Penn State has a fun new offense, but fans should be very patient

After yet another underwhelming season with yet another underwhelming offense, Penn State fired offensive coordinator John Donovan.

That decision was met with much rejoicing from Nittany Lions fans. Donovan’s offense ranked 101st in points per game and 79th in yards per play this year, despite entering the season with a top-tier NFL quarterback prospect. Donovan’s firing gave Penn State a chance to try something new, and that’s what it did.

James Franklin hired Fordham head coach Joe Moorhead, bringing in a new offense that is read-intensive and relies on quick decision-making from the quarterback to pick apart opposing defenses.

Here’s Moorhead explaining his offense:

We want to be up-tempo. We want to be attacking. We want to dictate the speed of the game. We want to get our kids in the best play possible against the look that is presented. That’s one thing about being no-huddle, and having the coaches change the play affords you that opportunity.

With Christian Hackenberg departing for the NFL, Penn State will probably be starting redshirt sophomore Trace McSorley or redshirt freshman Tommy Stevens at quarterback. McSorley looked decent in the TaxSlayer Bowl loss to Georgia, going 14-of-27 passing for 142 yards, two touchdowns and no interceptions.

Moorhead’s offense emphasizes coverage reads, rather than the progression reads Penn State fans are used to from Donovan’s offense. Coverage reads mean making throws based on how the defenders react, rather than going through receiver options one-by-one. The formations and play calls are simple, but they’re based on the quarterback having to make split-second pre-snap and post-snap reads. That can lead to disastrous mistakes from a quarterback who hasn’t had years to study the offense, and particularly for a quarterback who has never seen meaningful game action in college, as explained by Smart Football’s Chris Brown:

Coverage reads are great in theory (and maybe are great for long-term, established NFL quarterbacks) but they are not easy to teach and -- because while one defender might react as expected you might not be able to predict where the others are, thus causing problems -- they can even be misleading.

That might be a bit extreme, as Fordham has proved you don’t need an NFL quarterback to do well in this offense. But Penn State should absolutely be concerned about the implementation.

Moorhead’s last foray in FBS showed some of those issues. His offenses at Connecticut ranked 56th and 95th in yards per play in 2009 and 2010, respectively. The Huskies flipped between quarterbacks, and neither was very successful.

Coach Randy Edsall did not take Moorhead with him when he left for Maryland, and Moorhead was subsequently demoted to quarterbacks coach under new coach Paul Pasqualoni. A year later, he left for Fordham.

The story was different at Fordham, for whatever reason -- maybe offensive refinement, maybe the competition -- and Moorhead’s quarterbacks were far better.

Fordham played one FBS team in 2015, a 37-35 win over Army. As Black Shoe Diaries showed, Moorhead’s take-what-the-defense-gives-you offense was dominant, particularly with play-action. The Black Knights’ linebackers and safeties were constantly fooled by play-fakes, and Fordham brilliantly took advantage of blitzes and man coverage.

Here, the play-action draws both blitzing Army safeties in, before the QB finds an open receiver on the crossing route:

Later in the quarter, two linebackers bite HARD and take themselves out of the play:

An offense with a weak offensive line that puts more responsibility on a young quarterback to recognize defenses could be a dangerous proposition, but Moorhead’s made this work before.