Mike Gundy: “I think that in five years, you’re going to see the SEC playing offensive football like this league.”
By Anthony Slater – Aslater@opubco.com – @anthonyVslater
“Is this what we want football to be?” Saban asked media members.
If Saban posed the same question to Oklahoma State coach Mike Gundy, the defensive mastermind might cringe at the answer.
“I think that in five years, you’re going to see the SEC playing offensive football like this league,” Gundy said inside Boone Pickens Stadium on Monday afternoon.
His theory may not be popular among SEC defensive traditionalists, but his explanation is a hat tip to them. Why run at a powerful and athletic front when you can get to the outside and try to get around them?
“At some point, you line up and say, ‘How in the world are we going to move the ball on these guys?’…When you watch a good defense like the ones you are talking about in the SEC, Alabama, LSU, you don’t really see any matchups that fire you up,” Gundy explained. “But I know that I’m not fired up at all if I have to play inside the hashmarks. That makes me really miserable. I’d rather get them all spread out and try to hit some lanes.”
And in the brief moments he’s been able to take in SEC games this year, he’s already seen the air raid, no-huddle trend creeping into the nation’s most storied conference.
“A&M’s already doing it,” Gundy said. “From what I saw, Georgia’s running a number of plays no huddle from the line. So is Tennessee. LSU’s not going to, Florida, I didn’t watch them play. Arkansas was moving fast with Petrino, I don’t know what they’re doing over there now. I just think you’re going to see it. And it doesn’t matter, it’s just my opinion, but I think in five years you are going to see the SEC will be moving toward this style of offense.”
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