Fleck credits tackling, 'Havoc Defense' for Gophers' dominant opener
The Danny Collins era of the Minnesota Golden Gopher’s defense got off to a great start last Thursday as the Gophers defense kept Buffalo to just 151 total yards and 10 points. The Bulls averaged just 1.8 yards per run and 5.35 yards per passing attempt. It was a performance that couldn’t have gone much better.
The only blemish on an otherwise terrific night was a 40-yard touchdown reception by Bulls’ receiver Victor Snow who beat safety Kerry Brown with a double move to get open for quarterback Ta’Quan Roberson.
Perhaps the most impressive part of the Gophers’ performance was that they missed zero tackles. It was a stark difference from the 22 missed tackles that they had a year ago in their season opener against North Carolina.
On Monday during his weekly press conference, Gophers’ head coach P.J. Fleck was asked about his defense and their performance this week including their perfect night tackling.
“When you look at it, you want to get better at tackling. That’s one of our big three in the 78% statistics we talk about, ball tackling and explosive plays,” Fleck said about the Gophers’ tackling.
“Danny Collins does a really good job of teaching it. I think we do a really good job of emphasizing it and we’ve done it more than we ever probably have in an offseason,”he continued.
“It’s the drills starting every single practice with the tackling convention, the tackling circuit, it’s the emphasis from the coaches. You’re going to get what you emphasize and I thought in the offseason we emphasized tackling in a major way.”
If Minnesota is going to be a surprise team in the Big Ten this season, they’ll have to continue to be strong in the tackling department.
“This football team, for us to have, however you want to consider success, has to do the little things really, really well,” Fleck explained. “The little things, the blocking, the tackling, the catching, the breaking tackles, the tackling the ball carriers. I mean, those things, we’re going to have to do really, really well and I thought it was a good start in that department.”
The Gophers ninth-year head coach also liked what he saw from his defense when it came to the aggression and how they played overall.
“Danny calls it the havoc defense and rightfully so,” he said. “I think that described how we played and we swarmed everywhere.”
The lone touchdown of the game for Buffalo?
Fleck isn’t overly concerned about Kerry Brown and if it was a sign of things to come this fall.
“One thing about Kerry Brown is if he ever makes a mistake, he’s never going to make that mistake again,” Fleck said about the redshirt sophomore safety.
“He’s one of our better cover guys, one of our better football players on this team. But I’m glad that happened early in the season to him and it’s only going to make him better.”
Other than two plays, Drake Lindsey’s second-quarter interception that set up a Buffalo field goal and Snow’s 40-yard touchdown, Fleck said that the Gophers’ defense shut down Buffalo’s offense in the game.
“I mean, literally shut them down, shut down their entire offense,” he said. “They have an all-MAC running back. They’ve got a really good, maybe the best offensive line in the Mid-American Conference. Our guys did a really good job tackling, really good job swarming the ball, creating havoc.”
There was one thing that the Gophers’ defense, however, didn’t do in their season opener. Something they were fantastic at last season, creating turnovers. After creating 21 turnovers last season in 13 games, the Gophers had zero against Buffalo.
“The only thing we just didn’t do was create the takeaways that we need to continue to create to have success this season.”
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