HOW AND WHEN to make defensive adjustments during a game is a complex subject. I have developed steadfast rules and procedures that may help make this process easier. These rules have worked over time and have worked consistently both with championship defenses and defenses that haven’t been as talented.

Before you make any kind of adjustment, you must have defensive goals — an objective or reason for making the adjustment. You need to have a clear picture for a specific outcome that you desire. Some reasonable defensive goals include:

-    Preventing a score.
-    Physically dominating an opponent.
-    Preventing big plays.
-    Forcing a “three and out.”
-    Creating a turnover.
-    Breaking the momentum of an opponent.
-    Scoring on defense. 

During the course of a game, some of these goals may require an adjustment, while others may not.

Always try to remember that defense is a guessing game requiring a reaction to your opponent. The best adjustments must be built into the game plan and without a lot of change week to week. This reduces the chance for mental errors. Adjustment rules must be iron clad, practiced every day and become automatic for your defensive players. Every defense you run should have adjustment rules to cover 2- and 3-back formations, 2- and 3-receiver formations, 1-back formations, 4-receiver formations, who to key on, where to flow to, where to flow away from, pass responsibilities and option techniques. But even with this level of preparation, there may come a time when you’re forced to make an adjustment to win the game.

When To Make Adjustments

If an opponent is consistently moving the football and your defense isn’t stopping it, you need to make an adjustment. The most important question to ask first is why should you make adjustments to your defense?

Coaches often panic far too early and try to fix problems instead of staying on the game plan. Before trying to adjust, you must determine the exact problem and be certain that your players are able to execute the called defense.

The most obvious adjustment, and often the most effective defensive adjustment, is to simply abandon the defensive scheme that isn’t working. This sounds easy, but if your team is a reading defense and your personnel isn’t equipped to run an attacking style of defense, then you’re in big trouble. Every coach must develop a sound method to make effective defensive adjustments during the game.

The first step is to determine why your team cannot effectively execute the defense that you’ve designed for this particular opponent. You must determine the problem by having a coach assigned to watching the defensive line’s attack, one coach to watch the linebackers’ reactions and another assigned to watch the defensive backfields actions. The more eyes analyzing the defensive unit, the better.

The coaches should watch for correct alignment, proper technique and evaluate personnel. The three most common reasons that a defense does not work properly are as follows:

1. Missed assignments.

2. The opponent has superior personnel.

3. You’ve called a poor defense against a particular play or formation.

Solving Defensive Problems

Once you’ve determined the type of problem that you’re facing as a defensive coach, you should use the following step-by-step correction process to solve the problem.

Step 1. Try to get your players to execute the designed defense correctly.

Step 2. Run the same defense, only this time, try running it from a different defensive alignment. 

Step 3. Bluff a blitz and play normal defense. 

Step 4. Take advantage of a defensive player, a particular technique or scheme by attacking an opponent’s weakness (such as blitzing or stunting).

Step 5. Fake the defense and then run a different defense from the same defensive look (align in a defensive look and slide into another defensive look). 

Step 6. Discard this particular defense and move on.

Using Defensive Forms

To aid in the defensive-correction process, I use several defensive forms to help me make my changes. These forms save a great deal of time because they allow coaches to make adjustments quickly and not waste time and effort trying to recall how to adjust to an opponent from memory. It is much easier to make an adjustment from a written plan rather than trying to remember all the permutations of your offense.

In this article, I’ve included short examples of these defensive forms so you can determine how much easier it is to make an adjustment with a solid plan. All of the forms can be found in my book, Football Forms for the Winning Coach, available through Gridiron Strategies. (Editor’s Note: See page 31 to order Football Forms For The Winning Coach.)

The first form I use is called the Defensive Game Plan Form. This form has an area for Base Defense, Front Adjustments and Blitzes for all defensive calls. This is the key to making adjustments — plan ahead and practice the calls with your defense during practice prior to the game.

To get the right players on the field at the right time, I use a Defensive Substitution Package Form.
The Defensive Play-By-Play Analysis Form helps you check tendencies and look for trends that you may need to make adjustments to your game plan.

The Defensive Game Checklist Form has many helpful adjustments and situations that I use to help us make the best call during the game.

Defensive Strategy Matrix

The Defensive Strategy Matrix helps you select the best possible defense for a given in a game. The chart on the following page (page 8) shows the matrix.

Achieving Defensive Goals
Here are some ideas on how to achieve the goals I listed at the beginning of this article.

‰  Preventing Scores. Your defense must be able to stop an opponent’s best or favorite plays on a consistent basis. Good scouting and practicing against their key plays is a must. 

‰  Physically Dominate An Opponent. It’s imperative that you emphasize this trait every day you practice and in every drill. This doesn’t mean that you must hit all practice to achieve this goal. You can stress this by always coaching speed and proper body position. An excellent defensive coaching tip I learned from the late NFL defensive coordinator Fritz Shurmur, is to require your players to 2-hand-touch every ball carrier or receiver below the waist during non-contact drills. This tactic requires your defenders to get into a proper hitting position in order to make the two handed touch.

Another point of emphasis is to coach your linemen and linebackers to knock opponents back during live drills. We teach our line to penetrate 18 inches (which we call “creating a new line of scrimmage”) on every snap.

So what do you do if your team simply isn’t as physical as your opponent? Try to blitz or stunt against its weakest lineman or overload one side of the line with a last-second shift. Of course these are risky techniques, but sometimes it’s necessary if you don’t match up well.

‰   Prevent The Big Play. Your team must perform together as one unit. Defenders must always hustle to the ball, arrive there in a “foul mood,” get into a great hitting position and deliver a hard, yet legal hit.

To prevent big plays, your players must also not commit any mental errors. The longer I’m associated with the game the more I realize that everyone has to believe in the system and have confidence that their teammates will make the correct play at the correct time. Some defensive schemes are better than others in a given situation but it’s how a defensive system is executed that makes all the difference.

A team can and has won games by just running one defense all game. Teach your players how to react to situations so it becomes second nature and you’ll prevent big plays and win a lot of games.

There are always 5 or 6 critical plays in every ball game that determines who wins and who loses. You just never know when these big plays are going to occur, so your players had better play like every play is the most important of the game.

Big plays are often eliminated by playing the percentages, having patience, bending but not breaking, playing zone defense over man defensive coverages and sticking to your basic defensive philosophy.

‰  Forcing “Three And Outs.” To achieve a successful “three-and-out” defensive series, shutting down the opponent on first down is critical. If you can limit a team to 3 yards or less on first down you have an excellent chance for a three and out. The farther a team has to go on second and third down, the greater the chance they will have to punt on fourth down.

‰  Creating Turnovers. Forcing turnovers is a hallmark of any good defense.  Getting the ball back requires pursuit, hard hitting and a ball-hawking mentality. Creating turnovers is a function of good fundamentals. A good tackling team that hustles to the ball will also be a team that creates turnovers.

A team that plays good zone defense will have more interceptions than a man coverage team because breaking on the ball properly while facing the quarterback — instead of chasing a receiver — allows defenders more opportunities to get the ball for your team.

Can you coach to improve turnovers? There isn’t magic formula to increase turnovers, but you can improve your opportunities to increase turnovers by coaching fundamentals. More opportunities inherently leads to more turnovers. A well-coached defense will get turnovers.

‰  Breaking An Opponent’s Momentum. When an opponent is on an offensive roll and you need to break its momentum, it requires a change from your normal procedures. It may take a blitz, a quick shift into an unexpected front or just more pressure or perceived pressure on an offense.

Players make mistakes or slow down when they’re not familiar with a certain situation in a game or when surprised by their opponents. There is often a risk-and-reward association with this strategy. More defensive pressure increases the chance of a big defensive play, but it also increases the chance of giving up a big offensive play.

‰  Scoring On Defense. Scoring a defensive touchdown is the ultimate goal of a defense. A safety, a fumble recovery or an interception returned for a score instantly changes a game’s momentum and has decided the outcome of many close games.

Again, you can’t just coach this — if you knew how to score every time our defensive units took to the field, you’d have the perfect defense. You can, however, increase scoring for your defense by creating more opportunities to score. Good fundamentals — such as hustling to the ball, hitting hard and making good tackles — are key to creating turnovers. Once you’ve covered the fundamentals you need to emphasize finishing the opportunity with a score. In every practice or drill, a fumble or interception must be run back for a touchdown.

On a coming-out-of-the-end-zone situation, emphasize blowing the other team back to get the safety. A hungry team takes advantage of its chances.