Wonder if Clawson might get any interest from someone or his OC Ruggiero to a bigger school. Here's an article on their offense. Example of finding a way and getting it done and compensating for past poor OL performance.
From the article:
The Demon Deacons got here by a tempo offense that’s defined by a delayed run game, invented out of necessity and tweaked to its current juggernaut by one of the game’s most innovative coordinators.
They’ve shined without the benefits of recruiting stars, as they’ve twice in the past five years had the ACC’s lowest rated recruiting class. And they’ve built gradually thanks to coaching continuity and a scheme that has put Wake Forest a step ahead in Dave Clawson’s eighth season there.
Picture the tempo from Art Briles’ RPO revolution at
Baylor, rhythm from LaVell Edwards’ West Coast attack at
BYU and downfield passing aggression from Run And Shoot godfather Mouse Davis. Add in the trademark delayed run game with an exaggerated mesh point, and Wake Forest has evolved into the sport’s buzziest offense.
Wake Forest averages 43.1 points per game, fifth best in the country, and is No. 16 overall in total offense with 469 yards per game. It has also become the program coaches marvel at for maximizing talent and inducing migraines for defensive coordinators.
The offense is so unique that opposing coaches compare it to the rarity of playing a triple-option team.
“I joke that we run the triple option from sexier formations,” Clawson told Yahoo Sports last week. “It’s really what we do. We line up as a spread offense. ... And in most of our plays, there’s a run or dive aspect, a quarterback run aspect and instead of a pitch, there’s a pass aspect.
“A lot of the plays that we run have those three elements to it. And so it really becomes a systematic, repetition offense. When you run most offenses — the defense does this, we’re going to do this. We build those answers into our plays.”
The nexus of the offense’s aura comes from the elongated mesh point on some plays – though not all – that are Wake Forest’s unique spin on the blender of different systems. The mesh point is where quarterback
Sam Hartman hands the ball off to a tailback, holding the ball near his belly while simultaneously reading the defense with his head up.
“The mesh point normally takes a half-a-second,” said another opposing coach. “Their's takes anywhere from a half-second to 3 seconds.”
The genius of Wake’s spin on these RPOs, according to the coaches who face them, is Hartman’s ability to make multiple reads during that delayed mesh point before deciding to hand off the ball. That ability to manipulate defenses has helped him become Pro Football Focus’ No. 6 rated quarterback, as he’s putting multiple defenders in distress. “A lot of RPOs put one person in conflict,” Clawson said. “The way we run ours puts multiple in conflict.”
The program has proven to thrive by identifying players it likes and recruiting them agnostic to perception.
Clawson complimented Ruggiero’s ability to identify unpolished gems and project how well players will fit in Wake Forest’s offense.
That power style wasn’t going to work at Wake Forest, as the Deacons finished No. 113 in sacks allowed in 2016. Without the four-stars or archetype athletes to protect the passer, Ruggiero needed the scheme to build in protection.
Clawson said Ruggiero built the offense on the tenet of protecting the quarterback. A ramped-up tempo would make it harder for opposing teams to sub defensive linemen, which dulls the effectiveness of the pass rush when those players get tired. Clawson also said that one of the hardest things for a defensive lineman to do is switch from playing the run to suddenly playing the pass on a play-action.
“The RPO allowed almost every pass to start out as a run,” Clawson said. “It made us more effective throwing the ball by helping our protection. The longer we are here at Wake Forest, after one or two years, we felt like this is a place we had to be a little bit unconventional.”
Clawson wanted aspects of option football, just not the wishbone. So the option came at the mesh point, as he said Wake now runs about 20 percent of its plays using the delayed run game.
“There’s a lot of people who run RPOs. How we read stuff is very unique to us.”
The reads can put virtually any defender in conflict to choose run or pass on a given play, and the offense is designed to have built-in answers for whatever choice the defender has. “It changes by the play,” Clawson said of who is in conflict. “Other than the defensive tackles, at some point everyone can be in conflict.”
Along with the RPO game, there’s still a traditional dropback passing game. That’s where some of the West Coast timing and Run and Shoot concepts shine.
Wake has averaged more than 30 points per game every year, including 36 ppg in 2019.
The Demon Deacons shined without the benefits of recruiting stars, as they’ve twice in the past five years had the ACC’s lowest rated recruiting class.
sports.yahoo.com
