One of your main goals on offense in College Football 26 is to confuse the defense in as many ways as possible. If you can successfully fool the defense, even for just one play, that can make the difference between a drive stalling and you scoring a touchdown. While there are many ways to confuse defenders, one of the best mechanics you can take advantage of to do that is the pump fake.
The pump fake is a mechanic involving the quarterback that aims to trick a defender into thinking you’re going to throw the ball. However, your real intention is to throw the defender off and pass the ball later, or pass the ball to an entirely different receiver than the one you’re looking at. Essentially, you’re faking a throw to a receiver. While the pump fake has a particular use case in College Football 26, you first need to know how to pull off the mechanic.
How To Pull Off A Pump Fake In College Football 26
Luckily for you, the pump fake is one of the easier mechanics to use in CFB 26. All it requires is a single button, and you can do it on pretty much any passing play you call on offense.
Below, you’ll see the steps to pump faking:
- Make sure you call a passing play while on offense, or you audible to one before the snap
- You generally want to select a passing play that takes some time to develop. So something like a screen, RPO, or quick slant route isn’t the best for pump faking, as there’s not much chance to fool a defender with a fake throw
- Instead, try going with a passing play that uses multiple routes all across the field, which makes it believable that you’d try and throw to any one of the receivers at any time
- Once the play is in motion, find the receiver you want to fake a throw to. After you identify them, all you have to do is double-tap their button, and you’ll pump fake in their direction
- So, for example, if you’re pump faking to your Circle/B receiver, just quickly double-tap Circle/B
- Make sure you don’t linger too long on those button presses, though, as that will result in you actually throwing to that receiver
That’s all there really is to using a pump fake in CFB 26. You’ll still want to practice using the mechanic in Quick Play or Practice Mode before trying it out in a real game, though.
Tips To Remember When Pump Faking
Now that we’ve gone over how to actually pull off a pump fake, here are some quick tips you’ll need to ensure you don’t make a costly mistake while trying one:
- There are certain situations when a pump fake is most effective. Generally, you don’t want to pump fake to one receiver and then quickly throw to that same receiver. Instead, you want to pump fake to a receiver to try and lure a safety or DB away from one receiver and then throw to the receiver that is now more open as a result of the pump fake
- It’s generally recommended not to pump fake too much throughout a game, especially if you’re playing a real opponent. If the opponent knows you like to pump fake, they can blitz you more often because they have more time to get to the quarterback if you’re always faking throws
- A pump fake needs time to develop, so make sure that your quarterback has enough time and space to successfully fake a throw and then still make a real throw during the same play. If the quarterback has a defender pressuring them, the pump fake will usually result in a sack or a fumble
With all of that, you’re now ready to start pump faking in College Football 26. One other factor that might help with your pump faking, though, is changing the camera angle on offense, which we covered in a previous guide.
