Program Blueprint

I believe that the defensive and offensive systems and styles that a basketball team employs must be complimentary.

In this post, I am going to concentrate on what I call the 6 phases of an offensive possession.

The following is the system that I use to organize, teach, and evaluate each possession as it cycles from offense to defense.

My hope is that you can get a couple of ideas to adapt to your program.

Here is a link to the 6 defensive cycle of a possession.

 

 

Basketball Offensive Phases

Offensive Phase #1 Transition after made baskets and missed baskets. Never be surprised by a trap or full court press–we inbound the ball in our press offense every time after our opponent scores. Our principles in our press offense are to put one player back as a finisher at the basket. Throw the ball over the top of the press as a pressure release. One reversal and then cut through. Do not throw the ball back to the side from where it came. 3 x15 foot receivers in the backcourt. Pass fakes to move the defense.(10 sec better than bad pass). Man to man clear out for primary ballhandler, but be prepared for a run and jump. Click here for more on press offense.

All eyes on the ball as it crosses half court. If we do get trapped, we automatically go into rotation–our half court trap alignment.

Long lead pass is thrown to ft line

Offensive Phase #2 Establish and maintain spacing spots

Just as in the defensive phases, it is important not only to establish spacing, but it is important to maintain it during ball and player movement.

Our perimeter spots are one step behind the 3 point arc.Wide wings, deep elbows, deep corners are suggested spacing spots. Only throw to a player in the deep corner who has an immediate shot to avoid putting the ball in a trap situation. Too high and too wide is better than too close for deep elbow and wide wing.

A critical concept in spacing is that if the ball is in the post, the short corner (halfway between the post and the deep corner), or in the deep corner, there MUST

be someone at the ballside wide wing to give the ballhandler an outlet if s/he is trapped.

At all times we have 4 players without the ball, screening, cutting, spacing, slipping, or posting

Offensive Phase #3 Handle the basketball with sureness (This is a continuation of my entry on avoiding turnovers. Click this link for that post: Avoiding turnovers

Catch triple threat–eyes on the net. Make the easy pass. The best Use Pass Fakes. Use bounce passes to throw out of traps or trouble. Don’t pass to the offense-pass away from the defense which usually means the outside hand. Meet every pass. Attacking too fast or forcing drives or passes that are not available Catching and dribbling rather than catching in triple threat leads to turnovers.

Passing-push with outside hand to outside hand of receiver. Contact is never an excuse to loose the ball Fake a pass to make a pass.

Do not fake backdoor. If you start a cut backdoor, you go all the way to the basket.

Offensive Phase #4 PUT THE BALL IN THE LANE AGAINST ALL DEFENSES Put the ball in the lane to score, to collapse the defense, and to get to the free throw line. We want an inside out attack.

Do not settle for outside shots against a zone or a trap—go inside.

Dribble drives, Post feeds, passes to cutters, and offensive rebounds are the ways that we get the ball in the lane.

Offensive Goals: 2/3 possessions ball in lane. We chart this in practice and games.

Offensive Phase #5 Shot selection—Don’t settle for anything less than who, what, when, and where we want

Shot rating system and the order in which we look to score

4. Layups and Power Shots
Free Throws
3. Wide open three point shot
2. 2 point jump shot with hand in face
1. Pull up 2 point shot with hand in face, shots off the arc

Offensive Phase #6 Fill rebound spots when the ball is shot (where the defensive cycle starts)

When we shoot the ball, we go to the spots diagrammed at the left to give us offensive rebound coverage and to prepare to convert to defense.

if #1 or #2 Shoot the ball, they do not follow their shot in our system. #2 (We call him our halfback) slows the ball as it is beirng advanced on the dribble. #1 (we call him our fullback) retreats to cover the basket.

If 3, 4, and 5 can’t grab an offensive rebound, look to tip out to 1 and 2

Here is a link to the 6 defensive cycle of a possession.

I believe that in coaching basketball, the defensive and offensive systems and styles that a basketball team employs must be complimentary.

In this post, I am going to concentrate on what I call the 6 phases of a defensive possession. I do have the 6 offensive phases posted as well. Here is a link to the 6 phases of offense.

The following is the system that I use to organize, teach, and evaluate each possession as it cycles from offense to defense.

My hope is that you can get a couple of ideas to apply to your team defense.

 

 

 

 

Basketball Defensive Phases

Phase #1 Defensive Conversion (Goal: no conversion points and force the ofther team to play against our halfcourt defense.)

When we shoot the ball, we go to the spots diagrammed at the left to give us offensive rebound coverage and to prepare to convert to defense.

So if #1 or #2 Shoot the ball, they do not follow their shot in our system. #2 (We call him our halfback) slows the ball as it is beirng advanced on the dribble. #1 (we call him our fullback) retreats to cover the basket.

The numbers are for explanation only, #1 is not necessarily the point guard. #3, #4, and #5 are our best three offensive rebounders, but 5 does not always go to the front of the rim. Our objective is to cover the block, block, and front of the rim for offensive rebounding. The players go to the first available.

Players 3, 4, and 5 inside fight for offensive rebound position. If the other team retrieves the rebound, those players SPRINT inside our defensive three point arc and match up. Our rule is that if you pick up the ball (#2s responsibility) you keep it, even if that is not who you are assigned to guard, until you are called off by the player who is guarding him.

Defensive Phase #2 Establish and maintain defensive spacing to be ready to help. This includes guarding the post. Our defense is a pack style man to man, so our players play more in gaps and help postion, but the same can be applied to a pressuring man to man or to a zone. The idea is to have all 5 players working and never relaxing.

The “establish'” part is our effort to get into initial help and post defense positions.

The “maintain” is the adjusting part as we defend the player movement and ball movement of the offense. We drill that by using the shell drill with various types of player movement in addition to the traditional stationary offense and position check shell drill.

When the ball is passed, we run on the air time of the pass to our new spots. Our expectation is that the player picking up the ball arrive Recovering applies to all 5 players, not just the player recovering to the ball. The other four are recovering to their post defense and gap positions.

Defensive Phase #3 Pressure the ball without giving up penetration and without fouling. We pressure the ball on the dribble one step off the arc and the passer when the ball is picked up. We chart deflections as a measure of how we are doing, but do not reach in for the ball. Our rule on taking the ball is to take it with two hands only and never reach with one.

Our defense is a helping defense, but we do not want to rely on help and continually get beat on the dribble. We work to keep the dribbler in front of us. “Guard your yard”–you need to guard the ball 3 feet in either direction without relying on help.

An important part of our pressure is great technique and intensity on our closeouts.

Defensive Phase #4 Keep the ball out of the lane It takes 5 players pressuring and contianing the basketball, defending post passes, and getting in their gaps to discourage penetrating dribbles. We start of in help position to keep the ball out of the paint, rather than deny, help, and recover. We do not deny non penetrating passes.

If the ball goes in the lane, trap it and force it to be thrown to the perimeter, then sprint to new defensive spacing spots, closeout on the ball and contain penetration. Keeping the ball out of the lane keeps us out of foul trouble and keeps the opponent from being able to take inside out shots.

It takes a continual effort to keep the bal out of the lane and I often paraphrase Dick Bennett when he said to one of his Wisconsin teams,: “We Must OUTLAST the offense on every possession! Great defense takes consistent effort and commitment to excellence, every second of every practice and every game. It is not good enough to just go through the motions, to give the impression that you are trying, that you care. You must take PRIDE in your defense, in your effort, and be committed to OUTLASTING your opponent. You have to believe that! Anything less gives our opponents the edge. Gentlemen, we must OUTLAST the offense on every possession. That must be our foundation.”

Defensive Phase #5 Contest every shot with mirror hand. That is, if it is a right handed shooter, we contest with our left hand, if it is a left handed shooter we contest with our right hand. The objective of our defense is to force contestd jump shots and then complet the possession with a rebound.

Cardinal rule do not foul a jump shooter. To emphasize contesting shots In practice, if a starter does not contest a shot, it is 2 points (or 3 if it is behind the arc) for the second team if the shot misses. If the shot goes in, we count it and add the extra 2 points or 3 points as well.

In a game, we chart contested shots. On a players second shot he doesn’t contest, he comes out of the game temporarily. Not for the rest of the game, but long enough to send a message.

Defensive Phase #6 Block out, pursue the ball, chin the rebound or dive on or chin all loose balls.

Finishing the possession is key. We don’t consider rebounding as a separate phase, we consider it as a part of the offensive or defensive possession. It is the part that concludes all of the hard work.

We don’t want to work relentlessly in the first five phases and then waste all of that work by not blocking out then going after the ball tenaciously.

We chart block out percentage from our game videos. We reward those with 90% for a game with a sticker on their locker.

We also give a sticker for collecting 8 or more rebounds. We take playing time away from players with consistently low percentages.

I also believe it is key to teach players to grab a loose ball with two hands and chin it rather than trying to dribble it. Chart and reward who gets the 50/50 balls and who is on the floor after them. There aren’t as many loose balls as rebounds per game, but each one is as important as a rebound because it can finish the possession on defense or continue the possession on offense.

Offensive Phases

I will be adding more description to these tomorrow

Offensive Phase #1 Presss Offense, Halfcourt Trap Offense, Transition. Never be surprised by a trap or full court press–always be prepared for them.

Offensive Phase #2 Spacing. Fill our spacing spots.

Offensive Phase #3 Sureness—catch triple threat, use bounce passes. Passing-push with outside hand to outside hand of receiver. Contact is never an excuse to loose the ball Fake a pass to make a pass.

Offensive Phase #4 Put the ball in the lane to score, to collapse the defense, and to get to the free throw line.

Offensive Phase #5 Shot selection—Who, what, when, where.

Offensive Phase #6 Fill rebound spots when the ball is shot (and the cycle starts over)

Here is a link to a more in depth discussion of the 6 phases of offense.

This document was contributed by Mark Williams, Head Boys Basketball Coach, Fremont High School, Fremont, Nebraska

You can click here to Download the document in pdf format.

FREMONT HIGH SCHOOL
TEAM SELECTION CRITERIA
BOYS BASKETBALL

“Not everything that counts can be counted and not everything that can be counted counts.”

We are very proud of our program here at Fremont High School and are also pleased that so many players want to be associated with our teams. However, to maintain the level of success we have enjoyed, squad selection becomes a necessity.

There are many factors that enter into the selection of members for all of our Boys Basketball squads. This process is probably one of, if not the toughest part of coaching. As coaches we try very hard to be fair in our judgments, as we fully realize the athlete’s desire to be a member of our teams and the disappointments associated with not making the squad.

It is impossible to make a purely objective evaluation, based entirely on the mastery of basketball skills, or any other criteria. Too many other things have to be considered in order to maintain a successful program. Consequently, subjective evaluations are basically opinions and are open to many arguments both for and against these evaluations. Please keep in mind that the coaches have been hired as professionals to make these types of decisions. Also realize that the coaches want to make the teams and the program the best they can possibly be and will not exclude players they believe will accomplish this in the end.

Coaches will make selections based on the following general guidelines:

1. Players that will make our teams better.
2. Players we believe have a realistic chance to play varsity basketball at some point in their career.
3. Players that fit the available positions for the greatest benefit of the team.

More specifically, coaches will consider:

1. TALENT/ PHYSICAL ABILITIES/ MASTERY OF FUNDAMENTALS

• How well has he mastered the offensive skills or shooting, passing, dribbling, and screening?
• How strong is he and does he like to rebound?
• Does he look like he will grow or has he reached growth potential?
• How quick are his feet and his reaction time?
• Does he have the ability to think and react quickly?
• Does he like to play defense?
• If he has any size, can he play the forward position as well as a post position?
• If he is a forward, can he handle the ball well enough to play guard or is he big enough to play post?
• If he is a guard, can he go inside and post up his defensive man?
• Is this guard a leader?

2. EFFORT/ WILLINGNESS TO WORK

• Must not be afraid of hard work, both in season and out of season.

3. WILLINGNESS TO LISTEN, LEARN, AND THE ABILITY TO APPLY WHAT IS LEARNED.

• Can he be coached or does he seem to know it all?

4. SELF DISCIPLINE

• Is he on time?
• Can he work hard on his own without having someone looking over his shoulder to push him?
• Is he a troublemaker on the court? At games? In class? At lunch? Etc…

***   PLAYERS MAY NOT BE ABLE TO DO ALL THE THINGS THEIR FRIENDS DO!

5. CONDUCT

• What behavior does he display towards the school, administration, teachers and other students?
• What is his attendance record, past and present? Tardies? Detentions?
• What kind of grades does he have, past and present? Will he have trouble with eligibility?

6. ATTITUDE

• Has he quit the Reserve or JV team after he had been selected?
• What will his attitude be if he is not likely to be a starter?
• Does he dislike losing or does losing not seem to bother him?
• Is he a team player, or is he all for himself?
• Will he be willing to accept any role in order to benefit the team?

(Example: Starter, 6^th man, practice player, etc.)

• Does he have great desire on and off the floor to be the best that he can possibly be?

In addition the following things are also considered:

• How many returning starters do we have?
• How many lettermen are returning?
• Has the player played on the 10^th grade or JV team?
• Have there been any transfers into the district and what level of proficiency do they display?
• What kind of offense/ defense do we want to run this year?

By no means is this an all-inclusive list we use to evaluate players but it does cover many of the things we look for in the selection of our teams. We strive to use our best possible professional judgment, and if we error, we try to do so by keeping more players on squads, rather than less.

As always, we appreciate and value each student as an individual, but will base all decisions on what is best for the TEAM.