On Saturday night, Louisville will
make their way to Clemson, South Carolina for the second top-five matchup in
the history of Clemson Memorial Stadium, affectionately called Death Valley.
Leading Louisville to their #3 AP ranking is Heisman-frontrunner Lamar Jackson,
who has made his name this season as a dual-threat monster with 13 passing
touchdowns to go with 12 rushing touchdowns in four games. While much of the
focus leading into the game has been on how Jackson compares to Clemson’s
preseason darling Deshaun Watson, it should be on how Brent Venables, Clemson’s
defensive coordinator, can game plan to stop the player nobody else has even been
able to slow down. Since being hired as one of the highest-paid coordinators in
college football back in January 2012, he has steadily improved what had been a
porous Clemson defense. It culminated with Clemson finishing the 2015 season in
the top five in defensive S&P+ and fielding the #1 ranking so far this
year. His ability to stop dual-threat quarterbacks has similarly improved over
his tenure in Clemson, and that is something that will be very important in the
matchup against Louisville.
In each of
his four full seasons on the Clemson sideline, Venables has improved his
defense’s game plan against dual-threats and it has shown in the numbers. For
the sake of this article, I am calling a quarterback who ran for more than 300
yards in that season a dual-threat player. The Tigers defense has gone from
allowing such players to rush for over 100 yards per game in Venables’ first
year to holding them to just over 21 yards per game each of the past two
seasons. In that first season, dual-threat QBs were rushing for over 60 yards
more than their season per-game average against Clemson. Venables was able to
cut that number down by both limiting the number of carries they got as well as
the number of yards per carry. Despite getting nearly five more carries than
their per-game season averages and almost double their season yards per carry
in 2012, Venables’ unit has since limited dual-threat QBs to 0.4 carries more
on average than their season per-game averages and a healthy 2.3 yards less per
carry. Limiting that scope to the last two full seasons and this one, Clemson’s
defense has held those QBs to 0.6 carries less than their per-game season
average and 2.8 yards less per carry. Since the start of 2014, Clemson is 12-1 in
games against dual-threat QBs compared to just 5-2 in the two preceding seasons.
Stopping
Lamar Jackson, however, is very different from stopping your average
dual-threat quarterback. He is 5th in the FBS in rushing yards, 1st
in rushing TDs, and averaging more yards per carry than any player in the top
100 in carries all while leading the FBS in total QBR. While he has been a very
good passer, it is clear that the majority of his threat comes from his legs, which
he has used better than most running backs. Venables’ defense has faced three
QBs that have rushed for over 1000 yards, with all three games coming since
January 2014. They have limited those players to just 45.3 yards per game
compared to their aggregate season averages of 85.5 yards per game and have
allowed them to gain 3 yards per carry less than their average. While those
signal callers scored a combined 31 TDs in 39 games, they totaled just 2 in
their 3 games against the Tigers. The ability to slow down some of the most
prolific rushing QBs in the nation could bode well for Venables and Clemson if
they can continue that level of play.
For
Clemson, stopping dual-threat quarterbacks has started and ended with an elite
defensive line. Despite constantly losing talent on the line, Venables has been
able to reload rather than rebuild. In the 2015 NFL Draft, two members of the
line were selected, including end Vic Beasley going #8 overall. In the 2016
draft, they lost three more linemen, including Shaq Lawson 19th
overall and Kevin Dodd 33rd overall. This year, they have Carlos Watkins--who
is projected to go in the first round according to Sports Illustrated’s Chris
Burke-- as well as former 247Sports five-star recruits who are not draft eligible Christian
Wilkins and Dexter Lawrence (Lawrence being the #2 recruit nationally). Thus
far in 2016, Clemson’s defense ranks 9th in the nation in allowed
yards per carry and 5th in tackles for loss per game. If their
defensive line can control the line of scrimmage like they have this season,
they will stand a much better chance of stopping Jackson’s rush game than any other
team has.
While Lamar
Jackson has been electrifying and unstoppable in 2016, he has yet to face
someone so uniquely suited to stop him as Brent Venables is. If Venables can
continue the improvement he’s shown in slowing down dual-threats in his game
plan for Louisville, Jackson may not find as much room to run as usual. Though
Jackson is a strong passer, it’s been obvious this season that his run game is
what makes the Louisville offense go. If Venables’ side can force Jackson to
drop back and pass more than he wants to while containing his scrambles, they
may just make him one-dimensional enough to win.
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