The State of Youth Football Play Calling: Fall Season Halftime Report

• Spread is the default everywhere. It is the most-drawn formation in all four formats, and Trips is second wherever there are enough coaches to rank one.
• Mesh is the play. 13% of coaches drew a Mesh concept, more than any other named concept.
• The go route is the most-drawn route in every format. Underneath crossers are second in flag and 8v8; slants are second in 11v11.
• Tackle coaches run more. A designed run appears in 39% of the typical 11v11 coach’s plays, against 29% in 5v5 and 20% in 7v7.
• Coaches ask the AI for trick plays, not answers. 20% of coaches asked for a trick play. 8% asked for a play to beat a specific coverage.

Coaches build very different games with the same words. A 5v5 flag offense has no linemen and a no-run zone; an 11v11 offense has five blockers and a running back. Even so, the playbooks look remarkably alike.

Mesh, two receivers crossing underneath at shallow depth, tops the list because it works in every format and against both man and zone. Our guide to the Mesh concept shows how to install it.

RC Football lets a coach describe a play in plain English and have it drawn. The way coaches use that is the clearest picture there is of what a volunteer coach wants help with. The short version: precise, small edits, from coaches who already know what they want.

• They direct players by name. 43% of the typical coach’s requests name a specific player, like asking for the slot receiver on a wheel route.
• They keep it short. 65% of requests are under 40 characters.
• They edit more than they create. 53% of requests change a play the coach already has rather than starting a new one.
• They want motion and misdirection. 28% of coaches asked for motion and 20% asked for a trick play.
• They rarely ask for an answer to a defense. Only 8% asked for a play to beat a coverage, and 6% for a specific situation such as the red zone or third down.

That gap is the coaching opportunity. Most coaches already know which routes they like; far fewer build a plan for the coverage they will see on Saturday. Our guides to beating man coverage and beating zone coverage start there.

• Source. Plays saved in RC Football from August 1, 2026 to 2026-10-09, and requests typed into its AI play designer, by youth and amateur coaches. Figures are aggregated and de-identified, as described in our privacy policy.
• Coaches, not plays. Every figure is a share of coaches, or an average across coaches, so one prolific coach cannot tilt a ranking.
• Minimum of 10 coaches. Nothing is reported with fewer behind it, which is why some formats list fewer formations.
• Excluded. RC Football staff accounts, our curated public play library, plays copied from it, and any diagram saved unchanged by three or more coaches, so a popular template cannot pass as a popular choice.
• Hand-drawn routes. Most routes are drawn freehand. We name each one by its shape: depth of the stem, direction of the break, and whether it climbs or settles. Checked against routes that carry a name, the method agrees 87.5% of the time; most misses fall between drag and in, a line coaches blur too.
• Formats. 6v6 and 7v7 are reported together, as are 8v8 and 9v9.

The figures and charts are free to cite and reuse under CC BY 4.0, with a link to this page. Suggested citation: “RC Football, The State of Youth Football Play Calling: Fall Season Halftime Report, rc-football.com/research/youth-football-play-calling-halftime-report/methodology.” The underlying aggregate figures are available as JSON. For anything else, write to hello@rc-football.com.

Draw your plays in the football playmaker, collect them in the playbook maker, and print play cards so every player knows them come Saturday.