Coach Expects Smooth Adjustment For Derrik Allen
The 21 prospects who have signed National Letters of Intent with Notre Dame can now receive plans from the strength and conditioning staff and playbooks from the Irish coaches to get them as prepared as possible physically and mentally to make the leap to the next level.
Adjusting is a strength for 2018 safety signee Derrik Allen Jr., according to his defensive backs coach at Lassiter (Ga.) High School, Ced Dickerson.
“When I played ball, I was always told the good players always adjust,” Dickerson said. “What I mean by that is every level you go up, there’s an adjustment to be made. Some can do it and some can’t. Derrik came in and started for me as a freshman. He’s always adjusting, like the good ones always do.
“He’s always been a loose athlete. Like I said, he went from a corner to safety. When his body changed, he was able to maintain his foot quickness, footspeed as well as his hips, which typically, a lot of people aren’t able to do. With the Derrik, I’d say the biggest improvement we had to make was seeing the field from a different perspective. Like I said, he started off at corner for basically two and a half, almost three years. The biggest thing now is seeing that different perspective, the leadership aspect of it as far as what he needs to be able to perform at Notre Dame once he gets there. Again, it’s about him adjusting.
And thanks to Dickerson and Irish defensive coordinator Mike Elko, the adjustment won’t be as big for Allen.
“The good thing for Derrik is that our system defensively is very similar to the system that Coach Elko runs,” Dickerson said. “Coach Elko and I have talked on many occasions, we’ve been on the board before. I wanted to make sure I was able to start incorporating some of the things he’s going to be teaching Derrik at the next level. I started trying to put that into our defense as far as coverages and talking to Derrik so it’s transparent to what he’ll be doing come June when he reports.”
What the Irish refer to as their Rover, Lassiter just calls Viper.
“Same thing,” according to Dickerson. “Whether he wants to roll down on the strong side, on the two-receiver side or if they want him to be that middle-of-the-field safety. That’s something they haven’t determined just yet. But we basically do the exact same thing.
“We’ll spin a safety down on the strong side. We’ll blitz him some, put him in coverage some. The middle-of-the-field safety is sitting back there directing the defense and being able to make plays from hash to hash. They basically have five DB-type guys on the field and so do we.”
Exactly what Allen will be doing in Notre Dame’s scheme and from where has yet to be determined.
“At one point, I think they thought Derrik was going to be that Rover, but I think they talked to him and said they wanted him to play the free safety position,” said Dickerson. “It just depends on what they want him to do, but he’s familiar with both and can be successful with both.”
Dickerson is currently working on getting Allen back into game condition in preparation for his last game as a high-schooler in a couple weeks.
“Right now, it’s just about getting him back moving because obviously he had surgery at the end of his year on his pinky,” said Dickerson, referring to the procedure that forced him to sit out the end of his season.
“The pin is out and now we’re just trying to get him back in shape with the Army game coming up.”
Allen has “grown leaps and bounds” with his body, football IQ and leadership during high school, according to Dickerson.
“He went from playing corner his first two years to kind of splitting duty as a junior,” the coach said. “This was his first full season of him playing safety. He’s a great talent, but more so than anything, his football IQ is going to be ready to go as soon as he steps foot on campus.”