Joe Moorhead is teaching Penn State’s coaches. And Penn State’s players. And high school football coaches from around the Commonwealth.
The new offensive coordinator in town is a busy guy.
Take Friday morning at 8 a.m., for example.
That’s when Moorhead will be presenting a chalk talk session on “Red Zone Offense” at a Pennsylvania State Football Coaches Association (PSFCA) clinic in President’s Hall at The Penn Stater Hotel on the outskirts of the Penn State campus.
At Fordham in 2015, Moorhead’s offense ranked No. 31 in the FCS in red zone offensive efficiency, scoring 83% of the time it got inside the 20-yard yard line (45 of 54). It scored touchdowns on 70% of those trips (38 of 54).
Comparatively, in 2015 Penn State ranked No. 6 in the FBS in red-zone scoring efficiency, scoring on 93% (42 or 45) of its trips inside the 20. Where Penn State came up short, though, was on scoring touchdowns inside the 20 – it turned just 25 of its 45 trips (56%) into TDs. Penn State’s red-zone TD efficiency was even worse in 2014, when the Nittany Lions scored a TD on only 43% (17 of 40) of its trips inside the red zone.
Moorhead, obviously, has a lot more work ahead of him. This weekend, he’s part of a whole host of coaches from Penn State, Pitt, Temple, St. Francis, Albany (a program headed by former PSU defensive lineman Greg Gattuso), Holy Cross and Clarion taking part in the multi-session PSFCA clinic on the Penn State campus.
Penn State head coach James Franklin is a speaker at a PSFCA dinner on Friday, preceding keynote speaker Dave Wannstedt, former head coach of the NFL Bears and Dolphins, as well as Pitt’s head coach from 2005-10. (Wanny and James will no doubt make reference to their joint appearance on the Big Ten championship game telecast on FOX in December, when Wannstedt noted Iowa’s defensive plans against Michigan State’s Connor Cook: “They’re not going to let him sit in the pocket like Penn State did.”)
On Saturday morning, coaches from the in-state troika of Penn State, Pitt and Temple will present drills in Holuba Hall for the hundreds of high school coaches in attendance. Repping Penn State are cornerbacks coach Terry Smith and new offensive line coach Matt Limegrover.
A CLINICAL DIFFERENCE
What a difference a year and a clinic make.
On the final Saturday morning of February in 2015, at the Nike Coach of the Year Clinic, John Donovan was in a ballroom at the Pittsburgh Doubletree Inn holding forth to scores of high school coaches. Donovan, Penn State’s offensive coordinator at the time, headed a two-part session on “Developing and Training the Quarterback for the Spread Offense: Passing Game of the Nittany Lions.”
I was there that day. Donovan’s presentation was full of such phraseology as “hitch tossers,” “ISO’s,” “honey hole” and “sticks.” He noted that Penn State’s receivers were often unsure of their route reads and that the “offensive line needs to be more aggressive” and “the back needs to get out quicker” and “Christian can’t think that his arm is always going to save him.”
Nine months to the day later, after a season where Penn State averaged 23.2 points and 348 yards of offense a game, Donovan was fired. Now, after four seasons of running a high-scoring, up-tempo offense as Fordham’s head coach, Moorhead is putting in an entirely new system for Penn State.
“The big thing with an up-tempo, no-huddle is we want to dictate the tempo of the game, be physical in the run game and be explosive in the pass game,” Moorhead told Jeff Byers on the Penn State Coaches Radio Show on Wednesday. Listen here, beginning at the 55:31 mark.
“And, ultimately, offensive football is about putting points on the board. We want to make sure that we do that very successfully.”
THE INSTALL
As such, Moorhead’s days in Lasch are being spent teaching his new system to Penn State’s offensive staff – tight end coach Ricky Rahne (formerly the PSU QB coach), running back coach Charles Huff, wide receivers coach Josh Gattis, Limegrover and Franklin.
“It will be a learning curve for everyone,” Moorhead said. “You come in and start talking a different language. Now we’re installing it with our coaching staff. I’m sitting down with the offensive coaches and working on it and going through things. We’re talking about general philosophy, personnel, formations, run game, pass game. And then when we get an opportunity to meet with the kids, we’ll install it and put it on the field.”
Moorhead has already started working with his quarterbacks – just not with a football. Penn State is undergoing winter workouts, where the team does group conditioning and strength and agility drills.
Moorhead liked what he saw on Thursday, Tweeting out the following from his @BallCoachJoeMo account, referencing freshman quarterback Jake Zembiec – who enrolled in Penn State last month — by name:
AM Workouts: @jakezembiec stood out for the QB group…Earn The Right!!!#preparation#effort#execution
— Coach Joe Moorhead (@BallCoachJoeMo) February 11, 2016
AM Workouts: Another positive step for the offense. Plenty of room improve. Keep the pedal down. Good is the enemy of Great!#sharpentheaxe
— Coach Joe Moorhead (@BallCoachJoeMo) February 11, 2016
In talking with Byers on Wednesday, Moorhead delineated the steps for rolling out his offense for the players. It’s a process he’s done before, when he took over as head coach at Fordham, following stops at UConn, Akron, Georgetown and Pitt.
Learning a new offense isn’t new for the Nittany Lions, either. For veterans like Wendy Laurent and Brent Wilkerson, it’s the third completely different offensive system they’ve had to learn in their five seasons at Penn State.
“It’ll be a measured pace,” Moorhead said. “We don’t want to go through everything all at once. I’ve done it before, in 2012, when it was the first time. We need to be very calculated in the things we ask them to do early and make sure we come out and take another positive step and don’t take a step back.
“I think we have a very good plan in place. I’m excited to get going.”
