Football scouting report: BYU
BYU linebacker/defensive end Harvey Langi (right) was all over the field in last year’s game between the Cougars and the Bruins. He finished with a team-high eight tackles to go along with two interceptions and one pass breakup. (Daily Bruin file photo)
By Matt Joye
Sept. 15, 2016 12:00 p.m.
UCLA football (1-1) will wrap up its two-year home-and-home series with BYU this Saturday, as the Bruins travel to Provo, Utah, to face the Cougars (1-1). Last year, then-No. 19 BYU gave then-No. 10 UCLA a serious scare in the Rose Bowl, taking a 10-point fourth-quarter lead before the Bruins came back and won 24-23.
In this year’s contest, the Bruins will see a lot of familiar faces from the Cougars, who retain 16 starters from last year’s team. There are some changes to the Cougars’ coaching staff, however, as their former head coach – Bronco Mendenhall – is now holding that position at the University of Virginia.
Stepping into Mendenhall’s shoes at BYU is a former defensive coordinator at Utah and Oregon State – Kalani Sitake.
Sitake has ruffled the feathers of some UCLA players and coaches before, as his defensive line at Oregon State last year bluffed offensive cadences at the line of scrimmage, eliciting a slew of false starts from the Bruins’ offensive line.
“It was kind of BS what they were doing on the defensive line,” said UCLA sophomore quarterback Josh Rosen after the Bruins’ 41-0 rout of Sitake’s Beavers last November. “(The Beavers) were calling cadences, saying ‘set, huts.’ So all these false starts and stuff on our offensive line – it wasn’t on them.”
[Related: UCLA blows out Oregon State on the road]
It will be interesting to see if Sitake tries some of the same defensive strategies when he faces off against Rosen and the Bruins once again on Saturday.
Without further ado, here’s a full scouting report for BYU, which is currently being listed as a three-point underdog against UCLA.
BYU’s offense
Base formations: Shotgun four wide, pistol and singleback
Run/pass ratio: 51 percent run, 49 percent pass
Strengths: Short passes and quarterback mobility
Weaknesses: Pass protection and wide receiver speed
X-factor: RB Jamaal Williams
This BYU offense did not look good at all against Utah last week. Cougar quarterback Taysom Hill threw no touchdowns and three interceptions, all while averaging a measly 4.5 yards per pass attempt. Hill was missing receivers left and right, and even the passes he completed weren’t perfectly placed.
Despite the poor showing in the passing game, Hill still deserves a lot of credit for leading a clutch 13-play, 75-yard touchdown drive in the final two minutes of the game. On that final drive against Utah, Hill used his speed as he scrambled out of pressure three times for a total of 26 rushing yards, including a 7-yard touchdown run, to bring the Cougars to within one point of the Utes. BYU then decided to go for the two-point conversion to take the lead, but Hill’s quarterback draw attempt was snuffed out by a stingy Utah defense.
BYU’s offensive attack predicates upon Hill’s ability to throw short passes and escape pressure. In last week’s game against Utah, both of BYU’s touchdowns came via Hill running the football. And they aren’t always designed runs or read option runs for Hill – sometimes he just improvises and turns pass plays into run plays. Last week, he scrambled out of pass plays seven times for a total of 53 rushing yards.
But as important as Hill is, senior running back Jamaal Williams may be even more critical to the Cougars’ offense – particularly against a Bruin team that struggles with run defense.
Williams ran the ball 12 times for 58 yards last week against Utah, before missing the fourth quarter with a lower leg contusion. When Williams got going, BYU’s offense seemed to gain some balance, as well as some momentum. He provides a powerful presence in the backfield at 6 feet 2 inches and 220 pounds.
If Williams can find his groove and return to the 1,000-yard rusher that he was in the 2013 season, BYU’s offense could become potent. But if Williams is still suffering from that lower leg contusion, the Cougars’ offense can become one-dimensional. Right now, it seems as if Williams will be 100 percent healthy and ready to go on Saturday, per his Twitter account.
BYU’s defense
Base defense: 3-4
Blitz tendency: Medium
Strength: Deception
Weakness: Fatigue at end of games
X-factor: OLB Fred Warner
This BYU defense really rattled Rosen and the Bruins last year, forcing the UCLA quarterback into three first-half interceptions. The Cougars thrived off of their ability to create confusion at the line of scrimmage, using an array of “psycho fronts” with only two down linemen – or sometimes zero down linemen.
With BYU having so few down linemen, it made it difficult for Rosen to diagnose exactly who was blitzing and who was dropping back in coverage. That’s really what BYU does best: disguising its pass rushers. The Cougars often have three down linemen and two edge rushers at the line of scrimmage, but rarely will use both edge rushers to blitz the quarterback. Thus, the opposing offense has to guess which of BYU’s two edge rushers will actually be doing the blitzing.
Of course, the Achilles heel for this BYU defense has always been its ability – or lack thereof – to finish games.
Last year, the Cougars had a healthy 10-point lead in the fourth quarter against the Bruins, but then their run defense wore down considerably over the final 13 minutes of the game, allowing the Bruins to march up and down the field without really having to pass at all.
[Related: UCLA barely escapes from the Rose Bowl with a one point win]
The same thing happened in this first week of this season, as BYU held a 15-3 fourth-quarter lead over Arizona, but then allowed Arizona to come back and take a 16-15 lead with just over a minute remaining in regulation. Then it all happened once again last week against Utah, as the BYU defense – which had been doing so well all game – allowed a punishing 19-play, 78-yard drive late in the fourth quarter. That drive allowed Utah to pad its lead enough to secure the one-point win.
Overall, it appears as if this week’s contest between UCLA’s offense and BYU’s defense will come down to which team makes tactical adjustments more quickly and soundly. The Bruins’ first-year offensive coordinator Kennedy Polamalu will have his hands full against a BYU defense that is known to scheme very well.
