Oklahoma football: Breaking down the Jeff Lebby offense

Oklahoma has played four football games now and we can finally get a better evaluation of what this system looks like with Sooner players in the mix. We saw a lot of what Lebby did at UCF and Ole Miss, and while he did a lot of good things there, the caliber of player he has access to at Oklahoma is another level. In addition, he is getting to add new offensive minds like Bill Bedenbaugh to his system. It is bearing some nice fruit so far this season, though it is not where it needs to be yet, but can take off more and more as things go along. Here are the things to know about Jeff Lebby and the Oklahoma offense

Oklahoma’s offense is fast fast, pedal to the metal

The staple of this shoot and veer offense that originated with Art Briles at Baylor is tempo. You go fast, you put stress on the defense. The Sooners are 130th so far in time of possession. That’s the nature of the beast, while you can overwhelm your opponent, your three and outs are going to be lightning quick as well. So you have to be able to be a balanced attack and attack based on the numbers in the box. Seven or fewer, run it, eight or more throw it. So naturally this system in its updated version runs several RPOs. The speed can also make it difficult for offensive linemen at times. They have to get set and not move. So you’ll see an uptick in false starts, and shift penalties.

Tight ends play a huge role in blocking and receiving

Brayden Willis has been a absolute stud in the run game, and also making a difference in the passing attack. This is an aspect that wasn’t fully taken advantage of when Lebby was at Ole Miss and UCF. The personnel differential allows him to do a bit more. While the general rule of what you do is based on the numbers in the box when you have tight ends who can impact the game blocking the way Oklahoma can, you can impose your will even more on the ground.

Interior running game

The splits in this offensive system are a big thing to note. Receivers will stretch to the far hashes in almost every formation. It makes it difficult for secondary players to help in run defense. This will allow you to rip off huge runs on the ground game, which also will then make it difficult to keep safeties out of the box which allows you to take shots down the field.

Vertical and horizontal passing attack

In this offense you will see a ton of deep shots as well as tons of screens. The idea is to attack space on the field, so if you make these defenders have to crash down on screens, but also have to be aware of the deep shots. When you’re running it well on the interior it’s difficult to deal with the athletes in space in the screen game. Sometimes it’ll be a swing to a running back, or a screen to the split out wide receivers. Either way everything you do creates conflict.

This Oklahoma offense is extremely difficult to slow down and almost impossible to stop, particularly when you have a team with top notch athletes like the Sooners do. The best way on paper to deal with this kind of offense is to have equal athletes who can consistently win one on ones, but even if you have equal or better athletes as a whole, there is always going to be a match up you can’t consistently win. So when good decisions are made, by the quarterback it’s impossible to stop.