Welcome back to “Breakdown,” where we’ll look at a KU play each week and try to go a little more in-depth into why it did or didn’t work.

For this blog, I have consulted a Div. II offensive assistant coach, someone we’ll just call “Coach.”

Here is a replay of Josh Gordon’s 94-yard touchdown reception in Baylor’s 55-7 victory over Kansas. You can click back to this video later in the blog if you need to.

Immediately, Coach notices something unusual in Baylor’s formation for this play.

The Bears’ two receivers are lined up to the short side of the field — also called the boundary.

Typically, teams put their receivers to the wide side of the field, which gives them more room to run their routes.

So why would Baylor do this? In short, the Bears’ coaching staff is trying to exploit a weakness in KU’s defense.

Baylor’s tight end goes in motion before the snap. Let’s take a look at what happens. (The “ghost” players are where each player lined up before the tight end motions, while the filled-in players are where each player lined up after the tight end motions.)

Coach says that because of the motion, KU rolls its coverage.

Safety Lubbock Smith (bottom blue arrow) positions himself further toward the bottom of the screen so he can defend the tight end.

At the top of the screen, KU safety Phillip Strozier backs off the receiver he’s covering about four yards.

Why is that? Coach says it’s because KU’s two secondary players are now matched up man-to-man at the top of the screen.

“You don’t expect your safety to be able to cover one of these guys man-to-man if they run a deep-type route,” Coach says.

Because he is a safety — and not a cornerback — Strozier backs off to make sure he isn’t beaten down the field.

After the tight end goes in motion, Coach says it’s a simple numbers game.

KU has three secondary players to cover two tight ends at the bottom of the screen, but just two secondary players (one of which is a safety) to cover two receivers at the top.

“Technically, they’re not wrong. That’s probably what they’re being coached to do,” Coach says. “But it’s just not an ideal situation.”

Coach says these are the types of tendencies that college coaches look for in film study early in the week so that they can come up with successful play calls on game days.

There are two more crucial elements to making this play work.

The first is the play-action fake to the running back.

The fake to the running back gets the flow of the play going to KU’s right. Notice that defensive end Keba Agostinho (top right arrow), linebacker Steven Johnson (top middle), linebacker Justin Springer (bottom middle) and safety Lubbock Smith (bottom left) all take a couple steps to their right to try to defend against the run.

“The play-fake does its job,” Coach says, “in getting those guys to hold off just a second before they trigger on the throw.”

The other crucial part to this play for Baylor is downfield blocking.

The inside receiver’s job is to block KU cornerback Chris Harris, while the right tackle has the responsibility of getting quickly to the outside to block Strozier.

With some open space on the outside, the Baylor players execute cut blocks, going low to try to cut the KU defenders’ legs out from under them.

As we can see from the replay, both of Baylor’s players throw great blocks, creating an easy alley for Gordon.

When Harris and Strozier are taken out of the play, only two KU defenders are left to make the tackle: Johnson and Smith.

Johnson has the best shot, but he’s unable to make a shoestring tackle on the sideline.

Meanwhile, Smith never can catch up to Gordon in a footrace.

Coach says both players could have helped their cause by taking better angles to the ball.

Both Johnson and Smith appear to underestimate Gordon’s speed, taking direct routes to him, shown by the blue arrows below.

The red arrows above would have been better routes to the ball.

“(The defenders need) to run to where the receiver’s going,” Coach says, “not to where he’s at.”

In the end, Coach says Baylor’s alignment, assignment and execution all contributed to the 94-yard touchdown — the longest in Baylor history.

It also goes to show that a little bit of film work has the potential to go a long way, as Baylor’s offensive coaches used the right formation and motion to get the numbers in their favor.