A college offense that could challenge the spread's popularity

It has been 20 years since Pro Football Hall of Famers Jim Kelly, Thurman Thomas and Andre Reed last took the field together for the Buffalo Bills and ran a no-huddle offense known as the “K-Gun.”

This season in college football USC is employing a more straight-up sendup of the K-Gun — the Trojans call it “smash and gun” — and it isn’t the only team doing so.

Coaches are human, and like all humans they get intrigued by what’s next, the evolution of technology, of thought, or in this case their sport. And after a decade of college teams embracing the spread and spread-option, coaches are thinking about what they can do with more runners in the backfield and tight ends on the line — commonly known as a “pro set.”

One of the draws of this approach, according to Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly, is that it renders problematic a trend in recruiting specialized defensive players tailored to stopping the spread such as nickelbacks, pass-rushers and those who slide from defensive back to linebacker.

“If you start to utilize more two-tight end sets, that could be problematic for defenses,” he said.

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But the pro sets seen on Saturdays will include a proven college ingredient: faster pace.

This approach isn’t new to USC. But it’s also not the only school in the Los Angeles city limits that is going that route.

“I think that you can run a no-huddle, up-tempo with anything as long as you can get into enough formations to make the defense adjust,” said UCLA coach Jim Mora. “Sometimes we’ll go quick, try to get there and snap it before they’re ready, and sometimes we’ll get up there quickly and give Josh (Rosen) a chance to force them to show their hands so you can get the right play.”

USC offensive tackle Zach Banner likes the smash and gun because its physical and fast style taxes defenses within a scheme favored by the NFL — something Banner says resonates with recruits. His coach, Clay Helton, sees other advantages to an up-tempo pro-style combination. “Part of the pro-style system is to be able to call two plays and have your quarterback get you in the right one,” Helton said. “What I like about the no-huddle is the ability to see the defense and them not know whether you’re going fast or whether you’re just trying to get to the right play. I think you can do both.”

Nearly every coach, when discussing this topic, stressed the need to have great size, strength, fitness and depth to do it effectively. One of them was Bret Bielema, whose Arkansas team ran tempo out of its pro set last season last season against Alabama in a losing effort that nonetheless kept the Tide 10 points off its season average to that point. Bielema felt his team caught the Tide a little off guard because normally the Razorbacks have a more methodical pace.

Bielema says he sees more teams playing fast in a pro-style attack but views the concept as more of a change-up option than a base offense, and that to run it all the time would require a special kind of quarterback and special kind of conditioning. He once interviewed an offensive coordinator job candidate who planned to bring the scheme with him. “He wanted to go up-tempo with pro style,” Bielema said. “I didn’t hire him, but it was a good idea.”

Oregon State’s Gary Andersen likes changing offensive tempo, something his Utah State teams did constantly and that he did at times at Wisconsin. “As a defensive coordinator, that’s what I would hate the most,” he said. “It’s hard when they’re going really fast, then they huddle up, then they go really fast. But a non-huddle, pro-style system, it would be interesting.”

While praising the Wisconsin offense and its effectiveness, Ohio State coach Urban Meyer says the Buckeyes are committed to the spread and recruiting to the spread, which they do well — the Buckeyes have finished in the top seven nationally in recruiting every year under Meyer and have a huge lead in for 2017.

And not every West Coast-based coach is an adopter, either. As coaches in every FBS conference have accelerated their offensive pace and put more value on quantity of possessions than time of possession, Stanford’s David Shaw believes in the opposite.

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“We don't want to speed up,” he said. “We choose not to. We'll jump the ball periodically and do some things, but for the most part we love time of possession. Most people want to add possessions to the game. We want to take possessions out of the game. We want to give you less opportunities with the ball.

“If you're a hurry-up offense, but you go three and out, and we go on a seven-minute drive and score, and you go five and out and don't score, and now we go on another seven-minute drive, the half is almost over. There's not enough time, whereas if you hurry up now, yes, we get more possessions, but so does our opponent. We'd rather be very efficient with our possessions and give our opponent less possessions.”

As much as he likes the idea of a pro-style hurry-up, Bielema also has a foot in the Shaw camp. “To see the offensive coordinator pacing on the sidelines wanting the ball back is very gratifying,” he said. “I don’t know if you can do full-go because the methodical approach wears people down and eats up the clock. A big part of it is keeping the ball away from them.”

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Stanford’s rival across the bay is coached by one of the earliest and most innovative practitioners of the spread, Sonny Dykes, but he also is a proponent of fast-paced pro-style concepts. He watched Kevin Wilson use them effectively as the offensive coordinator at Oklahoma when Heisman winner Sam Bradford and tight end Jermaine Gresham thrived with the Sooners, and Dykes said it’s something he’s leaned toward as the offensive coordinator at Arizona and now as Cal’s head coach.

He likes it because on a brief succession of plays, the offense can go from one running back and four receivers to two running backs and three tight ends and no receivers to five wide receivers.

“All these personnel groupings without a huddle,” he said. “To me, that’s when you really play the defensive line. They’re trying to match personnel but then all of a sudden you’re going with three tight ends and two running backs and then spread everybody out and go empty. They’ve got five D-linemen in the game. How are they going to respond to that?”

Contributing:  George Schroeder.

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