Nickel Stunt Defense
Our regular base 4-3 Defense (above) is the defense from which we do all our adjusting from. With our regular Nickel Defense we felt that we have a good pass defense and it has been very good for us. When we went to play the defending State Champions in the second round of the playoffs in 1999, we felt that we needed something extra. In reviewing the scout films we saw that they were very good a picking up the blitz up the middle. Their line was superior in pass protection. They were averaging over 330 yards a game passing. We had to do something to get them out of their rhythum. What we noticed was that they had no provisions in their pass protection for blitzer coming off the edges and up the middle at the same time. While the inside blitzer was likely to be picked up the outside blitzer would have the chance to come clean.
Nickel Cover 5 Zone
This is our basic Nickel Cover 5 Zone alignment with wide side to our left. The Nickelback aligns on the wide receiver to the left. The scouting report may have us position him on the other side of the formation. Basicly, we want our better pass defenders on their better pass receivers.
The NickelBack has the far flat; the SS has the near flat; The W (WLB'er) has the flat to the boundary.
From this basic alignment we determined there were many different stunts that we could run which would be to our advantage
We put together the following stunts which proved to be very effective for this particular game and we have keep the package together and made it a part of our regular pass defense. We were playing the State Ofensive Player of the year and he was throwing to the number 1 receiver in the state. They averaged more than 300 yards a game. these adjustments limited them to just 35 yards passing for the entire game. We ended up losing 22-12, but it was not because of our pass defense.
Lightening
The first stunt is called Lightening because the Left side of the defense is involved in the stunt. That means that the NT is going to take the left A gap, the SB is going to take the B Gap, the DE will strike the TE and take the C Gap; and the SS will stunt from the outside. The backside DE will rush from the outside in for contain. By rushing 4 defenders to one side of the formation leaves the offense at a disadvantage because when the TE releases to get into the pattern, there are two defenders for the FB to block - the SS and the DE. He cannot get both, and in fact, often gets neither.
Behind the stunt, we usually run Cover 5 zone. The Nickelback has the flat, W has the opposite flat, with three deep zone behind them.
The MLB'er checks for run/draw and drops over the middle.
Nickel Rain is the same stunt run from the Right Side of the defense. This time the NT takes the other or right A Gap, the MLB'er takes the B Gap, the DE takes what would be the C Gap and the W takes an outside rush (someitmes we refer to this a the D Gap).
Note that the Nickelback has come over to the Stunt side. We have the Nickelback align to the stunt side so that he might take the flat while the inside rusher (SS or W) stunts.
We still have 3 Deep Zone behind all this with flat coverage to both sides.
Nickel Storm
Here we have Nickel Storm. Storm means that we are running the stunt from both sides. We are going to rush 7 and cover with 4.
The DT takes the A Gap to the wide side; the inside LB'er take the B Gaps; the DEs take the C gaps; and the SS and W takes the D Gap.
The rest of the secondary aligns like they would in normal zone coverage, but they are going to lock up man-to-man (indicated by the dotted lines).
What we learned this year on this and other stunts is that when facing superior passing teams, these 4 defenders have to step up and lock up much sooner than they do against average teams.
Of course the idea is that we are going to get to the QB before he has a chance to release the ball to a 'hot' receiver. It becomes a game of who can beat who to the punch the fastest.
This is Nickel Cover 7. Cover 7 to us means Man under, two deep zone. What we have, therefore, are defenders for all the pass receivers who lock up in man under coverage. What we want these defenders to do is to play "inside and under" the receivers while the two deep zone guys play "outside and over" the receivers going deep.
If the receiver is not going deep, the QB will still have to pass the ball through a defender to get to a receiver. And that pass will have to be 'under' the boundary (like on an out) or under the deep defenders.
You have to have a really good passing attack to be able to do all that against this type of coverage.
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