The ever popular 3-4 defenseis a great defense to run at the pee wee, youth and midget football level. The most important factor when using a complicated defensive scheme, like the 3-4 defense, is making sure it has been modified for the pee wee, youth and midget football level. The 3-4 defense has many different slants, blitzes and secondary schemes and most of these need to be left out or modified, especially if you are coaching a very young pee wee, youth or midget football team.
One area we believe you can carry over to every level is the defensive line slant. The defensive line slant in the 3-4 defense can really mess up an opponent. If you have done your job and have a good scouting report on your upcoming opponent, you should be able to mess up his preferred blocking schemes using the defensive line slants in the 3-4 defense. We give all the modified slants and stunts for the defensive line in our modified 3-4 Defense Playbook.
One staff of our coaches uses only the 3-4 defense as described in the book and have enjoyed great success. They coach in the smallest town in their league and have never given up more than 2 scores in a game. Almost half the games they coach in are shut outs and they have won over 80% of their games. They are big believers in using the defensive line slant in the 3-4 defense to make sure their line backers are never blocked. Their philosophy is to keep their linebackers free so they can make plays.
