4th down chess match on tap against Ole Miss

[WFE12 9,350]

Fourth-down chess match on tap for Auburn against Ole Miss
 

Nathan King

AUBURN, Alabama — Some coaching tidbits Lane Kiffin picked up on in Tuscaloosa are now, seven years later, giving SEC defensive coordinators headaches.

“We had started to see these analytics — the company and the details about them — in the time at Alabama,” Kiffin said this month during the weekly SEC coaches teleconference. “They were not, as you can imagine, really used there. And it doesn’t matter — some people like them, some people don’t.”

No. 10 Ole Miss (6-1, 3-1 SEC) leads college football in fourth-down attempts this season with 30; that’s good for an average of 4.3 per game. Auburn’s defense, fresh off a bye week, will be tasked with defending at least a few of them in Jordan-Hare Stadium this Saturday.

Why the aggressiveness? Kiffin said, since learning about the impact analytics can have on an offense during his time at Alabama, that the numbers his staffs have produced about the benefits of attempting a fourth-and-manageable versus kicking a long field goal are usually in the offense’s favor.

“If you study the analytics on the field-goal attempts in the Alabama game (against Texas A&M), the analytics would tell you 100% to go the other way,” Kiffin said. “But everybody’s different. We’re way over on the other end of it, which I would say is new school versus old school in terms of believing in them — because they are factual.”

As a result, Kiffin’s offense this season has gone for it on fourth down in close games, in the first half, on their own side of the field multiple times. And the Rebels tend to be successful; their 76.67% conversion rate is the second-best in the country among offenses with at least 25 fourth-down attempts.

So Derek Mason’s Auburn defense was glad to have the bye week to start altering its mindset on downs and distances to more often expect four-down territory. The Tigers won’t always be seeing the punting unit after a third-down stop. 

But No. 18 Auburn (5-2, 2-1 SEC) was already stellar in that department. On 13 tries, the Tigers have allowed only three fourth-down conversions all season. Their stop rate of 76.9% is the best in the SEC and No. 4 in college football.

As the saying goes, something’s got to give Saturday.

“Close for them is probably a little bit more than what most people would do in a fourth-down situation,” Bryan Harsin said Monday during his weekly press conference.” “But they’ve been very good at it. They’ve gone for it quite a bit so you’ve got to be ready for that. And they’ve been successful with it, so they’re executing. A big part of that is their style of offense and their quarterback and his play.”

As Harsin alluded to, a big component of Ole Miss’ success on fourth downs is the dual-threat ability of Matt Corral, who’s completing 67.6% of his passes on the season, with 15 touchdowns to just one interception. Corral also has 474 rushing yards on the year, and his nine touchdowns on the ground are tied for the second-most in the SEC among all players. His 24 total scores are the most in the conference.

“Frontrunner for the Heisman,” Harsin said of Corral. “... Offensively, I’ve just been impressed with everything they’ve done.”

Auburn is coming off a performance before the bye week at Arkansas in which it stuffed two fourth-and-short attempts by the Razorbacks, and forced an incompletion on fourth-and-long to seal the win.

Kickoff inside Jordan-Hare Stadium is set for 6 p.m. CST on ESPN.

[rexbo 104]

Bend-but-don’t-break defense against a team using their fourth downs is going to have to be really good in the red zone, the offense is going to end up there plenty of times…

[Randman5000 4,271]

Last year, Alabama matched Ole Miss in the game by going for it to keep pace and prevent extra possessions by Ole Miss. I wonder if that strategy comes into play... I would say not the entire game but hopefully in manageable 4th downs, to rest our defense and prevent Ole Miss from getting the ball. Although if you stop them a few times and score, it might cause him to think twice about going for it. 

[MaxCohen216 514]

I think we need to intercept Corral a time or two - get him rattled and make them more conservative.

[WDE_OxPx_2010 5,473]

12 hours ago, MaxCohen216 said:

make them more conservative

🤣 Nice one. 

[steeleagle 2,945]

I think the key is to put them in 4th and longs, of at least 7+, then they have to either think more about it, or they will just not be as successful.

It's those 4th downs and 3 or less that probably can be more successful, and we need to try to stay away from those, especially Corral as a threat back there running or w/ his passing.

 

[EastAl_Tiger 228]

34 minutes ago, steeleagle said:

I think the key is to put them in 4th and longs, of at least 7+, then they have to either think more about it, or they will just not be as successful.

It's those 4th downs and 3 or less that probably can be more successful, and we need to try to stay away from those, especially Corral as a threat back there running or w/ his passing.

 

based on the previous games, I would think a 4th and 7 from around midfield would be an automatic easy peasy pitch and catch. it's only once they have bent and the field gets shorter that the cushion disappears just by necessity.  

[SRBautigerfan 1,040]

Fwiw...

 

Edited October 26, 2021 by SRBautigerfan

[Dual-Threat Rigby 9,046]

It was abysmal vs Alabama (who was obviously privy to the analytics as he mentioned), but vs a D that’s been very pushable over a good bit of the field, you have to imagine that’s not a good matchup. 
 

really just comes down to how much success will be had interior running. If they’re averaging like 4 YPC, the math becomes pretty easy 

[Hank2020 3,356]

3 hours ago, SRBautigerfan said:

Fwiw...

 

This is not your 29 years ago Ole Miss.

[toddc 13,197]

I remember Spurrier driving me crazy with the “go for it on 4th down “ crap in a game.

Edited October 26, 2021 by toddc

[boisnumber1 2,918]

Kiffin's amazing understanding of analytics absolutely lost the bama game before it even got good and started. Probably the worst coached game in the NCAA this season.  Coaches have tried this before and it bites them. Yeah, it works against the lesser teams, but if you have a decent team, it's just stupid to be going for it constantly on your side of the field. Risk is much greater than the reward. I hope we are able to embarrass Kiffin the "genius" this weekend.

[toddc 13,197]

35 minutes ago, boisnumber1 said:

Kiffin's amazing understanding of analytics absolutely lost the bama game before it even got good and started. Probably the worst coached game in the NCAA this season.  Coaches have tried this before and it bites them. Yeah, it works against the lesser teams, but if you have a decent team, it's just stupid to be going for it constantly on your side of the field. Risk is much greater than the reward. I hope we are able to embarrass Kiffin the "genius" this weekend.

Analytics have their place but they can also cause you to make calls a good coach knows better than to try. Analytics  don’t take into account momentum and crowd and a coaches gut feelings .

[Hank2020 3,356]

46 minutes ago, toddc said:

Analytics have their place but they can also cause you to make calls a good coach knows better than to try. Analytics  don’t take into account momentum and crowd and a coaches gut feelings .

Do they include impacts if not made? Most of the information I have seen include percentages of positive outcomes (first downs) but I have not heard of what happens when you turn the ball over with good field advantage (which is what happened in the Alabama game).

[boisnumber1 2,918]

1 hour ago, toddc said:

Analytics have their place but they can also cause you to make calls a good coach knows better than to try. Analytics  don’t take into account momentum and crowd and a coaches gut feelings .

Exactly. If it was so simple, every team would be doing it.