In 2009, head coach Brian Kelly’s Cincinnati Bearcats finished last in the nation (120th back then) in time of possession with a 25:46 average per game.
It was filed into the “Stats That Don’t Matter” category while finishing the regular season 12-0 and catching the eye of the University of Notre Dame before becoming the new Fighting Irish head coach that December.
The Bearcats’ success that year was built around a prolific offense that finished fourth nationally in scoring (38.6 points per game) and eighth in passing (308.8). Quarterback Tony Pike and the receiving trio of Mardy Gilyard, Armon Binns and D.J. Woods would all land on NFL rosters, so it made sense to build around their skills.
Here we are more than a decade later with Kelly and the No. 4 Fighting Irish — whose average time of possession (34:11) during the 5-0 start is now second in the country among teams that have played at least four games. Why such an about-face in that category?
The answer is the most elementary aspect of coaching: Play to your strengths, and try to mask current deficiencies.
The strengths are obvious: the most experienced returning offensive line in school history, a plethora of future NFL tight ends to complement them, some exciting young running backs, and a savvy third-year starter at quarterback in Ian Book, who is not necessarily known for the long ball.
The concern is equally conspicuous: A receiving corps that has been ravaged by graduation, injuries and some inexperience, which is why graduate transfer Ben Skowronek from Northwestern was signed last winter and starred in the 45-3 win over Pitt this weekend by grabbing the first two touchdowns on 34- and 73-yard plays.
Reflecting the team strength is Pro Football Focus’ snap counts. In today’s football, more teams are likely to line up three or four receivers and one tight end, or maybe even none. With Notre Dame, three tight ends (13 personnel) are more the norm, and on occasion even four, including on Kyren Williams’ two-yard touchdown run at Pitt.
Through five games, Notre Dame’s No. 3 tight end, senior Brock Wright has played more snaps (158) than Avery Davis, the player with the second most snaps at receiver (132). Junior Tommy Tremble has the most at tight end (237), while rising freshman star Michael Mayer (167) — now the team’s top pass catcher with 12 — has been seeing his time expand.
If he truly wanted to, Kelly could put four or five receivers on the field every play. But he would view that as coaching malpractice because it is not properly utilizing the team’s top assets, which was easily identified in August.
“This is strictly about personnel and making sure that you are playing the kind of football that is geared toward the strength of your offense,” Kelly said. “We said from day one that this should be centered around the offensive line and the tight end, which is the strength.”
Part II is that minus NFL Rookie of the Year candidate Chase Claypool and Chris Finke, and injury/health setbacks to Kevin Austin, Braden Lenzy and Lawrence Keys III (plus Skowronek for a few games), force-feeding a wideout-oriented look is not in the program’s best interests at this time.
“If I had Will Fuller, Chase Claypool and Miles Boykin and T.J. Jones … Michael Floyd and whoever, we might be in four wide receivers and throwing,” Kelly stated. “…This year it's about the players that is dictating the offense, not the particular play. So, that's why we look the way we look.”
That includes not using a tempo attack, or at least utilize it sparingly. Kelly said there were two-dozen plays for such an attack last season.
“We've pared that down considerably, because we're really going to be focusing a lot more on multiple formations,” he explained. “And when you get into multiple formations in motion, it's hard to play fast, quite frankly.”
Part of that is because the multiple tight end alignments are moved around frequently in their formations to create the best matchups possible against the defense.
“In playing fast, you have to be in a much more static alignment, lining up and playing fast,” Kelly said. “We're moving our tight ends around. We want to get into leveraged positions with our tight ends … Consequently, you're not going to be in as many of those hurry-up situations or tempo situations.”
As continuity builds at receiver, they will appear more in the alignments. For now, the comfort zone is with the tight ends.
"We're building a really good confidence with Michael Mayer and certainly Tremble because they've been in the lineup pretty consistently for us,” Kelly said. “I think Ian feels really confident that he knows where those guys are going to be. That has been singularly one of the areas that we built that rapport and we built that confidence level, and I think you can start to see that playing itself out.
“We need to do more of that at the wide receiver position.”
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