Bowling Green's Exit Stunt on Run Downs
Against their two Power 4 opponents, the Falcons used an Exit (E-T) stunt along the defensive line in an attempt to slow their more talented opponents' run games.
The MAC has always been an incubator for great coaches. Brian Kelly, Jerry Kill, Urban Meyer, Gary Pinkel, and Nick Saban are just a few of the better-known coaches who have started in the MAC. Miami, Ohio, even bills itself as the ‘Cradle of Coaches.’
Current Ravens head coach John Harbaugh and Rams head coach Sean McVay are RedHawk alums. Paul Brown, Woody Hayes, Bill Arnsparger, Sid Gilman, Bo Schembechler, and Dick Tomey have all stood on the sidelines in Oxford, OH, outside of northwest Cincinnati.
The MAC’s recruiting landscape and location in the upper Midwest have created a diverse and talent-rich ecosystem for a G5 conference. For the most part, the conference has remained relatively stable. Though coaches use the conference as a stepping stone to bigger jobs, several programs continue to pump out high-level schematics and attract good coaching.
I've highlighted Toledo's unique four-down defense before (link below), but Northern Illinois, Ohio, Miami (OH), and Bowling Green routinely play excellent defense. In this case, we will focus on the Falcons and their excellent defense from 2024.
Bowling Green is most famously led by Urban Meyer from 2001 to 2002. Retired Wake Forest Head Coach Dave Clawson and current Arizona OC Dino Babers have graced the sidelines in northwest Ohio. Babers even holds the best record as a head coach since the '60s.
Current defensive coordinator Steve Morrison, along with co-DC Sammy Lawanson, has built a four-down defense that can use reductions to mitigate size disadvantages when playing Power 4 schools. When offenses go heavy, which they will do in this region of the United States, the Morrison can transition into a 3-4 Base defense.
Staying on trend with some top defensive minds at the collegiate and NFL levels, the Falcons run a hybrid defense. Its structure can quickly morph from an odd spacing 3-4 into an odd spacing four-down front. When teams run the traditional ‘NCAA 11 personnel’ offensive looks, the Falcons can run their Nickel defense with multiple ways to counter modern offenses.
College Football Playoff elite defensive teams like Georgia, Notre Dame, Ohio State, and Texas all utilize similar concepts that Bowling Green uses on their defense. Whether utilizing a Base 3-4 against 12 pers. or a hybrid four-down front in their Nickel package, the Falcons mirror what we see from the best in the business.
In 2024, Bowling Green ran the country's 14th most snaps of Quarters and was #1 in usage in the MAC. Paired with a fluid front (movement-based, not gap-based), running Quarters behind it makes sense. In seven-man spacing (Quarters/split-field), a defense has to cancel gaps in the box to change the math in their favor. This can be done using reductions or ‘heavy’ techniques.
Bowling Green finished as the fifth-best defense in the MAC, according to BCF Toys FEI ratings (think FTN’s NFL DVOA). But it was a pretty tight race. Northern Illinois was the top unit, coming in 44th to end the year. Miami, OH (#50), Toledo (#54), Ohio (#55), and Bowling Green (#57) finished the regular season only seven places apart. This cluster is what makes teams is what makes the MAC so uniquely good for a G5 conference.