Venables challenges manhood of his defense

by David Hood - Senior Writer - Fri Sep 14 00:27:53 GMT-04:00 2012

CLEMSON – The Clemson defense gave up 232 rushing yards to Ball St. last Saturday, a week after giving up 200 to Auburn in the season opener.

Film study was not a pleasant place to be on Monday.

Defensive coordinator Brent VenablesBrent Venables
Defensive Coordinator / Linebackers
View Full Profile gathered the entire defense together, and showed the running plays that the Cardinals ran with success. No trickery, no sleight-of-hand. The Cardinals ran straight at the Tiger defense, and Venables wanted his defense to understand what had occurred.

He picked out certain plays, and ran them over and over, according to defensive tackle DeShawn WilliamsDeShawn Williams
So. Defensive Tackle
#99 6-1, 285
Central, SC
View Full Profile , and then challenged the manhood of his young defense.

“He was in there, and we met as a group,” Williams told TigerNet this week. “He kept rewinding the plays and let everybody know what happened. He just kept rewinding them. He says that when somebody runs the ball at you, that tests your manhood and you have to show pride and stop the run.”

Defensive tackle Josh WatsonJosh Watson
RS So. Defensive Tackle
#91 6-4, 285
Wilmington, DE
View Full Profile agreed with the assessment that their manhood was being challenged, and that being young was not an excuse.

“I don’t like it at all,” Watson said. “We scored 50-some points, but I was still unhappy after the game. It’s testing your manhood. Someone running right up the middle, that’s unacceptable, no matter who it is. We’re a young team, that’s no excuse. We know our job, we’ve got to do our job. There’s no excuse for not knowing our job, so I think you’ll start to see it this week. That’s too many rushing yards allowed on us these first two games and I’m tired of reading about it and hearing about it.”

Williams said seeing the Cardinals run with so much success was hard to stomach.

“Any defense, you don’t want to see a team run for 200-plus yards,” Williams said. “That is not good, and that is not acceptable. We just have to do a better job this week of being more focused. We can’t look ahead to Florida St. – we have to focus on Furman, because they are a good team and they will sneak up and get you. We just have to take care of business this week.”

Williams said that he expects Furman to try and run the ball this week, taking a page out of the Ball St. playbook.

“When you can’t stop the run, the offense just laughs at you,” he said. “They say, ‘Hah, you can’t stop us’ and they just keep running it. We have to be stouter this week. We know they are going to try and run the football, and we have to stop it. What you saw against Ball St. - that's not us. It was us; it wasn't them. We missed tackles in the backfield. We'd have everything jammed up and they'd pop it loose. We have to take more pride in stopping the run."

Watson said he thinks the defense will improve as the season progresses and the younger players - himself included – perfect their technique.

“After I get through with a play, I run through the play in my mind, I can tell you exactly what I did wrong,” Watson said. “Or looking at the film I can tell you before [DT] coach [Dan] Brooks even gets to it, and write down exactly what he’s going to write down on the play. They’re not like mental errors, just little technique things that’ll help the defense be more stout, be a wall instead of gaping holes here and there. We’ve got to get into the film room, get on the practice field and correct mistakes.”

Watson said the defense simply has to focus on doing its job.

“The offense is looking for one crease, one mess-up,” he said. “If you don’t do your job, the running back’s going to find that hole, and they did Saturday. Those are things we have to get corrected. It’s not talent, it’s just us doing our job.”