Stretching the Field: Why We Use Wide Splits

How using extreme receiver splits transformed our passing game.

As a young OC who got his first job at the height of Baylor’s “Veer and Shoot,” I was always intrigued by the offense. Its simplicity is what drew me in. Not just the flashy scoring that it was putting up, but it’s a similar philosophy to what we were doing with our Wide Zone: Get boringly good at a few concepts that could adjust and attack any defense.

Though we had found that in our run game with Wide Zone we still carried too much in our passing game. We suffered from the same inefficiency that plagued our running game a few years ago.

Ten years after becoming an OC it came full circle, and as we searched for a solution for our passing game we came across materials for teaching the Choice routes and how to utilize wide splits.

Experimenting with Wide Splits

The summer before our 2022 season we began to implement wider splits with our receivers. We had always been a team with a balanced philosophy, and that was the same with the “Veer and Shoot.” We wanted a physical run game that forced teams into 1 high and man coverages and use screens and choice routes to stretch the defense vertically and horizontally when we had the 1 on 1 matchups.

Rules for aligning

We have rules in place to give a minimum split but give receivers the option to align for success. We’ll get deeper into the specifics later, but some concepts are better with a wider split, and others are better at hugging the hash more. As the receivers learn the system, they will naturally move around accordingly.