Diagnosing Notre Dame's Offensive Struggles
I watched and charted every play so you didn't have to. Here's what I found.
I spent this week trying to find answers to the questions all of you have surely asked yourself this week: What in the world happened to the offense?
To do so, I watched and charted every play (aside from Tennessee State because of their FCS status) to get more granular data the provider I use doesn’t have access to. This includes the box count, formation, play action, and if the offensive alignment was condensed among other variables.
After using data and film collectively to evaluate the offense, I think a lot of the problems stems from the coaching staff putting too much onus on the players to win on every down and has become too predictable to win against opponents of equal talent and/or equal coaching.
Here’s what I think has gone wrong and what I would change.
Defenses have figured out what happens when Sam Hartman goes under center
Every time Hartman goes under center he may as well just be a walking billboard to the entire world that the offense is going to run the ball no matter what. It worked against Navy and Central Michigan because Notre Dame can simply overpower those teams. It’s been a disaster in pretty much every other game.
In the last three weeks they’ve run 28 plays from under center. 25 of them have been designed runs. Two plays in total resulted in positive EPA.
The easy answer would be to stop running these altogether, but there are going to be situations where they simply have to execute from under center. The bigger problem is volunteering to run into heavy boxes and the predictability of it all.
See, Gerard Parker loves running from under center with these condensed formations that bring an extra receiver in as a blocker in addition to a tight end or two. The issue with that is it brings in additional defenders into the box to account for those extra blockers, and for the play to work it requires a lot of blocks to be executed really well. When it works, it looks like the best play ever. That’s simply unsustainable over a large sample of plays and we’ve seen just that the last few weeks.
Here are two examples from the Louisville game, the first without motion and the second with motion.
While I can’t compare Notre Dame’s performance to other college teams because this data isn’t available publicly, we can use the average performance of NFL teams in similar circumstances to see is it an issue of execution on the players’ part or unrealistic expectations on the likelihood of success from the coaches.
And the answer is pretty clear it’s the latter.
The public NFL data doesn’t track if the offense is in a condensed formation, but if we look at the efficiency metrics for when an offense is in 12 personnel (1 running back and 2 tight ends) and under center that should give us an idea of expected performance when facing lighter or heavier boxes.
Unsurprisingly, rushing efficiency decreases when more defenders are in the box which Notre Dame has experienced first hand. What’s notable is the stability of passing performance in this alignment, likely a product of fewer cornerbacks/safeties and more linebackers on the field for the defense.
And while NFL teams are also running a lot more than throwing when under center, its about 67% compared to the 78% Notre Dame’s been operating at (and 89% the last three weeks).
If Notre Dame really wants to be under center for a sizable portion of each game they simply have to throw more than 3 of 28 times against teams where they can’t win on talent alone.
But the offense has been really effective running out of shotgun and it’s pretty unnecessary to go under center just to run the ball as often as they do.
If you break out Notre Dame’s offense into different two teams, when they’re in shotgun and under center, the results couldn’t be more different.
Shotgun Notre Dame’s rushing EPA/play and success rate would rank 6th in the country.
Under center Notre Dame would rank 130th and 117th.
If I can figure this out watching the TV copy, imagine what Jim Knowles, Mike Elko, and Louisville’s coaching staff did.
Either the offense needs to get way more creative when under center or they need to move to operating more and more out of shotgun.
More simple play action
I find it hard to believe Hartman simply forgot how to be effective on play action dropbacks this year. He’s been really effective on these plays his entire career and I’d be shocked if he just lost this skillset. In my opinion it’s more of a selection issue and what type of play action Notre Dame chooses to run.
Now, I didn’t track whether Hartman had his back turned to the defense on his play action dropbacks, but we can reasonably infer that will happen when he’s under center and when he’s in shotgun he’ll always be facing forward.
We know Notre Dame doesn’t really throw much when they’re under center, a signal that Hartman isn’t comfortable passing from those look. He only has 18 throws from under center, and 16 of those were play action. That’s 43% of his total play action throws, which is really going to skew the sample.
So, once again, let’s break that out into shotgun and under center.
Things are starting to make more sense. The efficiency numbers aren’t better than non-play action dropbacks but the sample size is still pretty small with only 26 plays. If we isolate it even further to non-condensed formations, on 19 dropbacks Hartman is averaging 0.45 EPA/play and a 47.4% success rate. Small sample size, sure, but just adding even a play fake on spread looks in shotgun can do a lot to help free up space in the second level.
Watch this clip from the Ohio State game to get an idea of what I mean.
Play action doesn’t need to be complicated and include a naked bootleg every time. By faking the hand-off there the linebacker who was responsible for Mitchell Evans, either in zone or man-match, was preoccupied with the potential of a run and allowed Notre Dame to complete an easy pitch-and-catch with some YAC.
These are the types of plays that need to be incorporated more into the offense and the ones that can be easily done in the middle of a season and don’t require a complicated install.
Notre Dame uses motion a good amount and it (mostly) works
It’s not like the offense isn’t doing anything right. They use motion on 36.7% of their snaps, which is just below the NFL average and would rank 20th among NFL teams the last two years.
And they get really good results when doing so averaging 0.15 EPA/play. But similar to their under center looks, they are really predictable when it comes to snap motion (motion at the time of the snap).
On 67 snap motion plays Notre Dame has run on 76% of them. And they are really unsuccessful at running the football on those plays, averaging -0.18 EPA/play and a 35% success rate. It’s possible that defenses are selling out to stop the run when they see snap motion given the low passing rate. With how hyper-efficient the Irish have been throwing the ball, this seems like a really simple adjustment to burn defenses for stopping the run first but also to open up opportunities for the running game once they adjust to more passes coming from these looks.
Have the players been perfect? No, the pass blocking has been really poor the last few weeks and the receivers have been banged up seemingly all season. But, in my opinion, they have not been put in the best position to succeed due to predictable playcalling and continuing to try and win with a style they simply have not been successful with all year.
The USC game might go really differently due to their own defensive struggles. But when you watch the game, look for how often Notre Dame runs when under center, especially in condensed formations. How often they use play action, especially simple play fakes from shotgun. Hopefully we see some changes in the strategy in a game where they’ll need to score to stay competitive. We’ll find out tomorrow.