I know we hold them below their averages, but it is because of the offensive philosophy and the 18 play clock shredding touchdown drives our defense gives up that reduce the number of possessions per game, not because of some brilliant defensive strategy. And for the record, the "average" includes 4 cupcake non-con games, I would sure hope we are better than average. Look, I have faith in Norm having learned something in that Mizzou game, the LB coming off the slot guy on the blitz was a nice added touch that we hadn't seen a lot of against spread teams - I'm thinking back to those days of Norm dialing up the quicksand blitz where he would blitz the slowest guy from the back 7 who looked like he was running in quicksand and wouldn't get any heat, but would leave a massive open spot in the middle of the field. Gabbert got his yards, but Norm hit him in the mouth and he gagged in clutch time.
I can't count the number of times our D gagged on third downs last year, but it was absolutely ridiculous and at some point, the guy's gotta take a risk because in the second half, if you're gonna give up 7, you might as well not run your defense out of gas doing it. That's what opposing coaches have figured out. It's just that 2009 was an anamoly because we had two sick LBs who had a great nose for the ball and they made plays in the clutch. You can't rely on that to win every game when your D is pinned up against the wall. You'll eventually get toasted. See, e.g., 2010 Arizona, NU, OSU, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Indiana games (thank god Indiana dropped that ball).