IUFB 2023 Preview: Defensive Coordinator
There are an infinite amount of questions for Indiana's 2023 defense, so I dove deep on new defensive coordinator Matt Guerreri.
This is…extensive. So I included a TL;DR overview section at the bottom that somewhat wraps up overall thoughts on Guerreri. Please read this in its entirety, though. Please.
We’ve seen what perils can exist when Tom Allen handles both head coaching and defensive coordination. The Hoosiers’ PFF Defensive Grade ranked 106th out of 130 in 2018 before Allen named Kane Wommack defensive coordinator and increased the grade to 69th the next season. And in 2022, Indiana’s defense was graded 117th in the nation (109th by ESPN SP+).
Allen has been searching for a trustworthy defensive coordinator to run his 4-2-5 system since Wommack’s departure after the fabled 2020 season, and the journey there has been rough, with a one-year stint by Charlton Warren included. It seemed as if Chad Wilt – 2022’s co-defensive coordinator – would be the next successor, but Allen hired the young Matt Guerreri to call the defense in 2023 instead.
Allen deserves credit for recognizing the changes in the landscape of college football. He also deserves credit for hiring Guerreri away from Tulsa, where Kevin Wilson had hired and introduced him as defensive coordinator and his “first hire” just a couple months before his introduction in Bloomington.
Guerreri is a young defensive mind that coaches have kept tabs on for many years now. Allen mentioned in his press conference in March how impressed he was by Guerreri’s abilities at such a young age, and when Jim Knowles was hired into an intense situation in Columbus – to fix an ailing Ohio State defense largely blamed for keeping the Buckeyes out of the CFP in 2021 – he grabbed Guerreri from Duke, where they coached together for six years, to serve as his “extra coordinator eyes” (senior analyst) in scouting, scheming, and play-calling. Knowles improved Ohio State’s PFF Defensive Grade from 41st in 2021 to 3rd in 2022.
Allen mentioned calling former Duke head coach Dave Cutcliffe in his vetting of Guerreri, but whatever early success Guerreri has in football will be credited to Knowles, who brought Guerreri onto his defensive staff when Guerreri was just 22 years old.
Let’s never forget when Kevin Wilson’s Hoosiers tore up the Knowles/Guerreri defense for 667 total yards in the New Era Pinstripe Bowl. Devine Redding rushed for 227 yards on 35 carries! We won’t discuss Brian Knorr’s defense, though.
With all of the impressive notes about Guerreri, he is still just 33 years old, and with any 33-year-old coordinator, there will be concerns, such as how and why Duke saw regression in defensive metrics after Guerreri’s first season as co-defensive coordinator in 2019, how the Duke safety room’s development showed regression over time, and how Guerreri can scheme and call a defense on his own.
System
To understand Guerreri, we must also understand Knowles. He runs the defensive 4-2-5 scheme, critical to Allen’s vision for Indiana’s defense and the same scheme he’s run in Bloomington since 2016. Ohio State was already on its way toward implementing a Husky-adjacent position at this point, but Knowles brought a more refined 4-2-5 scheme to Columbus. Guerreri was largely brought on to help in teaching the scheme, ensuring its quick implementation. Knowles told The Lantern that his staff implemented about “two-thirds” of his scheme in just the one season.
At Duke, the system was dependent on strong linebacker and safety play (read more about that below), and at Ohio State, LB Tommy Eichenburg flourished when Knowles came to town. Safeties Ronnie Hickman and Lathan Ransom had insane breakout years too, so it would be worth keeping an eye on the No. 2 LB spot and the three safety positions (strong, free, and Husky) for Indiana. Those will likely determine how good this defense can be.
Husky (and safeties) at Ohio State
What determines the Husky’s role in a defense could be a number of things. Sometimes it’s a third safety spot or a third linebacker spot based on talent at either position. At other times, it’s a boost to pass rush or an added coverage defender. It’s fairly heavily dependent on each defense’s collection of skillsets. For Indiana in 2022, Noah Pierre offered a hard-hitting presence in the box or near the line of scrimmage. That presence also lended itself to pass rush, where Indiana was dismal. In 2023, Pierre will likely be there again for experience reasons, and because he doesn’t fit the pure safety and cornerback positions.
Thanks to my friends at Eleven Warriors, I learned that Knowles has names for each of his safeties within his system – Adjuster (free safety), Bandit (strong safety), and Nickel (currently Husky at IU and formerly Bullet at OSU). These aren’t necessarily unique names (I played Bandit at times for my high school and Nickel is universally known as the extra DB), but they’re a good insight into how Guerreri might handle the safeties, particularly the Husky.
Noah Pierre played the Husky for Indiana in 2022 and is likely expected to again in 2023. He is Indiana’s highest-graded returning defensive back, but among Big Ten DBs with at least 150 snaps, he ranked 88th last year. Much of this was due to his poor tackling and run defense, where he graded near the bottom nationally for DBs and was 7th-worst among qualifying Big Ten DBs. This was a bit concerning considering that’s central to his skillset. He shored up his tackling issues for the final five games of the season, though. He also tended to struggle in coverage as well, but this could be attributed to scheme.
While Pierre is not the same athlete as Tanner McCalister, who played the corresponding position for Ohio State in 2022, McCalister has a similar frame, at 5-11, 191 pounds, and was schemed well enough to contribute in both run defense and coverage, largely because fellow safeties Lathan Ransom and Ronnie Hickman were so versatile in their own rites. McCalister didn’t exactly make noise in his only year at OSU as he dealt with injuries, but he was effective because he didn’t need to make noise; he just couldn’t be a liability like the Husky position often has been for Indiana’s defense in recent years. His run defense grade was fourth among IU and Ohio State’s secondaries and 29th among Big Ten DBs, and his NFL passer rating when targeted was second-lowest among IU and Ohio State DBs and 18th among Big Ten DBs.
In terms of scheme, McCalister was used in coverage a bit more often than Pierre, lining up more often at safety and corner, while Pierre was used more often in pass rush. If you understand how poor Indiana’s pass rush was last season, it’s obvious why they added Pierre’s help.
For the safety group as a whole, Ohio State had more versatility to work with – McCalister and Ronnie Hickman are both playing for spots on the Cleveland Browns this summer and Lathan Ransom will be drafted – and Knowles was able to lean into that, moving those three all around the field. For Pierre, Devon Matthews, and Bryant Fitzgerald, there were varied alignments, but each had their own skillsets which limited versatility. That’s to be determined with the new faces at the position this year for Indiana.
It also must be noted that it appears Ohio State will be going with Sonny Styles at the Nickel (Husky) position in 2023. Styles is 6-4, 230 pounds, which will change how Ohio State uses the position. This might be the way Guerreri uses it too, but Styles was a top-30 prospect nationally, so maybe not.
Safeties (Duke version)
There is a lot of ground to cover for Guerreri’s time coaching safeties at Duke, so let me summarize by noting that from 2012 to 2015, Guerreri helped develop one of the best safeties rooms in the ACC (maybe the nation), saw an understandable downgrade at the position afterwards as he tried to rebuild, found some success in his first year as co-defensive coordinator, then saw the most defensive deterioration of his tenure in his last two years there.
I want to first highlight his first season as co-defensive coordinator and safeties coach – the same position he will serve at Indiana. That year (2019) was the best year during his three-year co-defensive coordinator span. Most notably, the Duke secondary recorded an 8% havoc rate (a plus number for the defensive backs). Marquis Waters was also the team’s best coverage defender that season, and Duke got a combined 51 stops (plays stopped due to individual effort) from its two primary safeties.
As mentioned earlier, he struggled to rebuild the safeties room following the unprecedented success of his first contributors.So, is there proof that he can develop safeties? The answer is yes.
Jeremy Cash: Guerreri’s greatest example of player development is Jeremy Cash, ranked No. 448 nationally coming out of high school. Cash enrolled at Ohio State but soon transferred to Duke in 2012. After sitting out a year for transferring, Cash exploded onto the scene as a Second Team All-American as a redshirt sophomore. In 2014, he was the only DB to have 100+ tackles, 10.0+ TFLs, and 5.0+ sacks. He later switched to LB and won ACC Defensive Player of the Year. Due to injuries and various other factors of the draft process, Cash went undrafted and jumped around a few teams but never clicked as a LB in the NFL.
DeVon Edwards: Guerreri also helped develop DeVon Edwards from a 2012 high school prospect outside of the top-2,000 and into a versatile safety. Edwards was selected as a Second Team All-American as a return specialist as a redshirt freshman (one of Duke’s greatest kick returners ever), but he also recorded 3 INTs and 64 tackles that year. As a sophomore, he added 133 tackles, 8 PBUs, and 5 forced fumbles. He was a regular All-ACC selection, and he displayed all of this at just 5-9, 180 pounds. An injury in Duke’s 2016 win over Notre Dame ended his career.
In 2014, Edwards and Cash combined for 244 tackles, 18 TFLs, 10 sacks, 3 INTs, 15 PBUs, 9 forced fumbles, and a fumble recovery. Both were developed with the help of Guerreri.
Deondre Singleton: Yet another plus for Guerreri was Deondre Singleton, who recorded 12 tackles against Indiana in the Pinstripe Bowl. Outside of the top-1,300 nationally coming out of high school, he came to Duke as a CB but moved to safety before his sophomore season. While Edwards and Cash tore it up in 2014, Singleton was fifth on the team in tackles and added 7 PBUs. His success throughout his career led to Duke landing its sixth-best recruit of all-time – Deondre’s little brother, Dylan.
Dwayne Norman: That 2012 offseason when Guerreri joined the staff, he came in with safety Dwayne Norman (ranked outside the top-1,300 nationally and No. 169 in Florida). Norman immediately stepped in and was fifth on the team in tackles during the 2012 season. Guerreri developed him into a dependable, versatile safety who forced his way onto the field by switching to LB as a senior in 2015 and was selected Second Team All-ACC.
The 2015 Duke defense that played against Kevin Wilson’s Indiana offense was full of players developed by Guerreri in Jim Knowles’ system. All four of the above players led that team in tackles, and by switching Cash and Norman to LB, they could fit all of them on the field at the same time. Cash was the only player inside the top-1,000 as a high school prospect.
Corbin McCarthy: McCarthy was needed at Duke for one full season in 2016. A two-star recruit coming out of high school, he backed up the stellar safeties of 2012-15 at Duke until a spot opened during his redshirt senior season. That year, he wasn’t as effective as the safeties before him, but he posted the second-best run defense grade on the team (4th on the team in tackles) and allowed 62.5% of his targets to be completed (for reference: that’s a better number than both 2022 IU starters, Bryant Fitzgerald and Devon Matthews).
You get the point. Guerreri can develop safeties. But there are concerns. First, Derek Jones was the defensive backs coach at Duke for four seasons before Guerreri was hired and retained that title for all but three years (2015-17) that Guerreri and Jones were both at Duke. Jones also was highly active in recruiting DBs (the primary recruiter for the Singleton brothers, for example). He has always had a specialty for CBs and currently coaches CBs at Virginia Tech, so one could assume most safety development was Guerreri’s, but Jones’ presence is noteworthy.
After the strong force that was Guerreri’s first batch of safeties, building that front back was a struggle. After the Corbin McCarthy 2016 season, some of their additions in recruiting were inconsistent at best, even though Duke had advanced from bringing in players outside of the top-1,500 prospects to players around the top-1,000 and better. Duke added 11 safeties in three classes (2015-17), and two of them became consistent contributors – four-star prospect Dylan Singleton and national No. 730 prospect Michael Carter (current New York Jet RB). Guerreri recruited and developed Carter.
Some would have hoped additions like Nate Thompson (No. 585), Damani Neal (No. 630), and Michigan transfer J’Marick Woods would’ve panned out a bit better. Even Dylan Singleton, who was the program’s sixth-highest commitment, was held to a higher standard than he achieved under Guerreri. There are others who struggled during the last days of Guerreri’s tenure at Duke and transferred to other programs (Marquis Waters at Texas Tech and Lummie Young at Tulane, for example) who showed improvement elsewhere. With that said, there have been flashes of over-achievement from others, such as Jordan Hayes, who transferred to UCF and didn’t play as well, and Da’Quan Johnson, who was recruited outside of the top-1,700 by Guerreri’s staff and is a decent contributor for Duke now. This is the nature of recruiting, but one would hope a class of five safeties, such as the 2017 Duke class, would’ve yielded more for them. The transfer portal helps patch these things over in 2020’s college football, though.
There had been a steady dose of new faces at the safety position for Duke by the end of Guerreri’s time, especially once the transfer portal opened. That can’t all be placed on Guerreri, just like not all of the development can be credited to him either. It’s likely somewhere in between. But his clear capability of, at the very least, getting solid production from almost any player for a short amount of time will help the safety position at Indiana in 2023.
And his part in building the formidable safeties room as soon as he joined Duke’s staff at 22 likely speaks louder than anything that followed.
Tackling
Among 103 Big Ten DBs with at least 150 snaps, the following are where Hoosiers ranked in terms of highest missed-tackle percentages:
7. Noah Pierre (24.3%) - returning
8. Josh Sanguinetti (24.0%) - returning
9. Brylan Lanier (23.5%)
12. Jonathan Haynes (22.4%)
16. Jaylin Williams (20.5%)
No other team had 5 DBs at or above 20%, and only Wisconsin had 3 at or above 20%. To review, Indiana had 5! Three of them played safety/Husky.
Since this stat was established in 2014 until he left Duke in 2021 (8 seasons), Guerreri had 9 safeties with at least 150 snaps record missed-tackle percentages of 20% or higher. Most of these occurred during his tenure as co-defensive coordinator at Duke, when 6 safeties (5 individuals) hit the mark in three years.
Zooming out, with Guerreri as co-defensive coordinator, Duke’s PFF tackling grade ranked 108th, 117th, and 108th, from 2019-21 respectively.
Has he shown an ability to coach premium tackling? Yes. Are there questions about whether he can fix it at Indiana? Sure.
Stopping the Run
Tom Allen has expressed this specifically: in 2023, he wants to run the ball and stop the run. Indiana graded 48th nationally in rush defense but allowed the 99th-most rushing yards per game last season. Allen is hoping that transfer additions along the line can help with this, as only 5 of IU’s top-20 run defenders (of anyone to take a snap last season) were defensive linemen, and none of those 5 returned.
For Guerreri, stopping the run has seen its successes and failures during his co-defensive coordinator years at Duke. His first year (2019) saw Duke rank 42nd in run defense, but the following two years were outside the top-90 run defenses.
Comparing Guerreri’s 2019 season to Indiana’s 2022 season, Duke’s defensive power success rate was better (70% to 62%), stuff rate was better (21% to 16%), and front seven havoc rate was better (12% to 9%).
Run defense is what Guerreri’s safeties at Duke have thrived on. Looking back at his slew of safeties in 2014, Duke was the only team to place four safeties in the top-17 ACC run defenders. In 2015, it was three in the top-21. As years went by, the rush defense presence from the safeties began to decrease, but that didn’t seem to affect the Duke run defense as a whole – ranking anywhere from top-60 to top-30 – until the bottom dropped out during Guerreri’s 2020 and 2021 seasons at Duke and they struggled to grade as a top-100 run defense.
Recruiting
Given Guerreri’s lack of defensive coordinator experience, when you ask anyone about him, recruiting comes up first. A players’ coach, Guerreri is beloved among those who’ve played for him, and that translates to recruiting.
One of the best ways to identify a good recruiting coach is by commitments he’s earned outside of his position (in Guerreri’s case, safety). A good example of this on Indiana’s staff is Kasey Teegardin. Guerreri’s highest-rated commitment was four-star safety Dylan Singleton in 2016, over Ohio State, Auburn, Georgia, and others. He earned that commitment (as the secondary recruiter) in large part because of how well Guerreri coached his brother, Deondre Singleton. After Singleton, though, his highest-rated commitments were all top-600 prospects at offensive guard, defensive tackle, linebacker, and offensive tackle (with a safety sprinkled in).
If one thing can be said about Guerreri and his eye for talent, he built his safeties success at Duke through identifying and developing talent that was available to Duke, and when Duke’s recruiting success jumped a level, he was part of it.
Overview
Guerreri was never going to have a perfect resume. Those coaches don’t exactly look to coach at Indiana. But what speaks loudest, besides that Jim Knowles trusted him to help teach the 4-2-5 system and turn around the Ohio State defense together, is that he contributed to developing what was the 2015 Duke safeties room at such a young age. Now we know why Kevin Wilson wanted him at Tulsa!
It’s fairly clear that the Jim Knowles system Guerreri will be deriving from in 2023 finds its success through strong linebacker and safety play. Indiana has Aaron Casey, of course, and it has a few options for the No. 2 LB role (Jacob Mangum-Farrar, Josh Rudolph, Lanell Carr, Matt Hohlt), which will be crucial. Based on the safeties he’s coached and developed, he likes a versatile player, which bodes well for Hoosiers like Tyrik McDaniel, JoJo Johnson, James Monds, Jordan Grier, and even Noah Pierre.
We also know that he has worked within the recruiting talent window that Indiana typically pulls from and has found fairly decent success doing so. His contributions in recruiting will likely be significant.
There are some legitimate questions, though. Can Guerreri produce without Jim Knowles? 2019 was the best indication of this, but 2020 and 2021 don’t bode super well. Can he improve the tackling quality of the defense? I lean yes, but there's data that makes it a less confident yes. Can Guerreri bring back the takeaways? The 2019 Duke defense ranked 34th in takeaways, and the 2020 defense was 13th, but few others he was a part of – even the early days – were founded on takeaways. Are some of the inconsistencies of Guerreri’s Duke days indicative of what he can do at Indiana? That’s to be determined.