Defense: For better or for worse

The practice fields have fallen silent since Spring Football ended, leaving the world of BYU football fandom without daily news reports. No more balloon-gates. No more stories of Gooch cracking someone in "non-contact" drills. No more gravity defying leaps by George or Pitta. BYU football players are even trying their best to get through finals week and mentally prepared for summer voluntary work-outs. It is a time for the newly annointed King of BYU Football, Mr. Max Hall, to step up and take control of the team.

Today I am going to be reviewing the defense by position and whether I think it will be better or worse than 2006's #10 scoring defense (14.7 pts a game)and #16 pass efficiency defense(106.23), one of the best in BYU history.

Defensive Line:

I wrote a whole article about this recently, but I think the defensive line will be the oil that keeps this defensive machine working smoothly. Ian Dulan, Jan Jorgensen and Russell Tialavea are all sophmores and ready to get into the backfield this coming season. Tialavea gets a great push and had two blocked kicks last year. There are more than adequate back-ups in Brett Denney, Judd Anderton, and Mark Fitu.

Best player: Jan Jorgensen. A leader of this very young group, Jorgensen does a great job getting into the backfield. He should lead the group in tackles for a second year in a row.

Suspect: NT. Russell Tialavea is good, but this position is one injury away from being manned by a walk-on. Hopefully, BYU can get Brian Soi, a NFL quality NT that is currently at UVSC getting his associates. Once he gets his degree, BYU can then work on getting him to fall practice.

Injuries: Judd Anderton is out with a torn labrum, should be back for fall.

Linebackers:

Hands down the best and deepest position on the team currently. Returning 2 starters and 2 guys with significant playing time, they are ready to knock some heads. Bryan Kehl and David Nixon are a very quick tandem. Nixon was held out of spring camp from a lingering groin injury but will be participating in the summer and fall. These two are fast enough to play coverage and strong enough for the pass rush. Kelly Poppinga and Mark Staffieri will be replacing the General and Wagner, the two leading tackler's on last years team. Poppinga and Staffieri aren't as big as the other two, but are much quicker.
The 4 projected starters combined for 186 tackles and 8 sacks last year. With the new blitzing schemes, this number should be much higher this season. This group will be the dominating playmakers on defense and should help keep the momentum in BYU's favor. The back-ups are very talented as well, including Chris Bolden, Austen Jorgensen, Matt Bauman, Jaden Wagner, Shawn Doman, Terrance Hooks, Dan Van Sweden, Grant Nelson and several others.

Best Player: Bryan Kehl. He is emerging as a leader of the defense and has the skills to back it up. I was sitting next to Lark the day after his freak injury and Kehl came over to check up on him and see how he was doing. Kehl will be a 1st team MWC and possibly garner some national praise if he can have big games against UA and UCLA to start the season.

Suspect: Hard to say at this position. Staffieri worries me because of lingering injuries, but should be more than healthy for fall.

Injuries: David Nixon (groin), Austen Jorgensen (labrum), and Markell Staffieri (ready to particiapte for summer.)

Defensive Backs:

Coach Jaime Hill turned 2005's suspect defense into the best suprise of 2006. The secondary had to play on its toes the whole game as the offense often scored so quickly teams abandoned their game plans and began slinging the ball across the field. Only one starter graduated (Justin Robinson CB) and there is still a battle going for his position. Robinson actually had a great year and led the team in interceptions. However, his size made him a bit of a liability (5'7.5) so I think we will all feel a little better with Kayle Buchannon, Brandon Bradley or someone taller playing field corner. Gooch quietly had the most tackles of all the DB's last year (66) while Criddle had an impressive 47 solo tackles. Criddle was great at run-support and often got in the way of passes. He let a couple INT's slip through his hands and hopefully has taken his down time to practice with a JUGS machine. The safeties Quinn Gooch and Dustin Gabriel, both are returning starters and are both very reliable and talented. Gooch is rumored to be establishing himself as a leader on the defense, which is a good thing. Safeties have a good vantage point from their position on the field, hopefully he uses his knowledge and experience to help the defense even more.

Best Player: Ben Criddle. Criddle was a solid tackler and excellent defender last year as a walk-on. Bronco gave him a scholarship over the off-season and he is ready to come back. He led the team last season with 9 pass break-ups. Hopefully this season some of those are INTs instead.

Suspect: Dustin Gabriel. Poor guy is always injured. He may not make it to fall ball if he decides to not risk himself anymore. David Tafuna is the likely back up, though Kellen Fowler is said to be one of the smarter players on the team and could be a good option as well. Honorable mention in this category is Kayle Buchannon who is always injured. His hit that knocked Weddle into the runner against Utah shows he is capable of being a very physical corner. Hopefully he can stay healthy.

Injuries: Chris Warner (ACL), Ben Criddle (Toe), Dustin Gabriel (perpetually)

My 3 Cents: The defense will be very good this year. If nothing else, they will be faster and from the reports from Spring, more physical. The new blitzing schemes and wrinkles they threw into the system should give offensive lines fits. I fully expect them to stay within the top 10 scoring defenses (the clock changes mean that they will probably allow more points, as will everyone else.) The defensive line is more experienced and show keep the offensive line in check better to let Nixon and Kehl blow up the back-field.

The comments left thus far have been great, please let me know if you are agreeing with what I'm posting!