Even Ohio State Football players thought last year’s defense was basic

The Ohio State football team had two different defensive coordinators last season. After Kerry Coomb’s failure to adjust to Oregon, Matt Barnes took over. According to some Ohio State players though, the defense was showing pretty basic looks all year long.

Speaking to the media today, C.J. Stroud remarked how different the defense looks this year compared to last year’s squad, not in terms of personnel but in terms of scheme. According to Eleven Warriors, Stroud had an interesting comment about that.

"“They do a lot of different things,” Stroud said of going against OSU’s defense in practice. “They have different ways to get to different coverages, which is really good for my eyes to see. Not just seeing Cover 1, Cover 3 or just base coverage every day."

It’s not great when players on your own team even think that you were running basic stuff. Stroud clearly thought the defense wasn’t complex enough to confuse teams, so that’s why they were getting hammered with the same type of plays over and over again.

Looking at the tape, we knew Cover 1 wasn’t good enough. After the Oregon game, that was quite apparent. It’s good that Jim Knowles has updated the defense to include multiple different looks so that the opposing team can’t just exploit the same weaknesses constantly.

Stroud said this in part because the defense seems to be giving some issues to the offense. That’s a good thing though because this offense is going to be really good. If this defense is handling them, then it means good things are on the horizon for this team as a whole.

I hope that the defense keeps up this energy all year long. It’s a long way till Fall, so they have to stay diligent. I’m sure they will.