Author: John K. (---.knology.net)
Date: 05-20-07 20:28
Coaching 11 to 13 yr olds here. We use Three Kickers and have Five KO plays. We work some form or part of KO in every practice - full field or a drill. We use KO as a form of conditioning. Why waste time with wind sprints. Use the KO team. Everyone runs it. We use stopwatches and even film in practice to get it perfect. We use labeled markers (Big PowerPoint numbers in plastic three ring binders sheaths.) And put these on the field to speed alignment & communication. We hammer this starting on the first day. By week three, the boys are fighting for the pride of being on the KO team. Lots of kickers means a lot of boys get involved. Kids kind-of like that. Allocate the time for this. Every recovered on-side KO is worth how many defensive plays in the game, 4? 8? 12?
Does it work? In three games last year, we put three touchdowns on the board ‘before’ our opponent ever had a chance to touch the ball.
Attitude: It is not just "Our House!" We are playing with "Our Toys!" Nobody gets to play with "Our Toys (the ball)" unless we let them. We are not going to let anyone play with our toys. The boys seem to like the idea of being selfish and not sharing.
Plays are signaled from the sideline after the Referee blows the whistle to KO. On ‘Move’ players must sprint to their new KO position. On ‘Go’ we execute the KO.
Front Line is 10 yards off the ball: Symmetric, from the left:
Flanker (Sprint down the sideline must keep the on-side kick in bounds.)
End (an On-Side Kicker.)
Tackle
Guard
Second Line is 15 yards off the ball: Left-HB, Kicker, Right-HB.
KO-1: On-side kick, left to right. On ‘Move’, the LT & LG sprint to the right side of the ball. The second line sprints to, and folds into, the right side front line. Very important, the L-End - the on-side kicker - must shift to a kick position, 15 yards from the ball. Left Flanker is a safety. On ‘Go’, the End attacks his on-side kick target, and all players SPRINT up field and attack.
KO-2: Opposite of KO-1.
KO-3: Compress to the middle, on-side kick. Flankers stay five yards off the end. Don’t be afraid to compress tight. Be aggressive and attack. No safety.
KO-4: Straight up field, deep kick. We stay in lanes, stay in a line, attack hard, full sprint. We strive for no gaps horizontal of vertical. We do not use a safety. We attack with 11 players.
KO-5: The Back-Door Pooch Kick. We fake KO-1. On ‘Move,’ the difference is that the Left-Tackle shifts to the left on-side kicker position. All other players shift the same as in KO-1, except for the Left-End. The L-Flanker and L-End stay in their original position. Teach the boys to ‘Pause’ here and wait for the receiving team to shift to your on-side setup. On ‘Go’ the right side attacks to within one yard of the ball and slams on the brakes. The Left side Flanker and End should delay a second and attack full speed. The L-Tackle fakes a kick but does not cross the line. As soon as he fakes, the Right End comes in right behind him and pooch kicks the ball 20-25 yards deep to the left. Why? Teams will scout you and start to shift as you shift. This will catch them flat-footed if they over-shift, or force them to stay spread across the field if they don’t. It is dangerous. We have given up points by doing this wrong and short the kick. When it is done right, it is murder. They scouted you and burned practice time adjusting to your shift, and you just faked and back-doored them.
To sides of the same coin? Just like good bunting baseball teams seem to work harder on bunt defense. Our focus on KO seems to help focus the kick return team. Good luck.
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