Earl Browning - 2012 Coach of the Year Clinics Football Manual

ZONE GAP SCHEMES: IMPLEMENTATION/UTILIZATION

Temple University

It is a pleasure to be here today. I am not one to get up here and preach because I am an offensive line coach. When we played against Ohio University this year, the night before the game, we had a local minister come in and speak to our team. He said, As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another (Proverbs 27:17). That proverb stuck with me.

I thought about our football team. I thought our team had to sharpen our team. We had to bring each other up and bring the best out of each other. We had to be a team when we took the field on Saturday afternoon. That is an important concept that seems to be leaving football now. The team sharpens the team and our coaches have to bring the best out of each other.

It does not matter if it is college or high school coaches, we have to complement each other and bring out the best in each other. It is the same with a marriage. The husband and wife have to complement each other and bring out the best. That is what that proverb means to me. I wanted to share that with you.

I want to share with you something I got from our strength coach. This summarizes just who we are.

THE PROFESSIONAL FIGHTER

I am the last of a dying breed. I will tell you the truth even if you do not like it. Many of you do not like me and are even afraid of me because I tell it like it is and you do not like to hear it. I am always there for my friends. I will tell them the truth even if they do not like it because that is what a friend does. Strength and honor are my bloodline. I will back my friends and stand with them even if there is an army standing in front of us. I will fight to the end. Death before dishonor is our motto. I am a man with honor.

That inspired me when I read it. This is the essence of building a football program and team. That is what it is all about, and it is our job to convey that to our players. That might not be in vogue right now, but that is the way it is and what the sport of football is all about.

Mike Sherman was the head football coach at Texas A&M last year. He wrote a letter to the Texas High School Coaches Association that I want to mention. At Temple, this is what our program is all about. It is about our core values. I have plagiarized this letter from Coach Sherman on how to build a program.

If a player learns anything from me, it is that there are specific core values by which to live your life. The core values are a guiding light followed not only as a football player but also as a man. Our core values for our team are simple. They are truth and love. I believe they are essential elements to running a football team, a business, an organization, a government, or a family.

Let us speak first of truth. Be who you say you are, do what you say you will do, and be truthful to yourself and others. Be accountable, with no excuses. Speak the truth, demand the truth, and tell the truth. Live the truth because if there is no truth, there is no trust. If there is no relationship, there is no value or substance to what you are doing. As coaches, we must never lie or mislead a player.

It is simple. He has to trust you and you have to trust him. There is no trust when truth is not at the forefront. You cannot fix something unless there is absolute truth. Never let a player get away with lying to you and go to the nth degree to confirm that what he is telling you is the truth.

They have to know that you will not accept dishonesty and that there are consequences for not being honest. Without absolute truth, there is no relationship, and without a relationship, there is no chemistry. Without chemistry, you lack a major component for winning a championship.

The second component is love.

Love your God, family, friends, and country. Love your freedom and those who protect your freedom. Love your teammates, coaches, and school. Love the game of football, competition, and winning. Love all the things that equate to winning. Love is the passion that brings great success to your life and your team. Love is the one emotion that plays out positively for your team. It is the glue for your team and promotes great chemistry.

I wanted to share those two core values with you before I get going on football. Those are the most powerful things I have ever heard. I wanted to make sure you had a chance to listen to that letter, and I hope it struck you the same way it did me. Urban Meyer once said, Great talent would get you seven wins. But to win a championship, you need leadership, chemistry, and unselfishness. Talent will get you seven wins, but how do we win the championship?

Many people think it is the Xs and Os. All the offenses and defenses work regardless of the schemes. The secret is to coach the fundamentals of the game. Then, you motivate the players to play with great passion and energy. You coach them to respect the game and make them understand it is a privilege and not a right to play the game. Those are the important thing for winning championships.

I was a high school coach for seven years, and it was the greatest time of my life. In those seven years, I felt like I had an effect on kids. Your job is the greatest job there is because that is what you do every day. The scheme stuff is highly overrated. Be a great fundamental teacher, motivate, demand, be a great role model, hug them, and love them, and you will win a championship.

My talk is about the implementation and utilization of the zone/gap schemes for our spread and two-back offense. I want to tell you our core values for winning football games.

CORE VALUE FOR WINNING FOOTBALL

Play great defense.

Run the football.

Play great special teams.

Score in the red zone.

Do not turn the ball over.

That is our plan to win at Temple. It is on the board and the first thing you see when you come into the locker room. In order to play great defense, you must be able to control the ball. When you run a zone/gap scheme, you work with double-team blocking. With this scheme, it does not matter if you are under the center or in the shotgun set; they will both work. You cannot run the ball unless you create movement on the line of scrimmage. Penetration by the defense stops running games. Gap schemes are double-teams to a backside linebacker, and zone scheme are double-teams to a playside linebacker. Those two schemes make up our entire offense.