49ers film room: Steve Wilks second half defensive adjustments were the key to beating the Lions in the NFC Championship Game

It was a tale of halves for the 49ers defense where defensive adjustments in the second half proved to be the difference in the NFCCG.

Author’s note: I wanted to get these out sooner but I got sick when I was mostly finished and didn’t do much. Finished up 2 articles on this game today.

The 49ers went into halftime in the NFC Championship Game 24-7 to the Lions. Two straight weeks of falling behind at some point in the game due in part to the defense’s inability to get get stops in the run game and get off the field put the team in a hole that seemed almost insurmountable even with the talent on offense (though for their part the offense does deserve some blame too).

And in two straight weeks, the defense made key adjustments and made key plays to give the offense a chance and win the game. To be fair, the defense did play well versus Green Bay in a game where bad luck was the primary culprit. In this game, the defense felt unprepared for anything Ben Johnson and the Lions were throwing at them, at least in the first half.

The defense, and offense to an extent, did get some lucky bounces to go their way but that’s what happens when faced with trying to overcome a 17 point deficit. They’d ultimately need a couple of luck bounces to erase that kind of deficit. On defense a big part of why they were in such a deficit was self-induced. 

On third downs in particular, especially third and long, the defense stayed in soft quarters coverage on the back end with deeper drops from the second level zone defenders, most likely due to not wanting to give up explosive pass plays to the Lions high-powered offense.

First play

On this play from the early second quarter, the first real time the Lions faced a third down and long, a 3rd-and-10, they converted easily with an underneath route to Amon-Ra St. Brown for a gain of 11.

The Lions have a choice-shallow concept called with trips to the left side with tight end Sam LaPorta as the point man in the bunch.

 The defense is playing poach quarters to the backside of the formation with the backside safety as the poach safety for anything deep over the middle. Since the Lions are in a bunch, the coverage defenders play off coverage so they don’t get picked. Fred Warner is responsible for the #3.

This is actually a common coverage for the 49ers that predates Steve Wilks, especially in 3rd and long situations. The Lions run a play that stresses the horizontal coverage of the quarter/flat defender by putting St. Brown in the soft zone between Warner with eyes on the shallow crosser and Deommodore Lenoir with eyes on the vertical route. The Lions would’ve gained 8 easily and the 49ers could’ve forced a punt situation but Warner was unable to make the tackle.

On 3rd and 10, it’s certainly understandable to play some off coverage and sit at the sticks. On 2nd-and-15, it’s less clear why Wilks would have the corners sit off coverage, especially while sending a nickel blitz.

This is a staple concept the Lions run with Jared Goff and it’s one he’s particularly skilled at reading out the progressions on because he threw this play a bunch with the Rams. It’s a 3x1 dagger concept called “Swiss Coin” with the inside crosser, a dagger/dig route from the outside receiver, and an underneath arrow route to occupy the hook defender.

The defense is playing a 3-under/3-deep fire zone with a nickel blitz off the edge. In this coverage zone, Greenlaw has seam/flat responsibility where he’ll carry any vertical in the seam, match any flat route, and deliver any crosser. Warner has responsibility for the final #3 across as the 3-receiver hook player.

The play is designed to stress these coverage rules by sending a crosser at the middle hook/3RH defender and a dagger route at the seam player while the arrow occupies the space underneath, putting the seam player in conflict. Since the dagger is not vertical, the corner is out of the picture, zoning off to his deep third. LaPorta chip-releases and sits underneath the coverage, catches the pass, and is able to sprint to a 16 yard gain.

Right before the half, another soft zone play call bit them on a 3rd-and-18 when the Lions converted with a 23-yard gain.

The Lions are flooding the zone with out routes to the left and crossers from right to left to put stress on the 49ers zone coverage.

The 49ers are running their soft zone poach quarters coverage again and defending the sticks area. 

Ji’Ayir Brown is the backside poach safety here he does his job by running with the deepest of the two crossing routes. Warner has the intermediate crossing route and should have run with the route immediately. This play is more about the call itself than execution though execution could have been better.

But there’s no reason to give that much ground on 3rd and 18 to a quarterback who struggles under pressure. A 4-man rush won’t cut it if they can block it up while Goff picks off his targets.

Second half adjustments

In the second half, adjustments were made to show more disguised rotations instead of static shells. Once that happened, the 49ers defense started to make their impact felt. Wilks’s adjustments included disguising coverages and baiting throws with the use of cover-2 robber coverage (inverted tampa-2). The result was several key pass break-ups that limited the Lions explosive play potential.

The Lions first two drives in the 3rd quarter resulted in a turnover on downs and a fumble recovered by the 49ers. On their drive, Tashaun Gipson had a critical pass break-up over the middle on LaPorta.

On 2nd and 9 here late in the third quarter, the Lions are running a drive concept from right to left consisting of a shallow crossing route and a dig route behind it.

The defense shows single high coverage post-snap but rotates to cover-2 robber/inverted Tampa-2 coverage post-snap. In 2-robber, the middle zone runner is Gipson who drops to the high hole middle zone. Brown, down at the line of scrimmage, bails just before to the snap to his deep half and Lenoir bails to his deep half post snap.

The rotation speeds up Goff’s process as he scans from left to right. The coverage blankets the smash concept so he turns to the backside drive concept and rips the throw over the middle to LaPorta but doesn’t see Gipson flying down to meet him.

Goff thinks he has LaPorta over the middle on the dig route, and he does, initially, until safety Tashaun Gipson knocks the ball out of his hands as catches it with a crushing hit over the middle. Goff didn’t see Gipson coming down late or he could’ve put this pass behind LaPorta to shield him and the ball from the hit.

The 49ers were able to record another 4th down stop but on 3rd down forced a quick throw by Goff with another disguised 2-robber shell from what looks like a three safety coverage look from Logan Ryan, Gipson, and Brown with Gipson as the high hole middle zone robber. Goff gets the ball out quickly this time after seeing the rotation and gets them to 4th-and-2.

On 4th-and-2, what was perhaps the key play of the game on defense, the 49ers defense confused Goff with the coverage and forced him into an incomplete pass under pressure.

The Lions are running mesh, a man coverage-beating concept, which is what they think they’re going to get.

The defense, showing cover-2 man underneath, is actually playing straight Tampa-2 zone coverage.

The video doesn’t show the full sequence here, only the tail end of the motion, but Greenlaw traveled with the running back out wide and then back inside before the snap, indicating to Goff that the 49ers were in man coverage. But they weren’t in man coverage. They were in zone Tampa-2.

Goff dropped back expecting to get the ball out to one of his shallow crossing routes but they ran into the zone hook/curl defenders underneath. The pressure up the middle forced Goff out of the pocket where he looked downfield but he’s not a good under pressure/on the move quarterback. The pass falls short and the 49ers take over on downs. Where they add to their lead with a touchdown.

The broadcast showed a good angle of the motion out by Gibbs where Greenlaw follows and then back into the formation.

Outlook

In part 2, we’ll look at some of the defensive run game snaps in the NFC Championship game.