TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — As chaos ensued, Kane Wommack tracked down Zabien Brown for another dialog earlier than leaving the sphere. Brown was the focal point, his interception with lower than a minute to play sealing Alabama’s win over Georgia on Saturday.
It was the largest second of Brown’s younger profession and provided redemption after he had been focused all through the sport. Wommack, who trusted Brown, a real freshman, needed to place the sport and the ultimate drive into perspective.
“These are the moments that may make your profession,” Wommack mentioned he advised Brown. “We’re going to construct and study off of this however what an exceptional job battling again. I’ve by no means seen a freshman compete like that. Happy with you.”
Belief was key in Alabama’s win on Saturday. It was the primary time that Wommack really opened up his defensive playbook this season and entrusted his group to hold out the total recreation plan. That resulted in 11 “game-changers” as Wommack describes them — turnovers (4), sacks (three), three-and-outs (three) and a security.
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Based on TruMedia, Alabama’s protection is ranked eighth nationally in cease charge (79.2 %), which is the proportion of a protection’s drives that finish in punts, turnovers or turnovers on downs.
“There’s a motive why I needed Kane to be right here,” coach Kalen DeBoer mentioned. “I noticed it again in 2019 after I was at Indiana with him. Whether or not it was schematically or how he introduced a unit collectively, simply the help he provides me and the kind of particular person he’s and I can go on and on.
“Kane has accomplished an excellent job making ready the protection, permitting them to play quick and do the issues they’re doing. 4 takeaways in opposition to a staff that hadn’t had any turnovers, that’s an enormous deal.”
Kane Wommack is in his first season as Alabama’s defensive coordinator after three years as South Alabama’s head coach. (Gary Cosby Jr. / USA As we speak Community through Imagn Photographs)
Now into SEC play, extra of Wommack’s “SwarmD” will reveal itself. The scheme was a query mark getting into the season, primarily how a shift in philosophy from Nick Saban’s scheme to this one would uphold the usual that has been set throughout the program. It has been a blended bag, however week-over-week progress on protection is the important thing to Alabama persevering with to ascend.
The protection has been elite in some areas, like cease charge, third-down charge (17.2 %, which is second nationally) and yards allowed per play (4.1, eleventh nationally). However Alabama is permitting 196.5 passing yards per recreation (52nd) and 119.3 speeding yards per recreation (forty sixth). Saturday’s win highlighted the ceiling of what the protection will be however strengthened sure areas of concern that future groups may exploit.
The problem is discovering the required consistency to play to the extent wanted for championship competition.
“We’ve received to do an excellent job of going from a recreation that had quite a lot of consideration and quite a lot of momentum swings and do the identical factor time and again,” Wommack mentioned. “Success, in the event you permit it, will breathe complacency into your program. It’s important to combat to have the ability to play to the usual week in and week out. That’s definitely going to be the problem for us.”
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Following Saban has been a storyline and stress largely saved for DeBeor, who straight changed him as the top coach. However Wommack succeeded Saban because the architect of Alabama’s protection, and gamers like fifth-year senior Tim Smith puzzled how Wommack would function as the brand new coordinator.
It didn’t take lengthy for the protection to reply.
“His first day right here, he commanded the defensive room,” Smith mentioned. “Each place was in there; it was like, ‘Sit up,’ and he mentioned ‘SwarmD, lock in’ — that’s our response. That’s how he begins each assembly so it forces us to concentrate. I favored that he commanded the room, understanding that it’s his protection.”
It’s a protection that employs what’s referred to as “imaginative and prescient protection,” a zone-based scheme the place there are three to 4 rushers, and the opposite gamers have their eyes on the quarterback. That’s a distinction from Saban’s match protection scheme, which was a hybrid of man-to-man and zone protection.
“When you possibly can put your eyes on the quarterback, now you aren’t simply defending individuals or grass however defending the individuals on the grass the quarterback needs to throw the ball to,” Wommack mentioned.
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That model permits for the protection to make use of a number of coverages with out altering personnel and even its alignment from snap to snap. Towards Georgia, the protection was capable of disguise itself all through the evening, which created confusion for Georgia’s offense and in the end compelled errors.
“Typically we’re going to present a pre-snap image, an instantaneous post-snap image after which change that image,” Wommack mentioned. “That’s the place you might inform we received (Georgia quarterback Carson Beck) slightly bit off-kilter, and he threw us the ball a few instances simply just because we’re displaying him one image pre-snap, a unique image proper on the snap after which rotating to one thing else completely because the play is happening, and we have been capable of have an effect on him numerous instances. Strain permits you to have the ability to velocity up the quarterback’s tempo within the throw recreation.”
Strain blended with disguised coverages is the secret. Alabama blitzed 4 instances as a lot in opposition to Georgia (12.2 %) because it had in its earlier video games (3.3 %), leading to 11 quarterback pressures (one led to a security that prolonged the Tide’s result in 30-7). However what’s most intriguing about Alabama’s protection is the variety of gamers contributing.
Alabama repeatedly has rotated greater than 20 gamers all through the early a part of the season. That didn’t change in opposition to Georgia as 20 gamers (seven defensive linemen, 5 linebackers and eight defensive backs) performed double-digit snaps. It’s a mixture of gamers from fifth-year veterans like Smith to true freshmen like Brown. Creating playable depth for an extended season is a problem throughout the nation, and the way Wommack has gone about instructing the scheme has allowed Alabama to get a jumpstart on that via the primary month of the season.
“I feel we’re actually intentional about having a short-term improvement plan to get younger gamers on the sphere,” Wommack mentioned. “We’ve at all times accomplished that on this system. We’ve at all times been capable of play freshmen due to that. There’s some there’s some particulars which are difficult for younger gamers to return in and study, however we really feel like now we have created a system that’s easy sufficient for a younger man to study after which detailed sufficient for the nuances as you go.”
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Wommack’s basis as a coach comes from his father, Dave, whose protection Wommack is working in the present day. The 2 shared an embrace shortly after the Georgia recreation amid the joy on the sphere, however Wommack already had began wanting forward.
“We have now to get higher,” he mentioned.
There’s an understanding throughout the protection {that a} extra constant effort is required. The second half of the Georgia recreation noticed Alabama permit 27 factors, 4 fourth-down conversions and 366 whole yards. Just a few days eliminated, Wommack recognized what went incorrect and the place the protection goes from right here.
“Whenever you go up 30-7, you’re enjoying a really completely different model of recreation,” Wommack mentioned. “Primarily that staff now has 4 downs to get a primary down. They’re going to be far more aggressive on first and second down, take extra pictures downfield, realizing that they’re going to be in a go situation on fourth down. It’s one of the crucial difficult issues to deal with as a protection. They’ll take their time; they will take these pictures downfield.
“I believed, at instances, we dealt with it rather well to get them to fourth-down conditions (Georgia was 3-for-10 on third down within the second half), however we weren’t capable of execute and get off the sphere. We would have liked another cease, another takeaway, and definitely, we wanted to scrub up a few of the massive performs. If we get off the sphere on fourth down, a few of these issues don’t occur within the first place.”
The following alternative is Saturday in opposition to an improved Vanderbilt staff that already has matched final season’s win whole (two) and has two losses by 5 mixed factors, together with an time beyond regulation loss in opposition to No. 9 Missouri. There’s no scarcity of motivational techniques to maintain the staff targeted coming off an enormous win as mouse traps have been positioned all through the power this week to point a entice recreation.
The problem for Alabama’s protection will likely be slowing down Vanderbilt quarterback Diego Pavia, who has but to show the ball over and is a dual-threat possibility, which has damage Alabama this season.
It’s a problem Wommack welcomes and one he has missed in the course of the previous few seasons. He left South Alabama, the place he was probably the most profitable head coach in program historical past, to turn out to be Alabama’s defensive coordinator. A few of the causes, resembling publicity, are apparent however there was one other: Wommack’s true calling, he believes, is constructing defenses and game-planning particularly for offenses.
“Calling performs and making changes on recreation day was one thing I actually missed attending to do,” Wommack mentioned. “It’s the factor that I’ve in all probability accomplished probably the most of my profession. I’ve recognized I needed to be a coach my complete life. You get into it, and also you notice I type of have a knack for this or that. (Play calling) has at all times come slightly bit extra pure, in order that’s one thing that I’m actually excited to have the ability to do, use these presents once more.”
(High photograph of Zabien Brown (2): Todd Kirkland / Getty Photographs)
