Some of my favorite anecdotes involve a defense knowing what an offense is going to do, yet being powerless to stop it.
Apparently, that happened during the 2005 Texas-Oklahoma game. The score that broke the game open — a 64-yard bomb to receiver Billy Pittman — was telegraphed by the Longhorns.
It was a gorgeous throw and catch.
I mean, just feast your eyes here (Pittman’s second from the bottom).
On at least two occasions, Young’s said on the record that Oklahoma knew that the play was coming. The first time was right after the game.
...the Sooners yelled, “Sprint-out! Sprint-out! Sprint-out! And then Texas receiver Billy Pittman started too soon, drawing a 5-yard penalty
But as the Longhorns huddled again, Vince Young was resolute.
”I told the guys, If they call out our play, we’re gonna laugh when we score,’ Young said.
Sixty-four yards later? Pittman was in the end zone.
”We all laughed, Young said.
A sprint out is when the offensive line all slants to one side and the quarterback sprints out to that same side, similar to a rollout.
Young talked about the play again with the The Dallas Morning News when asked about it 13 years later.
Yeah, that was definitely a true story right there.
Kasey Studdard, one of the offensive linemen was very nervous because the defensive guys were yelling out the play that we were about to run, which they were correct but they didn’t know that we were running a wheel route with it.
We called that timeout and Kasey was on the sideline nervous about it. I said ‘Man, listen. We’re going to run the same play and when we score, we’re going to go, everybody, and run down to the end zone and we’ll pile on each other.’
We went out there and rand the same play and Billy Pittman made a great catch and then you just see the whole entire team run down into the end zone and do the pile on. I thought that was pretty cool.
Young references a timeout, but technically, there wasn’t one called. There was a very lengthy delay while the refs tried to get the game clock right because their mics weren’t working, so they had to phone up to the press box. That’s probably what Young’s thinking of.
What Oklahoma keyed on was correct at first, and it’s also one reason why the wheel route is so deadly.
The Sooners got burned in that game because they keyed on the “sprint out” portion of the play, probably worried about Young’s athleticism. They didn’t realize the wheel route was developing to dust them.
The wheel route doesn’t just mimic a flat route. It is a flat route, and then it becomes a deep route.
A commonly exploited wheel defender is one who’s “sitting” on the flat route. His job on a flat route is to drive down on it and blow it up near the line of scrimmage.
Here’s a look at how the route’s supposed to go, and how a receiver can mess it up.
Oddly enough, later in the game, a similar scenario happened.
Pittman’s second from the top here, and although this play gets blown dead due to a delay of game, you can see Pittman taking off, subtly faking to the inside before heading outside.
It’s a different route, but the setup is still the same. After the penalty, you see Young and Pittman put it together. This time, there was no sprint out needed.
Maybe OU knew that one was coming to, but there’s nothing the Sooners could have done about it. The Longhorns rolled, 45-12, en route to a perfect season.