Goaline Defense

[martinrr94]

Hello Coach,

I'm installing the 4-3 Over Defense at our High School this year. I been reading your book and looking at playbooks but have not found any goaline defense. Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Coach Martinez
Marshall HS (L.A. City)

[CoachJoe]

We bring the 3-tech down to the A-Gap, so we have both tackles in the A-gaps. The ends both play in 5-techs (or a 7, depends). They've got the C-Gaps. We walked the Sam and Will down on the Tight End, or split the difference if they get a slot receiver out there. They have contain. Our safeties were capable of being linebackers, so we didn't have to sub anyone. Mike backer is right in the middle at 3 yards, he has no gap to fill. Safeties fill the B-Gap, which is definitely the weak spot.

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C...........................W..E........T...T........E...S.............................C
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....................................FS.......M..........$.......................................

For coverage, I picked something up from Vic Koenning (used to be at Clemson... he's moved but I don't remember where) called Lanes. Pretty simple, divide the endzone into 5 lanes across, corners have the outside lanes, safeties have the next two lanes in, and the Mike backer has the middle. That concept makes a lot more sense to the kids than "hook to curl" does, especially in this area. I think there are notes on it in the Clinic Notes section, but I'm not positive.

The under front was really effective on the goal line too. I think if you just slide the weak tackle into A-Gap and run the under front with both backers in 30-techs it's pretty sound and doesn't involve teaching anything new if you already run the under front.

Thanks for getting the book, I hope it's helpful to you and your team!