Last season, Vanderbilt's offense ranked 119th in scoring, 116th in rushing offense, and 107th in passing offense and a dismal 125th in total offense.
That lack of production led to a parting of ways with offensive coordinator Karl Dorrell, and Derek Mason brought in former Wisconsin offensive coordinator Andy Ludwig to turn things around. Ludwig led some of the most prolific offenses in Wisconsin program history (the third and fourth most prolific to be exact) in his two years in Madison.
After having an opportunity to watch last year's film, Ludwig told WSNR Radio in Nashville that he'll be starting at ground level offensively in Nashville.
"Working with the offensive staff, we're just trying to identify the strengths and personnel in the program, and then designing and implementing schemes around those strengths. It's not so much being a purist, and saying 'hey, we're West Coast, or we're spread, or we're power." Just having the ability to adapt year by year, and sometimes week by week with the personnel available to you."
Ludwig later expanded on his scheme and approach on 104.5 The Zone.
"We want to start at ground zero. We’re very basic right now, very vanilla - concentrating on fundamentals and focusing on our core schemes, and just getting those introduced and mastered.”
“In the running game, we’re going to install about six concepts, but try to great a lot of different presentations through formations and personnel usage there. In the passing game, same thing, we'll be concept-driven. There’s probably about eight to ten core concepts we want to teach and master through the course of spring and grow from there.”
For a team going on their third offensive coordinator three seasons, simplifying things makes a whole lot of sense, and 14-16 base plays seems like a good place to start the rebuilding process.