Offense

Dribbling Ideas / Live Ball Moves / Penetration Ideas

from Don Meyer

• Dribble vs. Drive. We want our players to drive, but we don’t want them to dribble for no particular reason.
• We always ask our ball-handlers: “If the ball had eyes, would it be able to see when you had it?”
• On all dribbling drills (and as a general rule of thumb): Start slow, get a rhythm, go fast enough to make a mistake.
• Versus pressure in the full court, we teach our players to attack the defense at a 45 degree angle–very hard to guard.
• A good player needs no more than 1 or 2 dribbles to get from the wing to the rim. In all our breakdown drills, we don’t allow our players to use more than 2 dribbles to get to the rim, unless they are using a hesitation move, back dribble, etc. 
• We want our players to drive in straight lines to the rim. We don’t want them veering out. Our goal is to make contact with the defense (make contact with the man guarding you and contact with the 2nd line of defense). We want to put our shoulder into the defensive man’s hip on all drives (put a body on first).
• We want 60% of the weight on the permanent pivot foot on all moves (reduces traveling)
• Play against your opponent’s momentum–Drive the front hand
• We want to go from a medium center of gravity to a low center of gravity
• “Be ball quick” and have eyes on the rim for vision 
• Use the dribble to get out of trouble, not into trouble
• Never pick up your dribble without a pass or a shot
• The back dribble is the most important dribble in the game of basketball, but it is also probably the most rarely used, and it may be the most difficult dribble to master. The key points for the back dribble are:
  1) To Keep eyes on the rim
  2) Have an “arm-bar” with the weak hand to shield the defense.
  3) Point the back toe, dribble near or behind that toe, and get out of trouble as fast as possible.
  4) The back dribble is a great time to get the defense attacking you–perfect opportunity to use a hesitation move to the rim (in the half court). 
• The middle drive is the drive of preference in our offensive system. We believe that getting middle drives forces defensive help from defenders above the drive (great opportunity for crack-backs to 3 or dives to the rim) and from defenders (typically post men) below the drive (opportunity for bounce passes to our post men for easy lay-ups).
• The only reasons to dribble are:
  1) To advance the ball up the floor
  2) To improve passing angles (especially feeding the post)
  3) To get out of trouble
  4) To get to the rim
• Great players typically only have 2 moves with the dribble; the Go-To move, and the Counter move.
  1) The Go-To Move is the move everybody in the gym knows you’re going to make, and they still can’t guard you.
  2) The Counter Move is the move that you make when the defense is trying to take away your Go-To Move at all costs.
  3) Example: Go-To Move is the left-to-right crossover move, and the Counter Move is the In-n-Out (Fake Crossover) with the left hand. It works best if the Go-To & Counter Moves compliment each other. 
• When driving baseline, players have to know what their options are if they can’t get all the way to the rim. In our Drive & Space scheme, on any baseline penetration, the weakside wing will “drift” to the corner, the strong-side guard will “crack-back” behind the penetration, we will have a low-post ready for a feed, and we will have one more shooter in the opposite guard / wing spot looking for the 3-point shot.
• We allow our players to use either a “step-plant” or a “quick-stop” to go into the pull-up game. We typically teach and encourage player’s to use the 2-footed quick-stop, because it is easier to teach and it allows our player to keep his permanent pivot foot on passes in traffic, but we also will allow a step-plant if the player can prove to us that they are comfortable with that move. The step-plant does have benefits, most notably that it is “quicker” and it creates more separation between the offense and defense.
• When a player penetrates and gets too deep into the lane to shoot a traditional pull-up, we teach the player to shoot a one-handed floater over the defender (we also have the shooter use the strong hand on the floater).

This article is from retired D1 Assistant Randy Brown.

Here are links to 2 other resources for playing against switching defenses. Both were written by D1 Assistant Coaches:

5 Strategies Against Switching Man to Man Defense

Practicing Against Switching Defenses

Diagrams created with FastDraw

Have switching defenses ever defeated you? The art of screening your own man to get a teammate open is rarely seen. But, it is a time tested strategy to counteract perimeter switching.

Take a look at this simple 3 on 3 drill that teaches the screener how to adjust the screening angle to actually screen his own man.

Starting Positions.

1 passes to 3 and screens for 2. Defense switches and X1now has 2 and X2 has 1.

The problem is that X1 and jump switch and deny the pass to 2, stalling the drill.

 

 

In the same starting positions, 1 will again pass to 3 and begin screening action towards 2 on the wing.

 

 
 

Just before 1 sets his down screen on X2, he stops and gets screening angle on his own man, X1.

 

 

 
 

2 cuts off 1’s screen (on X1) and cuts to the open spot on top of the floor.

2’s defender, X2, has no one to guard now. X1 and X2 are BOTH guarding 1.

This is a proven strategy against switch and junk defenses and is rarely defended properly by the defense

Maine Assistant Men’s Basketball Coach Zak Boisvert has put together some short clips of the St. Louis 1-4 high playbook from a few years back.

Many of these sets started with Coach Rick Majerus.

Zak has posted several videos of some of the better schemes he has seen.

His You Tube channel is: Zac Boisvert You Tube Channel

If you are interested in subscribing.

He also is also very active on Twitter: @ZacBoisvert

The plays are to stimulate your thinking about improving your offense.

They don’ score on every play, there are some calls that you won’t agree with.

Neither of those factors are relevant for this.

If the movements give you ideas that can work for you to put your players in positions to score and or get fouled, that is my objective.

I hope you can find a few that you can save for next season.

This article was written by Del Harris, retired head coach of the Lakers, Bucks, and Rockets. Coach Harris guided the Rockets to the 1981 NBA Finals. He was also a very successful high school, small college, ABA, International, and NBA assistant coach.

He went to high school and started coaching in Indiana and I have crossed paths with a few of his former players. They all say that even with the success he has enjoyed, he has remained loyal to those who knew him on his way up the coaching ladder.

Spacing is key—Know the Bailout Rules on Penetration

Bailout Dribble Rules-where to go on dribble penetration—creating four pass angles for the ballhandler on penetration at all times

 If you are on the perimeter and the ball is dribbled toward you.

• Drift toward the ballhandler so that if your man drops to help on penetration, you are creating an open pass lane to the ballhandler.
• This is true whether you are in the corner on a wing or front angle penetration toward you, or if you are on top and the ball is penetrated toward the middle. In the latter case, drift up and toward the ballhandler so as to be a safety pass outlet and to avoid getting into his penetration path.
• If you receive a pass on the penetration, you may have walked into a rhythm-up jumper or you may run a second penetration and the man who passed to you will curl up behind your second penetration dribble.

If you are on the perimeter and the ball is dribbled away from you.

• Fill cut in behind the dribbler in order to provide a safety outlet pass in the event he cannot get to the goal, pull up for a jumper or pass to any of the other three players on his team. Again, provide a safe angle outlet pass for him.

If you are in the post and the ball is penetrated.

• If you are on the strong side post, move opposite of the dribble and open up to the ball, ready to catch and shoot.
• That is, if you are on the block and the drive is to the baseline, move up the foul line 2-3 steps and 1 step over toward the sideline to create a pass lane, if the defender on the post helps vs. the driver.
• If the penetration is to the middle, the strong side post will pop out 2-3 steps on the baseline ready to catch and shoot, if his man helps. Obviously, if the defender on the post does not help on the penetration, it makes it open more for the penetrator.
• If the post is on the weak side, his move is the same on penetration.
• If the penetration is baseline, he moves to the front of the rim.
• If the penetration is to the middle, he has the option of moving out to the baseline on the weakside or to cross under to the block on the other side of the basket, which I tend to prefer.

If you are on the weak side wing area and see the penetration going down the side line opposite you, quickly drift to the corner to be an outlet along the baseline. The catch phrase on this is, “baseline drive, baseline drift”.

• However, if you are already in the weak side corner and there is a middle penetration from the wing or a penetration from the top, move up a step or two out of the corner. That way, if your defender moves into the lane area to jam the middle, you will create an easy pass lane from the ballhandler for a catch and shoot or a second penetration.

PROGRAMMING YOUR PENETRATION GAME

PROGRAM THE TEAM MOVEMENT UPON DRIBBLE PENETRATION–TEAM PENETRATION MOVES I REFER TO AS “BAILOUTS”.

• THE PENETRATOR MUST KNOW WHERE HIS 4 TEAMMATES WILL BE MOVING WHEN HE PENETRATES FROM ANY ANGLE.
• THIS REQUIRES DRILLING 2-0, 3-0 AND 5-0 SOME IN THE SHOOTING DRILLS.
• THESE PROVIDE HIS BAILOUT PASSES, IF HE CANNOT GET TO THE RIM OR DOES NOT ULL UP FOR A JUMPER.

• SIDELINE PENETRATION TO BASELINE
• SIDELINE PENETRATION INTO MIDDLE
• FRONT OR TOP ANGLE PENETRATION
• CROSSOVER PENETRATION AT TOP

TEACH THE PRINCIPLES OF PASSING GAME AS WELL AS THE PENETRATION GAME—YOUR 3-3 AND 4-4 COACHING SHOULD DO THAT AS YOU FINISH OFF DRILLS THAT ARE DESIGNED TO TEACH THE BASIC FUNDAMENTALS OF OFFENSIVE AND DEFENSIVE EXECUTION OF THE BASIC BASKETBALL 2-MAN AND 3-MAN EXERCISES SUCH AS:

• BACK PICKS
• CROSS PICKS
• DOWN PICKS
• FLARE PICKS
• PICK AND ROLL AT VARIOUS ANGLES
• PINDOWNS AND TURNOUTS
• STAGGERED DOUBLES

USE PICK AND ROLLS
WORK THE MIDDLE, THE HIGH WING AND THE ELBOWS

DEVELOP YOUR PLAYS INTO OPTIONS
INSTEAD OF 10 PLAYS, HAVE 3 OR 4 WITH DEPTH IN OPTIONS.