Examining how the Panthers employ RPOs in both subtle and explosive ways

The next offseason, the two Carson coaches traveled to a Glazier coaching clinic and learned how to teach the intricacies of Xs and Os. Armed with these lessons and their book of Utah notes, Canales and his staff overhauled their playbook to bring the Colts’ run game to life.

More than 20 years later, he’s watching it come alive again with Chuba Hubbard and the Panthers’ run game. It was done to great effect in that Lions win, as Hubbard and Young utilized the concepts en route to Carolina’s best rushing performance of the season to date.

“One of the things I learned way back, way back when I was studying Urban Meyer when he was at Utah, it was like they would tell the backs replace the space and if the backer plays the route concept, the running back, go get the void that they left,” explained Canales. “So, those principles fit with how Chuba runs; he’s aggressive, he’s downhill, decisive, so it’s a good combo.”

Filling the open space is key to these RPO concepts, both on the run and pass options, and it feeds off Young’s high football IQ.

Young ran these concepts in college to a Heisman Trophy. But it’s not a simple copy-paste situation in terms of “he did this well at Alabama, let’s do it here.” That’s possible with other parts of a scheme, but not RPOs.