How Kansas State surprised Stanford with inside run to Deuce Vaughn on third-and-long
Had a common fan known in advance that Kansas State offensive coordinator Courtney Messingham called for an inside run to Deuce Vaughn on third-and-13 in the second quarter against Stanford last week, that fan probably would have thrown his or her arms up in disgust.
For good reason.
Running between the tackles when you need 13 yards for a first down is rarely a smart idea. The vast majority of teams would have looked to throw down field in that situation.
But K-State football coach Chris Klieman had a very different reaction when he heard the play call over his head set on Saturday at AT&T Stadium. He smiled as the following words streamed through his head: This could be a touchdown.
“There’s not a lot of great calls on third and 11-plus,” Klieman said, “unless you just hand the ball to Deuce.”
Skylar Thompson was also confident as the senior quarterback stood at midfield and relayed the play to his teammates.
“That was a game plan thing that we saw in third-and-long,” Thompson said, “just the way that they lined up and played. We saw a play on film from the previous season against them that a team had success running inside zone versus them in third and long. If we targeted it right, we knew that we could get Deuce one-on-one with a guy. We like our matchup in that aspect to get loose.”
Sure enough, Vaughn took the ensuing handoff from Thompson and not only ran for a first down but sprinted 59 yards for a touchdown that gave the Wildcats a 14-0 lead. The play worked so perfectly that he wasn’t even touched.
“They put me in a great position to make a play,” Vaughn said.
That was an encouraging highlight for the Wildcats.
Unlike many teams in the Big 12, K-State doesn’t try to win shootouts with flashy offenses. The Wildcats like to run the ball, control the clock and pass only when it makes sense to do so. Klieman hired Messingham has his offensive coordinator at both North Dakota State and K-State to effectively zig while others zag.
When his offense is humming, it’s a thing of beauty that can produce demoralizing 15-play drives. But it’s rarely great for playing catch up or converting third-and-long.
Finding a simple way to move the chains, and score, against Stanford could bode well for the future.
“It throws off tendencies, for sure, as far as being able to just throw vertical games or drop-back games or screen games on your third and extra long that you can hand the ball off and block it up well,” Klieman said. “Once again, I give our offensive staff and offensive line credit for picking up the kind of stunt that they had, and we’re able to wall everybody off and make a big play.”
Here’s a closer look at how it happened:
K-State lined up in a four-receiver formation with Seth Porter, Sammy Wheeler and Phillip Brooks on the left and Malik Knowles on the right. Stanford countered by defending them in man coverage with two blitzers bringing pressure on the right and one safety lingering back.
Conventional wisdom suggested Stanford would have six pass-rushers trying to beat five K-State offensive linemen and Vaughn to Thompson before he could unload a pass. And that defensive strategy easily could have worked if K-State was intending to throw.
But giving the ball to Vaughn changed everything.
“We had seen that look,” Vaughn said. “Whenever it was a third-and-long, they would be in a really soft coverage to the point where it kind of dropped everybody outside into a zone to the point where you can’t get to the outside. So it left things open in the middle.”
With four Stanford pass-rushers heading right and two more heading left, K-State’s offensive line was able to build a wall in the middle of the field. That left a gigantic hole for Vaughn to run through.
“I saw the way they lined up was very similar to what we saw on film,” Thompson said. “They brought pressure away from the run, which is what we want. I knew pre-snap that we had a good shot to convert on it.”
The hard work was done. The only thing standing between Vaughn and the end zone was Stanford safety Noah Williams. And, well, Vaughn is going to win that matchup 99 times out of 100. Vaughn cut to his right at midfield and zoomed past everyone else on the field on his way into the end zone.
When it was over, Vaughn deferred all credit to K-State coaches.
They did their home work on Stanford and came up with a play that surprised everyone other than themselves.
This story was originally published September 8, 2021 at 10:20 AM with the headline "How Kansas State surprised Stanford with inside run to Deuce Vaughn on third-and-long."