I’ve talked about “Isolation” plays and the Hokies’ “shuffle-Isolation” before, but after watching Dalton Keene wallop some folks with the play for my last article, I’d like to give it a proper look.
Iso plays evolve from “man” or “base” blocking. Man/base blocking is almost as simple as it sounds: find a guy (usually the dude across from you) and keep him away from the ball. At the college level, most teams use plenty of man/base blocking in the passing game, but for a while it mostly disappeared from the running game, excepting maybe draw plays. The Hokies and other spread offenses began to buck this trend by using Isolation (or just “Iso”) plays. On Iso plays, a blocking back becomes a lead-blocker for the runner, creating an extra gap the defense has to deal with.