STARKVILLE — In the winter months between Joe Moorhead’s introduction as Mississippi State’s head football coach and the installation of his system in the ensuing spring, players were left to do their own research. The numbers showed running backs were used as pass catchers more than most, but the exact usage remained to be determined.
For Kylin Hill, that usage has become clear: swing screens.
That concept — in which Hill flares horizontally out of the backfield with wide receivers in front as lead blockers — has accounted for most of Hill’s 17 catches for 152 yards and three touchdowns. Hill the pass catcher has been prominently used and will continue to be so when No. 25 MSU hosts Arkansas (2-8, 0-6 Southeastern Conference) 11 a.m. Saturday (ESPN).
“There’s opportunities within the RPO (run-pass option) system, there’s reads that go with it,” running backs coach Charles Huff told The Dispatch. “Obviously the entire offense’s trying to create numbers, angles and grass with his skillset and getting on the perimeter, but I think the unspoken piece is how well our slots are blocking. You can’t throw those swing screens if you don’t have perimeter blocking. Deddrick (Thomas) is one that stands out to me, at his size and stature and able to bow up to bigger guys.
“Just trying to create ways to create numbers and angles and use his speed.”
MSU (6-4, 2-4 SEC, No. 21 College Football Playoff) wasted no time turning to that play: the first offensive snap of the Moorhead era was a swing screen from Keytaon Thompson to Kylin Hill for a 53-yard touchdown.
Beginning with the Kentucky game on Sept. 22, Hill has 13 catches: nine of them came on swing screens. Of the four that were not, one was on a swing and two were other kinds of screens; the one left unaccounted for was a wheel out of the backfield for a 23-yard touchdown against Louisiana Tech. Hill scored a 16-yard touchdown on Kansas State the same way.
The same ball-in-hand ability that has Hill among the top of SEC running backs with 6.63 yards per carry is the same ability that makes Hill so good on the swing screen: he can read blocks.
“We’re trying to get to the edge, we’re trying to get the defense spread out, and then we’re reading the blocks of the slot receiver and the outside receiver,” Huff said. “In most cases, we’re doing our best to get the ball to the perimeter where there’s more space, more space to get his foot in the ground and get vertical. Kylin does a good job of reading blocks. We tell the receiver to take him where he wants to go fast and let Kylin make them right.
“It’s no different than reading the guard on inside zone: if the guard’s taking him out you want to be just inside.”
Hill takes a similar line of thinking through those plays: he wants to the play to go outside, but if the receiver’s block goes outside, he cuts inside the block and immediately tracks it back to the sideline.
Operating in space that way is a learned skill, and one the former Columbus High School Falcon went out of his way to acquire.
“During practice, I go through the receiver drills to prepare for situations like that,” Hill said.
The result of it all is Hill ranking fifth on the team in targets, with 22, a common occurrence in the Moorhead offense. His Penn State running back, Saquon Barkley, was top five on the team in targets both years, fifth in 2016 (37) and fourth in 2017 (68).
It is a proven way to get a playmaker a touch in space, but the idea of the swing screen carries an additional benefit.
“I think what you’ll see around college football is there are good running backs, but at this point in the year, those guys that had big splashes earlier in the year will start to wear down a little bit,” Huff said. “If you’re just handing the ball off and letting a guy go for eight or nine, you’re going to have some success with that, but long-term I think you have to be able to use those guys. We could hand it to him 20 or 30 times, but at what cost? Guys that jumped out early in the year, even in this conference, that pounding is starting to wear on them.”
As Huff expected, there are examples in the conference of running backs wearing down in the workload. The league’s leader in carries, Kentucky’s Benny Snell Jr., averaged at least 5 yards per carry in each of his first four games; over his last three games, he’s averaging 3.74 yards per carry. LSU’s Nick Brossette ran for at least 75 yards in five of his first six games, but has done it just once in his last four games.
Recently, MSU has been forced to adjust the scheme. In the past, the swing screen was almost always run in a trips formation, with Hill running behind three receivers. Recently, MSU has done it differently, in a one-wide receiver formation with right tackle Stewart Reese shooting out wide to serve as another lead blocker.
MSU has turned to this wrinkle twice, once against LSU and once against Louisiana Tech.
“Give credit to defensive coordinators, especially in this league, if you do something well they’re going to stop it,” Huff said. “We have to find different ways to do the same things well.”
Follow Dispatch sports writer Brett Hudson on Twitter @Brett_Hudson
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