Yup. High %, low risk plays that are almost guaranteed to pick up good yardage when opponents stack the box against us. "Taking what the defense gives you" is essential to the Spread. Lining up 3-4 wide ensures that the defense can't protect all areas of the field; why use the Spread if you're just going to run plays into your opponent's strength anyway?
The relative weakness of our running game is partly attributable to personnel, but it's also attributable to scheme. Oregon "imposes its will" on the ground via pace and a running QB, Auburn does it through gap-blocking principles. Thus far, Kelly hasn't been willing to expose Golson to additional hits or to make the schematic sacrifices necessary to regularly use a lead blocker. So we look more like aTm or Clemson, utilizing our ground attack as a constraint for when opponents sell out against our passing attack. I distinctly recall a few plays where Golson saw favorable numbers in the box, audibled to an Inside Zone, and we ran up the gut for 5-7. Then Syracuse would go right back to stacking the box, and we'd go back to trips wide for our screen game.
Since we haven't really been tested yet this season, I'm optimistic that Kelly and BvG still have some nasty surprises in store for future opponents (we'll likely know for sure against Stanford). For instance, the easiest way to "fix" our running attack would be to adopt Oregon's model and push high tempo with lots of Read Option from Golson. We saw lots of that during Fall Camp, but Kelly hasn't used it much. If he really needs to get something going on the ground, I expect he'll risk 5-10 more hits on Golson in such games and start calling those plays.
Point being, 2014's offense is much more explosive and harder to scheme against 2012's iteration. Yes, it was fun to run power on overmatched opponents that year, but I think we've gained more than we've lost.
