Best offense and defense for undersized team

This post has been up almost 4 hours and no mention of the Double Wing being the best on both sides of the ball

All kidding aside, DW would be a pretty good offense to run with smaller personnel. I ran spread a few years back with a small line. We didn't fair so well, protection was a pain and our running game became almost non-existent. Not to say it wouldn't work for someone else.

Defensively, I have played some smaller teams who ran a 3-3 and were pretty stout against the run, plus they flew all over the place and made it difficult on the linemen to know where they were coming from. I would be concerned about a physically dominant team because they could pound you.

we got beat twice by liberty hill a few years ago even though we were way bigger and stronger. their small ars linemen were like piranhas on all our defenders legs. slot-t baby!!

I would agree with chiefscoach. I think the spread option is a great offense for smaller players. Look at what Navy has done.
fbdoc also has a point about the wing-t. That was developed for smaller players to be successful. Both are good. The one thing about the option is who is playing QB. They must be able to read it, and they must be consistent in doing so.
I feel that is one advantage the Wing-t has is that it puts the chess game in the coaches hands more.
On Defense I also agree with chiefscoach. The 4-3.
Everyone is saying that the 3-3, 3-5 is the way to go with smaller players. I am not so sure.
I think it is good for smaller "fast" good players. The 4-3 is so much more flexible in my opinion. (and that is all this is!)
We tried the 3-3 with a smaller ave speed team and got ran over, so we switched to the 4-3 (same team 1/2 way through the year)and really were able to control the offenses we saw a lot better.
I am just giving my expirience, just my opinion.

Veer/ 44 and two bottles of asprin.
Worked for Coach Yeoman at Houston.
Easy install-then rep it till its perfect.

Our team is always too small as compared to the other teams in our conference. We tried the 335 the previous season and got crushed on the ground. We found that without the guards being covered up they got to our second level too quickly and our lb's and spurs had to make every tackle while being blocked. That is a tough task when giving away alot of size. This year we went to the 4-3 and were much more successful in slowing down the rushing game. We basically told the front four to make a pile at the LOS. In one game we had the DL fire out and basically tackle the guards and tackles in order that the LB's and safeties could run to the ball without too much trouble. We did not get a penalty for Defensive holding until late in the second half and the ref was almost apologizing when he made the call. The guy he called holding on was 180 lbs and the O-linemen he was holding was 270 lbs and an all-state player. We still got beat, but only by 10 points and they only gained 130 yds on the ground. If we had stayed with the 335 they would have run for 400 yds easily.

On offense we have gone to the spread zone option read. You need a good QB and another player that can take it to the house on any play. If you are small and don't have a quick strike type player then the defense just keeps coming hard without any fear. If you are small with average speed then the under center triple option is your only chance to succeed. Try to get four to five yards with each play and pray you don't turn it over. Most of the successful DW team I have seen had some size up front with average to slow backs. I have seen the smaller teams going DW just get pushed back at the LOS. The DW guys on the site can give you a better idea of how to run it with small guys.

No matter what the scheme, if your team is small and avg speed, every guy out there better be one hell of a football player or it will be a tough season. I am not saying it is impossible, but very difficult.

We are grossly undersized.


50 front most of the time.

Wishbone and multiple I formation on offense.

We don't power it down the throats of the opponents, but we play solid fundamentals, dive the crap out of the fullback (who is our stud every year), run some veer, and unbalanced line to cause some confusion.

2 players on offense above 200 pounds. Only 3 players on defense above 200 and one of them was a stretch for that. Have made the playoffs last two years, almost won it all this year on the back of a good fullback. (historically weak team, VERY poor historically)

Really focus on not giving up the big play, and KEEPING THE CLOCK RUNNING. We play conservative defense, conservative offense, good special teams, and execute fairly well (lowest penalties in the classification last 3 years) and try to make sure that teams drive the field on us. We want the game to be as short as possible. The fewer the possessions the more we feel like we are in the game.

Have seen a lot of smallish teams spread the ball out or run the HUNH. We think the longer the game lasts, the more exposed our lack of athletes is. We aren't just small, we really don't have any great athletes (although the more we win the more that changes)

System doesn't matter. It's just like anything else. It's more the technique you use and the WAY you run your system that counts.

For example, there's a huge misconception that "without size, you have to get in the 3-3-5 defense, because they run around and blitz and stunt and the kids love it (they always add "and the kids love it"!!)" I would argue that, depending on what you are DOING with each position, you can just as easily line up in a 50, 4-4, 4-3, etc. and get the job done.

Same thing with offense. You invariably get these answers with "undersized offense"

Go with the Urban Myer spread
Go with the Wing T
Go Veer and Midline Option
Go Double Wing

HUH? Translation: run whatever works for you, and teach techniques and schemes that help your lack of size out. I always think it is funny that people think you can run the spread with "smaller" people. Haven't bigger linemen in the NFL and college evolved because of the need for larger bodies in pass blocking?

It's like propaganda or something! You can pretty much run whatever system you know well, and just tweak it for your lack of size. If you're an I team, maybe you run less Iso and Power and you run more Stretch and Option. If you're a DW or Straight T team, it doesn't matter what size you are, you're going to run your stuff perfectly every play. If you're a Wing-T team, maybe it's less Belly and Buck stuff and more Jet Sweep and counter stuff.

Don't look for the "magic offense" or "devine defense"...be a coach and make the changes to your tried-and-true system as it exists now!

Any time your OL can dbl down on one DL and you read/kick out/trap the next DL out.

Zone blocking, particularly stretch, is just fine with undersized offensive linemen because it's all predicated on double teams and moving the bigger defenders off the line of scrimmage with 2 linemen working in tandem. That's why Denver, which is largely regareded as one of the best zone teams in the NFL, also has the smallest OL in the league...

Again, it's how you chose to run within your system, and what you chose to emphasize. If I'm running an undersized 50 for example, I don't read. I slant, gap, or rush. But I still stay with my 50 system.

I would say Navy flexbone option, or spread whatever you want to call it. It is just when I hear spread option now I think of it out of the gun instead of under center. I know it was called that by some in the past, but I think it took a new meaning the last couple of years.
On defense I like to go with a 3-4 defense with smaller guys with them slanting almost every play. 4-4 would also be something to look at.

We play big schools with well coached teams that work hard in the weightroom etc so that's where my bias comes from. If your guys are little, I don't care how well you coach them. The big well coached guys from the other schools will put their little zone blocking tails in the backfield and if they stay on doubleteams to get the blocks made, the lbers are unblocked, so around here you better be doing something schemewise to offset your disadvantages.

Hehe...coach, if you are getting blown back into the backfield with two of your offesnive linemen working in a zone tandem on one of their defensive linemen, I don't know many schemes that are going to help you. I don't care where "around here" is...that is something I'd consider fact.

I don't care what you run, but throughout the course of the past 13-15 years...we've had all manners of offensive lines come through, from big and dominant to nearly non-existant. We've used various concepts (all within the same system) to help with our weaknesses:

Option
Angle and Trap Blocking
Zone and Stretch Blocking
Throw the ball more
etc.

There is one thing I have found: The schemes that worked best were directly related to how well we could coach them, so YES it does matter "how well you can coach them" to a large degree. For us, the angle blocking and zone blocking schemes seem to be the ones we are most successful with when we are undersized. From there, we simply decide which is going to be our primary scheme based on the types of backs we have.

We don't zone block every season, but I strongly feel that it is a misconception that "you can't just line up in an I formation and zone block people unless you have the horses." That's bullcrap. We've done it and been competitive with it because we're good at teaching it, and because our system allows us to formation players and to build in appropriate complimentary plays. We've tried to be a gun team or an option team at points far in the past (all fabulous suggestions), but we suck at it because we don't believe in it philosophically, and therefore don't coach it well. The day I change my entire offense because I have a few small guys up front is the day I put a gun to my head.

It's like a team in our state that went to the single wing because "they didn't have a QB." That's great, but what happens in 2 years if you get a good pocket passing QB? Are you going to change your offense again? Consistency is critical in high school football. It is much more critical than trying to look like a genius because you change your offense every other year. How can your feeder programs help you if you are changing things all the time? How do you expect to sell your players on a system or a philosophy if you are not sold on one long enough to stick with it and develop it?