In the first two games against the Seattle Seahawks and the Pittsburgh Steelers, the New England Patriots used their secondary to deploy more man-to-man defensive looks to great success. Zak Kuhr’s unit gave up only 13 points to Seattle and only a lone field goal to Pittsburgh during New England’s home opener.
On Sunday against the Jaguars, the defense opted for more zone coverage to offset Jacksonville’s condensed formations. This decision allowed Trevor Lawrence to go through his progressions and spread the football around. According to the New England Patriots website, Lawrence was an efficient 14-of-21 with three touchdowns against the Patriots’ zone defense.
New England Turnovers Gave Jacksonville Great Field Position
Even though New England’s zone coverage took the deep shots down the field away from Trevor Lawrence, he was able to methodically work his way down the field to put touchdowns on the board.
It also helped that Drake Maye turned the ball over three times and gave the Jaguars’ offense a shorter field to have to work with.
Questionable Decision to Shy Away From Man Coverage
Jacksonville does not have a clear alpha No. 1 receiver like Jaxon Smith-Njigba or DK Metcalf. However, they do have a very good wide receiver group in Parker Washington, Brian Thomas Jr., and former Patriot Jakobi Meyers.
My prediction heading into Sunday would have been that New England with three above-average cornerbacks in Christian Gonzalez, Carlton Davis III, and Marcus Jones would have had the ability to match up with Jacksonville’s weapons one-on-one.
New England actually fared well against Lawrence when it decided to play man coverage, holding the quarterback to 5-of-8 for 41 passing yards and an interception. Unfortunately, Zak Kuhr’s unit decided to play man coverage only 31% of the time, after playing over 41% man coverage the first two weeks, and saw its zone defensive structure struggle.
As New England gears up for another tough road matchup against the Bills next week, they need to get back to their man-to-man schemes. Clearly, the zone defense did not work against Jacksonville. New England cannot afford to replicate its Trevor Lawrence game plan against Josh Allen, or else, especially with the state of the Patriots’ offense, the game could get out of hand in a hurry.
