Bucs Run Defense Fixed Its Issues This Offseason

The Bucs take pride in their run defense. Even in a day and age where the NFL has become a pass-first league, stopping the run is still paramount in Todd Bowles’ defensive scheme.

In order to get to Bowles’ pressure packages, opponents must be in third-and-long situations. Third-and-3 is still a run-or-pass down. But third-and-7 is almost exclusively a passing down – and a down where Bowles is going to bring pressure.

So that remains the goal.

When Bowles arrived as Tampa Bay’s defensive coordinator in 2019, his unit led the league in run defense, allowing just 74 yards per game and an NFL-low 3.3 yards per carry. That turned out to be one of the greatest run-stopping defenses of all time.

Jets RB Austin Walter and the Bucs defense – Photo by: USA Today

During the Bucs’ Super Bowl season in 2020, the run defense was just as good, ranking first in several categories. The Bucs allowed teams to run for just 80 yards per game in addition to allowing 3.6 yards per carry. Both were tops in the league, in addition to allowing a league-low 15 rushing touchdowns.

Bucs Run Defense Fell Off A Bit In 2021

Last year was a different story.

The Bucs run defense wasn’t quite as dominant. Still quite good, but not the impenetrable force it was the previous two seasons. Tampa Bay surrendered 92.5 yards per game, which ranked third in the league. The defense only allowed nine rushing TDs, but that ranked fifth in the NFL.

“We have pride in that, we take a big sense of pride in that,” Bucs reserve nose tackle Rakeem Nunez-Roches said. “It hurt us last year personally. It’s something we have taken upon ourselves and put on our shoulders that we will do and we will accomplish this year. That’s our biggest goal along the D-line. Stopping the run, limiting rush per yard, all of that so we can get to the quarterback. We don’t want to be in third-and-2 when we can be in third-and-12.”

Worse yet was the fact that Bowles’ unit allowed 4.3 yards per carry last year, which ranked 15th.

After allowing a season-high 173 yards rushing against Buffalo in a 33-27 overtime win, the Bucs surrendered 150 yards to the lowly Jets in a 28-24 come-from-behind victory. At the end of the season teams were attacking the Bucs laterally by running stretch zone plays.

It was a smart tactic. Running straight into the heart of the defense which featured Pro Bowl nose tackle Vita Vea, defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh and Pro Bowl middle linebacker Devin White wasn’t wise. So opponents made Suh and Vea have to run laterally to the edge, which wasn’t their strength.

Those lateral runs by the Jets and the Panthers late in the season worked and exposed the fact that Suh, who was 34, and 35-year old backup nose tackle Steve McLendon couldn’t run anymore. Bowles knew that teams would continue to test the Bucs run defense with zone schemes and lateral runs if he didn’t make some personnel changes.

New, Athletic DTs Should Help Bucs Run Defense

Bucs DT Logan Hall – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

So Suh and McLendon weren’t re-signed in free agency. And the Bucs signed a more athletic defensive tackle in Akiem Hicks and drafted Logan Hall, one of the most athletic defensive tackles coming out this year, to replace them.

In an effort to really work on stopping outside zone runs, Bowles strategically scheduled joint practices against Miami and Tennessee to really get some quality work against that type of attack.

“I feel like we took a lot of steps on helping that in practice,” Nunez-Roches said. “We brought out Miami, we brought out Tennessee, which was a flat-zone team, seeing how those things work and how we can correct it. I feel like we did a great job. You still saw a lot of younger guys out there [in the preseason games]. So you didn’t see the full potential of what we’ve done to take strides to stop that. But we’ve definitely corrected it.”

It showed in the joint practices. Neither Miami nor Tennessee was able to find any success getting to the edge against Tampa Bay in the run game. In two series against the Colts starters, the Bucs’ starting defense allowed just two yards on two running back carries in the preseason finale.

Bowles expects that success to continue in Week 1 at Dallas when the Bucs open the 2022 season against Ezekiel Elliott, Tony Pollard and the Cowboys.