NIU changed up offense against Tech

Shift to ‘22’ surprised Jackets defense, led to first two touchdowns.

After two three-and-out drives to start the game, Northern Illinois coach Thomas Hammock redirected the offensive attack against Georgia Tech.

“After the first couple drives, I said, ‘Let’s get in 22 and see who’s the tougher team,’” Hammock said Saturday night following the Huskies’ 22-21 upset win over the Yellow Jackets at Bobby Dodd Stadium. “We wanted to be physical and get after them and keep our defense off the field.”

The “22” he referred to is a personnel package with two tight ends, two running backs and one wide receiver. The Huskies’ standard grouping is “11” — one tight end, one running back, three receivers.

The switch was effective, providing the blunt force that propelled the Huskies to touchdowns on their next two drives and opening the door for the upset. On Monday, Hammock shared more of his team’s strategies that led to the Huskies’ landmark win (and the Jackets’ devastating loss) with The Atlanta Journal-constitution.

“Obviously, Georgia Tech was a team that liked to blitz, and so anytime you blitz, they can always have one more guy than you can block,” Hammock said. “So we decided to jump to some heavier formations and extend edges and give them different looks and gap responsibilities.”

After the game, coach Geoff Collins said Northern Illinois used a “unique package” on its first two touchdown drives. The 22 package would be it, instrumental in the Huskies’ 22-point production. Hammock said the offense used it more against Georgia Tech on Saturday than it had in all six of its games last season combined.

Even more, the Huskies employed some subterfuge in springing it. The offense huddled tight before the first play of the first scoring drive and then hurried to the line for a quick snap, springing running back Harrison Waylee for a 9-yard gain. Tech defensive coordinator Andrew Thacker responded by removing a defensive back from his base 4-2-5 defense (four down linemen, two linebackers, five defensive backs) and adding a linebacker to counter Northern Illinois’ beefy lineup.

Later in the drive, Northern Illinois went back to its standard “11” grouping and Thacker returned to the 4-2-5. The Huskies were in that package when Tech called timeout before a first-and-10 at its 35-yard line.

But coming out of the timeout, Northern Illinois returned to its 22 grouping while Tech stayed in its base 4-2-5. The Huskies again quickly lined up and snapped the ball, with quarterback Rocky Lombardi handing the ball off to Waylee, who ran behind both tight ends and fullback Brett Bostad on the right side of the line. They cleared the path for Waylee’s 35-yard touchdown run that gave the Huskies a 7-0 lead.

Northern Illinois returned to the 22 grouping again several times for the next drive, a run-dominant series that also often went up-tempo and concluded with a 5-yard touchdown pass for a 14-0 lead.

“After the first two drives when I saw their plan of attack, being in 11 formation wasn’t going to help us,” Hammock said. “We had to do something to change it up. The third drive, we jumped in 22 and that created some problems, so we kind of stayed with it.”

For the rest of the game, the Huskies continued to use the 22 but also returned to the 11, and didn’t have the same sort of success as they did on the first two touchdown drives. Northern Illinois averaged 7.0 yards per play on those two touchdown drives and 4.2 yards the rest of the game.

Defensively, the Huskies were intent on slowing running back Jahmyr Gibbs and limiting big plays in general. Hammock cited Gibbs’ performance against Duke last season, when he gained 139 all-purpose yards on 10 touches in less than a half, including touchdown runs of 61 and 26 yards and a reception of 42 yards.

Against a team with smaller and less-recruited players, Tech averaged 5.5 yards per play. The Jackets had higher averages against four ACC opponents last season.

“The biggest thing for us was to be able to gang-tackle and try to eliminate explosive touchdowns,” Hammock said. “They have a lot of explosive players. The running backs are all explosive, the receivers are explosive. We knew the quarterback was an explosive player, and then the backup quarterback that came in, he caused us problems and fits for us. We didn’t want to give up the big plays.”

The Huskies did give up some big plays, notably a 53-yard pass from quarterback Jordan Yates to Malachi Carter on the first play of the Jackets’ game-tying touchdown drive in the fourth quarter. Quarterback Jeff Sims had a 28-yard run before he left the game in the second quarter with an apparent left arm injury. But Gibbs’ longest run was 19 yards and his longest reception was nine. The longest pass play after Carter’s 53-yarder was Kyric Mcgowan’s 22-yard touchdown catch.

And, as generally needs to happen for an upset of this magnitude, Tech cooperated by failing to make plays. Among the missed opportunities were an overthrown pass by Sims to an open Nate Mccollum in the end zone, another missed connection from Sims to Gibbs that could have been a touchdown, the failed fourth-and-goal pass from Yates to Mcgowan, two missed fieldgoal tries by Brent Cimaglia and only one turnover and one tackle for loss (both created by defensive back Wesley Walker). It all served to render the surprise switch to the 22 package difference-making.

The Huskies’ goal was to get into the fourth quarter with the game still in the balance.

“And we said, in the fourth quarter, we’re going to need somebody to make a play to give us an opportunity,” Hammock said. “I know the point spread was very high, but I didn’t think it was that big of a difference. I thought it was going to be a very tightly contested ballgame. I thought it was going to be within one score and somebody needed to make a play to go win it.”

Hammock said he was confident in his team, despite the 18-point spread and the 0-6 record last season, because he trusted in the team’s development since then.

“So I thought, going into a first game with no tape or no film on how our players have gotten better, I thought we had a chance,” he said.

Down 21-14 with 2:42 left in the game, Northern Illinois got it on an 80-yard touchdown drive. The Huskies benefited from miscommunication in Tech’s secondary multiple times during the drive.

“The first play of the drive (a 39-yard pass from Lombardi to Tyrice Richie) was a play we ran earlier in the game, but we didn’t motion a guy (the first time), so we came back to it because we saw that there was a hole in their coverage, and we were able to get the drive started,” Hammock said. “But the rest of the drive was kind of normal-type plays for us.”

After the game, Hammock said the decision to go for two in a lategame situation (down 21-20 with 38 seconds left) had been made Friday night in a game management meeting. He said the play call — a sprint-out to the right by Lombardi, who found Richie in the back of the end zone — was a counter to a two-point play that the Huskies had previously run.

“I said, ‘They will be prepared for a two-point play that we ran before,’ so we had a complement off the play and we went with that play and were able to find Tyrice in the back of the end zone,” Hammock said.

Back at Northern Illinois, ticket sales were churning for Saturday’s home opener against Wyoming. Social media was buzzing. The NIU athletics Twitter account registered 5.6 times the number of impressions Saturday through early Monday than it had the previous three days, and the MAC West Division players of the week were all Huskies.

“Obviously, it’s a long season, but I think it’s been positive,” Hammock said. “There’s a lot of good energy and vibes, but we’ve got to continue to move forward as a team.”