When it comes to offense, college football has often proven to be a beta testing ground for innovative new styles. Things such as the Spread, run-pass options, Wildcat, Air Raid… all of these offensive styles were conceived of, worked on, and perfected in the trenches of college football, long before being adopted in the NFL. And, to this day, new and innovative ways of playing offensive football are still prevalent at the college level.
Because of this, many players who are new to College Football 26 will immediately want to give offense a shot. And even though having a good running game is incredibly important, let’s face it — throwing the ball is one of the sport’s most fun and exciting aspects. But before you can master the Air Raid Offense, you’re going to need to learn a few of the basics. And one of the most important basics of passing is pass placement.
At the surface level, passing the ball seems simple. You see a wide receiver on a route, press a button, and complete a pass. But the reality of that is way more in-depth and complicated, as this kind of mindset doesn’t take into account a receiver’s position, nor does it consider the defenseman who’s likely closely guarding him. And this is where pass leading comes into play in College Football 26.
How To Pass Lead In College Football 26
First off, if you wish to have more control over where you’re placing your passes, you’ll need to have the proper settings enabled. To check to see if your settings are correct, do the following steps:
- Open College Football 26
- At the main menu, tab over to Settings
- Select Game Settings
- Scroll down to the section called Passing Mechanics
- Choose “Placement & Accuracy” as the Passing Type
By doing this, you are ensuring yourself ultimate control over the accuracy of your passes, as well as ball placement. Essentially, what this setting enables you to do is be more precise with your passes when a receiver is closely guarded.
So, how does it work in practice? Well, by enabling Placement & Accuracy, you will be able to control where the ball goes using the left stick after pressing the button to pass to a specific receiver. Upon using the left stick, you’ll see a gray circle surround the receiver. A crosshair within this gray circle will indicate where the ball is intended to go, relative to the receiver’s location.
But, when and how should you use it? Well, if a receiver is on a route and a corner is trailing behind, you’ll want to lead him to the path of least resistance to catch a ball. In this case, you’ll throw where the route is directly going, placing the ball into a spot where it’s incredibly hard, if not outright impossible, for the corner to make a play. If the corner has a beat on your receiver, then placing a pass slightly behind them will likely get the job done.
This is obviously a bit of an oversimplification, and it will prove to be difficult at first. But once you start reading patterns and fooling around with the mechanic, then you’ll become Arch Manning in no time!
