Decoding Langsdorf: Replacing the QB Run Game In The Nebraska Offense

The Huskers will look to play 11 on 11 football even without a mobile QB

As the days dwindle down in the final approach to the most joyous time of the year, many Husker fans are curious about how the Huskers will force defenses to play 11 on 11 football without the added luxury of a mobile QB. Some fans have even gone so far as to suggest that the lack of a fleet-footed signal caller will allow defenses to choke the life out of the Nebraska offense, when coupled with the lack of success upfront in the traditional tailback run game NU has had the past two seasons.

However, there is more than one way to skin a cat, as the expression goes. The real threat that designed QB runs provide an offense with is the dimension of an added gap and an added blocker, disallowing the defense from having two unblocked defenders.

The lack of a designed QB run game does not preclude the 2017 Husker offense from forcing a defense to play 11 on 11. Rather, the lack just requires offensive coordinator Danny Langsdorf to implement a few more moving parts to accomplish this; by motioning and formationing defenses to exert leverage and then run what many football purists believe to be something of a four letter word, Run-Pass Options (RPO’s). Before we delve into the nuts and bolts of exerting leverage and running RPO’s, it is imperative to have a conceptual understanding of an RPO. An RPO is two plays, a run and a pass, married together into one play, where the QB reads a conflict defender, typically a linebacker/2nd level player who has to relate to both the run and pass; and taking the football elsewhere based on this Conflict Player’s reaction. For example, last season Nebraska’s most efficient play, the QB Lead Draw was the run action of an RPO, paired with a stick route to the TE from a Trip formation. If the MIKE widened to defend the stick route, Tommy Armstrong would follow the tailback’s lead block and run the Lead Draw. However, if the MIKE did not widen or relate to the stick route, Armstrong would zip a pass to tight ends Cethan Carter or Sam Cotton.