Unlocking the Power of Gap Manipulation to Limit Explosive Plays

• By Keith Grabowski

Are offense having their way with your defenders they put in conflict? At the 3rd Annual Lauren’s First and Goal Clinicusers/johnloose"> Lauren’s First and Goal Clinic Shane Direking, Defensive Coordinator at D3 National Champion North Central College, shared his insight on gap manipulation and limiting explosive plays as well as the knowledge and strategies to elevate the performance of your defense. He covered everything from understanding the importance of a tight top-down defense to mastering the art of manipulating gaps.

Defensive Structure and the 30% Rule

Coach Dierking believes the aim of the defense is to make the offense earn their yards by implementing a tight top-down defense while ensuring it never gives up explosive plays. By manipulating gaps, the defense can confuse the quarterback with stems in the secondary, forcing the O-line to adjust tracks, and throw off pass pro communication.

Coach Dierking als wants to avoid giving the quarterback easy access throwsl. By constantly self-scouting throughout a season and implementing a 30% rule. His 30% rule is, when they have an offensive formation and thy’re higher than 30% with a coverage variation against that offensive formation, they look to break the tendency. The 30% rule ensures that they remain multiple in coverage and keep the quarterback guessing.

Gap Manipulation in Football

Coach Dierking utilizes four main techniques to manipulate gaps: gap cancellation, gap call, stunts, and bumping. These tools are crucial for linebackers, Nickel, Mike, and Qill to communicate with the defensive line, and can be based on offense tendencies or game plan by formation.

By mastering these techniques, a defense can effectively manipulate gap fits in the run game and gap cancel tools, allowing them to be more multiple in coverage and keep the offense on their toes.

Here’s Coach Dierking discussing “Why Gap Manipulation?” in his clinic talk:

The Power of Limiting Explosive Plays

Explosive plays can be a game-changer in football. The chances of scoring in any single drive increase significantly with a single explosive play. By ensuring that the defense never gives up explosive plays, it forces the offense to work harder and increases the chances of the defense creating havoc plays like TFLs, tackles, interceptions, and fumble recoveries.

By making the offense earn every yard, the defense can increase the team’s win-loss percentage and maintain a strong defensive presence on the field.

Let’s take a look at some of the gap manipulations that Coach Dierking explained in his clinic.

2x2 Gap Cancellation

Coach Dierking gives his Will “gap cancelling tools” which allow him to give a call to the defensive line in order to keep himself out of conflict.  These tools are critical in today’s RPO world where the obejective is to put a defender in conflict.  He shares an example of this in this game clip:

Bump

Come formations can give a defense issues. Bumping gaps can allow a defense to keep players out of conflict and create better run fits.  Here Coach Dierking shares an example of “Bump” on game film and how they are able to take away the run and defend the stick and almost take it the other way by giving an appearance of a void in the defense.

Conclusion

Coach Direking’s clinic provided invaluable insights into putting defenders in a better position through the power of gap manipulation. This is a tremendous resource to gain the insight and examples to evolve your own defense to optimize your run fits and remove conflict.