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Old 04-10-2010, 07:40 AM   #1
swg
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UC Building Defense

"We're attacking the ball on defense on every snap," Jones said. "That's what you're playing for. That's the mentality of our defense. We want to play great defense. That's one of our gospels. Defense is the one thing that's common in all sport. We're going to set the bar high."

Last year, UC's defense was good enough to allow the Bearcats to produce the first perfect regular season in school history and a No. 4 national ranking before heading to the Sugar Bowl to face Florida.

But the numbers weren't pretty near the end of the season. In their last five games, the Bearcats surrendered an average of 471 yards and 39.4 points.

Those numbers were inflated by the 659 yards and 512 points that Tim Tebow and the Gators ran up against UC in the Sugar Bowl, but even if you take that game out of the equation, the Bearcats allowed averages of 424.5 yards and 36.5 points over their final four regular-season games. Connecticut, hardly known as an offensive juggernaut, totaled 462 yards and 45 points against UC.

By the end of the regular season, the Bearcats ranked sixth in the eight-team Big East in total defense.

"I think people caught on to what we were doing," defensive tackle Derek Wolfe said. "We gave up the big play a lot."

UC has the potential for another powerful offense this fall with the return of quarterback Zach Collaros, a talented fleet of wide receivers and an emerging running back in Isaiah Pead.

But if its defense, doesn't improve, it could be difficult for the Bearcats to nail down a third straight Big East title.

Wolfe and linebacker JK Schaffer return as established players with all-league potential. Walter Stewart, who can play on the line or drop back into pass coverage, made great strides last year, and there are a lot of young players in the secondary with potential.

It falls to co-defensive coordinators Banks and John Janacek to put those pieces together as the Bearcats turn to their third and fourth coordinators in the past three years.

"We're really young," said Banks, who will call the coverages during games. "We don't have a lot of depth right now. The guys that we have are going to have to pick it up. We're going to have to find a way. We have to play harder than everybody we play. The sooner we understand that, the better we'll be."

Banks worked under Jones last year at Central Michigan and presided over a unit that led the Mid-American Conference in scoring defense, allowing an average of 18.9 points per game. The Chippewas were second in the league in rushing defense and third in pass efficiency defense.

Under Diaco last season, the Bearcats seemed content to focus on not giving up the big play and letting the offense carry the load.

"It kind of felt like that, and I think that had a lot to do with how we played," Wolfe said. "We'd have a lot of good plays and it would take them 20 minutes to score. Then the offense would come out and hit right away again, and we'd be right back on the field. We never really got a break."

Jones plans to run the ball more this year in an attempt to improve UC's offensive possession time and, in the process, give the defense a breather.

But that alone won't solve the problem.

"Our job is to get off the field and get the ball back for our offense, and that's what we're going to do," Banks said. "I don't think you can win consistently without having a great defense. Can you win some games? Can you have great seasons? I think you can. But when you really start to build your program, I think you've got to have the foundation set defensively."

As Wolfe put it, "Imagine how good we could have been if our defense was up to par. It wasn't really up to par."

http://news.cincinnati.com/article/2...l+for+Bearcats
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