Basketball: Six Pack, 6 Actions Vs 2-3 Zone and Doctor NO

Beat the zone. Beat it with transition, with rebounding, and with disciplined, quick passing. With (on a good week) three hours of practice, we can't work on much of this, mostly simple concepts.  

As a general rule, force the defense to cover a side. 

Here's a concept from Kirby Schepp. Who's the weaker defender? Overload them. 

But sometimes we need more. Let's share six 'easy' options plus some bonuses (lagniappe). Use the EASY button and don't force passes into tight spaces. 

1. Overload from box with middle screen (Box WHAM) 

2. Clock pressures the middle as the wing cuts through and the 5 rolls behind. The 4 must be patient to wait and see if the pass to 5 develops. The immediate give-and-go to the 3 may create a poor matchup but the 3 and 5 must coordinate to look for an inside 2 on 1 if that happens. 

3. Boeheim vs Boeheim. WWJD? What would Jim (Boeheim) do? Distort the zone, flash the 5 to the ball and look for high-low action. 

4. Screen Gems (Wisconsin). Stack and screen, bringing a player across to the blocks. Be physical without fouling and avoid the 3 seconds call. 

5. Horns into Flex-like action. The key is sealing x4, resulting in stressing the middle defender. It also opens up inside-outside actions. 

  6. 1-4 double ball screen. If you have good pick-and-roll players, this can be a good option. 

Lagniappe 1: the WHEEL. A strong passing 5 (or other player in the middle) gets multiple choices. 

Lagniappe 2: Corner 5 Rip. If x3 aggressively covers the corner. Post up the 5. 

Doctor NO: we lost by three yesterday. We competed. Our defense continues to break down giving up untimely 'easy' baskets. A player asked, "are we going to play zone defense?" "No." The priority is improving, developing players for the next level, above winning. If they learn to play solid man, they will learn zone easily enough. 

We trailed by three, with the ball on our own baseline with 3.6 seconds left and two timeouts. I took one time out to use a play to advance the ball and the girls got the ball to almost the hash at about 2.8 and used the last timeout. We then tried a modified Valpo...we hadn't practiced it and got a bad shot...