TCU explosive plays stand out to Bill Belichick

The college football world has been fascinated all offseason by Bill Belichick, arguably the greatest mind in NFL history, taking over the North Carolina Tar Heels. He’ll be tested immediately by an excellent college offense and the TCU Horned Frogs.

The TCU offense under Sonny Dykes is an Air Raid that he became known for creating big plays over the years. That’s something that has immediately stood out to Bill Belichick when watching tape, and he knows the Tar Heels need a plan to slow down those explosives.

“The number of explosive plays they get is impressive offensively,” Belichick said. “They can throw the ball down the field. Go routes. Post routes, seams, and things like that. They can also throw the ball on intermediate throws, like slants and quick end cuts, things like that. And then they have plays behind the line of scrimmage, screens, hitches, and so forth. They make a lot of yardage with the ball when the receiver gets it in their hands. They’re very good after the catch. Some of those guys are gone, but they also brought in some explosive players that we’ve seen.”

TCU is coming off a season where the it finished eighth nationally in passing yards, averaging 312.9 yards per game. That helped the Horned Frogs finish tied for 23rd nationally in scoring offense, averaging 33.5 points per game. Now, with quarterback Josh Hoover returning, he’ll be more experienced running that Air Raid offense.

“We’ll see how that goes, but it’s a good catch-and-run team. If you let them throw it in front of you, you’ve got to do a good job of tackling,” Belichick said. “And they do a good job throwing the ball over the top. They also have a good intermediate game. They really make you defend all the blades of grass on the field. The sideline to sideline, the line of scrimmage to 50 yards down the field. So, you’ve got a lot to defend, and they do a good job attacking all of it, and where you’re light, that’s where they want to throw, and where you’re heavy, they go somewhere else.”

This offseason, Belichick flipped the North Carolina roster. That’s led to plenty of new faces and players looking to learn a new defensive system and how to play together. It won’t be easy, but against this type of offense, Belichick needs his defense to trust their assignments and do their job on the defensive side of the ball.

“So, they’re a tough offense to match up against. Coach [Kendal] Briles and Coach Dykes, do a good job of putting stress on the defense,” Belichick said. “And this is one of those games where, defensively, everybody will have to really do a good job with their responsibility. You can’t cover a receiver and stop the run. You can’t cover a short zone and still cover a middle zone. Like, you’ve got to do your job and everybody else has to do theirs, and we have to play good team defense and we have to tackle well.”

North Carolina is set to host TCU on Monday, September 1st. All eyes will undoubtedly be on the game to see how the Tar Heels adjust to being coached by Belichick.