These notes are from Bob Starkey’s Basketball Coaching Blog, hoopthoughts.blogspot.com. He has been posting for several years and there are hundreds of posts with ideas to make your program better.
Transition Defense:
Post Rule: “Get your butt ahead of your opponent’s butt.”
Goal: Force at least 2 passes when offense has numbers
Don’t allow a skip for a 3
Rule: Deep man never leaves paint until post comes to release.
Dribble Penetration:
Toughest thing to defend in basketball
Rule on Closeouts: “We don’t force the ball anywhere- we tell them don’t get beat.”
Coach Matta: “if you give up catch and shoot too much, you’ll lose your scholarship.”
TP: Don’t allow ball to get to the shot pocket when defending a shooter.
On non-driver, we will defend the passing hand (scouting)
Post Play:
OSU fronts the post
TP: Want quick feet like a boxer
Ball up top: up the line, on the line
Will front LP always, even if the low post takes a step off the lane
Show hands… sit down.. push him under basket
TP: if you are late fronting, don’t front.
Off Ball Screens:
TP: Jump to the ball- OSU wants jumper to extend far enough to swipe at the ball
Objective: get S guarding the ball
Down Screen: Trail all cutters- no sliding them
1st Rule: don’t get screened
“If you are constantly getting screened you are not going to be able to play for us.”
TP: Must start when the ball is in the air.
TP: “If my man is screening, play to help.”
On Ball Screens:
TP: On ball screen you don’t have a man.
Ball Defender Rule: Must make him use the screen (no rejection)
Ball defender must go once the screen (not behind)
Want defender on screener to recover (through to ally) between the ball defender and screener.
Basket Cuts:
Jump hard to the ball- stay in stance
No face cuts
Offensive Rebounding:
You can’t spend too much time blocking out
OSU likes bubble to work on rebounding
Screen the Screener:
Flex Cut
Jump low and take away low cut
Screen defender will bump high cut
On 6-to-6 pass, jump to the ball and swipe
Thru on down screen (swipe creates lane to cut thru)
Shooters with Great Range:
Vs. Shooter, OSU exaggerates denial- force back out.
In transition defense, OSU teaches to run the lane- vs. shooter, run to the shooter.
3 Pointers in Late Game Situations:
Contact switch on dribble hand. Offs vs. Shooter on late game shot
TP: player switching on shooter should have high hands
5th Defender Principle: Defender whose man is out of the play-your goal is to mess up the play.
During walk thru, Matta makes sure player knows- “you are the 5th defender on this play.”
Four Basic Guidelines to Switching
And a few more defensive notes from Coach Starkey’s Blog. These are from retired NBA Head Coach Del Harris:
Switch with teammates of equal or near-equal size on screens and crosses.
Switch to keep big players inside and small players outside on screens. Do this on changes and crosses away from the ball when possible, and on matching up in transition defense, as well as in recovering on rotations. Any communication that can allow a switch to accommodate the big in-little out concept is usually worthwhile.
Switch within fifteen feet of the goal.
Use the “emergency switch rule.” That is, switch whenever a situation arises in which a switch will challenge an open shot, regardless of the mismatch as X2 does for X5 in D-60.
