Scoop Study: Buster Faulkner - GH Counter (Scoop Study)

Scoop Study

Scoop Study: Buster Faulkner - GH Counter

By Doug Samuels

Apr 1, 2026 ā€¢ 3 hours ago

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This past fall, you'd be hard pressed to find a play caller who had plays admired, clipped, and shared on social media more than Buster Faulkner's 2025 Georgia Tech squad.

The mix of a dynamic and veteran player behind center like Haynes King, plus additional playmakers at running back and receiver, coupled with Faulkner's creativity proved to be a great mix as the Yellow Jackets started the year with seven straight wins where their top 25 ranking climbed as high as #7. Those wins included victories over Dabo Swinney and Clemson, Manny Diaz and Duke and Fran Brown and Syracuse.

Florida's Jon Sumrall was among the head coaches who took notice, and when it came time for him to hire an offensive coordinator, he set his sights on Faulkner to come to Gainesville and help him flip the fortunes of the Gators before eventually landing the veteran play caller.

The second installment of our Scoop Study series puts one of Faulkner's staples at center stage - GH Counter.

Lots of teams feature the GH Counter scheme as part of their catalog, but no one in college football dresses it up and diversified it quite like our 20225 FootballScoop Coordinator of the Year did.

That's where this piece takes us. As we've highlighted on X, we took a look at three Georgia Tech games (against Clemson, Duke and Syracuse) and found a ton of variations. 14 of those variations took place over the course of two games - Clemson and Syracuse - while one was leaned on during a late-game critical moment of their Duke matchup that broke the game open in their favor. 

Let's get into each of them.


OVERVIEW
Georgia Tech vs Clemson

The first game we take a look at features Faulkner utilizing unbalanced receiver looks and 12 personnel to get to GH Counter featuring both the running back as well as a heavy dose of quarterback run putting the ball in the hands of Haynes King off fake pitch action as well as brief looks at bubble screens before taking the ball himself

Every variation we cover this particular game also happens to feature some of motion early in the season as well.



OVERVIEW
Georgia Tech vs Duke

It became clear early on that Faulkner and Georgia Tech leaned heavier on zone schemes during their mid-season matchup with Duke, but when they needed a big play to bust the game open, he went to GH Counter.

Holding onto a 20-10 lead over the Blue Devils, and knocking on the door of red zone at the +28, Faulkner put the ball in the hands of their most dynamic playmaker in quarterback Haynes King with GH Counter, who busted free to effectively put the game out of reach.

OVERVIEW
Georgia Tech vs Syracuse

Already known for his creativity, Faulkner had that on full display in their decisive win over Fran Brown's Syracuse squad.

This game, the unconventional split of the running back, often times aligning deep and outside of the tackle caught my attention. The path on GH Counter with that alignment ends up being very similar to an underneath handoff to player aligned in a tight bunch formation you've likely seen before, so there are some elements that carry over, but once again Faulkner' creativity is on full display as the back also released into some option routes from that spot during the game as well, in a move obviously intentioned to break tendencies and provide balance.

Not only is the split of the back unique, but they also get to the same GH Counter scheme early on aligning the H directly behind the quarterback in a pistol-set and also motion him in from multiple receiver spots as well, which had to be a nightmare for defensive coordinators moving forward evaluating this film.


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