"If we can run it against Boston College at Navy, why can’t we run it against Boston College at Georgia Tech? If we can beat Pitt with this system at Navy, why can’t we beat Pitt at Georgia Tech? Are we going to get worse players at Georgia Tech?"
— Paul Johnson, in 2008
Hawaii football fans of a certain age know first-hand that Georgia Tech head coach Paul Johnson’s offense can beat Pitt … or at least it could at one time. It was a challenge, but UH did it with a second-half comeback, in 1992. The Rainbows won the last regular-season game of the Holiday Bowl season 36-23.
Back then we just called the offense "the spread." That’s ironic, since "spread" is now the umbrella title for offenses that spread the field, usually via passing. Johnson’s spread, which he brought to Hawaii from Georgia Southern as OC, was a gussied up triple-option ground game run out of a formation similar to that of the run-and-shoot.
Any similarity to Hawaii’s current offense, however, disappeared once the ball was snapped. The offense — now known as the triple-option flexbone — was designed to keep the ball on the ground. Based on reads of defenders, quarterback Michael Carter either kept the ball, handed off up the middle to fullback Travis Sims, or ran outside and either tossed to a slotback or kept it, depending on another read.
Johnson moved on to be head coach at Georgia Southern and then Navy and enjoyed continued success with the scheme.
It’s what Navy still runs, under Ken Niumatalolo, who learned the basics from Johnson when he was a UH quarterback and grad assistant.
WHEN JOHNSON was hired at Georgia Tech three years ago, detractors questioned whether this modernized wishbone would work consistently at today’s higher levels of college football. (We can argue if the ACC constitutes the higher levels of college football on another day.)
The reason we bring this up is that the answer, for now, is absolutely affirmative. The flexbone, veer, triple option, spread — whatever you want to call it — is working fine for Johnson and the Yellowjackets, who are now 4-0. Tech entered the AP Top 25 last week and climbed to the No. 21 spot Sunday after knocking off previously unbeaten North Carolina 35-28 on Saturday.
Johnson, in his fourth season in Atlanta, is 30-14.
For a team that had just enjoyed the roster presence of the best receiver in college football, Calvin Johnson, skepticism abounded among the Tech faithful.
But, as Hawaii fans could have told them, there’s no rule against passing from the flexbone, and sometimes it even works. They could have shared video of Garrett Gabriel tossing it around Aloha Stadium in those blowouts of BYU in 1989 and 1990. Or the fact that Johnson adapts; in that win over Pitt, he and head coach Bob Wagner abandoned the base offense temporarily and confused the Panthers with the 4-stack formation made famous by Jerry Rice at Mississippi Valley State.
MAYBE STEPHEN HILL’S name doesn’t belong in a sentence anywhere near one with Jerry Rice in it. But I’m doing it anyway after seeing the video of his catch Saturday in the Tech win. It’s a beauty, the best I’ve seen this year — he used every bit of his 6 feet and 5 inches and big old right hand (with no help from the left) to make an incredible snag. Not something you’d expect from a guy in an old-fashioned veer offense.
It was one of six catches for 151 yards and a touchdown. The Biletnikoff Award people wisely added him to their watch list.
Georgia tried to switch Hill’s commitment three years ago, but Hill stuck with Tech and its run-based attack. Maybe he knew something.
Mel Kiper had an interesting thing to say about Johnson’s offense, which leads the nation in scoring with 53.3 points per game.
Since so few teams run the option these days, it is hard for defenses to prepare for it.
Sometimes it pays to zag when everyone else is zigging.
Reach Star-Advertiser sports columnist Dave Reardon at dreardon@staradvertiser.com, his "Quick Reads" blog at staradvertiser.com and twitter.com/davereardon.
