It didn't take flag football defensive coaches long to figure out that playing man coverage every snap is a hard way to live. Virtually every flag football offense has at least one explosive player who can get open if they face man coverage every play. Playing at least one safety and often two has become a staple for 5v5 flag football defenses.
However; along with playing zone defense comes understanding what it is and what it is not. Often times when you see flag football teams play zone defense it looks like they are trying to cover the entire field. If the offense comes out in a balanced formation or if they line up with all of the receivers to one side seems to have no bearing on the defense.
This is a huge mistake. One of the first things an offense will do to zone coverage is to flood the different areas on the field. If your defense is just covering all areas then you are setting yourself up to play with three or maybe only two defenders. The other one or two are going to be covering grass and nowhere near the football when it is thrown.
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So when an offense comes out and gets lined up, your defense should be talking about the formation. They should be talking about the different things that can happen. If you are getting a bunch set then your players had better be talking about crossing routes and picks or rubs.
If there are three receivers on a 5v5 flag football offense all to one side then there's a chance the quarterback is going to roll out to that side. Your rusher should know to pull the quarterback up and not let that happen. Everyone else should cheat that way too.
If the offense runs a crossing route underneath or a deeper over route then your backside zone players will have time to react and adjust. Always remember that you have a rusher who is getting after your opponent's quarterback making deeper routes that come across the field hard to complete.
Defenders to the weak side of an overloaded formation should always be looking for something coming back to them BEHIND the line of scrimmage. This is usually in the form of a jet sweep as the offense is trying to get the backside defenders to become overly focused on the routes coming at them. When this happens the backside defender must at least turn the jet sweep runner back to the rest of the defense or pull the flag.
So the next time your flag football defense gets an overloaded formation and you are in zone coverage, scratch where it itches. Don't let your backside defenders become spectators. You're going to need them where the action is.