reid gets blamed for losing his man, but he’s not supposed to be covering the middle of the field.

These are the sort of coverage lapses that have bitten Penn State over the final month of the season.

Here’s another third-and-long late in the game. Penn State has a great opportunity to take the ball back and give its offense a chance to put the game out of reach.

It’s not always big, blown assignments that cause coverage lapses. When coaches preach the little things, like zone discipline, this is why.

Check out how close Jan Johnson and Garrett Taylor are to each other instead of holding zone integrity.

It’s hard to blame this on coaching or on the defensive line. Overall, there were just too many mistakes by the defense like this one above.

There were also plenty of missed tackles, too.

Or this one that helped lead to three points before the half.

Memphis also did a good job attacking the underneath zone.

As we’ve talked about before, one way to mitigate PSU's pass rush is to simply not give them the chance to get to the quarterback.

Memphis also did a good job of putting defenders in space in conflict.

Even Parsons, who had a good game, bit in coverage a few times.

The most surprising struggle for the defense was its inability to stop bubble screens, which had been a strength of the team all season.

In the end, Memphis was able to generate ‘easy’ yards and the Lions allowed the Tigers to get those yards by missing tackles and not playing a clean game from a fundamental standpoint.

What saved Penn State was that the defense made enough plays to overcome their mistakes, focing Memphis to settle for field goals.

You can’t win a shootout if you aren’t getting into the end zone.

PARSONS ON THE PATH TO BECOMING A COMPLETE PLAYER

The reality is that there were stretches in this game that Parsons simply took over. He only rushed the passer six times, yet he tallied two sacks, a forced fumble and several other pressures that affected the game.

He was so dominant that he almost single-handedly ended this Memphis drive.

While Yetur Gross-Matos got the sack on that final play, it was Parsons falling into his blocker that sent quarterback Brady White off balance and into his waiting... hand.

The most impressive part has been his development in the passing game. While he’s still not a complete player, he’s inches away from becoming an elite player in this area.

He still has some work to do when covering in space, particularly when he’s in man coverage, but his zone instincts are starting to catch up with his physical skills and he’s beginning to break on balls underneath.

For frustrated Penn State fans who complain about Brent Pry’s scheme, this is the type of player that can take it to the next level.

If Parsons keeps playing like this, he’ll finally get his first interception.

There are few linebackers with the ability to attack as a pass rusher, stop the run and play well in coverage. With a final year of improvement in the passing game, Parsons will not just be an All-American, but also a top pick in the NFL Draft.

ODDS AND ENDS

We’re going to chalk this game up as rust for Clifford, who simply did not look like the same player that had been taking steps towards being a complete quarterback in early November.

One troubling theme is that he's been locking on to a receiver and staring him down.

Aside from this, there were issues with footwork, missing easy throws and not finding the right receiver post-snap. Clifford has shown glimpses of being the kind of quarterback that can win big games, but he’s got to get his mind right again after his injury and shaky performances to end the season.

JUST FOR LAUGHS

No. 58 for Memphis had a rough day.

But so did Taylor.

Penn State has a hard enough time defending screens without Taylor taking out other Nittany Lions’ defenders.

JOHN REID GOES OUT ON TOP

Reid has been one of my favorite players to watch during his time at Penn State. When he does it right, it’s pretty. Last Saturday, he had perfect coverage several times throughout the game.

Those were just the ones he was targeted on.

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again: Reid gets a bad rap because occasionally he gets dunked on by bigger receivers. When he’s on though, it looks so pretty. His intelligence, meticulous footwork and mind for the position will be missed.

TIME WARP

Robert Windsor looks like he was put in a time machine from the early 90s.

CAIN/BROWN 2020

A healthy Cain is so fun to watch.

And now, so is Brown.

This could be a big problem for Big Ten opponents next year.

Based on preseason expectations for this team, 2019 was as successful as you could imagine. If not for one stumble late in the season, Penn State would have been in the conversation for a College Football Playoff berth.

With talent and experience returning, the Nittany Lions are poised for another serious run at it in 2020.

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