Advertisement - Click to support our sponsors.
Thursday, August 17, 2000
UH installs The option wasn't one for University of Hawaii defensive coordinator Kevin Lempa.
option defense nice
and early
Warriors gain preseason knowledge
on stopping the option -- an
attack used by Rice, TCUNOTEBOOK
By Paul Arnett
Star-BulletinInstead of preparing for the wishbone, the veer or the speed option, Lempa stayed up late nights the last three seasons with the San Diego Chargers trying to defend the aerial assaults of the Denver Broncos or the Seattle Seahawks.
One of the first things UH head coach June Jones told Lempa once he got comfortable in his office last spring was dust off the defenses he used to use to stop one of the staples of college football.
Lempa conceded after last night's practice that it had been awhile since he designed a defense to stop the option -- the offense some opponents used to run wild over the Rainbows last year.
"But I faced the option a lot during my days at Boston College and Dartmouth," Lempa said. "We have a plan in place and have already started employing it here in fall camp."
Planning ahead wasn't something former UH defensive coordinator Greg McMackin was able to do last year. He spent most of the spring and fall camp of 1999 getting the team accustomed to his attacking style of defense.
This is something Lempa plans to build on this season. But unlike McMackin, he won't wait until the week of playing an option team to unveil his plan to attack it.
"Last year, we waited until the week of the game to put the option in, and it didn't really work," defensive line coach Vantz Singletary said. "It's just not enough time to get your team ready."
The proof of that is in last season's statistics. Hawaii played option teams Rice, Texas Christian and the Naval Academy. UH lost two of those games and barely hung on to sink the Midshipmen, 48-41.
In those three games, Hawaii yielded an average of 38 points and 347 yards rushing. It led to the team finishing No. 91 nationally against the run and 79th in scoring defense, giving up 27.7 points a game.
"One of our main goals this season is to do a better job defending the option," Jones said. "You don't see a lot of it in the NFL, so it's an adjustment you have to make as a defensive coach.
"Coach Lempa has a good handle on what needs to be done to defend the option. We probably will only see the triple option against Rice, but TCU does a good job with it out of their two-back set."
Lempa doesn't plan on going wild against TCU's speed option.
"We should be able to defend that out of our base set," Lempa said. "But the triple option is another matter. You have to be able to disguise your packages and play responsible football. You can't free-lance too much against a team like Rice."
Defensive end Joe Correia is one Warrior glad to see Lempa already dealing with the matter. Like Singletary, he believes preparing for it now will pay dividends later in the season.
"We never really worked on it until the week of the game," Correia said. "There just aren't enough practices to prepare for it, especially if we go on the road."
Lempa worked on the speed option on Monday and will put in the package for Rice next week.
"During preseason, it's about half of the practice time for the year," Lempa said. "So when you prepare for somebody, you try to get something in preseason so it's not the first time they see it.
"If they have a taste for it now, then it won't seem so brand new the week of the game. The week of the game we will refine it and fine-tune it, so hopefully, we'll do a better job than we did a year ago. I've always said stopping the run is key to winning a game. And that's especially true against an option team."
UH Athletics
Ka Leo O Hawaii
