Before I close the off-season by looking at offensive players I haven’t covered much, I’m going to preface those reports with some discussion from Coach Fuente himself. Since he was hired by Tech, Coach Fuente’s annual presentation for the Nike Coach of the Year (COY) Clinics has been high on my Hokie football “want to” list. Coaches presenting at clinics are not only far more detailed about their schemes and tactics than you’ll find anywhere outside of their school’s athletic facilities, they’re also much more candid in their approach. My article on Fuente’s approach to team culture drew a great deal from one of his coaching presentations.

While I haven’t gotten a chance to attend his clinics, the good folks at Telecoach did throw me a bone by publishing a transcript of Fuente’s February COY presentation. He gave the discussion at Nike’s Louisville clinic, where he and fellows like Nick Saban, Mark Dantonio, and Kirk Ferentz roamed the Galt House Hotel for a day. Though it’s titled “RPO’s and 11 Personnel,” Fuente talked about a great deal more when he closed out the conference.

Fuente’s Approach to Offense

Some good news for me was that Fuente corroborated a few things I’ve said about his system over the years. First, he’s a big advocate of the KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) principle. Tech’s QBs have six basic reads that trigger run/pass and primary runner/receiver decisions, and they only use a few of these reads every week. He mentioned specifically the “MOFO/MOFC” safety reads I’ve talked about before, man/zone keys, and also Mike linebacker reads. Similarly, Tech only brings four or so drop-back pass plays, a handful of play-action plays, and four-to-six screen passes to every game. He also talked about Tech’s commitment to box math in determining run/pass calls.

In explaining his preference for simplicity, Fuente talked about being the offensive coordinator at TCU, when he brought complicated plans to the field every Saturday with the help of a roster with NFL guys like Andy Dalton. Fuente tried the same approach when taking over Memphis, which was a reckoning. “We had too much stuff,” he said, “and it forced us to cut down and give our kids a chance to execute.”

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