I just watched Minnesota vs. Cal, and usually when I watch film, I try to watch it through once just to get a feel for personnel, and then I'll watch again for down and distance tendencies and then again for anything in particular that caught my eye.
I couldn't help but find Minnesota's safety, Koi Perich, more often than not, and not in a good way. Perich was highly recruited, but he played against some tomato cans in high school, and the step-up in competition appears to be weighing on him. I'm not a big PFF guy mostly because it's impossible to grade players based on assignments when no one knows what the actual assignment was on any given play, but according to PFF, he had the worst game of his college career versus Cal—49.7 overall grade, missed three tackles, and allowed six catches on seven targets. I think the actual film is worse than the grade indicates. His eye discipline was terrible; he couldn't have looked less interested in filling in his run fits, he took a bad sack on a gadget double pass play, and he added in muffing a punt within his own 5-yard line.
If I’m Hartline going into this game, I’m building my offensive game plan around attacking Koi Perich. First, I’d work in a lot more RPOs to stress him. When they go 1-high and bring him into the box, make him the conflict defender. Test his eye discipline early and often.
Next, I’d find him in man coverage and go right at him. Whenever you have man indicators presnap, find number 3. He gave up six catches on seven targets last game—that’s a matchup worth exploiting.
In the run game, I’d scheme to make him fill the alley. Use 12 and 13 personnel to force them out of their two-shell and run directly at him with power or counter. Force him to fill and I promise our backs win that exchange. He missed three tackles last game, and if he keeps doing that, it’ll break the defense wide open.
There's a lot more on film that bodes well for the Buckeyes, but this was an aspect of the game that I feel can yield a lot of results if exploited properly. Go Bucks.
