August 18, 2005

Breaking down game film withe Fridge

ESPN's Ivan Maisel pulls back the curtain with Maryland football coach Ralph Friedgen to see how he reviews game film. The column itself is a must read, because it highlights Friedgen's approach of determining how the opponent is going to adjust to Maryland.

A few highlights:

"This guy is 12 yards deep," he says, pointing a red dot at a West Virginia safety from last season's 19-16 overtime loss."

The red dot swerves to the nearby cornerback.

"This guy is 10 yards," he says. "If this guy [the safety] backs up, that corner is going to walk up [toward the line]."

At the snap, the safety takes one step back, the corner moves forward.

"I can anticipate that," he said, "because that guy [the safety] lined up 12 yards deep. I tell the quarterbacks that the corners lie. The safeties don't lie. The answer to the test is the safety. I'm giving you the answer to the test, but you don't want to look at it."

To hear Maisel explain it, Friedgen is John Nash of the sidelines. That doesn't exactly sync up with getting shelled 55-6 by Virginia Tech last year, but I digress.

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