Midshipmen aren’t only on Irish coach’s mind this week
Kelly says Navy’s triple option a ‘year-round study’
In a moment of honesty, Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly will admit he and his staff were not quite prepared for Navy’s tripleoption offense in 2010.
That was Kelly’s first season at the helm, and the annual meeting with the Midshipmen at the new Meadowlands Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, turned into a nightmare for the Fighting Irish.
Quarterback Ricky Dobbs and fullback Alexander Teich led the way as Navy ran wild for a 35-17 rout of Notre Dame. Teich found huge holes up the middle in rumbling for a career-high 210 yards on 26 carries, while Dobbs added 90 rushing yards and three touchdowns.
Navy coach Ken Niumatalolo and offensive coordinator Ivin Jasper pulled out a tiny wrinkle that threw off the Irish. Navy’s offensive lineman took wider splits than normal and that altered the blocking lanes — a ploy that produced 367 rushing yards.
Kelly was so confused by what he saw that he said Notre Dame’s staff did not expect Navy to run the veer. In truth, it was the same triple option the Midshipmen have always employed, with a slightly different blocking scheme.
Over nearly three decades, which included highly successful stops at Grand Valley State, Central Michigan and Cincinnati, Kelly has proved he’s an outstanding coach. He was never again going to allow the Irish to get caught flat-footed by the triple option.
Notre Dame now spends considerable time and effort studying the Navy triple option and devising methods to defend it.
“Well, it’s a year-round study,” Kelly said.
“Our coaches are always looking at Navy.
“We stay on top of it all year round because it’s very difficult to prepare for this team with three days of practice. So we try to use a little bit of it in the spring, a little bit of preseason camp, because they are so difficult to defend.”
Kelly and staff are so determined to be prepared for the option that they have identified players in the program capable of mimicking the Navy quarterback, slotbacks and fullbacks in practice.
“Well, we’ve done a lot of work that’s residual toward that end,” he said. “Certainly that work began in earnest a couple years ago in terms of how we recruited some walk-ons and what we did in spring and summer to keep us in at least a prepared state as we went into these weeks of preparation for Navy.
“So those decisions were made a few years ago. Doesn’t necessarily mean you have an advantage in any way. But when you come into Navy week, it doesn’t feel like ‘Oh, my God. Here we go again.’ We’ve got a pretty solid plan. It just needs to be refined and developed during the [game] week.”
Kelly thinks the overall option plan the coaching staff put in place several years ago has enabled the scout team to replicate the Navy offense at a relatively high level.
“Look, the hardest thing is playing to the speed of what you’re going to get, and so how do you develop that with a group that is not as efficient in running that at the highest level,” Kelly said. “We think we’ve come up with some things that allow us to play fast enough that we can duplicate that model when we step on the field.”
Cole Capen, who was an option quarterback in high school, has been running the scout team offense this week. Lawrence Keys and Kendall Abdur-Rahman have been used to imitate the speed and quickness of Navy quarterback Malcolm Perry.
Kelly and defensive coordinator Clark Lea are most concerned about Perry, who has already rushed for 1,042 yards and 16 touchdowns through eight games. The 5-foot-9, 185-pound senior speedster is averaging just under 7 yards per carry.
“Malcolm Perry is a dynamic offensive player. He’s the No. 1 rushing quarterback in the country — just a dynamic, explosive player,” said Kelly, joking that he wished Perry was still playing slotback.
“I think when you have a guy like Malcolm Perry, he’s a quarterback obviously that makes this thing very, very dangerous. He’s precise — a point guard distributing, making really good decisions. Very difficult to defend.”
Having to account for the quarterback on every play requires committing an extra defender to the run. Perry is adept at dropping back to pass then taking off on designed scrambles.
“An outstanding quarterback that is going to stress you in so many areas and get the ball on the perimeter and force you to defend him,” Kelly said. “Really, you have to play a lot of cover zero against them. If you’re not, it’s a slow march to the end zone because they certainly do a great job of having a quarterback that can continue to make yards each and every down.”
Perry has become quite adept at reading the defense and making checks at the line. The Tennessee native has done a superb job of dealing the ball to the fullbacks and slotbacks while also keeping defenses honest by completing nearly 55% (29 of 53) of his passes for 722 yards and five scores.
The Midshipmen boast a solid one-two punch at fullback in starter Nelson Smith (505 yards, seven touchdowns) and backup Jamale Carothers (355 yards, eight touchdowns). Two slotbacks, Tazh Maloy and Keoni-Kordell Makekau, are averaging 9.4 and 9 yards per carry, respectively.
After playing Navy nine times, Kelly has learned that a single defensive strategy does not work.
“Well, Jasper and Ken have seen everything,” he said. “They can make adjustments to what you’re trying to do in a split second. You’ve got the best and brightest that are playing at the academy that can make some quick adjustments in the game, at halftime, so they’re not going to be fooled by what they see.”
Kelly also referenced the necessity of being assignment-sound and disciplined.
“It requires all 11 players,” he said. “If you’re not attentive to all areas, you’re going to have some problems. So it’s not really just one player. I think you got to have great effort from all of those players.”
Navy employed a high percentage of zone blocking run plays from 2016 through 2018, when quarterbacks Will Worth and Zach Abey were almost like second fullbacks. Niumatalolo has gotten much more involved with the play-calling this season and the Mids have recommitted to the read triple option.
“They actually do a couple different things that they didn’t do last year that are not triple option,” Kelly said. “They run a counter play they didn’t run last year that’s not triple option. So they’re back to their roots, but they can still do some things like toss sweep to get the ball outside, that are not part of their triple.
“You have to stop the basic tenants of their offense, and that’s triple option.”