Gap 8 defense

[Catbacker44]

Has anyone ever ran this and what were your experiences? Thanks.

[whodathoughtit]

Has anyone ever ran this and what were your experiences? Thanks.

 

Yes and it's great at the youth level. Coached it for few years before going over to the offensive side. You gotta coach them up though, you can't just stick them in an eight man front and expect it to work. I assume you've either read coach Reed's book or spoke with someone who has. If your going to run it you need to purchase his book.

 

In Reed's system your 2 corners and the safety need to be studs. The next best two I would make DE's. The other positions don't need to be good players but they must do what is asked of them. Unless you have 11 good players (if you have that many it won't matter what you run) your front 4 must bear crawl and stay in the "gap" (IMO this is the biggest drawback because kids hate it). This is a big coaching point for this defense. When they do it correctly even the little guys can get it done and that allows you to rotate your line alot. 2 LB's are at the l.o.s. head up on the ends. 2 DE's are ALWAYS lined up on "air". 2 Corners lined up a couple yards behind the LB's and 1 Safety. However, it does adjust to or "mirror" the offense and will look like Celina's 10-1 vs. a spread offense. It will always have at least 8 on the l.o.s. though. Great against sweeps, A & B gaps, and the pass (mostly because of the pressure+your best players will be in coverage+youth passing stinks). Weakness is probably off tackle but you can make an adjustment or two to fix that. When I've had a lineman who is a monster for his age I've let him have both A gaps and added an extra safety on the strong side up closer to the line (otherwise keep the same rules as the G-A-M). Good luck!

 

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