Use Coach's Video Assistant to look at an offensive play versus a common defense across several teams.

As an offensive line coach I like to look at how we run a particular play against a specific defensive front that is used by more than one team. More often than not I'll create this film study during the off-season. This type of film study is important to for three reasons.

	Quality control …	We can see what we must do in order for a play to be successful. As much as all of us like to make adjustments each week to increase a play's efficiency &endash; it is also very important to eliminate any variance in the way a play is executed.
	Offensive Tactics …	Analyze to see if there are any general trends that defensive teams are using in that front versus a particular offensive set and play.
	Improving Performance …	Use with returning players to analyze individual techniques and with new players to make specific coaching points.

Important technology note. Whether you are using Coach's Video Assistant to create your video projects and film studies or a different video editor it is important to keep in mind these important concepts:

• When describing a defensive front use the same name to describe the front regardless of the defensive team. This will allow you to create a filter that will find the same defensive scheme regardless of the opponent.
• When describing an offensive formation and play type be consistent across opponents as well. You may want to look at a particular play type versus your defensive team. 

Procedure:

The following set of directions can be used with Coach's Video Assistant to create this film study.

Step 1: From Coach's Video Assistant's main screen choose CREATE FILM STUDY.

Step 2: Click on NEW FILM STUDY. Type a short, 15 character name film study name.

Step 3: From the list of Focus teams choose the name of your own team and on the next small panel choose the offensive side of the ball.

Step 4: This next panel asks you to select the teams from which you want to choose your clips. Don't make the mistake of leaving a team out. You can't choose too many teams, as your filter will only gather clips from teams that are playing the desired defensive front. In other words, choose all the games and all the clips. But once you choose to filter the clips by defensive front and offensive play you will have reduced the clip selection significantly.

Step 5: Using the filter panel displayed below, click on the panel tab "Defense" and then from the D Front pull down button choose, in this case, "40".

Note: The D Front, 40, is really your defensive front. The button is filled with defensive fronts that you have entered for your team, as you were the focus of the film study. That is important for two reasons.

1. Make sure you are consistent in your naming of defensive fronts. It is NOT okay to name a defense that one opponent plays as a 40 and another as a Forty. Coach's Video Assistant will NOT filter those out the same way.
2. You will want to makes sure that the defensive fronts for your team are INCLUSIVE of all defensive fronts that your opponent might run. In this way you will be able to choose from your defensive fronts &endash; that match your opponents.

 

Step 6: From the panel click on the O SETUP tab and from the PLAY TYPE pull down button choose RUN.

Step 7: From the same panel click on O PLAY and then from the RUN TYPE pull down button choose a run type, which in the case of this film study is ZONE.

Step 8: At this point you have collected a group of offensive run plays against a variety of teams that are all running the same defensive front. You could make the filter even more restrictive by adding in the direction of the play, a particular stunt or blitz or even a specific ball carrier or down. Simply finish the film study by sending it directly to a VCR using screen "mirroring" or to iMovie/iDVD as a digital project.