The Minnesota Vikings’ defense had another dominant day on Sunday against Will Levis and the Tennessee Titans en route to a 23-13 victory and an 8-2 record. The defense has pulled the Vikings through three consecutive games with up-and-down offensive performances.
Even including the gaffe that led to a 98-yard TD, Minnesota’s defense dominated the Titans. They held the 29th-ranked offense by EPA/play (-0.132) under its season average. The Titans put up -0.18 EPA/play in the game and had a terrible 25% success rate. If you take out the long TD worth 8.2 EPA, Tennesee would have averaged -0.32 EPA/play, nearly identical to the marks the Jacksonville Jaguars (-0.32) and Indianapolis Colts (-0.33) have put up in the previous two weeks.
Minnesota’s pass rush was a big reason for its success. They pressured Levis on 17 of 37 dropbacks per PFF, a 45.9% rate. That translated into an impressive five sacks. Those sacks help tell the story of the game, with the Vikings covering well and winning individually to get them. Let’s dive deep into the tape and dissect what happened on each play.
First Sack
On the first drive of the game, the Vikings stopped Tennesee’s drive with a third-and-six sack. On the play, the Vikings ran man coverage on defense and presented six rush threats on the line of scrimmage. That confused the Titans’ pass protection and led to Blake Cashman coming in unblocked.
On the play above, the Vikings are running what is known as a “simulated pressure.” A “blitz’ is defined as a play where a team rushes five-plus players, but Minnesota only rushes four on the play, so it’s not a blitz. Still, they lined up six players on the line of scrimmage to threaten pass rush, which forced the Titans to account for all six in their protection.
The still below shows how the Vikings attacked the Titans. They used their two best pass rushers, Jonathan Greenard and Andrew Van Ginkel, as decoys, having them drop into coverage. Instead, they sent all four of Pat Jones, Josh Metellus, Cashman, and Jihad Ward. They had Jones and Ward twist outside to confuse the offensive linemen and had Cashman and Metellus stunt to the inside with hopes of springing one of them free.
I mentioned above that the Titans failed to pick up the pressure properly. It appeared that their LG, Peter Skoronski, was not on the same page as LT JC Latham and RB Tyjae Spears. Given the confusion, I’m not sure exactly what Tennessee called. There are two possibilities.
The first is a full slide protection to the right. That would have the OL block down and then ask the RB and TE to cover the sixth rusher — in this case, Greenard. The advantage of this is you get good matchups on the inside defenders, closest to the QB, with linemen blocking off-ball types. You also get a double team on Minnesota’s most dangerous rusher, Greenard, although it has the downside of being by a TE and RB.
Schemed up, it looks like the picture below:
The second is a half slide with the RB up the middle blocking Cashman. The advantage with this is that you get big-on-big because they’d be blocking all four Vikings defensive linemen with offensive linemen. The disadvantage is that the RB’s block is closest to the QB, which makes the C and RB work together to pass off any stunts by the Vikings, which are common from this front.
As the play unfolds, you can see that Spears and Latham think the Titans were running full slide, while Skoronski thinks they were running half slide. The TE, Chig Okonkwo, also appears to block like it’s full slide. However, the C, Daniel Brunskill, does a poor job of passing off a stunt from Metellus. That may indicate he thinks it’s half-slide or could have been a poor reaction. Either way, Cashman ends up unblocked, which leads to a sack.
It’s hard to say where the fault lies for the Titans on this play without being in the room, and it depends on what the call was on the two options above. If pressed, I would put it on Skoronski and Brunskill because it seems odd that three other Titans were all on the same page, and Brunskill messes up his reaction to the stunt regardless. Skoronski was likely supposed to block down on Cashman, but he let him go for the sack.
second sack
On Tennesee’s second drive, they moved the ball into scoring position on the Vikings, but Minnesota shut it down with another third-down sack. On the play below, the Vikings ran 1 Double coverage, and Jones came free to sack Levis:
“1 Double (Jersey No.)” is a famous call by the Belichick tree to take away an opponent’s best receiver. In this case, the Vikings are running “1 Double 0” to double Calvin Ridley. At the bottom of the screen, you can see that Shaq Griffin and Cam Bynum are doubling Ridley. The rest of the defense plays Cover 1 Man, with Harrison Smith in the middle of the field.
Pre-snap, Bynum is shaded over the three-receiver side and looking at Levis. However, when Levis snaps the ball, he immediately turns his head towards Ridley. Levis works to bracket him to the inside with Griffin on the outside, a dead giveaway that this is 1 Double coverage.
The coverage is sticky on this play. Metellus and Byron Murphy play with outside leverage on their receivers, funneling them toward Smith, who is covering the middle of the field. Up top, Stephon Gilmore plays inside Nick Westbrook-Ikhine and uses his position to force him toward the sideline on the fade. Cashman mirrors Spears out of the backfield. As you can see, no one is open:
Moving to the rush, the Vikings play with a disciplined plan. They only rush three, with Van Ginkel spying Levis. Their goal is to crush the pocket to Levis’ left and force him to move right. Greenard and Ward do a great job closing in on Levis’ space. He has the option to move to his right, either climbing in the wide space between the RG, Dillon Radunz, and RT, Isaiah Prince, or looping behind the Prince to go towards the sideline.
Levis steps up, which QBs are taught to do, but the Vikings have both options covered. Jones cuts back inside on his rush and beats the RT to get the sack. However, Van Ginkel would have been there to chase Levis down to the outside had he chosen the other path.
The Vikings’ DL did an excellent job executing a pass-rush play on this play. They forced the QB to move and then had a player available to cover his rushing options when he decided to do so, leading to the sack.
third sack
Minnesota’s third sack was primarily aided by good coverage and another good rush plan. The pass-rush mechanism was the same as the previous play. However, on the coverage side, the Vikings’ Quarters coverage forced Levis to move in the pocket after his initial read wasn’t open, and he ended up in Van Ginkel’s arms for the sack:
On the play, the Titans are running a Smash concept to the side that Levis opens up to and a Drive concept on the back side. Minnesota’s Quarters coverage has a great answer for Smash. The CB to the top, Gilmore, can play MOD against Ridley, the No. 1 receiver to that side, while Cashman plays the flat.
On the other side, the drive concept attacks the coverage high-low and has an open player, but Levis chooses to open to the Smash side. Because of the pressure, Levis never gets back to his read over the middle of the field, which would be a short but effective gain on second-and-10.
Minnesota’s pass rush plan again came up big on the play. You can see how attacking a QB can force him to react in a certain way, and you can win if you account for that. On the play, the Vikings had Jones spin inside against the Radunz. That’s the intention, and Jones won on his rush to force Levis to his right again.
After getting chipped, Van Ginkel took a super wide path before coming back down inside the RT, Nicholas Petit-Frere, to meet Levis as he tried to climb. Van Ginkel’s path created the illusion of a wide lane to run through. However, when he came back inside, it seemed like he came out of nowhere from Levis’ perspective.
Van Ginkel’s response to the chip help on the play was one final puzzle piece. Levis might have wanted to check down to the TE after he saw the out to Ridley was covered. However, Van Ginkel did a good job of using a pass-rush move to knock Okonkwo off balance, bringing his hands down and forcing him to lean forward and stumble. His stumble likely prevented any throw to the flat.
fourth sack
The Vikings got another sack on the next play, a third-and-15. Because it was close to the half, the Titans went with a deep concept to get a score before halftime. Instead, the downfield coverage held long enough for Van Ginkel to get his second sack in a row.
On the play, the Vikings are running a Non-Traditional Tampa — or NTT — coverage. That means it’s Tampa 2, but they got there using disguise. In this case, they used their three-deep safety look, which they sometimes go into on long down-and-distance situations. Metellus comes forward at the snap and is the “high hole” or “Tampa” player, while the rest of the defense plays Cover 2. The Titans are running a verticals concept, with dagger by the two outside receivers and a deep over on the inside.
As the play unfolds, you can see the Vikings have covered it well. Metellus runs with the vertical route, which is not something a Tampa player is coached to do in Flores’ defense. Still, it helps protect the post. Because of the down-and-distance, Murphy has enough depth to help cover the dig. Depth also helps Gilmore and Smith bracket the deep over route. Levis has open checkdowns available, but it’s unlikely they will convert the first down.
From a rush perspective, Van Ginkel does another great job with his path after being chipped by the TE. In this case, he takes a very flat route, like he’s running a stunt with Jones. That gets the RT, Nicholas Petit-Frere, to step to the inside, and he gets his feet tangled with the Radunz.
Van Ginkel has great quickness to get back upfield, and he swim moves past Petit-Frere for the sack:
fifth sack
On Minnesota’s final sack, they ran another sim pressure. In this case, they dropped Metellus and Bynum and kept Greenard and Van Ginkel in the rush. The Titans used a half-slide protection and declared their intent by moving Tony Pollard up in the formation. Dropping Cashman and Metellus meant that the RB and C were wasted in protection, and Jones’ quickness could get in between Radunz and Petit-Frere for the sack.
The Vikings are playing man in coverage. Specifically, they’re playing Cover 1 Rat, which has a deep safety and a LB responsible for the middle of the field (in this case, treat Metellus as an LB). One of Metellus and Cashman will be responsible for the LB, depending on which side Pollard runs his route to on this play.
In reality, neither Metellus nor Cashman takes the RB because both watch Levis’s eyes as he drops. This play is on fourth down, and they know the Titans need to get past the sticks. Levis hasn’t shown the ability to go with a full-field read, so they aren’t too worried about the checkdown. Good coverage by Bynum on the out route deters a throw from Levis, and he has to progress on his read.
That progression leads to disaster, as Levis’ protection didn’t give him enough time. Jones had a great rush on the play because the Vikings were stunting. Jones was supposed to attack the RT, Petit-Frere, through the RG, Radunz, allowing Van Ginkel to come free and loop around. Ward and Greenard were running the same game on the other side. You can also see Tennessee’s protection, a half-slide to the right, like I referenced above.
The stunts force communication by a bad Titans’ offensive line that has already struggled with them in the game. To pass off a stunt, the linemen working together generally need to be on the same “level” or have the same depth in the pocket. In this case, you can see that the Petit-Frere is much deeper in his pass set than Radunz. That means that Radunz cannot attempt to pass off the stunt because he doesn’t have help.
A further problem for Radunz is Jones’ explosiveness. Jones attacks his outside shoulder with a strong rip move and gets upfield past him as Radunz leans into his block. Radunz didn’t try to pass the stunt off but lost soundly. Petit-Frere recognized Jones coming free and tried to recover. However, it was too late because Jones was already inside of him, and he ended up getting to Levis for the sack. If Jones hadn’t made the play, Van Ginkel would have been able to loop around and take down a scrambling Levis.
Here’s a close-up of Jones’ rush:
conclusion
Minnesota’s dominant pass rush against the Titans resulted from great coverage and pass-rushing techniques. The Vikings’ secondary often locked down Tennessee’s receiving options, forcing QB Will Levis to hold on to the ball past his initial reads. Once he had to do that, he often ended up with a pass rusher in his lap.
The Vikings used several techniques to get rushers to the QB. They executed a great rush plan that forced Levis to move off his spot into areas other rushers were twisting into for sacks. They also used simulated pressures to confuse blocking schemes and get their players one-on-one matchups.
From an individual perspective, Pat Jones and Andrew Van Ginkel had a great day attacking the right side of Tennessee’s OL. Both had multiple wins against the RT, whether it was Prince or Petit-Frere. Jones also overmatched Radunz on multiple plays.
Dominant performances require all links of the defense to come together and chain off the end zone for the opposing offense. Minnesota’s defense had everything working together on Sunday and accomplished that goal.
