McElroy faces ‘Tampa-2’ as he looks to rebound

TUSCALOOSA | Saturday won’t be the first time Greg McElroy has seen the Tampa-2 defense, and even though he’s a first-year starter, it won’t be his first time ever taking snaps against Tennessee, either.

But coming off his two least effective games of the season, the University of Alabama’s starting quarterback will try to rediscover his early-season success against a plan devised by UT defensive coordinator Monte Kiffin, a 26-year coaching veteran of the National Football League.

Throw in the Volunteers’ All-America safety, Eric Berry — who UA coach Nick Saban called one of the nation’s top defensive players — roaming the middle of the field, and the circumstances aren’t exactly ideal for McElroy’s recent skid to come to an end.

No matter.

“I’ve got a lot of confidence in the way that we’re going to prepare this week and the way that we’re going to be ready to go on Saturday. I’m excited to get those mistakes ironed out and to have a good game on Saturday,” McElroy said earlier in the week.

The Tampa-2 defense has its roots in the championship defenses of the Pittsburgh Steelers of the 1970s, but a few changes by Kiffin and Tony Dungy popularized the scheme when the two coached together with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Saban said he recognized Kiffin’s genius long before his years with the Bucs.

“Actually, he really gained fortune and fame as a really good defensive coordinator in college for many, many years. And probably made some innovations in the game relative to coordinating fronts and coverages and doing some things that nobody had done before,” Saban said. “I remember going to visit him when he was at Arkansas -- and this was back in the ’70s. In pro football, he sort of developed what is called Tampa-2 as a coverage way to play. That was effective for a long time. And right now at Tennessee, they probably do a combination of both of those things.

“He’s just a really good teacher, a really good coach, has a lot of knowledge and experience and has done a really good job this year helping their defense develop.”

The scheme emphasizes speed over size, and also requires an exceptional middle linebacker who is athletic enough to be effective in pass coverage. The Tampa-2 has been adopted by various teams both around the NFL and at the college level. In fact, McElroy already has seen some of it this season.

“Tampa-2 is actually a form of Cover 3. You actually do it when you have a very good middle linebacker, somebody like Coach Kiffin had at Tampa in Derrick Brooks,” McElroy said. “The safeties get extremely wide off the hash and the middle linebacker shoots straight to the back, so it actually develops a three-deep look.

“Coach Kiffin’s actually the founder of that defense, I believe. I never thought I’d be playing against him. That’s pretty neat.”

According to UT head coach Lane Kiffin, Monte’s son, Berry has adapted not only to the Tampa-2 but all the various coverages the Volunteers’ first-year staff has installed. Considered a surefire first-round NFL draft pick, Berry leads Tennessee in solo tackles with 35 and has the coverage skills of a cornerback.

Lane Kiffin, however, suggested that it’s the defensive front that drives the Tampa-2, and that it could be years before the Volunteers go to the scheme wholesale.

“We’ve moved Eric around a lot in a lot of different places and Eric’s done really well. There’s a lot of conversations about the Tampa-2 defense, (but) that’s just one thing that we do and we don’t even run it that much as maybe we will some day,” the younger Kiffin said. “We have to stop the run now and build from up front and one day when we have a defensive line that’s been with us for awhile with four great rushers, then (the Tampa-2) becomes something we do more. I think it gets overpublicized a little bit.”

After completing roughly two-thirds of his passes through the first five games of the season, McElroy has completed less than 50 percent over the last two games (25 of 54). In a 20-6 win over South Carolina last Saturday, he threw for just 92 yards, but the Crimson Tide got a 246-yard rushing performance from sophomore Mark Ingram to help carry the offense.

“Greg has done a good job this week (in practice),” Saban said. “Sometimes you can get caught up a little bit in focusing more on how you’re playing than what you’re doing -- how you’re doing, rather that what you’re doing. We don’t want our players to focus on how they’re doing, we want them to focus on what they’re doing on this play, at this time, and all the things that they have to do fundamentally to be successful on that play.”

Reach Chase Goodbread at chase.goodbread@tuscaloosanews.com, or at 205-722-0196