Breaking down Indiana football’s late first-half defensive issues

Indiana football opened its 2024 season with two dominant victories over Florida International and Western Illinois.

But the Hoosiers’ biggest stain in both games was similar. They allowed their opponents to drive downfield and record their only score of the game in the final minutes of the first half.

After two straight weeks allowing subpar non-conference opponents to march downfield and score at the end of the second quarter, two-minute drill defense is one of IU football’s bigger issues early this season.

“That was pretty bad, I’ll be completely honest. That was pretty bad. Cause the same thing happened last week,” defensive end Mikail Kamara said after the Western Illinois game. “So we’ve got to end the halves a lot better. That’s something we’re definitely going to be focusing on, especially that middle eight. So that’s something we’ve got to do better going forward.”

The drives near the end of the second quarter against FIU and Western Illinois both lasted 13 plays, including the Leathernecks’ field goal. But the Panthers drive took over four minutes of game time, while WIU’s lasted around two.

The film reveals that IU utilized different approaches to these two series, but got burned both times.

When FIU got the ball back with 4:53 left in the half after an IU touchdown, defensive coordinator Bryant Haines remained aggressive. He continued to bring blitzes and pressures to stymie shifty Panthers quarterback Keyone Jenkins. And those pressures backfired on several occasions.

The Panthers called plays — some were audibles from Jenkins — that negated IU’s rush in different ways. Most of these were quick hitters, like a slant or toss, that opened up looks without requiring time for the play to develop. That strategy produced mostly short gains — FIU’s biggest play of the scoring drive was an 11-yard completion. Key missed tackles by defensive tackle CJ West and defensive end Venson Sneed Jr. made things worse, and the Panthers capitalized with their only score of the game.

“The end of the second quarter didn’t go the way we were expecting,” linebacker Aiden Fisher said after the FIU game. “We did a lot of sloppy things, a lot of messy things, missing tackles, bad angles, just really not what our defense is about.”

Haines called the late-half drive against Western Illinois more conservatively.

Indiana spent most of the Leathernecks’ scoring drive sitting in zone coverage, mostly in the base defense without heavy pass rush. IU’s safeties sat deep in pass coverage, leaving plenty of space for WIU receivers. Jamier Johnson and D’Angelo Ponds both got beat during the drive, and Jailin Walker also missed a tackle early in the series that led to the first WIU first down of the game.

Western Illinois exploited the spacious coverage for some bigger gains than FIU got on its drive. The biggest play of the drive, a 30-yard pass that put WIU in the red zone, happened because the Leathernecks found a soft spot in the zone coverage and took advantage.

Even head coach Curt Cignetti may have made a mistake during this series: he declined an illegal formation penalty on the Leathernecks that would’ve given them second and 11 from their own 44 as opposed to third and six from the 49. The individual decision didn’t matter as much in a blowout game, but the longer yardage would’ve made it tougher for WIU to extend its drive.

The Hoosiers were too easy to pick apart on that drive, both because of scheme and individual mistakes.

Cignetti didn’t want to discuss much detail on the Western Illinois series after the game before he could watch the tape.

“There were probably a couple mistakes in there. I think we had subbed a little bit at certain positions also,” Cignetti said. “You’ve got to finish the half well. You’ve got to start the third quarter well. We’ve been starting the third quarter well, but we haven’t finished the half well. We’ve been starting the game well and finishing the game well too. There’s a lot more positives, but just like 98 percent of the teams in the country, we have a couple things to work on and improve on.”

These scoring drives didn’t impact either game that much, as the Hoosiers had full control of both contests. But if IU’s late-half problems resurface against better opponents, it could spell trouble.

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