Bruisers embrace little filth
In college football, the field has become the party deck for the quarterback.
Many games are a loose, festive two hours of lickety-split football, a full buffet. The defense is spread out by formation, and quarterbacks pick their way downfield by delivering short passes to four or five receivers.
Tonight, when BCS No. 13 Louisiana State (7-2) plays at No. 1 Alabama (80), the running back will take his turn on stage and the game will downshift. It will be an old-fashioned game played in that phonebooth-tight space over guard and center.
No. 5 Stanford showed how it is done Thursday night with a muscular victory over No. 3 Oregon, but this SEC game between the Crimson Tide and the Tigers will be two teams — not just one — running the football inside.
“Much is decided in the trenches between the big guys and the big guys,” LSU Coach Les Miles said of a typical game between Alabama and LSU.
Jalston Fowler, Alabama’s 245-pound blocking back, agreed.
“It is the game we grew up playing,” Fowler said. “It’s filthy football.”
That raises the question: Is this the last stand for filthy football?
Alabama and LSU will use formations with three wide receivers, and they may try to cross up each other with some spread formations, but their identity is tied to the thumpers in the backfield. The Crimson Tide could use five running backs in the game: 218-pound T.J. Yeldon, 201-pound Kenyan Drake, 238-pound freshman Derrick Henry, 208-pound Altee Tenpenny (North Little Rock) and Fowler.
The Tigers feature 235-pound Jeremy Hill, 220-pound Alfred Blue
and 231-pound Kenny Hilliard. The 214-pound speedster Terrence Magee is the runt of the crew.
In the past seven seasons, which is the length of the SEC’s run of national championships, Alabama and LSU have had 15 running backs play in the NFL, which prefers big, sturdy backs who can protect the quarterback and grind out yardage.
Alabama produced firstround picks Mark Ingram and Trent Richardson and the Packers’ sudden star, Eddie Lacy. LSU turned out Stevan Ridley, the starting running back for the New England Patriots, and Jacob Hester, among others.
While the featured back seems like it may soon become extinct in the NFL with quarterbacks spreading the field, reading coverage and throwing darts to receivers “in space,” LSU’s Hill, a sophomore, feels the job market is still open for players who use their legs more than their arms.
“It’s too strong a statement to say teams are going to de-emphasize the running game and it will go away,” said Hill, who is second in the SEC in rushing at 115.2 yards per game. “Having a respectable running game is essential. You may not have a feature guy, a great guy, but you need a guy that is respectable back there.”
Fowler said Alabama calls those short-yardage plays “attitude runs” and a “grudge match.” He said running backs hear about fundamentals every day in practice: Hold the football high and tight to their chest for security, shoot their hands out into the defender to protect the passer, keep their pads low, read defensive linemen, and on and on.
“To run the ball, period, takes a mind-set of physical and mental toughness and technique,” said Nick Saban, the Alabama coach. “Power up front is an important part of the game as far as getting movement on the line of scrimmage. I just think it’s a mind-set of teams that choose to run the ball, and there are still a few of them out there.”
More teams, however, are building lighter, faster defenses to cope with the speed of Oregon, Florida State and Baylor, among others. That’s fine by Hill.
“A lot of schools are recruiting more spread guys, they are smaller guys, hybrid guys, so having that downhill running game is putting those guys out there at a disadvantage,” Hill said. “A lot of teams are going nickel packages, even on first down.”
Hill noted that the traditional middle linebacker is being slowly phased out.
“So, for the running back,” he said, “it’s a lot easier without him sitting there waiting on you.”
Tonight, when LSU is in a base formation with two running backs, Alabama will make sure it uses a 3-4 defense with a middle linebacker. When the Tigers use three wide receivers, the Crimson Tide will hustle a fifth defensive back on the field and use a 4-2 alignment up front.
“When you build your team, you have to say what kind of team are we going to have, and we’ve always chosen here to have bigger, physical players,” Saban said. “The downside of that is when you have to play in ‘space’ games, those guys aren’t as good as players.
Tonight’s game, then, will be about which team can hang physically, and not which can hang 50 on the scoreboard.