6-2 Defense – Coaching Youth Football
My 4th grade pee wee football team ran variations of the 6-2 defense last season. To be honest, we should have stuck to our 7 Man Front Eagle Defense variation. But, my new defensive coordinator wanted to try the 6-2, and he had not heard of the Eagle 7, so we gave the 6-2 defense a shot. In most situations it works, but for teams that figured out our “C” gap was weak, we had to rely on our offense to score points. A double lead block run to the C gap with a guard trap on the D-End will kill you in a 6-2. We had a very tough time defending this play in our 6-2. Our two losses last season, both by 8 points or less, were from two teams that attacked our “C” gap. Below is our 6-2 Base Defense.
6-2 Defense – Base
To address our C gap weakness, we would move into a 6-2 Wide defensive formation, which moved the two linebackers into the C gaps. See below.
6-2 Wide Defense
I probably should have moved the D-tackles wider also to stunt the C Gap. But, I moved back into our Eagle 7 Defense, which plugged the strong C Gap hole with a big D-Tackle.
There are many types of blitzes you can run out of the 6-2 Defense with Linebackers and Defensive backs. I ran mainly LB /Lineman stack cross blitzes to the gaps or a Corner blitz to one side. I would also occasionally Blitz the safety up the middle.
I am not going to run the 6-2 defense in 2008. I am sticking with my Eagle 7 variations and testing out the Gap Air Mirror Defense for short yardage situations.
Coach Wade at his website has some great info on the 6-2. You may want to visit his website.
Good Luck this season.
Update 2016
Check out my new defense the 62 Multi 8 Youth Football Defense in this free youth football coaching video.
Or the the blog post https://coachparker.org/2016/05/18/62-multi-8-youth-football-defense/
Play for Fun and Winning is Funner,
Coach Parker
Keller, TX
Hello this is my second year as an defensive coordinator. And I’ve been looking on different websites trying to figure out the right type of defense to run this year for my team. My boys are ages 10-12 I was considering the 5-3 defense. But I see that the 6-2 defense is the most common defense now. But I also see that you were talking about the Eagle 7 defense. I’ve never heard of that defense and maybe you can email me explaining more about it. Thanks.
So I run the 70 Eagle like a 7-4 or a 9-2. Bascially you have two strong safty LBs in the middle and two CBs wide and almost on the line.
…..de…dt..g..ng..g..dt…de
cb……………………………CB
……….SS…………S
I prefer to coach the offensive side of the ball and have been coaching youth football since 1992. As far as defensive schemes, you have to keep them simple because it is youth football. Most leagues have a MMP rule so you have to figure out where to play these kids. I would pick a scheme with 8 players in “the box”. However, in todays football, and youth coaches watching TV, going on the internet, imitating HS, etc…, your scheme has to be able to adjust to a spread, pistol, and or option offense. I like the 4-4 split defense. But i have some major issues when i coach it to youth players. First, MMP. I put them a DT’s with them head up on the guards. We try to teach them how to run stunts with the inside LB’s. To me, this is the best position to put them in because they are not playing in space. I also try not to put 2 MMP in at the same time. If team has a TE, them our SAM LB will play him on the inside shade, bump him with his outside arm and take away the C GAP or the off tackle play. If a team has 2 TE’s, the our SARA LB will do the same on the weak side of the offense. If they have no TE”s, then these OLB’s will play 3 yds off the line of scrimmage out side of the DE’s. They are my best players. Then my CB’s. Then my inside LB”s. Our theory is we don’t want you running wide. We want to stop the sweep, reverse, bootleg, etc… We know must youth teams can’t run inside competently.And their coaches usually don’t have the patience to attack a defense interior. The next play we want to stop is your off tackle play. That is why we put these players in this technique when we see a TE. If the players get injured we put our CB’s in the OLB position and would move our starting FS to the strong corner and the back up to the weak. Our inside LB’s are good players but they are not my “best” players. And our DE’s are on “air” when they have a TE to their side. So they don’t have to be the best player. They just have do be disciplined. If they don’t have a TE to their side, then they have the “best” players outside of them just in case some runner breaks contain. My point is injuries will hurt any defense. But the 4-4 split, based off of JOE ROMANS book adjust better to any offense we see. Finally, we teach cover 3 and man. If you can beat us passing, then I take my hat off to you because most youth teams don’t pass really well. This is the defense that i was trying to show our rookie DC last season. I am glad our HC said that this is what we are going to run this season. I almost forgot, the wedge play will hurt this defense. I think the wedge play will hurt almost all youth defenses for that matter. It is a good thing that we run it and our opponents do not.