Close Menu
The Baylor Lariat
    Facebook X (Twitter) Instagram YouTube LinkedIn
    Trending
    • Baylor graduate charged after killing cats with pellet gun, hanging bodies over utility lines
    • Baylor Football’s Alex Foster dies at 18
    • Board of Regents confirms budget, renovations, new leadership in May meeting
    • How facilities responds to storms, flooding in campus buildings
    • Welcome Week leaders now paid in hopes of increasing numbers
    • 5 Baylor sports storylines to look forward to in 2025-26
    • Castle’s grand slam lifts baseball to 30th win of season 10-7
    • What to Do in Waco: Summer Edition
    • About us
      • Spring 2025 Staff Page
      • Copyright Information
    • Contact
      • Contact Information
      • Letters to the Editor
      • Subscribe to The Morning Buzz
      • Department of Student Media
    • Employment
    • PDF Archives
    • RSS Feeds
    Facebook X (Twitter) Instagram YouTube LinkedIn
    The Baylor LariatThe Baylor Lariat
    Subscribe to the Morning Buzz
    Saturday, June 21
    • News
      • State and National News
        • State
        • National
      • Politics
        • 2025 Inauguration Page
        • Election Page
      • Homecoming Page
      • Baylor News
      • Waco Updates
      • Campus and Waco Crime
    • Arts & Life
      • Wedding Edition 2025
      • What to Do in Waco
      • Campus Culture
      • Indy and Belle
      • Sing 2025
      • Leisure and Travel
        • Leisure
        • Travel
          • Baylor in Ireland
      • Student Spotlight
      • Local Scene
        • Small Businesses
        • Social Media
      • Arts and Entertainment
        • Art
        • Fashion
        • Food
        • Literature
        • Music
        • Film and Television
    • Opinion
      • Editorials
      • Points of View
      • Lariat Letters
    • Sports
      • March Madness 2025
      • Football
      • Basketball
        • Men’s Basketball
        • Women’s Basketball
      • Soccer
      • Baseball
      • Softball
      • Volleyball
      • Equestrian
      • Cross Country and Track & Field
      • Acrobatics & Tumbling
      • Tennis
      • Golf
      • Pro Sports
      • Sports Takes
      • Club Sports
    • Lariat TV News
    • Multimedia
      • Video Features
      • Podcasts
        • Don’t Feed the Bears
      • Slideshows
    • Advertising
    The Baylor Lariat
    Home»Sports»Football

    Onside kick for President

    Baylor LariatBy Baylor LariatOctober 24, 2012 Football No Comments3 Mins Read
    Share
    Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Email

    By Greg DeVries
    Sports Writer

    The old adage “defense wins championships” has held true throughout time. In the BCS top 15, 11 teams have a top 15-ranked defense. Last year, Alabama won the national title on the back of its defense, and it might win another this year. The Bears’ defense currently ranks dead last in points against, total defense, first down defense and third down defense.

    The way that teams eat up yards and pile on points is demoralizing for the Baylor defense. These are not encouraging facts, but the season is still salvageable. If the problem with the defense is a personnel issue, then the offense needs to be on the field for more drives than the defense. The best way to offset this is the onside kick.

    Down in Little Rock, Ark., there lives a man named Kevin Kelly. He is a football coach at Pulaski Academy, and his philosophy is simple: never give the other team the ball when you don’t have to. This means that on every kickoff, the Pulaski Academy Bruins try onside kicks. The team goes for it every fourth down, even in fourth-and-long situations. The strange thing is that Kelly’s system works. The Bruins have won multiple state titles under Kelly and have been nationally ranked in the past. Baylor’s record would probably be better if it implemented Kelly’s system. It certainly wouldn’t be any worse.

    Let’s take the West Virginia game as an example. Baylor kicked off 10 times in that game. All the special teams would have to do is recover the ball twice to equal the output of the defense’s two stops.

    According to Kelly, the likelihood of a team scoring from their own 40-yard line is only 15 percent greater than the likelihood that it scores from its own 10-yard line. In college, this disparity is even smaller because of the new touchback rule that brings the ball out to a team’s 25-yard line.

    So not only is Baylor getting a chance to recover the ball, but the chance that opponents will score is only a little bit greater than it was when Baylor kicked it deep. The new rules give the receiving team the option of calling for a fair catch. This new rule all but nullifies the onside kick towards the sidelines. Solution: Dribble the ball up the middle.

    The idea is that a kicker dribbles the ball straight ahead at a slow speed. The fastest players then outrun the ball and hit the first wave of opposing players going after the ball. As soon as the ball reaches the 10-yard minimum, the kicker dives on it and the offense takes the field.

    Baylor has the speed to execute this play and the lack of results to give them reason to do it.

    Baylor Football Team defense
    Baylor Lariat

    Keep Reading

    Baylor Football’s Alex Foster dies at 18

    5 Baylor sports storylines to look forward to in 2025-26

    Castle’s grand slam lifts baseball to 30th win of season 10-7

    Sports take: Trump administration threatens future of funding for brain injury patients, research

    No. 8 seed Baylor softball looks for fresh start in Big 12 championship

    Baylor softball loses finale against Iowa State, preps for Big 12 Championship

    Add A Comment

    Comments are closed.

    Recent Posts
    • Baylor graduate charged after killing cats with pellet gun, hanging bodies over utility lines May 30, 2025
    • Baylor Football’s Alex Foster dies at 18 May 28, 2025
    About

    The award-winning student newspaper of Baylor University since 1900.

    Articles, photos, and other works by staff of The Baylor Lariat are Copyright © Baylor® University. All rights reserved.

    Subscribe to the Morning Buzz

    Get the latest Lariat News by just Clicking Subscribe!

    Follow the Live Coverage
    Tweets by @bulariat

    Facebook X (Twitter) Instagram YouTube LinkedIn
    • Featured
    • News
    • Sports
    • Opinion
    • Arts and Life
    © 2025 ThemeSphere. Designed by ThemeSphere.

    Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.