From OnlineAthens.com
March 12th, 2016 10:07 AM
Days before Bob Shoop prepared to try and stop Georgia’s offense in its bowl game to end the 2015 season, the defensive coordinator was asked to look ahead to what Jim Chaney will bring to the Bulldogs running the unit in 2016 for Kirby Smart.
Shoop spoke from the experience of having gone up against Chaney twice head-to-head when Shoop ran Vanderbilt’s defense and Chaney was offensive coordinator at Tennessee.
“The things he does really well: He’s very balanced and he uses the personnel to his advantage,” Shoop said. “Here’s a guy who’s coached Drew Brees back in the late 90s at Purdue and has tailored his offense to be a run-first offense at Arkansas and Pitt. He’s unpredictable and I think that’s what Kirby likes about him. I don’t want to speak for Coach Smart, but Coach Smart has gone against him as well and recognizes that he’s always a challenge.”
Shoop will face that challenge once again because he left Penn State after the Nittany Lions’ 24-17 TaxSlayer Bowl loss to Georgia and was hired by Butch Jones to take over as Tennessee defensive coordinator on Jan. 9.
Tennessee visits Sanford Stadium on Oct. 1 in the first SEC home game of the year for Georgia.
Will Georgia’s offense then lean heavily on a running game with Nick Chubb (returning from a knee injury) and Sony Michel or will Chaney be able to help jump start a Georgia passing game that lacked firepower last season?
“This spring is probably going to be a really good indicator of being able to sit back as an offensive coordinator and evaluate where you are as a team, especially as an offensive team for Georgia, then being able to plug and play to what your strengths are,” said John Congemi, an ESPN analyst on TV and radio who worked a Pittsburgh game last year against Miami during Chaney’s one season as Panthers offensive coordinator and called Georgia’s games against Georgia Southern and Penn State. “That’s probably what Jim does the best. Analyze where they are as an offense and try to get the best out of them. I think that’s what this spring and summer will be about.”
Congemi, a former Pittsburgh quarterback, also was in the booth for Chaney’s last game at Arkansas against Texas in the Texas Bowl in 2014. Offensive line coach Sam Pittman from Arkansas has reunited with Chaney at Georgia.
"I believe that you fundamentally have got to be a physical football team to be a champion in any level of football," Chaney told the Pittsburgh-Post Gazette last year.
“You bring a head coach in with the pedigree on defense and the success that he’s had and you couple that with an offensive line coach and coach Chaney’s knowledge of how that works in tandem,” Congemi said. “I think balance is probably the best way to summarize it. You’d love to be able to rely on being able to win strictly on being able to win on the ground and be able to play keep away and win with an aggressive defense, protect the football and see where you go. That’s just not 100 percent what college football is now. Even in the SEC, you still need to be able to throw the football and I think that a good mix of run and play-action off of that and getting that to the skill guys on the outside, that’s a remedy for anyone in that conference.”
Like Shoop and Congemi, Smart used the the word balance when talking about what attracted him to Chaney as his offensive coordinator.
“He’s always been able to run the ball when he had to run the ball and throw the ball when that was a strength of his,” Smart said. “He has a multiple offense, uses a lot of formations. He uses the tight ends well. He’s really a guy that uses whatever personnel he has and that intrigued me.”
Chaney had a pair of 1,000-yard rushers in in Jonathan Williams and Alex Collins at Arkansas in 2014.
Two years before that, Chaney’s Tenneessee offense ranked 15th in the nation in passing at 315.6 yards per game behind quarterback Tyler Bray and wide receivers Justin Hunter and Cordarelle Patterson.
“Their problems on that 2012 team certainly weren’t on offense, they were on defense,” said Shoop, who was on the winning side of a 41-18 decision that season but lost 27-21 in overtime in 2011 to the Vols. “They were very explosive. We played one of our better games that week against those guys.”
Pittsburgh’s offense ranked 82nd nationally in total yards and 68th in scoring last season, but lost tailback James Conner, the returning ACC Player of the Year, in the first game to a season-ending knee injury and Tennessee transfer quarterback Nathan Peterman became the starter.
With Chaney as offensive coordinator at Purdue, the Boilermakers ranked fourth in the nation in 2000 in total offense, seventh in 2002 and 13th in 2004.
Drew Brees led a sixth ranked passing offense in 2000 and Kyle Orton the No. 4 in 2004.
“I haven’t been on the field with him yet but looking he coached Drew Brees and Kyle Orton and guys like that,” Georgia five-star freshman quarterback Jacob Eason said. “He’s coached young, freshmen quarterbacks and they’ve succeeded. I kind of look at that. Hopefully I want to be like one of those guys. I’m going to do the best I can to learn from him and I know he’s going to give me his all when he’s teaching me.”
Chaney hasn’t shown he is a sure-fire thing as offensive coordinator.
In the last six seasons, his offenses have ranked 75th or lower four times in total offense and 58th or lower four times in scoring offense.
Still, Shoop lauds Chaney saying he’s “really smart, he’s really organized, he’s really thorough.”
Congemi calls Chaney “ just a really good football coach. I think his personality is a factor in being able to see things and get things out of young men, get the best and get the most out of them. Just by being in meetings with him, he’s real personable, he knows football, he knows the strengths and weaknesses of his team.”
Said Smart: “I’ve had to call defenses against him and he’s created a lot of issues in what he does. He takes his best players and gets his best players the ball. That’s what football is to me, that’s what’s hard to defend and I’ve always thought he always has done a good job with that.”
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March 12th, 2016 10:07 AM
Days before Bob Shoop prepared to try and stop Georgia’s offense in its bowl game to end the 2015 season, the defensive coordinator was asked to look ahead to what Jim Chaney will bring to the Bulldogs running the unit in 2016 for Kirby Smart.
Shoop spoke from the experience of having gone up against Chaney twice head-to-head when Shoop ran Vanderbilt’s defense and Chaney was offensive coordinator at Tennessee.
“The things he does really well: He’s very balanced and he uses the personnel to his advantage,” Shoop said. “Here’s a guy who’s coached Drew Brees back in the late 90s at Purdue and has tailored his offense to be a run-first offense at Arkansas and Pitt. He’s unpredictable and I think that’s what Kirby likes about him. I don’t want to speak for Coach Smart, but Coach Smart has gone against him as well and recognizes that he’s always a challenge.”
Shoop will face that challenge once again because he left Penn State after the Nittany Lions’ 24-17 TaxSlayer Bowl loss to Georgia and was hired by Butch Jones to take over as Tennessee defensive coordinator on Jan. 9.
Tennessee visits Sanford Stadium on Oct. 1 in the first SEC home game of the year for Georgia.
Will Georgia’s offense then lean heavily on a running game with Nick Chubb (returning from a knee injury) and Sony Michel or will Chaney be able to help jump start a Georgia passing game that lacked firepower last season?
“This spring is probably going to be a really good indicator of being able to sit back as an offensive coordinator and evaluate where you are as a team, especially as an offensive team for Georgia, then being able to plug and play to what your strengths are,” said John Congemi, an ESPN analyst on TV and radio who worked a Pittsburgh game last year against Miami during Chaney’s one season as Panthers offensive coordinator and called Georgia’s games against Georgia Southern and Penn State. “That’s probably what Jim does the best. Analyze where they are as an offense and try to get the best out of them. I think that’s what this spring and summer will be about.”
Congemi, a former Pittsburgh quarterback, also was in the booth for Chaney’s last game at Arkansas against Texas in the Texas Bowl in 2014. Offensive line coach Sam Pittman from Arkansas has reunited with Chaney at Georgia.
"I believe that you fundamentally have got to be a physical football team to be a champion in any level of football," Chaney told the Pittsburgh-Post Gazette last year.
“You bring a head coach in with the pedigree on defense and the success that he’s had and you couple that with an offensive line coach and coach Chaney’s knowledge of how that works in tandem,” Congemi said. “I think balance is probably the best way to summarize it. You’d love to be able to rely on being able to win strictly on being able to win on the ground and be able to play keep away and win with an aggressive defense, protect the football and see where you go. That’s just not 100 percent what college football is now. Even in the SEC, you still need to be able to throw the football and I think that a good mix of run and play-action off of that and getting that to the skill guys on the outside, that’s a remedy for anyone in that conference.”
Like Shoop and Congemi, Smart used the the word balance when talking about what attracted him to Chaney as his offensive coordinator.
“He’s always been able to run the ball when he had to run the ball and throw the ball when that was a strength of his,” Smart said. “He has a multiple offense, uses a lot of formations. He uses the tight ends well. He’s really a guy that uses whatever personnel he has and that intrigued me.”
Chaney had a pair of 1,000-yard rushers in in Jonathan Williams and Alex Collins at Arkansas in 2014.
Two years before that, Chaney’s Tenneessee offense ranked 15th in the nation in passing at 315.6 yards per game behind quarterback Tyler Bray and wide receivers Justin Hunter and Cordarelle Patterson.
“Their problems on that 2012 team certainly weren’t on offense, they were on defense,” said Shoop, who was on the winning side of a 41-18 decision that season but lost 27-21 in overtime in 2011 to the Vols. “They were very explosive. We played one of our better games that week against those guys.”
Pittsburgh’s offense ranked 82nd nationally in total yards and 68th in scoring last season, but lost tailback James Conner, the returning ACC Player of the Year, in the first game to a season-ending knee injury and Tennessee transfer quarterback Nathan Peterman became the starter.
With Chaney as offensive coordinator at Purdue, the Boilermakers ranked fourth in the nation in 2000 in total offense, seventh in 2002 and 13th in 2004.
Drew Brees led a sixth ranked passing offense in 2000 and Kyle Orton the No. 4 in 2004.
“I haven’t been on the field with him yet but looking he coached Drew Brees and Kyle Orton and guys like that,” Georgia five-star freshman quarterback Jacob Eason said. “He’s coached young, freshmen quarterbacks and they’ve succeeded. I kind of look at that. Hopefully I want to be like one of those guys. I’m going to do the best I can to learn from him and I know he’s going to give me his all when he’s teaching me.”
Chaney hasn’t shown he is a sure-fire thing as offensive coordinator.
In the last six seasons, his offenses have ranked 75th or lower four times in total offense and 58th or lower four times in scoring offense.
Still, Shoop lauds Chaney saying he’s “really smart, he’s really organized, he’s really thorough.”
Congemi calls Chaney “ just a really good football coach. I think his personality is a factor in being able to see things and get things out of young men, get the best and get the most out of them. Just by being in meetings with him, he’s real personable, he knows football, he knows the strengths and weaknesses of his team.”
Said Smart: “I’ve had to call defenses against him and he’s created a lot of issues in what he does. He takes his best players and gets his best players the ball. That’s what football is to me, that’s what’s hard to defend and I’ve always thought he always has done a good job with that.”
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