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Game Analysis: NC State Steals a Win at Cal

Writer's picture: AlecLowerAlecLower

The Wolfpack is back in the win column after a grueling stretch of self-destruction, and first and foremost, that is sweet. Sports are supposed to be fun, and this was a fun win, so you should enjoy it, even if it doesn't carry massive weight. This was the first time all year I enjoyed watching NC State play football.


NC State is not good. Cal is not great either, although it’s a team that’s better than its record. Both teams are more than willing to self-destruct, a propensity that was demonstrated on several drives over the course of the game Saturday. The upshot was a messy contest, but this win is the kind of result you can eventually earn simply by not quitting. Already at 0-3 in the league and down 13 in the fourth quarter, the Pack was certainly circling the drain. One thing you can say about this program, even amongst what has pretty easily been the worst-coached season of Doeren's tenure, is that it doesn't quit. At the very least, that makes the team worth rooting for.



CJ Bailey Continues to Grow


CJ Bailey continues to make incremental growth weekly, and paying that off with something tangible has to feel great for the kid. My expectations for the freshman have been low. All I’m looking for is growth. Quarterback play severely limited State offensively against Northern Illinois and Wake Forest. That was less true against Syracuse, and it was even less true in the win against Cal. This is what you want out of your freshman quarterback. 


State has gradually leaned more on four verticals as its go-to passing play, really going all the way back to the Wake game. It’s starting to look Tim Beck-ish in this respect, with a small run playbook, a bunch of four verticals, heavy usage of the slot fade, and heavy usage of horizontal stretch concepts like snag and spacing. The comfort level of the quarterback in four verticals is pretty obviously growing. Bailey frankly just looked scared to throw the ball earlier this year, and it was crippling to an offense full of playmakers that just needed opportunities. The young quarterback did a much better job in this game attacking, and his guys made plays. 


Let's look at the three successful four verts plays for State. Below, I've drawn each play and how the coverage distributes for Cal post-snap. I apologize for forgetting the defensive line and linebackers in the first schematic.


4 verticals switch - 28 yard completion to Concepcion

Cal is going to show pressure before the snap. It ends up bringing six and walking down the safety into a quarterback spy/robber role, so it’s cover 0. Bailey gets excellent protection. Against cover 0, every route is in play and the quarterback can pick the matchup he likes the most, which is naturally going to be KC or Joly. KC has won on his route by five yards. The ball is underthrown, but Concepcion catches it because he’s so open, the corner still couldn’t catch up to the ball. 


4 verticals switch - 31 yard completion to Joly 

This was one of Bailey’s better plays of his young career in the pocket. It’s the same exact play call as above, but Cal is in true cover 1, so the safety is now part of the play. Bailey gets the safety working toward KC with his eyes before coming back to the other side for Joly. This is growth. If you recall our Louisiana Tech recap, we highlighted a 4 verticals play where Bailey got cover 1 and stared down his receiver, which allowed the safety to make a play on the ball. He looks him off here and then gives Joly a chance. It’s again underthrown, but again caught. It doesn’t have to be a perfect ball for a guy like Justin Joly, who has a massive catch radius.


4 Verticals from 3x1 - 23 yard completion to Joly

Bailey gets two-high safeties here. Cal will eventually play a coverage called Stump, which results in the strong safety carrying KC on the special route. Bailey starts on the weak side, likely sees the free safety gaining depth, gets to KC on the special route, likely sees the strong safety carrying, and immediately gets to Joly who is isolated now and in an obvious mismatch. I say likely because you can't actually see, but you know, Occam's Razor and such.


If Cal played man across the board here, that would put a linebacker on KC. Bailey is right to get to this with the safety dropping out, and he's right to get to Joly after you get stump and that safety ends up playing man-to-man on KC. There is no safety now on the strong side. He hits Joly with a ball that’s again not perfect, but good enough. Joly is an all-league caliber player. Just give him a chance. 


This was one of Bailey's best plays. All routes are in play in four verticals almost every time. It's part of what makes it so deadly. Bailey likely is expecting to get to the one-on-one at the top if the safety doesn't gain depth and to KC on the special route if he does. The other safety picking up that route throws a wrench in that, but he does a really good job of working through the routes when the picture ends up different than expected.


State has the receivers to exploit man coverage. The win rate either on the route or at the catch point is significant. The downfield throws just haven't been super competitive, and when they have been, they've usually been dropped. Bailey's best three throws of over 20 air yards all year have all gone right through the hands of the receiver. The throws in this game weren't perfect but routinely competitive, and guys made plays save one drop, which was easily Bailey's best throw of the day. Seriously, how does this happen? Other than that, every element of the downfield passing game was improved, and you saw who this receiving corps could actually be.


Pass protection had probably its worst game, which isn't saying much. This has been an elite pass protection unit this season. State as a whole gave up six sacks. Three of these belong to the offensive line and three fall pretty clearly on the quarterback, at least in my opinion. Bailey's pocket presence isn't good, but again shows growth from game to game. This is an example of a sack that falls on the quarterback.

State is in a full slide protection here to the left and it's pulling the guard for play action. That means everybody but that guard is protecting the gap to their immediate left. The guard picks up the opposite side, and the back is in help. Everything is pretty good here. Bailey is a bit late stepping up, but the mistake is the thing he does next, which was bad.


This would be an example of one on the line.

This ends up being a four-man rush. State's in a half-slide protection to the left, and Belton at left tackle is just going lose badly on the edge.


Anthony Belton has been strong for State this year, and he had not given up a sack at the left tackle spot going on 6.5 games. He's given up 2.5ish now in the last three halves. Tim McKay was responsible for the third sack that I would credit the line with. The other three were really just poor presence from the quarterback, with the third being a poor response to a naked boot play that was ran directly into a blitz. I'll be curious to see how State handles Duke, who does a lot creatively in the pass rush and had a field day against Florida State.



Offensive (Mis)management 


I am pretty firmly in the camp that NC State should move on from Robert Anae at this point. Anae’s redesign of the offense last season really helped rescue that team when Armstrong returned, and it turned me into a fan pretty quickly. The way this offense has been managed has done exactly the opposite. 


The designed runs for CJ Bailey on Saturday were the last straw for me. This is a total misuse of your personnel, and it makes zero sense. These weren’t read options plays either, even though they resembled such a thing. State is running inside zone lead with the running back as the lead, trying to create an extra gap that’s unaccounted for from the defense. This is conceptually sound, but the personnel isn’t there for it, and that was not in doubt before this game. 


CJ Bailey can run, but he can run in the sense that his lower extremities permit the transposition of his body across the field. In the sense of executing a zone run or counter play, he very much cannot run. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a football player worse at reading and reacting to blocking leverage. It’s one of many things that will probably come with time for Bailey, but State forcing this now is just dumb. 


C'mon man.

This is all Anae. I want to bust this inane myth right now that Doeren leashes his coordinators and affects the play calling in order to maintain some kind of mentality with the offense. If you recall the run/pass distribution during the Devin Leary years, this narrative should instantly fall apart. If you look at the run/pass distribution over the last two games, this narrative should instantly fall apart. State calls four verticals more than any other play, so if that's too conservative, I'm not sure the play for you exists.


If that doesn’t do it for you, former players that spent years in the program have told me directly to my face that this is not true. So while I understand where it originates from, maybe we can drop this now? This is Anae’s offense, and it makes very little sense.


We did get some wide zone plays with Smothers, which we need to see more of, although it wasn’t overly effective. I thought Cal's defensive line played well. State ended up with 20 rushing yards, so it was a heavy dose of vertical passing concepts. Execution lost State games earlier in the season, and execution won it this game. These are not complex plays.



The Defense Thrives


Reports of Davin Vann's demise were greatly exaggerated. State is starting to get better play from the defensive line, and it really started with Davin Vann's performances going back to the NIU game. In the last two outings, the senior leader has been totally unblockable, and he was a man amongst tiny stationary action figures in crunch time on Saturday. Travali Price, who had a horrible start to the year, has now recorded a sack in two straight games. State's defense does not function without a havoc-causing defensive line, and it's starting to find such a thing.


Just a straight up win one on one for the sack. What a beast.

Cal ran a ton of counter, because duh, and State gave up a 49-yard touchdown against GT Counter on the first drive, but gave up 2.8 YPC other than that run (including sacks). This was the big run.

It's on Devon Betty at middle linebacker, who seems to play the wrong gap at first before getting redirected by Bishop Fitzgerald. Betty would normally have the D gap where the run ultimately hits. He's not in great position to make a tackle because he messed up, and then he does whatever that is.


The good news is that State's fits were better after this, and that includes the secondary which has been beyond poor at both fitting the run and tackling. It was better. As expected, some actual havoc from the defensive line helped as well. Yes, Cal is bad offensively, but it's an all-around good effort from the defense to essentially give up zero real touchdown drives in the game's final 57 minutes.



Final Thoughts


State getting into the win column before the bye week is huge. Duke and Georgia Tech should definitely be favored over State. I'm less sure about UNC and Stanford, but none of these teams are wagons. Georgia Tech might be a tough ask, but Duke and Stanford at home back-to-back weeks is a nice opportunity to continue to build. The season isn't over. There is still opportunity to do good things, even if it's in pursuit of goal well below the original one for this season. Hopefully, State turned a corner.

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