Dantonio defends 3-man rush in Iowa finale
By Chris Vannini (Last updated: 10/27/09 10:37pm)For more than 58 minutes Saturday, the MSU football team shut down Ricky Stanzi.
But as the Iowa quarterback’s offense took the field with 97 seconds remaining and 70 yards ahead of them, they saw something they previously didn’t see much of — a three-man MSU defensive front.
Without feeling pressure, Stanzi drove the Hawkeyes down the field and threw a game-winning touchdown as time expired.
Sunday, head coach Mark Dantonio defended the coaching staff’s decision to pressure with three men on that final drive.
“We used a three-man rush periodically the whole game on third down,” Dantonio said. “In a two-minute situation we packed it all back; we wanted to keep them in-bounds and allow the clock to run.”
To Dantonio’s credit, the Spartans used the three-man rush effectively as Iowa went 5-for-15 on third down for the game.
But the Spartans ran the same defense trying to hold late-game leads against Central Michigan and Michigan and lost both of those leads, as well.
“That’s the normal thing to do, I think, when you’re in that situation,” Dantonio said. “We wanted to take the long throw away from them and make them earn it. … We knew they were going to throw the ball, so we needed to have our faster people on the field to be able to get out of that situation.”
The Spartans blitzed on the final four plays, but were unable to affect Stanzi much.
“When you max pressure, you’ve got to get home and affect the quarterback and we were unable to do that on the last play,” Dantonio said. “We didn’t hit the quarterback enough. When you’re sending more than they’ve got to block, you should hit the quarterback. We didn’t hit him and, consequently, you’re hung out to dry a little bit on certain routes and we’ve got to play the slant better, obviously, but it happened.”
Ware was the penalty?
Dantonio reiterated his frustration with a personal foul called against senior cornerback Jeremy Ware.
With the score tied at six in the fourth quarter, Iowa receiver Colin Sandeman turned as he caught a pass and immediately was hit by Ware. There was no initial call by the officials, but as Sandeman lay on the ground, a personal foul was called on Ware long after the play was dead.
“From where I teach and what I do, this is a tough game, this is a violent game,” Dantonio said. “We don’t want to hurt people, but it’s hard to tell defensive player (to) stand there and let the offensive player run you over. I don’t think that what we want to teach him to do is go cut the guy’s legs out at that point.”
Dantonio also said Ware did not to intend to injure Sandeman.
“It’s not like he has a bull’s-eye and a laser gun and he goes and hits the guy,” Dantonio said. “He’s going to roll up there and hit and these are split-second decisions that a young man has to make to protect himself and to be aggressive and play the football game.”
Two-minute drillmaster
Despite being hounded on the first two plays trailing 9-6, sophomore Kirk Cousins led the Spartans to a touchdown. He has successfully run the two-minute drill several times this season and it nearly won the game Saturday.
“We got beat, taking two sacks right off the bat, (but it was) great execution on the hook-and-ladder, getting it down the field,” Dantonio said. “It was a great play on the last play, stepping up and delivering it to (senior receiver Blair White) for a touchdown. Clutch performance, clutch play.”
Originally Published: 10/26/09 8:30pm
Seen Enough
10/26/09 9:14pmPrevent defense is no good against a good quaterback especially with average safeties and cornerbacks. You must pressure the quarterback with stunts and 8 man blitzes. This is not the pros ‘Narduzzi’- all college quarterbacks get nervous very fast. We’ve lost too many close games and I point the finger at the defensive coordinator who just does’nt get it.
Tony
10/27/09 5:49amIf Dantonio is just lying to the press saying his coaching staff made the right decisions on the last defensive series to keep up morale on the home front, fine. If it actually believes it, we’ve got problems.
Jason B
10/27/09 8:47amTony, I second your comment. Maybe he’s just saying this in public so his assistants don’t turn on him for throwing them under the bus. And then hopefully in private he’s telling them to get their sh%t together and make some changes so this doesn’t keep happenning.
Steve
10/27/09 9:47amYou can’t set a defense in the abstract, without taking your own personnel into account. Even if a prevent defense would be “typical” for the last drive in this game, we have proven time and again that we don’t have the talent in our secondary to play that defense, even with a fifth DB. If we don’t put line pressure on the QB, and so he has time to find a receiver, it is clear from this season that he very often will.
EP
10/27/09 12:36pmIt’s Iowa’s year. You guys were the best defense we played but when it’s winning time Stanzi is very clutch.
Great game by both teams and we found a way when it was urgent. Also, McNutt will be a stud in coming years, you’re the first team to see him.
Allow D
10/27/09 1:42pmUnfortunately with the personnel we currently have and the prevent defense they designed, The coaches insisting on using this defense at the end with leads isn’t “making them earn it”, it’s allowing them to win.
LIR Spartan
10/27/09 2:03pmLets review this. We want to take the long throw away from them, yet we gave up a long play against Michigan and almost blew that game. We blew the Central game because of this defense. We blew the Iowa game because of this defense. We blew the Michigan game two years ago because of this defense. We have blown numerous big leads because of this defense. It concerns me more than I can express that our Head Coach, who is a defensive minded coach, thinks this is a good defense to run.
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Eric
10/27/09 2:04pmIt’s difficult to keep the clock running in college football. The clock stops to reset the chains on every first down, which is why the prevent doesn’t work when you’re allowing 15 yds per play.
100% agree with Tony’s comment as well.
Du
10/27/09 2:16pmI guess we have a bunch of ammature coaches in here. Please MSU, hire these people to lead our team to victory L M M F A O!!
That wasn’t prevent D, anyone with any football sense knows it. We were beat, simple as that. The team that had the ball last was going to win this game.
RPGEnix0
10/27/09 3:29pmEveryone is either talking about Ware’s questionable penalty, and the prevent defense that in the end lost us this game. However, nobody seems to talking about not keeping the ball on offense. You were on your opponent’s 30 yard line with A LOT of time left, you could either get a TD or a FG to go into OT (If only Kirk Cousins made that TD pass a minute later). Say the “worst-best” case scenario happened and we only got a FG, we’d go into OT, but of course there wouldn’t be that BS prevent defense. We had a better shot at winning the game because overall our offense played marginally better (in terms of yardage mind you).
LIR Spartan
10/27/09 4:27pmPlease, anyone who has ever watched football knows that was the Prevent defense. There is not point in even discussing that. I do agree that the play calling on the goal line on offense needs to be looked at. We have run about 6-8 plays this year from the 1 yard line and have not been able to get the ball in the endzone. Please try something different, since the Power I formation is not working. Keep in mind, that kicking field goals during the game only leads to losses. I only want to kick field goals on the last play to either win or tie a game. A field goal during the heart of the game is, in most cases, a loss for us.
Ryan Schultz
10/27/09 4:53pmThe team that had the ball last was going to win, Du? Do you realize that only 28 pts were scored here. The team that was going to win was the team that scored last, because it was close. It shouldn’t have come to who had the ball last, because neither team could consistently move the ball.
Dantonio and Narduzzi need to quit supporting this late game defense, FOR THE FANS! that’s right, D.
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Philip
10/27/09 5:03pmIn most cases I would drop back and play a dime or nickle in a passing situation. In this situation (last drive of the game) I would have done the same. I like the 3-4 defense in this situation. Yes we lost the game but on the last play, on a inside route that you cant defend against unless you know the play call. I would have called the same play call. Lets just put it this way we lost, drop to 4-4, but we got to focus on the next game and win two more to make it to a bowl game!! end of story….. GREAT Article Chris!!
Hawk Fan who's Fair
10/27/09 6:37pmWhere was that Michigan State defense during the previous games? You guys shut the Hawks down till our last second lucky play. Luck was on both sidelines that night. The hook and ladder? I was waiting for the lady to be cut in half on the sidelines too.
The Ware hit was illegal. Apparently it wasn’t a cheap shot, according to your coach, and Dantonio seems like an honorable man, so I give him respect and the benefit of the doubt.
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LIR Spartan
10/27/09 7:04pmHawk, the Ware hit wasn’t even close to being illegal. Go and look at the play again.
Philip
10/27/09 9:16pmYea if you look at the replay ware was coming in from the flat to tackle him, when the hawk player, Colin Sandeman, caught and turned around he also was not straight up and then ware came up and hit him…. not illegal what-so-ever!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9ZdFlZ_wcA
ozzz
10/28/09 4:22pmPrevent a win defense has never worked for the Spartans.
Based upon Dantonio’s comments do we need to remind him/Narduzzi that the clock stops on first downs.
By the way, why did we run the same play 3 times at the goal line and then kick. I know we didn’t actually run the same play but they all end up the same place – stuck in the middle of the field at the one yard line.
Another great effort wasted by poor coaching.
how true
10/29/09 1:16amI agree with Tony, enough said.