The unique, prolific offense that has engineered Trent Miller’s teams to three regional semifinal appearances in the last four years was implemented out of necessity.
After a first-round playoff loss to The Woodlands in 2019, Miller, then the head football coach at Spring, and his coaching staff went to work tinkering with the Lions’ offense, mostly two-back personnel heavy with jet sweeps and orbit motions. A quarterback-read run game.
They started discussing the “empty stuff.” That is, empty formation — no back in the backfield, five wide receivers.
Then the COVID-19 pandemic hit in March that offseason.
“We had nothing but time to watch videos from all of these schools,” Miller said. “We had four months to sit behind a computer screen or TV and take all these ideas, all these pass protections, all these route concepts and mold them into what fit us.”
Miller extracted inspiration from Mike Leach, Lincoln Riley and Jeff Lebby. Concepts from the Hal Mumme era were entertained, as well as what Dabo Swinney runs at Clemson.
To incorporate some of the quarterback run game, Miller looked at what Chip Kelly did when he was at UCLA. In regard to tempo and play-calling, he studied Art Briles’ time at Baylor.
“As a play-caller,” Miller stressed, laughing, of what, and all, he took from the now-disgraced Briles. “He was a phenomenal play-caller.”
Miller felt his offense could be renovated because of Bishop Davenport, a promising sophomore backup in 2019 who would take over as starter in 2020 and was the pro-style quarterback Miller desires.
Davenport, now playing at Utah State, would be the centerpiece. Cadyn Bradley, QB1 in 2019, was moved to receiver.
Spring now had four solid receivers and a good running back to accompany a star quarterback.
But, and here’s where the empty formation became less of a want and more of a need, Spring had an offensive line that wasn’t big or fast.
“People look at me like I’m crazy when they ask why I went to that empty set,” Miller said. “I tell them because our offensive line was undersized. Our thought process was if we spread everybody out, we make the defense cover five receivers out wide, the worst-case scenario is it’s five-on-five in the box.
“If our offensive line doesn’t have to think, they just have to block the man in front of them, then we’ve eliminated half the battle for them. The whole deal started because we were trying to protect our offensive line. It caught fire, we built on concepts, sliding protections, to get it to where it is now.”
HOUSTON HS FOOTBALL: Games to watch in regional semifinals
Gifted and talented
Where it is now is Willis, where Miller is in his second year at the helm and leading the program to historic heights.
The Wildkats are enjoying their best season in 61 years.
The catalyst is senior Florida commit D.J. Lagway, one of the best high school quarterbacks in the country.
Lagway, a Class of 2024 five-star recruit, is in the conversation for MaxPreps and Gatorade national player of the year honors, masterfully directs an offense averaging 56.9 points on 548.7 yards per game.
His weapons include four-star sophomore receiver Jermaine Bishop Jr. and three-star senior receiver DeBraun Hampton.
Lagway has enabled an enhanced variation of Miller’s offense. He has completed 73.9 percent of his passes for 4,269 yards and 56 touchdowns to eight interceptions. He has rushed 84 times for 845 yards and 15 touchdowns.
The 6-foot-2, 230-pounder is two touchdown passes away from owning the state’s Class 6A single-season record.
“With D.J. back there, the offense is the special product that it is now,” Miller said. “If teams want to bring six-man pressure, obviously we only have five guys to block and he’s good enough to know how to slide one way and then he takes the sixth guy. He throws hot off of that guy, or we slide the protection just wide enough to where he can find a crease and get underneath it. If they’re going to bring six, then there’s nobody left at the second level to tackle him.”
Willis (12-0) plays reigning state champ DeSoto (11-0) in the Region II-Class 6A Division II semifinals at 7 p.m. Friday at the Alamodome in San Antonio in a classic offense-versus-defense affair.
DeSoto is surrendering just 16.5 points per game and has allowed 10 or fewer points in a game four times this year. The 42 points Willis scored against Tomball Memorial last week is the fewest it has scored in a game all year.
If No. 14-state ranked Willis is to have a shot at upsetting No. 2 DeSoto, its vaunted empty formation, which Miller said the Wildkats use about 80 percent of the time, will have to deliver its most potent results yet.
“We don’t see a lot of that up here, but at the same time we’ve seen it a little bit,” DeSoto coach Claude Mathis said of the empty set. “They’re different from the teams we play. When you play teams like that, you prepare the best you can and put your kids in the best situations to make plays and hopefully they make those plays. We have to be disciplined.”
Miller and Mathis are familiar with each other.
Spring lost to DeSoto 27-21 in the regional semifinals in 2020. Miller said he has taken a lot from that experience in applying it to game-planning this week.
“The good thing is DeSoto does what they do, offensively and defensively,” Miller said. “We watched that video from 2020 and, schematically, they do the exact same things. It’s affirming to our kids to know they haven’t played anyone all year that does what we do offensively. We have a pretty good idea of what we’re going to see (defensively).”
Mathis, who lauded Miller’s work with quarterbacks and skill players, said he gains nothing from 2020’s meeting.
“He’s (Miller) got a totally different team,” Mathis said. “I’m not even going to go back and look at that. I just want to focus on his team that he has right now. I really think they’re playing phenomenal right now, and I think we’ve got our work cut out for us.”
‘A chance to shock the nation’
Miller said he feels very good about how his team matches up against DeSoto.
DeSoto is strong in the front seven and stops the run well. The Eagles have compiled 50.5 sacks and 101 tackles for loss. They have seven interceptions in 11 games.
“Fortunately for us, we don’t run the ball very much,” Miller said. “It’ll be a matter of us to pass protect up front and take advantage of the holes they leave in some of their zone coverages.”
DeSoto has its own D.J. at quarterback in senior D.J. Bailey, a Sam Houston State commit who has thrown for 2,477 yards and 32 touchdowns to one interception.
“Our quarterback is dang good, too,” Mathis said. “He has a strong arm, he’s smart. He goes through progressions. He understands the system. He demands greatness out of his offense.”
Mathis said he loves the way his team is playing but it is far from a polished product.
“We’re trying to become great, and there are some things we’ve got to work on in order to become great,” Mathis said. “I like our chances. I like my team. I want us to become great, and in order to do so we’ve got to take care of the little things. That’s what we’re working on right now.”
The Eagles have a great running back in senior Marvin Duffey and a pair of gifted receivers in senior Antonio Pride and junior Daylon Singleton.
The offensive line is monstrous, anchored by 6-foot-8, 380-pound junior tackle Byron Washington. No Eagle offensive lineman stands shorter than 6-foot-1 or weighs less than 310 pounds.
Still, Miller is anything but concerned.
“There’s not anybody in the country, I don’t think, that has an offensive line that’s better than The Woodlands High School, and we played them well,” Miller said. “Our kids have seen that, so if we can just slow (DeSoto) down and force some turnovers, man, I think we have a chance to shock the nation.”
Miller is proud of what he’s seen from his team when faced with adversity, like it did in consecutive wins decided by a combined 22 points against The Woodlands and Oak Ridge to close the regular season.
It’s what gives him hope that Willis can take anything DeSoto throws its way.
“When we get faced with that adversity and our back’s against the wall, our kids come out swinging and don’t back down,” Miller said. “They don’t point fingers. They rally around each other, which is exactly what we needed.
“With DeSoto coming into the Alamodome, that’s going to be a four-quarter, 12-round, heavyweight fist fight. So, I’m glad we were battle-tested the last few weeks to prepare for that. If we face some adversity or get behind the chains, I feel good about the way our kids will respond.”
