Winning Way Series
130 Winning Special Situations
.
Brian Williams
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction
Chapter 1 Philosophy of Special Situations
1. What can I, as the coach, accept in defeat? 2. What strengths does our current team have? 3. What do the percentages tell me? 4. How much practice time do I want to devote to special situations? 5. If we do lose, how would I rather lose a late-game lead? 6. Am I willing to save some of my best plays for the end of a game? 7. Do I want to save my timeouts for the end of the game? 8. How long do I want to keep one of our best players on the bench when he is in foul trouble? 9. What are the tendencies of our opponents? 10. How do I emphasize the importance of every possession and every situation?
Chapter 2 Practicing Special Situations
11. Practice situations at the end of every practice. 12. Confidence in games comes from success in practice 13. Planning ahead for and practicing special situations forces you to think in detail 14. No one can plan for and practice every scenario 15. Try it, you’ll like it 16. Make every situation that you practice as game-like as possible. 17. Have an overall situations season plan 18. Use special rules so that your second team can compete with your first 19. Always play out the time, when you practice situations
Chapter 3 General situations in flow of game
20. Automatic Situations AUTOMATIC 21. Coach’s Call COACH’S CALL 22. Foul trouble in the first half AUTOMATIC 23. Calling timeout to save a possession AUTOMATIC 24. Jump ball AUTOMATIC 25. Timeouts AUTOMATIC 26. Saving a loose ball AUTOMATIC 27. Defending a 1-4 low AUTOMATIC 28. Shortening the game COACH’S CALL
Chapter 4 Offensive situations in flow of game
29. Save a second when inbounding the ball AUTOMATIC 30. Inbound ball in dead corners. Full court AUTOMATIC 31. Inbound ball in dead corners. Half court AUTOMATIC 32. Playing against combination defenses COACH’S CALL 33. Offensive rebound tip outs on missed free throws and field goals AUTOMATIC 34. 2 on 1 situations AUTOMATIC 35. Who is your best technical foul free throw shooter? COACH’S CALL 36. Short seconds on the shot clock AUTOMATIC 37. “Fire!” AUTOMATIC 38. Run counters to plays depending on how the defense plays them COACH’S CALL 39. Long lead pass AUTOMATIC 40. Playing to your strengths AUTOMATIC 41. All inbounds plays with your backup inbounder COACH’S CALL
Chapter 5 Defensive situations in flow of game
42. Defending under out AUTOMATIC 43. Playing against a great shooter COACH’S CALL 44. Rebounding a defensive Free Throw 45. Stop them before they start COACH’S CALL 46. Defensive adjustment COACH’S CALL 47. Defensive Matchups. COACH’S CALL 48. Break away layups AUTOMATIC 49. Converting to defense off a missed free throws AUTOMATIC 50. Pressing on a missed free throw COACH’S CALL
Chapter 6 End of 1st 2nd, 3rd Quarters
51. Teach your players to yell “Clock!” AUTOMATIC 52. Force the ball to the sideline in defensive conversion AUTOMATIC 53. Take the last shot of each quarter. AUTOMATIC 54. Last shot of quarter play vs. Man to Man AUTOMATIC 55. Throw the ball long inside our arc AUTOMATIC 56. Last second play vs. 2-3 zone AUTOMATIC 57. Do not try to beat the clock AUTOMATIC 58. Put a bad free throw shooter at the line at the end of the first half COACH’S CALL
Chapter 7 End of game philosophy
59. When will you begin to hold the ball for the last shot when tied? AUTOMATIC 60. When will you take the last shot of a tie game AUTOMATIC 61. When will you put the ball in the deep freeze with a lead? AUTOMATIC 62. Timeout when we score with the clock running. COACH’S CALL 63. Do you continue to “play to win” even if the game is over for practice? COACH’S CALL 64. Do you switch defenses to protect a lead? COACH’S CALL 65. Tie at home, win on the road? AUTOMATIC 66. When to start catch up mode COACH’S CALL 67. When do you put one of your best players back in with 4 fouls? COACH’S CALL
Chapter 8 End of Game General
68. End of the game communication. AUTOMATIC 69. Possession in Doubt AUTOMATIC 70. Call timeout the most effective way AUTOMATIC 71. If we are behind AUTOMATIC 72. Milk a Minute COACH’S CALL 73. Jump ball to start overtime AUTOMATIC 74. Jump ball play COACH’S CALL
Chapter 9 End of Game Offense
75. Miss a free throw on purpose with a lead. COACH’S CALL 76. Miss a free throw on purpose needing to score. COACH’S CALL 77. Full court game winner no timeouts COACH’S CALL 78. Nothing but a layup or free throws = “4!’ AUTOMATIC 79. Over the back on a free throw that your team misses COACH’S CALL 80. Get the ball in full court at the end against a man to man press. COACH’S CALL 81. Throw or dribble to half court and call timeout COACH’S CALL 82. Be prepared for a change in defense 83. Inbounding the ball with no timeouts. 84. Gain possession of the ball in last 5 seconds on other end of court AUTOMATIC 85. “Hands” team—COACH’S CALL 86. Plant the seed COACH’S CALL 87. Have your shooter be a ball screener if the defense traps COACH’S CALL 88. Reminder to inbounder spot or move COACH’S CALL 89. Last second shot vs. man to man AUTOMATIC 90. Last second shot vs.2-3 zone AUTOMATIC
Chapter 10 End of Game Defense
91. To foul or not to foul? AUTOMATIC 92. Unintentional intentional foul COACH’S CALL 93. Put your best defender on a different player if you know they are going to run a set play COACH’S CALL 94. Don't foul AUTOMATIC 95. Trap a Ball Screen to prevent a 3 COACH’S CALL 96. Guarding a dead 3 point shooter COACH’S CALL 97. Whether or not to guard the inbounder for full court inbounds defense COACH’S CALL
Chapter 11 End of Game Defense
98. Post Game—Player safety and leadership after the game
Chapter 12 Practicing end of game special situations
99. Players “coach” 100. No timeouts remaining 101. Possession arrow 102. Fouls to give when you are ahead 103. Fouls to give when you are behind 104. Playing through bad calls 105. Whether you are or are not in the bonus 106. Best player in foul trouble 107. Best player not available due to injury 108. Let the other team score 109. Playing through a bad play—personal and teammate
Chapter 13 Specific Time and Score Situations to Practice
110. 30 seconds to go in a quarter other than the 4th, your ball 111. Down 4, your ball at half court, 30 seconds to go, clock stopped 112. Up 1, opponent scores to take the lead. 10 seconds, clock running 113. Underneath your basket inbounding. down 2, 5 seconds left 114. Underneath your basket inbounding. down 2, 2 seconds left 115. Down 2, you shooting two free throws, 3 seconds, clock stopped 116. Sideline Inbounds from half court, trailing by 2 with 15 seconds to go 117. Sideline Inbounds from half court, trailing by 2 with 3 seconds to go 118. Opponent’s ball half court inbounds, tie game, 30 seconds to go 119. Down 2 Full length inbounds 3 seconds to go, clock stopped, one timeout 120. Down 2 Full length inbounds 3 seconds to go, clock stopped, no timeouts 121. Up 2 and the ball 1:00 minute to go 122. Tied with ball 1:00 to go 123. Up 1 inbounding ball no timeouts 124. Your ball full court inbounds up 1 point, 5 seconds to go opponent is pressing 125. Converting to defense when you miss a free throw, up 1, 10 seconds to go 126. Down 10 3 minutes to go with the ball 127. Down 5 1 minute to go with the ball 128. Up 3 other team ball under their basket 5 seconds to go, no timeouts 129. Other team misses a free throw on purpose., You have a 2 point lead, 2 seconds to go. 130. 30 seconds to go in a quarter other than the 4th, opponent’s ball
ular Spectac achievementeded is alwaysby prec unspectacular preparation.
Robert H. Schuller
130 Winning Special Situations INTRODUCTION
Introduction
There are many factors that affect the outcome of a basketball game. Just a few of them are:
1) Talent on your team 2) Talent of your opponents relative to yours
3) Location (home or road) of the game Winning Words 4) Injuries prior to or during games “Luck is where 5) Toughness and togetherness of team preparation 6) Preparation meets 7) Execution ” opportunity. The focus for this e-book is on the toughness, togetherness, preparation, and execution it takes to Seneca help your team to thrive and capitalize when special situations occur in games. Take these ideas, think through them with your coaching staff, and adapt them to your program’s philosophy and your personnel.
On most occasions, your games are going to come down to a few critical possessions. Many of those possessions involve special situations—an inbounds play, a last shot of the quarter, or the way your team manages the clock. The special situations in this book are not limited to the end of the game and they are not limited to the decisions that coaches make during games.
The success that your team experiences with special situations under pressure in games is not a matter of luck. It will not only have to do with your ability to X and O, but also to the skill you have at instilling confidence in your players that will allow them to act aggressively and decisively in all situations. I hope this book will be of assistance to you and your program in all of those areas.
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130 Winning Special Situations PHILOSOPHY OF SPECIAL SITUATIONS
Chapter 1 Philosophy of Special Situations
Your team’s in game success in executing situations begins with your clearly defined and communicated philosophy. Put your philosophy in writing to force you to clarify your thoughts and to enable you to share it with others in your program. Having a philosophy in place is the starting point to begin putting together your plan for teaching and practicing special situations.
This section contains the questions that I have used to develop my special situations philosophy.
What can I, as the coach, accept in defeat? No matter how much situational 1 planning and practicing we do, we won’t hit every shot, our opponents will make a better play, or we will mishandle the ball, I judge our performance on execution, not just baskets made or stopped. My goal is to be consistent in the execution of our strategies so that we do have a purpose that gives us the best odds possible of winning each possession. In order to decide how to approach each situation, I start by deciding what I can accept in defeat. As an example, I believe in fouling on the floor, not on the shot, at the end of the game (6 seconds or less) to preserve a 3 point lead. If we do foul, and they make the first free WINNING WORDS throw, miss the second, get the rebound (as long as we block our properly) and hit a shot to tie or to “You can do anything beat us, I can live with that. I made the decision to you want, but you foul ahead of time, when I was not caught up in the t do everything can’ t.” emotion of the game, based on the percentages and you wan with a great deal of thought. I am not going to second guess myself when I am prepared ahead of Don Meyer time with a strategy that is sound.
What strengths does our current 2 team have that I can take advantage of with our special situations plan for this year? Your philosophy is going to be constant from year to year. Your special situations system of execution will vary from year to year with the skills and abilities of your players.
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130 Winning Special Situations PHILOSOPHY OF SPECIAL SITUATIONS
At crunch time, at the end of the quarter or shot clock, will you look to get the ball to a post player, to a driver, or set up a 3 point shooter? Will you change any of your out of bounds plays? Do you have the depth this year and players with clear-cut strengths so that you will want to substitute offense for defense at the end of the game? Will you change your delay or catch up game? Are any of your opponents likely to employ anything out of the ordinary against your personnel? Do an audit prior to each season as to what you need to change for the upcoming season.
What do the percentages tell me is the best strategy for each special situation? Whenever possible, I want to use statistics to base my decisions on so that I have a 3 meaningful sample of information. Basing your special situations strategies on the results of one or two instances that you have experienced is not enough to make a good decision. I have a couple of examples of what I am talking about later in this e-book. Those examples are Idea #35 Choosing Technical Free Throw Shooter and #91 whether or not to foul at the end to keep your opponent from getting off a potentially game tying three points shot.
How much practice time do I want to devote to teaching and rehearsing special situations? Like almost everything else in coaching, you can do anything you want, 4 but you can’t do everything you want. The more practice time you devote to emphasizing and working on them, the better you will be. But, that comes at the expense of spending time in other areas. One way to strike a balance is to practice special situations during the course of your scrimmage and in your drills. Here are some ideas: Emphasize Special
1) Run the clock during scrimmage Situations during all segments. As the clock is winding segments of your down to end the segment, you can practice including drills practice end of quarter or end of game and 5 on 5 scrimmage scenarios. work.
2) Rather than handing the ball to the offense at half court when scrimmaging, have the offense
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130 Winning Special Situations PHILOSOPHY OF SPECIAL SITUATIONS
inbound from underneath and the sidelines. You can do that to work on both defending inbounds plays and running yours.
3) At times, start your on 5 on 5 portion of practice from a free throw lineup. You can have players shoot for free throw practice, or have a different player each time work on missing on purpose (which will be covered later in this e-book), and then play live from there. The benefits to this are that you can work on tipping out an offensive rebound and converting to defense on both made and missed free throws. Most teams do not convert to defense from free throws well unless they practice it and we, as coaches, emphasize it.
4) Have a coach toss the ball out of bounds under your defensive basket or toward the 10 second line to simulate an over and back save from your offensive end. Continue the scrimmage from that point on. You are working on not saving it under your defensive basket and not saving it to the other team at the timeline to give them a fast break.
If I had to lose, how would I rather lose a late-game lead? By working to milk the clock with a slower and more deliberate pace of play or continue to run our 5 regular offense? This is a decision that must be made regardless of whether or not you play with a shot clock. You need to know if you are going to work to get deep into the shot clock on your possessions when you have a lead at the end of the game.
NO EXCUSES This is how I want to execute at the end of a game where we have the lead (in a state Contact is not an without a shot clock) with one minute or less th excuse to lose the ball. to go in the 4 quarter or overtime): Our mindsetot is goingthat the to Hold the ball and run the clock. Call official is n timeout if our possession of the ball is in call a foul if we lose doubt. We always face the basket when we the ball. catch the ball and will take wide open layups that we can’t miss to keep the defense honest.
Shoot wide open lay ups and free
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130 Winning Special Situations PHILOSOPHY OF SPECIAL SITUATIONS
throws. , I A shot other than a lay-up is not acceptable—even ur way if the shot goes in. “You have yo . As for A missed lay-up is not acceptable. way A turnover is not acceptable. Contact is not an have my excuse to lose the ball. We know that the defense the right way, the will be coming after the ball, so we have to be correct way, and the tough with the ball. If possession is in doubt, call only way, it does ” not timeout. We save our timeouts during the game exist. for this very situation. Friedrich Nietzche Am I willing to save some of my best plays for the end of a game that is in 6 doubt? That way, your opponent will not have defended those plays earlier in that game? Or, would I rather use my best plays more frequently during the game? A third option is to run counters at the end of the game to the plays that you have run frequently during the game. That way you can benefit from those throughout the course of the game and the defense will not be able to “play the play” when you run your counter at the end.
What your players are able to learn and then execute will determine how many plays and counters your can run. When my players are able to handle it, I like to have plays for the end of a game that we only use when we are in a tight game.
Do I want to save my timeouts for the end or use them throughout the game? I save my timeouts for the end of the game so that I can manage the clock better and 7 help save possessions. We do not call timeout to save possession until the last two minutes of the fourth quarter or the last two minutes of overtime.
How long do I want to keep one of our best players on the bench 8 when he is in foul trouble? You need to determine a course of action for the entire game, not just the end. Are you going to sit that player at two or three fouls in the first half? Your decision, in part, determines your philosophy of fouling to stop a layup, whether or not to risk having a key player attempt to draw a charge early in the game, and who your best players guard during the first half of a game.
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130 Winning Special Situations PHILOSOPHY OF SPECIAL SITUATIONS
What are the tendencies of our opponents? In the months leading up to your season, take some time to think about and answer these and other similar questions that 9 you come up with about each opponent on your schedule.
What are their philosophies and tendencies regarding special situations? Are there any set plays they like to run out of a timeout? Does she change defenses after a timeout? What do they do at the end of the quarter? What is their philosophy regarding players in foul trouble? How do they approach the final minutes of a game?
The more you know about your opponents, their system, and their coaching tendencies the better you can prepare your players and the special situations aspect 10 for each of your game plans. WINNING WORDS How do I emphasize the importance of cannot accept in 0A “We every possession and every situation? In ” victory what we would 10 my efforts to emphasize the importance of being fundamentally sound and improving not accept in defeat. our execution, I have always pointed out to our players Dick Bennett that the outcome of a game that is decided by less than 10 points can be changed by altering four possessions of that game. The problem is we won't know what plays that we would want to change until after the game. Since we don't know ahead of time which possessions are game changers, it is absolutely necessary to properly execute every phase of every possession. As each possession occurs, the outcome of the game is being influenced. We don't want to look back, look for those game changing plays, and then wish that we would have executed properly and given a better effort.
Being four possessions better each game is an improvement that a team at any level can make. In high school, it is only one offensive possession and one defensive possession to improve each quarter. For college, a one possession difference every 10 minutes. I believe that is something that any coach can get a team to buy into. Your success and improvement can be measured by using a possession by possession chart of the game.
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130 Winning Special Situations PHILOSOPHY OF SPECIAL SITUATIONS
I want to give you some ideas that I have picked up from other coaches that have definitely made a difference in our execution. As Don Meyer says, it really is "Not what you teach, but what you emphasize." Presenting to our teams the four game changing plays has helped me to emphasize the importance of every possession.
The plays could be plays that lead to the "four point swing" such as: not meeting a pass leading to a steal and a layup. Eliminating other senseless turnovers such as trying to force a pass that isn't there, not chinning a defensive rebound and getting stripped, three second calls, or getting in a hurry, helps to stay away from game changing swings.
Taking a bad shot that gives us less of a chance to score and gives our opponent a chance for a numbers advantage break is another of the crucial plays. I heard Jay Bilas say that "A bad shot is the first pass for your opponent's fast break." I think that is a great way to put it. Trying to dribble a loose ball and not picking it up and chinning it which allows the other team get it is another play that is easily corrected with proper execution. Being aware of the clock at the end of a quarter, the half, or the shot clock is another play that we can control.
Take any four of those possessions and turn them in favor of the losing team and you have a game that is played differently during the last few minutes--which could change the outcome. I have framed it in this manner and I believe it has helped our players to understand the importance of each and every play. My WINNING WORDS point to them is that these are plays that collectively can change a game and are completely within the “A bad shot is the first control of the players. My job as coach is to properly pass for your ’s fast teach and drill them to execute them in games. I strive opponent ” to emphasize the four possession mindset in practice break. and during timeouts in games so that we are aware and prepared to make these plays when they happen. None Jay Bilas of us want to watch the video and go over what we "shoulda, coulda, woulda" done.
Not only do these plays make a difference on the scoreboard, but that difference is multiplied as a factor of the momentum they can create or negate in the flow of the game.
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130 Winning Special Situations PRACTICING SPECIAL SITUATIONS
Chapter 2 Practicing Special Situations This section contains my suggestions for practicing special situations.
Practice situations at the end of every practice. Even devoting the last five minutes of each practice to special situations is enough time to get something 11 meaningful accomplished that will pay great dividends in a game. Situations are a great way to end practice on an upbeat note. If you put five seconds on the clock, yourA ball out of bounds, trailing by one point, then execute your play and one of your players hits a game winning shot, that really generates some enthusiasm for your team. Even if the shot misses, or you make a mistake in executing the play, teaching the lesson involved so that you will get it right the next time is another great way to end practice. Both you and your players will know that you are better prepared the next time that situation arises. PRACTICE TEMPLATE Individual Skills Practicing situations adds three aspects to practice that we are constantly looking for as coaches: 1) Repetition with
Individual/Team Defense variety. Even practicing the same situation has scores of scenarios that can change such as: who is or isn’t in the Individual/Team Offense one and one or double bonus, what player has “fouled on/Toughness ti out,” which team is ahead and by how much, who has the Competi ball, where the ball starts, who has timeouts left, etc…) 2) SITUATIONS Competition, and 3) The drill is game-like.
Practice situations until they become automatic reactions for your players and not something they will need to think about in games. We cannot expect players at any level to execute anything in games that has not been repeated time and time again during practice. You will have more success in games with each special situation you face if the players are reacting from instinct that has been developed during practice rather than thinking about what you just explained to them during a timeout.
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130 Winning Special Situations PRACTICING SPECIAL SITUATIONS
Confidence in games comes from success in practice. Your players will 12 have confidence in games when these situations arise because they will have Winning Words beenA taught how to play them and then repeated omes them so often in practice. The players will have “Confidence c confidence in you, their coach, that you are from demonstrated” always prepared with a play or a strategy that ability. they have practiced and that will put them in the best position to succeed. There is always Bill Parcells pressure in games, but they will not experience the increased anxiety that comes from feeling unprepared. They will know what to expect— they have been there before in practice.
Planning for your special situations segment of practice forces you to take the time to think more completely and in 3 13 more detail. Having thought through situations in my office, run then by my staff, and then having a chance to see them live in practice them, gives me the opportunity helpsA me to come up with the best strategy for our team, not just any strategy. A
No one can plan for and practice every scenario that could possibly come up during 14 a game. However, the more you cover in practice will give your team the confidence that they can handle something that very rarely does happenA in a game that you have not practiced. More than likely, your players will have been through a very similar situation and will believe that they are as prepared as they can be.
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130 Winning Special Situations PRACTICING SPECIAL SITUATIONS
Try it, you’ll like it. Spend some of the practice time that you devote to special 15 situations experimenting with your sets, schemes, and where you place your Take some time each personnel.A Even during the years where we have had practice to experiment. “everyone back” the skills of our players should be improved if we have done a good job with our out of There is a difference season skill development workouts. You need to be able between drawing to see in action how your players’ new and improved something on seeingpaper skills from last year can best be utilized. it and actuallyexecute Early in the season, it is important to do some your team experimenting with what spots you put players in on the floor. against presses and traps, who inbounds the ball from under your basket, who inbounds the ball for a game
winning shot, who takes the shots at the end of quarters, and any other crucial personnel decisions that we need to make. Usually, I don’t change my mind as to who needs to fill each role and what they can do. But, there are times when I have made some decisions that I feel have made us better by putting players in different positions. Many times it is not the new role that you put someone in that affects your execution, but it becomes how that trickles down to filling their previous spot. What role changes would take place for the rest of our players is usually the deciding factor as to whether to change or not to change.
Make every situation that you 16 practice as game-like as possible. Have assistant coaches (or managers if they are capable)A officiate during your situation work. Have a manager—or a player who is out of the scrimmage--run the clock. Specify who is in the bonus or double bonus and how many timeouts each team has remaining. Who is in foul trouble? Who has the possession arrow? If a timeout is called in the situations have it like a game—set the timeout timer and have the players report to the bench. Have an assistant coach, coach the second team. The more game-like, you can make your practice segments, the better your preparation will be. On game night, the players will know that they have been through this before. Go through your practice timeouts just like
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130 Winning Special Situations PRACTICING SPECIAL SITUATIONS the game. Draw the play on your whiteboard that you use during game timeouts. Remind each player of his spot and what his role is for the situation you are facing or the play you are running. Remind them of the foul situation, timeouts remaining, and who you are going to foul on the other team if that is appropriate.
Have an overall season plan for putting in your special situations. Your plan should include everything you will be putting in as the season unfolds and when 17 you will be putting it all in. If you are new to your coaching job, you need to take the time to get the situation work in as you are putting in all of your systems. Without an overall plan, you run the risk of not having everything in that you need and at the time you need it.
Create special rules in practice that allowunit to Use special rules as needed to create a more equal playing field so that your your second 18 second team can compete with your compete with your ers to make your starters. You want to make the start situations as competitive as you can to make them - as game-like as you can. situations segment of practice more game Here are examples of special rules you can use to like. makes scrimmages more competitive. The “special rules” that you use need to fit your philosophy, be consistent, and are simple enough that they do not cause confusion. I am not suggesting to use all of them. We don’t use all of them every year. Pick the ones that will have the biggest impact on your preparation.
If the second unit hits the rim on a three point shot against the starters while you are working on situations, it counts as a made three point shot.
When we are working on killing the clock at the end of the game and the second team is attempting to steal the ball, we don’t call fouls as long as it is a clean attempt to take the ball. We don’t allow the second unit to be dirty, just physical. We do call offensive fouls on the first team if they react to the “no foul” calls in a way that would be called an offensive foul in a game. If you are going to use this, it is
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130 Winning Special Situations PRACTICING SPECIAL SITUATIONS
important to explain to the players what you are doing, what the purpose is, and that it is not a license to hurt anyone. You have to keep control of the situation with a whistle or it can do more harm than good if tempers get out of
hand. to be It is far more difficult Award the second unit two points if they
to be simple than can get free for an uncontested shot. If they hit complicated. the shot it is a four-point play. In addition to
making the scrimmage more competitive, this Unknown rule emphasizes how important it is to contest all shots.
Award the second team two points for each non-shooting foul by the first team. Committing unnecessary fouls hurts your team tremendously. Your goal must be to reduce the 1-and-1 opportunities for your opponents and not put them at the line at the end of the game regardless of what the situation is.
A turnover by the first team is an automatic two points for the second team. The first unit needs to feel the consequence of a turnover. In a practice scrimmage the second unit might not be capable of making the first unit pay for the mistake by scoring off of the turnover. On game night, your opponent will turn your miscue into points.
If the first team is scoring too easily or too quickly, then impose some restrictions on the first team. For example the ball must be touched in the post before the first team can shoot. Or, they must make a certain number of passes before shooting. That simulates playing against a first team defense. When restricting how quickly a team may shoot, require the players to fake a shot when they have a shot they might normally take.
Award the second unit two points for getting the ball into the paint. This teaches them that it increases scoring opportunities when the ball gets in the lane and at the same time reinforces to the first team how critical it is to keep the ball out of the lane.
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130 Winning Special Situations PRACTICING SPECIAL SITUATIONS
Require your first team to defend the ball handler with their hands behind their back. This will simulate playing against an opponent that excels at breaking down the defense with the dribble. Your other players will have to be prepared to help on penetration as well as helping the helper , in rotations created by the penetration. thoughts “Great . ” A missed free throw by the second unit is one reduced to practice, point, a made free throw is two points. This also helps teach the first unit not to commit fouls become great acts William Hazlitt Anyone on the first team not chinning a rebound is a turnover—loss of possession and the two points that are the result of every turnover.
If a player takes an unacceptable shot, for us that is anything except an open jump shot or power shot inside, award two points to the defense.
If you are able to make the competition even so that both the first and the second team have a legitimate chance to win through using special rules, then you can begin to have rewards and punishments for the winners and losers. If I have to error on one side or the other, I would much rather favor the second unit to make it so that it is more difficult for the first team to win the situations scrimmage part of practice.
Always play out the time, regardless of what situation you put on the clock to start, and how it plays out, play the time to 0:00. As the situation unfolds, other situations 19 come up as one team scores, gets into the bonus, etc… Your players don’t get a “do over” in games, so don’t give them one in practice. If you start out with the starters down by 3 and the 2nd team has the ball with 30 secondsA to go, decide who is in the bonus, timeouts remaining, possession arrow, etc…
You can end up getting practice in for more than one situation, and it is possible that something could come up that you haven’t covered yet, creating a teachable moment. If you end up with a tie score, play at least a one minute overtime to settle the outcome.
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130 Winning Special Situations GENERAL SITUATIONS IN THE FLOW OF THE GAME
Chapter 3 General Situations in the Flow of the Game
It is important to cover each of these situations frequently during each season.
Automatic Situations. There are some situations that we call AUTOMATIC SITUATIONS. We make these decisions at the start of the season based on our 20 philosophy and our players’ skills. We teach them to the players and then practice them frequently so that they become reactions. Automatic Situations eliminate decisions players have to make under pressure. They also eliminate confusion in communication. I remind players of our automatics during the game, but it is not something they are hearing for the first time. During the course of this e-book, I have noted which situations are automatic and do not have to be called as AUTOMATIC
Coach’s Call Situations. I have also noted 21 which situations are not automatic for the players and will be called from the bench. It is important that your players know the Victory or defeat is not difference between the two. I have denoted these determined at the situations in the remainder of the book as COACH’S CALL moment of crisis, but rather in the long and
unspectacular period Foul trouble in the first half. What are of preparation your beliefs regarding a player in foul trouble 22 in the first half? It is much better to Unknown determine ahead of time what you will do when the situation occurs rather than making the decision during the game at the time it occurs.
My belief is that with 40 minute games in college, a player should come out of the game after his or her 2nd foul. In a 32 minute high school game, I favor not taking them out until their 3rd foul in the first half. I would much rather get “my money’s worth out of a player by not holding them on the bench too long. AUTOMATIC
Calling timeout to save a possession Our rule is do not call time outs to save possession until he last 2 minutes of 23 the game. I teach that the clock and score are unimportant to players until the last 45 seconds of a quarter or the last two minutes of a game. Under 2 minutes—player with the ball calls timeout if possession is in doubt. AUTOMATIC
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130 Winning Special Situations GENERAL SITUATIONS IN THE FLOW OF THE GAME
Jump ball. All players line up between the player they are guarding and our opponents basket. We put a safety at our opponent’s free throw line. Our number one 24 objective is to win the tip. If we don’t win the tip, our goal off the jump ball is to force them to play against our set half court defense. AUTOMATIC
Timeouts I always call our 30 second timeouts first. It gives me one less decision to make. That way everyone on our bench knows what to expect and you can get right 25 into the huddle. The length of the timeout won't be in debate at the end of a close game resulting in less confusion to deal with. It also leaves your long timeouts for the end of the game when you need a little more time to talk and the players to rest, and calm down during the timeout. AUTOMATIC
Saving a loose ball. We always save the ball toward our team's basket, or throw it directly to one 26 of our teammates. When we throw the ball towards our basket, at best one of our players could beat the other team to the ball and score an easy basket At worst, if the other team retrieves the ball or it goes out of bounds under our basket, we will have an opportunity to set our half court defense. Both scenarios are much better than giving the opponent a running start in a scrambled situation and trying to defend that.
WINNING WORDS If the ball is loose and going out of bounds under the details other team’s basket, and we can't throw it to one of “It’s the little our players, we land out of bounds with the basketball so we can set our defense. The rule for that are vital. Little this situation is NEVER EVER EVER save the ball things make big ”things under the opponent's basket. happen.
The save it to our basket also applies if one of our John Wooden players is trying to save a ball from going over and back. If we cannot throw it in the paint at our end, all we are doing is fueling the opponent’s fast break by saving it and creating another loose ball at the half court line. Diving on a loose ball. Good teams and players give first and second efforts, great teams and players give third and fourth efforts. Chart how many of your players were first on the floor after the loose basketball, who gave second, third, and fourth efforts, and who won the loose balls. AUTOMATIC
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130 Winning Special Situations GENERAL SITUATIONS IN THE FLOW OF THE GAME
Defending a one four low. Several teams that we have played put the ball in their best player’s hands, put the other four players across the baseline, and let him create 27 a scoring opportunity for himself or one of his teammates. It is extremely difficult to guard a good player one on one in the middle of the floor. It is a situation that we adjust for and practice for. You might face it at any time of the game—including the end of a quarter.
We adjust our man to man and make sure that the players guarding the shooters in the corner are in their gaps between the dribbler at the top of the key and the shooters in the corner. That way they are in a position to show help and still recover to the corner if the ball is passed there. Our key for the post defenders is to not (never in any circumstance, not just this one) do we help up from the block and allow a dump down pass for a layup. We want to keep the ball in front of us. The other option that you have for defending a 1-4 low depending on your philosophy and your system is to switch to a 2-3 or 1-2-2 zone. AUTOMATIC
27 Shortening the game. There are times when it is to your advantage to shorten the 28 game, even if you are not in the lead. There have been times when I have held the ball early in the game (no shot clock) even when we were behind.
I have two ways to shorten the game. One is by running our normal offense, but calling “4” (no shots other than layups), or I can run our delay game. In this case, we would call “attack 4” meaning that we are looking to get backdoor layups and drives for layups out of our delay set. Here are three situations to consider taking time off the clock: COACH’S CALL
1. To combat foul trouble if you do not have a shot clock and don’t have a lot of depth. Take time off the clock while your best players or scorers are on the bench to keep your opponent from having the advantage of you playing without your best players.
2. If your team is playing too fast. I can think of two occassions that we had dug ourselves a double digit deficit in the first half by playing too fast. In both cases, my attempt to get the pace more to our advantage was to go into our delay and attack 4. One of the games we came back to win, the other we lost in triple overtime to an athletically superior opponent.
3. You are playing an opponent whose style of play is a much faster tempo than yours. You can use the “Milk a Minute” concept in #72 of this ebook at any time during the game. When I know that we are going to play that way against a particular opponent, we put 30 seconds on the clock for each possession in the practices leading up to the game. We run nothing but a layup (our call is “4”) until the horn sounds signaling that the 30 seconds has expired, then run our normal offense. That simulates what we need to do on game night. In these types of games, the football stat “Time of Possession” applies.
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130 Winning Special Situations OFFENSIVE SITUATIONS IN THE FLOW OF THE GAME
Chapter 4 Offensive Situations in Flow of Game
These offensive situations can occur at any time during the game—including the end of the game.
Save a second inbounding the ball. We break when our inbounds passer receives the ball from the official. We do not have the player say “go” or slap the ball. It 29 saves a second on the five second count from having the inbounder smack the ball to start our cutting and screening. AUTOMATIC
Inbound ball in dead corners full court. The diagram at the right shows a play to run to get 30 the ball in if you have to go full court and are being pressed on a dead corner spot inbound. This is a situation that does not come up very often, but as Murphy’s Law tells us--if you aren’t prepared, it will definitely happen at the end of tight game. I am not implying that this is the only play to run. I am saying that you need to have a play that works for your personnel. AUTOMATIC
Inbound ball in dead corner half court. The name of this play is Crazy Corner and I got it from Coach Ed Schilling. 31 Make sure you have something to run in this situation that fits your personnel. To run Crazy Corner: All players are facing the ball in the corner to start the play. 3 goes outside and to the ball, then to the basket. 1 jabs to the rim. 4 and 5 go shoulder to shoulder and screen for him. 5 then flashes to the ball 4 goes deep opposite toward the sideline and half court intersection. As with any inbounds play, hit the first open receiver. AUTOMATIC
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130 Winning Special Situations OFFENSIVE SITUATIONS IN THE FLOW OF THE GAME
Playing against combination defenses. If you have an outstanding player who would be subjected to these types of defenses. I don’t think that you should necessarily have 32 a special offense for each junk defense, but know what adaptations you are going make to your offense when you have some junk thrown at you. Using the one or two players who are being guarded man to man in the combination defense as a screener for the other players who are being zoned. That effectively takes away two defenders. Run America’s play pr any play that involves a screen the screener. COACH’S CALL
Offensive rebound tip outs on missed free throws and field goals. Our rule is that if you cannot grab an offensive rebound with both hands (either on a missed free throw 33 or a missed field goal), but can get one hand on it, tip the ball out to the 10 second line. We always have a player retreat to the center jump circle every time we shoot to be ready to establish or conversion defense. We call that player our “fullback” because he is responsible to get all the way back to guard the basket. That player is also back there to retrieve the tip outs that we make. AUTOMATIC
2 on 1 situations. In addition to working 34 on it in your transition drills, it is important to teach that 2 on 1 situations do happen in the half court game as well.
Those two on one situations should be executed in the If your offensive’t grab same way as in transition. You don’t get many 2 on 1 rebounders can situations during the course of a game, but when you the basketball with do, you should score on 90% of them. The only time the defense should be able to stop you is if there is a two hands, they should tip it back to the significant height advantage for the defense—as in 8 or more inches. players you have positioned to’s faststop break. your When there is a two on one opportunity, the dribbler opponent takes the ball to one side of the free throw lane. The offensive player without the ball runs down the opposite free throw lane. That provides adequate spacing so that the one defender cannot cover both. The player with the ball continues dribbling at the basket until he is stopped. If the defender does not come at him to stop him, he should get the ball to the basket for a layup or dunk. Neither the ball
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130 Winning Special Situations OFFENSIVE SITUATIONS IN THE FLOW OF THE GAME nor the open receiver should ever run down the middle of the lane in a 2 on 1 situation. Running in the middle completely distorts the spacing and gives the advantage to the defense. AUTOMATIC
Who is your best technical foul free throw shooter? Your best technical free throw shooter isn’t always your highest percentage free throw shooter and it doesn’t always 35 remain the same during the course of a year. Here is an example of what I mean. One year in the championship game of our sectional tournament, I chose Player B to shoot two technical free throws in the fourth quarter of a tight game. That player was a 73% free throw shooter. I chose him to shoot over Player A who was shooting 92% for the season.
My reasoning was that Player B had a broken hand early in the season and most of his misses were nd during that time period. I had compared the 2 half of the season of each player, player B actually had a to higher percentage during that time. His lower season key percentage was due to the injury and the large important - One is self amounts of early misses. success An - confidence. to self It was absolutely nothing against Player A—he was key tough and in no way did I feel that he couldn’t hit the important is pressure free throws. I would have gladly had him confidence . shoot as a very close second choice. In some cases, preparation that player with the higher percentage might not be able to hit them under pressure. That is a call that Arthur Ashe you must make as the coach.
In this example, I went with the percentages that were the most recent and the most pertinent. COACH’S CALL
Have a short seconds on the shot clock set if you have a shot clock at the level where you coach. I also 36 think it is important to give the exact time that you will get into that set—and a call for the players to make. If the ball is outside the 3 point arc and there are 10 seconds on the shot clock, players call “Duke” (or whatever you name of the set is) and the perimeter with the ball gets an on ball screen from the nearest big. AUTOMATIC
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130 Winning Special Situations OFFENSIVE SITUATIONS IN THE FLOW OF THE GAME
“FIRE!” If we are being trapped in the half court and have spread out the defense to the point where the basket is unprotected--the receiver under the basket yells “FIRE!” 37 After hearing “fire.” the player with the ball throws a pass to the bottom of the net. The receiver only makes the call if the player with the ball can throw it directly under the net without a chance of a stolen pass. We throw it right under the net because we have not had 4great size and that is someplace that everyone can catch the pass.
This doesn’t happen frequently, two or three times a season, but you do want to be prepared to capitalize when it does happen. At times, especially if you are playing against a very aggressive half court trap or a team that physically over matches your players, the defense may get greedy for steals and leave the basket unprotected. It is an effective way to get some of the pressure off the perimeter and force the defense to guard the basket. AUTOMATIC
Run counters to plays depending on how the defense plays the With all of the quick 38 hit set plays that I run, I always put in two at a time, so that I have two plays that are
counters to each other.
I name them in pairs using College names. So, we WINNING WORDS have UCLA and Bruin as a pair, Kansas and Jayhawk “It’s not what you as a pair, etc... s what you ’ teach it ” We start the counter (the school's nickname--ex: emphasize.
Bruin) the same as the original (the school's name-- ex: UCLA), but adjust it to make it so that we slip a Don Meyer screen that we set in the first, or cut backdoor, screen the screener, or some other action that we can exploit when the defense starts to "play the play" when we run the original.
Often times, it is a good way to get an easy basket by switching to the counter after you have run the original two or three times to set up the counter. COACH’S CALL
Long Lead Pass. We teach our players to throw 39 the long lead pass inside the old center jump circle at the free throw line. Of course, that takes some explaining as to the old jump ball rule to today's generation! :)
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130 Winning Special Situations OFFENSIVE SITUATIONS IN THE FLOW OF THE GAME
I have taught that for four reasons:
1) It helps the player throwing the pass to decide if the pass is open. If he can't throw it in the circle safely, don't throw it.
2) The player who has broken open in front of the defense knows where to expect the pass to be thrown.
Never put a player in a 3) It allows the player to catch the pass in stride and position where she score without a dribble when executed correctly. cannot be successful 4) It has saved turnovers by keeping us from throwing the pass too long and out of bounds.
We spend time working on the long pass in our practices as a part of our transition breakdown. AUTOMATIC
Playing to your strengths. It is important during the flow of the 40 game that you as a coach can keep 39 the players and the team as a whole playing to their strengths. As an example, if you are a team that has a strong inside presence, have a signal to go inside especially if you are hitting from outside and beginning to go away from your team’s strength. If possible, use statistics to measure whether or not you are playing to your strength. Our goal is to get the ball into the lane 2 out of every 3 possessions. Find a similar way to measure yours
All inbounds plays with your backup inbounder. I prefer to use the same inbounder for all inbound plays. The 3 types of inbounds passes that I differentiate 41 are Under the Basket, Sideline, and Full Court. I have a designated inbounder for each type of pass. The same player could do all three if he is the best we have at all three situations. However, if the inbounder is on the bench, you need to make sure that you have a 2nd and 3rd backups (3rd is in case the 2nd is out) rather than leaving it to chance as to who will inbound the ball. COACH’S CALL.
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130 Winning Special Situations DEFENSIVE SITUATIONS IN THE FLOW OF THE GAME
Chapter 5 Defensive Situations in Flow of Game
These defensive situations can occur at any time during the game—including the end of the game.
Defending under out. You must have a philosophy and practice so that your 42 players understand and can execute that philosophy. Do you want to work to get a five second count? If you do, you will cause some turnovers and could give up a few layups by ” The game is always spreading your defense. Our goal when defending “ g, are you? inbounds plays from under our opponents’ basket is changin to first not allow a layup. Second, we take away an Vonn Read open perimeter catch and shoot. We work on packing our players back in the lane when the ball is in the hands of the inbound passer, then sprinting to the ball and arriving at the player catching the ball with a perfect closeout when the ball arrives. All other defenders should also arrive in their help gaps as the ball arrives in the receiver’s hands. AUTOMATIC
Playing against a great shooter There are times in our scouting report when we feel that a shooter can hurt us more 43 from behind the three point arc than by putting the ball on the floor.
Our terminology is to “run him off” of the 3 point arc. That means that we are going to jump when the shooter starts to go up with his shot. Our goal is to make him change his mind away from the shot and force him to dribble. We then have a help defender attack the player (who is now a dribbler). Our player who leaped at the shooter scrambles back to help the helper.
Our technique is to jump straight up in the air and not into the shooter so that we do not allow him to draw a three shot foul. COACH’S CALL
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130 Winning Special Situations DEFENSIVE SITUATIONS IN THE FLOW OF THE GAME
Rebounding a defensive free throw. If you are outsized by your opponent, put four rebounders in the lane, have your two bottom players hold their block outs, 44 designate a player to block out the shooter, and have the fourth rebounder be responsible to get the ball. That way your outsized players don't have to both block out and get the ball. Take a few minutes each practice to experiment with this or other ideas you have to see if they will or won't work for your team.
Stop them before they start. When you are playing against a team that fast 45 breaks by taking the ball out quickly
after you have made a free throw, have a substitute at the scorer's bench to go in after the WINNING WORDS leads final free throw is made. During the substitution, training you can get everyone back and set your half court “Better to better ” defense. If the free throw is missed, you can always pull the sub back from the scorer's table if performance. you want. You can do the same thing if you are pressing and want time to set your press up. Navy SEAL Team 6 COACH’S CALL Motto
Defensive adjustments. It is usually best to not assign your best scorer to a 46 tough defensive matchup to start the game to keep her out of foul trouble. If she is your best defender (which is often the case if she is your best athlete), you need to practice to be prepared for and have a plan as to when you are going to switch her to one of the other teams’ best scorers later in the game if foul trouble is not an issue. COACH’S CALL
Defensive Matchups If you play man to man defense, one idea to consider when assigning your matchups is to 47 put your best block out player on their best offensive rebounder. Sometimes keeping that player from getting two or three putbacks can be the deciding difference in the game. It is important for us to maintain the defensive matchups that we want all throughout the game. We spend a lot of time in our game plan on who we will have guard who. Once the game starts and both teams begin substituting, those matchups can get lost in the shuffle. I assign an assistant coach to monitor our matchups and adjust them on the fly during the game. COACH’S CALL
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130 Winning Special Situations DEFENSIVE SITUATIONS IN THE FLOW OF THE GAME
Break away layups. Giving up layups in transition hurts on the scoreboard, but it hurts in other ways too. For one thing, it is a huge momentum shifter away from your 48 team and to your opponent.
One way to throw even more momentum their way is by making the mistake of giving up a conventional three point play with a basket and a free throw.
It is instinctive that players want to try to block a layup by Converting to defense swinging at the ball which almost always leads to a foul. It is critical to teach your players to not allow the three is one area of the game point play. that is not practiced enough and as a result, My belief is either to let the layup go or to foul in a way many teams give up (never by being dirty or being called intentional) that they baskets that could be can't get the shot off and must make two free throws. prevented with more practice. The only way that I can tolerate giving up a basket and a foul is when our player is attempting to draw a charge and is called for blocking. That I can live with because if we get the call that takes away a transition basket from them, that is a huge momentum shifter our way. AUTOMATIC
Converting to defense off a missed free throw. Defending a missed free throw has 49 always been a tough thing to handle. I use the free throw conversion as a part of our conversion drills during the defensive segment of our practice. We practice converting from a free throw in two ways. One is to rotate different players shooting the free throws and then play it live--make or miss. This gives us practice converting from both a rebound and from the ball being taken out of bounds. We also line up for a free throw with a player at the free throw line to practice missing the free throw on purpose in case we have to do that in a game, and then we convert to defense. AUTOMATIC
Pressing on a missed free throw. (This situation was contributed by Coach Steve Dement) I have used this 50 at various times for 34 years of coaching, particularly when I had smaller teams (which seemed like always!).
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130 Winning Special Situations DEFENSIVE SITUATIONS IN THE FLOW OF THE GAME
1) We are shooting a free throw, and I have a fairly athletic kid on the line that can move pretty well (sometimes you have to do this regardless of who is on the line, depending on the situation)
2) We can run this two ways -- a 1-2-2 trap or a 2-1-2 trap
3) First from the 1-2-2 set: If we miss the free throw, the shooter becomes the point man / girl on the press, he will force the ball to the side the rebound comes off on and set an early trap with the second row teammate on that side (we align him at about the top of the three pt. line extended, but not too wide as to give up a dribble move to the center of the floor).
4) At this point, normal 1-2-2 rotations kick in
Second Situation--Still shooting the free throw.
1) Alignment is standard offensive free throw situation, 2 teammates up on the lane.
you specifically “What 3) The difference is that we will put our "littles" up on .” teach is what your the lane instead of "bigs" because of the quickness factor in running a trap players will do best Dick Bennett 4) Obviously our "bigs" are back on third row.
5) The trap initially is going to be with the lane guy or girl on the side the rebound comes off on, and the shooter
6) Once the initial trap is set, even though were set up in what looks like a 2-1-2, the rotations will be identical to the 1-2-2 (kind of like a zones look like a 2-3 once the ball is passed to the wing).
*We don't do this every time, but usually will if our FT. shooter is one of our better ones. We also look at the situation personnel wise, if we are playing a good ball handling team, this will help slow them down. If we are playing someone that turns it over vs. pressure, we will run it to get the turnovers. It works exceptionally well vs. teams that like to run the sideline break, because they are taking the ball right where we want to trap! COACH’S CALL
If you would like to contact Coach Dement for more information, email me at [email protected] and I will put you in touch with him.
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF QUARTERS 1, 2,& 3
Chapter 6 End of quarter (1st, 2nd, 3rd)
There are some situations that occur at the end of the first three quarters that need to be handled differently than they are executed in the flow of the game or at the end of the game.
Teach your players to yell “Clock!” with 30 seconds remaining in each quarter, rather than “time” so that the official is not confused into thinking that you are calling 51 timeout. This rule applies in the 4th quarter as well as the first three. AUTOMATIC
Force the ball to the sideline in defensive conversion at the end 52 of the quarter. We force the ball to the sidelines in conversion defense and in the half court as well with less than five seconds to go in the quarter. That “Patience is power. will lessen the likelihood of a player banking Patience is not an in a long shot if their momentum is going .” It absence of action; sideways rather than head on. It also gives “timing us a better idea of where the rebound will go. rather it is The percentages show that it will rebound on waits on the right time the opposite side from where it was shot to act, for the right most frequently. AUTOMATIC ” principles and in the right way. Take the last shot of each quarter. That allows you to get Unknown 53 at least as many possessions as your opponent, and possibly three more depending on who gets the first possession of the quarter. Not getting a shot off to beat the clock at the end of the quarter is not our goal, but it is preferable to a quick shot that leads to an opponent’s basket.
There are different ways of measuring possessions. Some coaches count each shot or turnover as the end of a possession, so if you get two offensive rebounds then that counts as two extra possessions. The system that has worked best for us is that a new possession only starts when the ball changes hands from one team to the other, so even if there
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF QUARTERS 1, 2,& 3 are five consecutive offensive rebounds, we count that as all a part of one possession.
My belief is that it is very important to get the last shot of the first three quarters in high school and for middle school teams to learn the importance of that skill as well. Potentially that is an 18 point swing for nine points you can get and nine points your opponent will not get. Even if the shots are twos, a 12 point swing is still huge.
It is not realistic to think that you are going to hit a three to end each quarter, but I have been involved in two varsity games where our one team did hit a three to end each quarter—unfortunately neither one was our! Nine points made a huge difference in both games, as they will in most games. Since they were the last shots of each quarter, we did not have a chance to respond. My belief is that scoring runs, scoring droughts, and momentum play a big role in basketball. Taking the last shot and keeping the opponent from taking the last shot play huge roles in those three areas.
We practice going for the last shot in practice every day by running the last 30 seconds of drill and scrimmage work like a game. 30 seconds is normally when we set as the automatic time that we begin to hold for the last shot. Our rule is that we will take an uncontested layup with less than 30 seconds, but nothing else. We have had years, depending on our talent relative to our opponents and our depth, where we have started to hold at 20 seconds, and have gone as much as starting at 45 seconds. For middle school, 15-20 seconds is the appropriate depending on ’s what your players can do.
“Sometimeshallenge a player is I believe it is better to establish an automatic time to hold greatest c for the last shot that your players have been drilled on ” coming to grips with rather than getting up and screaming "One shot!" You can continue to run your regular offense and just shot his role on the team. fake when there is a shot that you normally would take. Scottie Pippin Again, we will take a wide open layup under 30 seconds and then have confidence in our defense to get a stop. Other than that, we feel that maintaining possessions is more important than shooting a 15 foot jump shot or
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF QUARTERS 1, 2,& 3 even a wide open three point shot if it would allow the other team to have a chance to score.
We start to run our last shot of the quarter play at 12 seconds (point guard yells “Set!” to start the play) and want to shoot the ball with five seconds to go on the clock. That gives us enough time for an offensive rebound and put back if we miss, but does not give the defense enough time to get a rebound and get a good shot at their end. I am banking that the opposing coach is not going to call timeout if they get a defensive rebound in the first three quarters. AUTOMATIC
Last shot of quarter play vs. man to man. Here is the play that I like to run at the end of the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd quarters against man to man defense. I call it Butler. All 54 of our sets are named after colleges and then the counter is called by the school’s nickname. The counter to this play, which we run at the end of the 4th quarter and overtime to take the game winner is called Bulldog. AUTOMATIC
There are four parts to the diagram. Parts 3 and 4 are continued on the next page
#1 can dribble to either deep elbow. I define the deep elbow as one step behind the intersection of the lane and the high school 3 point arc. We use the concept for spacing.
In this example, he goes right.
#3 cuts in to the elbow,
#4 fills the opposite deep elbow from where #1 dribbled. #1 passes to #4.
#2 cuts to fill the elbow that #4 vacated.
#1 cuts off the screen from #2
If he is open, #4 should hit him for a catch, sweep, and drive.
#3 cuts to replace #1
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF QUARTERS 1, 2,& 3
4 passes to 3 and then cuts off 5s screen.
If 4 is open, 3 should hit him for a catch, sweep, and drive.
1 cuts to the block if 4 does not receive the ball.
The final option is #1 coming off the staggered double down screen from #2 and #5.
Throw the ball long inside our arc at the end of a quarter after the other team scores and the clock is running with under five seconds. Rather than trying to quickly inbound the ball under the other team’s basket and risking a turnover that gives them 55 an opportunity to score again, we throw it inside our arc at the other end of the court and look to score off the long pass. We know we will not score much off the long pass, but it allows us to avoid a careless turnover under the other team’s basket by inbounding the ball too quickly. AUTOMATIC
Last shot of quarter play vs. 2-3 zone. Here is the play that I like to run at the end of the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd quarters against a 2-3 zone. I call it overload. 56 AUTOMATIC
There are four parts to the diagram. Parts They are on the next two pages.
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF QUARTERS 1, 2,& 3
#1 passes to #3 to shift the defense.
#3 passes back to #1 and cuts toward the basket
#5 slides over on top of #4
#3 continues his cut to the corner.
As the cut is taking place, #1 reverses the ball to #2
#2 passes to #3 as he arrives in the corner
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF QUARTERS 1, 2,& 3
#5 screens the middle defender in the zone to allow 4 to pop to a 12 foot 45 degree cut
#3 passes to #4 for the shot
Do not try to beat the clock with a shot at the end of a quarter or the shot clock. Take your natural shot, not one that you rush or try to pull your arms back to make it 57 appear that you beat the buzzer. Do not look at the clock prior to shooting.
A shot that is late is better than a shot that is rushed.
When you are working for the last shot of a quarter, teach your players to not look at the clock once they start making the play or taking the shot. The time to look at the clock is with 12 to 15 seconds to go (or if there is a whistle stopping play) and then to have a feel for the clock as it counts down.
What good is looking at the clock prior to the shot “Coaching is ’ other than to slow them down and distract their focus Preparation away from what you want them to execute? If they have been through daily repetitions in they will have Pete Carril developed that clock in their head. This is especially critical when rebounding a last second shot, there is no time to look, the player needs to rebound and score.
At levels where there is no instant replay, I have seen shots that were late counted by the official, but I have never seen a shot at the end of the quarter that did not
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF QUARTERS 1, 2,& 3 go in count—unless there was goal tending called. AUTOMATIC
Put a bad free throw shooter at the line at the 58 end of the first half if in bonus but not double bonus. If you have players you can put in to give a foul and you have someone on the other team that you would like to have at the line, why wait until the end of the game when you are getting closer to the double bonus. Don’t do it just for the sake of doing it, but if you have proof of a poor shooter on the other team (less than 50%) with enough attempts to matter, consider using fouls 7, 8, and 9 in the first half to force him or her to hit a one and one. COACH’S CALL
"We spent much practice time working on end-of- game situations...In most instances I didn't want to take a time-out in these late-game situations. After all, we had worked on these things in practice and knew what to do. Calling time-out allowed the opposing coach to set his defense and make some defensive substitutions.” Dean Smith
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME PHILOSOPHY
Chapter 7 End of Game Philosophy
Make all of the tough decisions in your office when you can debate them with your staff and hem what think through them for yourself. Play the "Tell t done, not percentages and take into account the teams on want you don't your schedule and the talent that you have. When what you it comes time to make the tough decisions at the done. We spendlling want end of the game, you will have already made too much time te them. what they did them Spend more time Do not second guess or berate yourself if you wrong. lose a game if you follow through on what you g them how you tellin it done." had planned. want g George Ravelin The only time I am upset with myself regarding end of the game decisions is if a situation came up in a game that we had not practiced or that we had not practiced enough and that I did not have a plan for dealing with.
For each of these, you will need to develop rules for time as well When will you hold the ball for the last shot when tied? I do not believe in holding the ball for the last shot if we are behind—only if we are tied. My rule of thumb is 59 one minute to go in the game, we will yell “clock” and “4” which means we are going to take a wide open layup that cannot be missed or we will go for the last shot. We start our play with 12 seconds on the clock with the point guard yelling “Set!” AUTOMATIC
When will you take the last shot of a tie game? My thinking on the timing 60 of the last shot of the game is different than taking the last shot of one of the first three quarters. If we miss the shot and the opponent rebounds the basketball at the end of any of the first three quarters, they are probably not going to call timeout, so we shoot at 5 seconds. That gives us time for an offensive rebound. At the end of the game, we shoot at 3
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seconds—time for a tip attempt if we miss, but not enough time for the opponent to rebound and call timeout and set up a play. We have lost games by shooting too early, even making the shot, and then having our opponent score to beat us at the buzzer. AUTOMATIC
When will you hold the ball to put it in the deep freeze with a lead? I don’t believe that there is one answer for this question that works in all coaching situations. However, 61 I do feel that it is absolutely essential that you have a definite clock time that you are going to apply your deep freeze at the end of the game (4th quarter and overtime), and that it is something the players will do automatically because you have coached them to do it at that clock time. I am not saying that you should not help to remind the players, but this is one that the players should be able to do even if you were not in the gym. For us the time is 1:00. Make sure that you have yours and that every one of your coaches and players know what it is. AUTOMATIC
Timeout when we score with the clock running. When we score with the clock 62 running in the last two minutes of the game, we call timeout immediately unless we are Take as many out of timeouts. Players on the court move toward the “ official and call timeout as explained in #70 situations as possible AUTOMATIC out of thought Do you continue to “play to win” even if processes and turn the game is over for practice? At the end them into quick requiring no 63 of the game that is totally out of reach, do s .” you still want your players to foul to stop the reaction thought at all clock? Do you still want them to call timeout if you o score and the clock is Dick Divinzi running? Do you still want them to be in hurry up catch up mode offense?
It is best that you know how you are going to play it when this comes up. Once the game is decided and we take the regulars out, we stop playing situations and give the JV players some time to play as we normally play (not catch up mode). For many of them it is a big deal to play in a varsity game, so I want them to play as naturally as possible when the game has already been won or lost. I do think it is a huge mistake to empty the bench too early, so I always make sure the game is over. It is a big embarrassment for everyone to take the starters out and have to put them back in. COACH’S CALL
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME PHILOSOPHY
Do you switch defenses to protect a lead? The answer to this question is dependent upon 64 your style of play. If you are a team that puts f I a lot of pressure and or trapping on during the course of a game, you might want to go to a more Consistency is crucial. packing type of defense with a lead in order to Again, I you are able to correct don’t think there is a right or wrong way to do it, but have — what you consider most a way that you are going to do it that is sound and that important—your you have thought through and stick with it. COACH’S CALL consistently
players will quickly learn to do those things you y Tie at home, win on the road? I don’t consider most worry about going for the tie at home, or important, consistentl 65 win on the road. Where we are playing is not a part of my decision making at the end of the game. If we are down 2 at the end of the game, I don’t decide to go for a 2 or a 3 based on whether we are at home or on the road. I leave it in the hands of our players to execute and take the best shot available—regardless of whether it is a 2 point shot or a 3 point shot. AUTOMATIC
When to start catch up mode. I got this idea from Coach Ed Schilling. A 66 study of 10,000 high school, college, and NBA games found that in 96% of the games in the study, you can tell when to start your catch up game–that is taking quicker shots and fouling--by using this formula in the fourth quarter of overtime:
Round the time up to the next minute. Double the number of minutes and it turns to points rather than minutes. Add one point. The fourth factor is that the other team has the ball. For example: 1:22 to go in the game. Round up the time (1:22 rounds up to 2 minutes). Double 2 minutes and change to points. (It becomes 4 points). Add one point makes 5 points.
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME PHILOSOPHY
If the other team has the ball and you are behind by five or more points, then you must play in your catch up mode.
The key to being able to execute catching up, or anything in a game, is to teach the players exactly what you want them to do. Then, rehearse it several times in your situations segment in practice. COACH’S CALL
When do you put one of your best Officials are human players back in with 4 fouls? The and will make 67 traditional thinking is that a coach should remove a player, particularly if mistakes. It is foolish that player is one of the team’s best players, when to rely on them to be he or she is 1 foul from fouling out of the game. perfect. Prepare your The coach’s decisions then become, “When do I team to be tough put the player back in the game for good?” or “Do enough to overcome I substitute on offense and defense to try to get bad calls. some use out of the player.”
I have always felt that it is better to put a player back in too soon and have him foul out than to keep him on the bench too long and feel (after the game is over) that I should have put him back in sooner. If he fouls out, then at least I know that I got every second out of him that I could have. If he finishes up with four fouls, then I wonder how much more time he could have played before fouling out rather than wasting on the bench.
A study analyzed approximately 5000 NBA games from 2006 to 2010. (The source of the study is the book “Scorecasting.”)
The study used the plus/minus statistic (How much did the team win or lose by when that player was in the game. If the team outscored the opponent by 9 points while that player was in, the player’s plus/minus score is +9) to determine the value of a player to his team. “Non-star” players had an average plus/minus of 2 points lower in 4th quarter of a game than during the 1st quarter of a game.
“Star” players (Made the All Star Team or All NBA team), plus/minus rating is only .17 points lower in the 4th quarter than in the 1st quarter.
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME PHILOSOPHY
Comparing “stars” (minus .17 plus/minus in the 4th quarter) to “non-stars” (minus 2.0 plus/minus points in the 4th quarter), it is clear that replacing a star with a non-star is definitely puts that team at a disadvantage.
The argument can be made that if a player fouls out, he or she is not around for the last plays of the game. My philosophy is that every possession of the game should be valued in the same way that the last possession is. I would rather have my best players for three quarters of the possessions in the fourth quarter (example 24 of the 32 possessions counting both offensive and defensive possessions and not for the last play than for 12 of the 32 possessions) and have him for the last play.
Two other pieces of data from the Scorecasting study are that: 1) A player with five fouls, will foul out 21% of the time in the NBA. 2) Leaving a “star” player with 5 fouls in the game rather than putting him on the bench improve the team’s chances of winning by 12%. So, you have pretty good odds that a player will not foul out and you are improving your chances of winning by leaving him or her in the game.
Some coaches feel that when leaving a player in the game with four fouls they might not play hard on defense. Our expectation for the entire game is that “Players who do not play defense do not play.” Anytime a player is not playing defense, regardless of how many fouls he has, he is going to come out of the game. Yes, you can occasionally get a bad call that puts a player’s 5th foul on him. I teach that a bad call on the 5th foul is almost never the reason for a player to foul out. It is usually the silly fouls that he picked up earlier in the game that put him in foul trouble. Reaching fouls, over WINNING WORDS the back with no position and no chance at the rebound, driving out of control, fouling a jump shooter, and other “Sometimes coaches needless fouls are what players need to eliminate. Then, an occasional bad call is not going to cost them and their foul their own players team. out by keeping them on the bench too long. One other type of foul that I want our best players to steer clear of is fouling to stop a breakaway layup. The Jeff Van Gundy two points he surrenders by not contesting the layup are much less costly to our team than him getting one foul closer to disqualification. COACH’S CALL
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME GENERAL
Chapter 8 End of Game General
We handle some situations differently at the end of the game due to the time pressure that is imposed by the clock and because of the limit in the number of timeouts I can call.
End of the Game Communication. You have to communicate constantly at the end of 68 a close game: How many timeouts you have remaining. Everyone has to know how many timeouts we have remaining every time we break from a timeout huddle (regardless of which team called the timeout) in the last four minutes of the 4th quarter. When your opponent is out of timeouts. We let our players know when we break the huddle during their last timeout. The significance is that the opponent cannot stop the clock after they score by calling timeout. If they have no timeouts, we have the lead, and they score with less than five seconds to go in the game, then we know that we do not need to inbound the ball. Who has the possession arrow? Don’t call timeout to save the possession if we have the arrow favoring us. If a player is in doubt as Communication makes to who has the arrow, call timeout. demands also on those I only tell our players the team foul situation who are to receive it... if it pertinent to what they will be doing. Example, if we are trailing and want to put demands in the sense our opponent to the free throw line. of concentration, of AUTOMATIC genuine effort to . Possession in Doubt. If possession of the ball receive whatnicated is being commu is in doubt in the last two minutes, ONLY the 69 player with the ball decides to and then calls Roger Sessions timeout. However, if the players and coach see the player with the ball is attempting to call timeout and the official is not reacting, all players on the floor and the coach help by calling timeout. My reason for putting that decision in the hands of the player with the ball is that he is the best judge of whether or not he is in trouble. AUTOMATIC
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Call Timeout the most effective way. If we are calling timeout to stop the clock after 70 scoring, we want all players on the floor making the timeout sign, moving toward the officials yelling “Timeout!!” I don’t ever want to have an “A lot of people want official not grant us a timeout and say that he did not to take the last shot, realize that we wanted one. That would be my fault for not having the players properly prepared, not the officials. we want to guard.” the last shot AUTOMATIC
If we are behind (even by a point) we do not Ronald Nored play for the last shot. We want to get the best and 71 quickest shot that we can get. That gives us an opportunity to foul and extend the game if we miss. If we make the shot, then we have the defensive mindset that we will get the stop at the end when we need it. AUTOMATIC
Milk a Minute. Have a system where you can milk a lead without going into a full blown delay. Our goal when we go to this is to run a minute off the clock without the 72 other team adjusting to what we are doing. Sometimes if you are just running your offense and it appears that you just can't get a shot, you can run some clock before your opponent is able to adjust with more defensive pressure or trapping. Have a call or signal for nothing but a wide open layup within your normal offense or run a continuity that doesn't lead to shot opportunities. I call the name of the set to run and “4.” COACH’S CALL
Jump ball to start overtime. Our strategy is the same as it is for the jump ball that starts the game —we line up 73 between our man and his/her basket with a safety at our opponent’s free throw line. If we don’t get the tip, the goal of the jump ball is to not allow a lay-up. In overtime you could have foul trouble and have players who are not used to being a part of a jump ball or players in different spots than they were in at the start of the game. AUTOMATIC
Play to run off the jump ball. If you do want to run a play to score off the jump ball, here is an idea of one to 74 use. The reason that I do not like to run a play off the jump ball is that I have never had a player who was sure to get the tip and I do not want our players so concerned about running the play that we lose our defensive consciousness and gave up an easy basket. COACH’S CALL
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME OFFENSE
Chapter 9 End of Game Offense
These are offensive situations that either only occur at the end of the game or need to be strategized differently at the end of the 4th quarter or overtime.
Miss a free throw on purpose with a lead. 75 I think you should miss the shot to the right (hit the top right side of the rim) for a right handed shooter—same thing on the left side for a lefthander. If you try to shoot it hard, you run the risk of banking it in. effort A winning “ “with You would want to miss a free throw on purpose with begins .” ation a one point lead---one free throw shot to go, the other prepar team has no timeouts, and there is less than 1.5 seconds on the clock at the end of the game—never in Joe Gibbs the first 3 quarters. If you make the free throw, the other team can inbound the ball with a long pass down to their end and catch and shoot. Your purpose is to get the clock to start so that your opponent has to rebound the miss and throw up a full court shot in less than one and a half seconds. You have to practice the situation and either pull your offensive rebounders off the line or make sure that you have confidence that you have practiced enough so that they will not foul on either the rebound or the full court heave. COACH’S CALL
Miss a free throw on purpose needing to score. I play this 76 differently than if we are ahead because we are looking for a different type of rebound than missing on purpose when ahead. We use this if we have one shot and are behind by two or three points with less than 4.0 second to go. In this case, the way I want to play it is to have the shooter shoot the ball hard off the front of the rim as soon as he receives the ball from the official. Our hope is to catch the other team off guard and not ready to block out. If you have a timeout you can call timeout it if you get the ball in the scramble for the rebound, or if
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you need a three point shot and don’t have enough time to throw it out on the rebound. Remind the shooter to stay behind the line until the ball hits the rim. COACH’S CALL
Full length game winner—no timeouts. You have to have something that you have practiced. Substitute your best long inbound passer if she is not already in the game. 77 It might even be someone who does not play much. I think it is wise to try everyone in practice to see who throws it the best. It might not be a good idea to have your best player take the ball out so that he or she can be on the floor and on the receiving end of the inbounds pass in order to be able to make a scoring play. However, something to keep in mind is that there is no scoring play to be made if the inbounds pass is not executed perfectly. COACH’S CALL
Nothing but a layup or free throws. Our call is “4.” It is often difficult to 78 communicate at the end of the game when the gym is loud and you are out of or rationing your timeouts, so it is essential that your ” players are sure about the strategy in advance. It “Effort is only effort does not mean that we when it begins to hurt. are not looking to score. It means that Ortega y Gossett we are going to score with layups and free throws.
Let’s take the case where a team is up eight points with two minutes to go in the game. There are hundreds of other time and score situations that we could examine.
I have heard (and have probably said it without realizing it as a young coach) and disagree with telling a team, “We’re up eight points with two minutes remaining in the game; we don’t need to score.” In the vast majority of end of game cases, you will still need to score to win. Your opponent will be more than capable of scoring eight or more points in two minutes, so you cannot become passive, but you need to be selective as to how you will score.
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The rule I follow is this: Any time the regular rotation players are still in the game, then we still need to be prepared to score to win the game. If you have cleared the bench and are ahead, then you are making the statement, “We don’t need to score again to win,” without saying it.
Here is what coaches really need to say at the end of the game when milking a lead and the clock:
“We want to control the types of shots that we take to get the additional points we will need to win this game. We don’t want to take quick shots, unless they are free throws after a quick foul. We don’t want to take outside shots. Offense isn't just the The shots that have the best chance best defense, it's the er of of going in are lay-ups and free perfect defense. Teach throws, so let’s make sure that the kids the pow those are all that we shoot.” possession. The other ot score, if Since that is often hard to team can n communicate in a gym that is up you have the ball. for grabs in a tight game and uses too much time in a timeout, I learned one word (or gesture) that would communicate what I want to milk the clock late in a game. I say “Four!” and hold up four fingers.
We use the Don Meyer shot rating system.4 = lay-up or power shot, 3= great perimeter shot, 2 = okay perimeter shot, and 1= bad shot. So, at the end of the game, holding up four fingers means it is time to shoot only lay-ups (and free throws). Not contested lay-ups, but open lay-ups that will not be missed. You can apply it to an end of game spread or delay offense or to your regular half-court offense.
In a perfect world, you could spread the floor, milk the clock, and run off the last two minutes of the game without a change of possession. In reality, the team that is behind is going to stretch out the game with timeouts after scoring, quick shots, attacking the basket
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME OFFENSE quickly, fouling when you have the ball to stop the clock, and flooding the perimeter with defensive pressure so that often the basket is one of the more open areas on the floor.
Frequently, in our games, the number of possessions in the last two minutes of the game is equal to or greater than the number of possessions in the first six minutes of the quarter. A well coached team can create 10-12
or more possessions the last two minutes. It Winners do not do will be difficult to protect an 8 point lead without scoring for 10-12 consecutive extraordinary things. possessions at the end of the game. They do ordinary things extraordinarily But, if your team: Has a plan to milk the lead well. that has been practiced frequently, can handle the ball well enough to make the defense foul you, shoots only uncontested lay-ups that go in, and can make your free throws—then you have a good chance of scoring enough points to maintain the lead and close out the game with a victory. AUTOMATIC
Over the back on a free throw that your team misses to stop the clock when you are behind. If you are at the foul line at the end of a game when you are in catch up 79 mode and are fouling to stop the clock and get the other team to the line, put in a reserve player in the first offensive rebound position and have her go over the back for the rebound if the free throw is missed. Go for the ball because once in a while, you might be able to get the rebound without having to foul. You can have a regular rotation player at the scorer’s table, ready to substitute for the designated fouler if the final free throw is made. COACH’S CALL
Get the ball inbounds going full court at the end against a man to man press. Have a special play 80 that is different from your normal press breaking alignment for the end of the game. COACH’S CALL
Throw or dribble to half court and call timeout. I 81 would rather run our half court inbounds play than our full court inbounds play if I have a choice. In this
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case, choice meaning a timeout left. If we have the ball out of bounds under the other team’s basket with less than 4.0 seconds to go, I would rather throw to half court and call timeout in order to be able to run our sideline out of bounds game winner. If we are dribbling in transition and can’t get a shot, we call time at half court to set up our game winning play. COACH’S CALL
Be prepared for a change in defense that the opposition hasn’t played all game. Some teams 82 change defenses late in the game to force you to shoot from outside, to keep from fouling, or just “Great teamwork is the to throw your rhythm off. Again, your best weapon to be prepared as a coach is practice. If you have had the second only way we create the” breakthroughs that team switch defenses against your first team from time to time in practice, your players will be prepared when it define our careers. happens in a game. Pat Riley Inbounding the ball with no timeouts. There is a different pressure on the inbounder when she 83 cannot call timeout when the five second count is almost up. Practice this situation with a one possession (3 points or less) lead, and a one possession deficit.
Have the inbounder ask the official to make the count out loud. If he or she will not, have the inbounder count out loud for herself. At four she needs to throw the ball towards your basket to the best receiver. It is the same idea as saving a ball going out of bounds, it has to be thrown toward your basket to eliminate the chance of scoring off the turnover and to allow you to set your defense. If you are behind, depending on the clock situation, you will need to practice an immediate foul.
In practice, emphasize to everyone, that the four players on the floor have to get open. The weight of the play does not rest with the inbounder alone. If there is a turnover on the pass, it is everyone’s fault for not getting open and not executing the pass.
Gain possession of the ball in last 5 seconds on other end of court. My 84 belief is that a very good player can go the full length of the court in 4 seconds and get a good shot. Our rule is that if the player gets the ball and can make a play, he has the green light. If he cannot make a play, he calls time out
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME OFFENSE immediately. Only the player with the ball calls timeout. AUTOMATIC
“Hands” team. If you are holding the ball to kill the clock and you know that your opponent will be fouling, put in your best 5 ball handlers and ft shooters together to 85 protect the lead. Just like a football team has a hands team for an anticipated onside kick, know ahead of time who you are going to put in when you know your opponent will be fouling. There is not enough time to think about who to put in. You just need to call for the hands team. Make sure that you know who players 6 and 7 are in the hands team so that you will be prepared in case of players who have fouled out, or who are injured. COACH’S CALL
Plant the seed. In the last two minutes when you are being pressed and have the lead, prior to inbounding the ball, let the officials know that you are going to watch 86 the clock and will call timeout if the 10 second count gets to 8. By planting that thought in their minds, the officials are expecting your timeout and are less likely to give you a “quick” 10 call knowing that you are on top of the situation. COACH’S CALL
Have your best shooter be the on ball screener if the defense traps balls screens. If you have scouted your opponents and know that they trap on ball screens at the 87 end to prevent three point shots, have your best shooter be a ball screener. Our “hurry up offense” when we are behind in the last two minutes involves several on ball screen sets. At times, our opponents will trap our screens. When they do, our adjustment is to make our best shooter the ball screener. That forces the opponents to leave our best shooter open if they trap the dribbler. COACH’S CALL
Reminder to inbounder spot or move. If you are inbounding the ball under the 88 other team’s basket, have an assistant coach who is designated to signal to the inbounder spot (right hand index finger touching left hand palm) or move (right index finger moving back and forth in the air). If there is a timeout prior to the ball being inbounded, then that designated assistant reminds the inbounder of the situation as we break the huddle. COACH’S CALL
Last second shot vs. man to man. We call this play Bulldog. I save it to run at the end 89 of the fourth quarter or at the end of overtime as our game winner against man to man defense. It is the counter to our play called Butler (see Idea #54 for a diagram and description of Butler that we run at the end of quarters 1, 2, and 3). My objective is to get the defense to “play the Butler play” that we have run earlier in the game and that they have probably scouted and prepared for, then hit them with this counter. AUTOMATIC
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME OFFENSE
The play starts in a 1-4 high set. I like it because it forces the defense to guard 3 screen the screener actions. The description consists of 4 diagrams and begins on the next page.
1 can dribble to either deep elbow.
In this example, he goes right.
2 cuts to the block
5 cross screens for 4 and 4 fills the spot at the wide wing vacated by 2. 5 then steps to the top of the key after screening for 4.
1 passes to 4
2 back screens for 5. This is the first screen the screener as 5 just screened for 4
5 cuts to the ball side block
If 5 is open, 4 will hit him for a layup or a post shot.
After 2 back screens for 5, he receives an immediate screen the screener from 1.
4 hits 2 who should take a three point shot if open.
This is the second screen the screener that the defense has to defend.
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME OFFENSE
The final screen the screener occurs when 3 flare screens for 1.
2 should dribble at 1 to deliver the pass.
3 can either take a 3 point shot or catch, sweep and drive.
Last second shot play vs. a 2-3 zone defense. I call this play stack. We save this play to run at the end of the fourth quarter or at the end of overtime as our game 90 winner against a 2-3 zone. The description consists of 4 diagrams and is continued on the next page. AUTOMATIC st
Play starts out in this alignment. a #2 is your best 3 point shooter.
#4 and #3 must also be able to hit a 3 point shot to force the defense to guard them.
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME OFFENSE
#1 dribbles right to move D2
#4 replaces #1
#1 passes to #4 to occupy D1
#4 passes to #3 to move D3
It is important that #3 breaks higher than “the free throw line extended” to allow for proper spacing. If 3 is too close to the corner, then D3 will be able to recover to challenge #2s shot.
#2 breaks to corner for shot as #5 screens in D5
After the shot, all players fill the rebounding spots.
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME DEFENSE
Chapter 10 End of Game Defense
These are situations that either only occur at the end of the game or need to be strategized differently at the end.
To foul or not to foul? Live Ball. Clock is running. Once the clock gets to seven seconds (so the clock will stop at 6 on 91 a foul), and the ball is in the front court, we take the ball from the dribbler. A foul is probably going to be called, but if you teach your players to take the ball, then you will either have stolen the ball (not likely to be let go by the official, but does happen once in a while) or you will have fouled and kept the Information beats opponent from instinct every time. shooting a potentially game tying three point shot. If you are not in the bonus yet, that is even better, you keep taking the ball when the opponent inbounds until they go to the free throw line. You must foul the dribbler at least 10 feet away from the three point arc and NEVER even close to going up for a shot.
There used to be some debate as to this strategy when the offense could put four rebounders on the free throw line, but now that the offense is only allowed two rebounders, the odds for an offensive rebound have dropped significantly.
Personal experience tells me that in the thousands of games I have watched, many more late three point shots go in and send games into overtime than I have seen the sequence of: making the first free throw, missing the second on purpose, getting the offensive rebound of the missed free throw, and then making a shot to tie (or win the game if the shot is a three point shot).
To me, the following statistical argument is even more convincing.
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME DEFENSE
An average three point shooter, can hit 33% even being guarded—for a good three point shooter the percentages increase dramatically. Today, the players have incredible range and can consistently hit shots from several steps behind the arc, so there is also a bigger area to defend when needing to guard against a three, not just the sector right on the arc.
Your opponent has to have five things happen successfully to tie the game (under extreme pressure) if you choose to foul:
#1 They have to make the first free throw. Let's just assume you foul an 80% ft shooter.
#2 They have to miss the second free throw on purpose without accidentally making it or missing the rim entirely. Most players do not practice missing free throws. You can't just shoot it to the right or the left, that would give a huge rebounding advantage to the defense because the ball will not come off the rim very hard. You have to shoot it hard to get a longer than normal rebound. I would say 90% success on not making the shot accidentally and not violating and missing the rim completely. That is not even taking into account the pressure factor of doing something you rarely if ever practice (unless their coaching staff has read this e-book ) during the most pressure packed time of the game.
#3 The shooting team must get the offensive rebound. I would say that 40% of the time without fouling would be great success on that.
#4 The offensive rebounder has to score without turning the ball over. If he/she throws the rebound to a teammate, they cannot turn it over or make a pass that makes the receiver reach for the ball and throw off shooting rhythm and balance. That is tough to do under pressure. I would say 95% of the Preparation can be time that would happen without a turnover. That defined in three words: percentage is probably high, but I am estimating high to give the benefit to the offense to drive home Leave Nothing Undone. the point that you have to foul. George Allen #5 The player shooting has to hit the shot--let's say 50% success on a 2 point shot to tie, 33% on a three to win (since we are assuming that the first free throw was made).
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME DEFENSE
If you calculate the probability that all five of those things succeed on the same play (80% x 90% x 40% x 95% x 50%) it comes to a maximum of 14% of the time you would be tied by a missed free throw, an offensive rebound, and a 2 point shot. That is also with high estimates for each of the five pieces of the play to happen independently, so I believe that the true probability is actually less than 14%.
Either way it is not close to the estimate of 33% of making a three to tie the game. Even if you believe the odds of your opponent making the three point shot to tie are as low as 1 in 6, the percentages say that you are If you are prepared,are able to still better off fouling the dribbler out by the then you 10 second line. feel confident.
When a good team is faced with a three Robert J. Ringer point deficit and 10 seconds, they are going to tie you once in a while. I would just rather make it tougher on them to tie by fouling and not letting them take a shot they will make at least one out of three times.
To hit a 3 point shot after making a free throw to win the game (again, if my percentages assumptions are correct--I think they are high) would be 80% x 90% x 40% x 95% x 33% = 9% I would add two thoughts that I believe dramatically lower that percentage. If you are throwing the ball out beyond the arc for a shot with tougher defense on the pass out and under extreme scoreboard and clock pressure, the chance of making a safe pass would diminish. Point number two, the rebounder is more than likely not going to look to throw out for a three, but is going to focus on scoring. Depending on how much time is left, there might not be time for a pass out and a three point shot. I believe the offense will go for the highest percentage shot they can get, which is a two not a three. My estimate is that throwing out for the winning three after making the first free throw and missing the second is less than 4%.
Even if you don't agree with my percentage estimates, put in your own percentages and do the math to make a judgment that is reason based. AUTOMATIC
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME DEFENSE
Unintentional intentional foul. Fouling to stop the clock at the end of the game where you are behind and playing in catch up mode. We use the traditional coach grabbing his arm at the end of a game to signal that we want to take an "intentional 92 unintentional foul." We verbally say "ball" to communicate to our players to get the ball (and a clean foul in the process of making a play on the ball is acceptable), rather than saying "foul" which is going to be called intentional when the official hears you.
We teach our players in practice that we are not fouling, but that we are going to make a clean and aggressive play to take the ball away from the ball handler. We either want them to take the basketball or
o fun, get called for an unintentional foul. There have been times when we have come up with the ball and not Repetition is n been called for a foul. but it’s the reason we won. Attention I do not believe in fouling just to foul when we have to detail is fouls to give. We use them to be more aggressive in everything. going for rebounds or loose balls and if we are beaten and are not able to get help. Mike Waldo . We do our best to instill in our players this mindset that our mission is to take the ball and if we get a foul called in the process it is okay because that stops the clock and forces the opponent to shoot free throws. Hopefully, this "get the ball" mindset rather than the "foul" mindset has saved us a couple of intentional fouls through the years.
We also have a signal to call off our "ball call" by raising an open hand. We use this if we have caught up and no longer need to foul. We don't take it for granted that the players know the situation or the score. Even if you are tied and you have been fouling, that is no reason to believe that the players know the situation and will react as you want them to. COACH’S CALL 93 Put your best defender on a different player if you know they are going to run a set play. At the end of the game, it is a good time to put your best player on the
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130 Winning Special Situations END OF GAME DEFENSE number one option that the other team is going to go to unless he or she is in foul trouble. COACH’S CALL
Don't foul. When we as coaches instruct our players not to foul, many times what that means to players is “don’t guard 94 them.” That is not what we are looking for. A smart offensive team will take the ball to the basket knowing that the defense might not be playing as hard. It is not an easy thing to do, but the defense must learn to play in position without fouling. That should be the way we always defend. Our philosophy is that if we are playing hard on defense we won’t foul because we will be moving our feet. AUTOMATIC
Trap an on Ball Screen to prevent a 3. Depending on the level that you coach at 95 and the abilities of your opponents you might trap on ball screens to prevent a three point shot. We use a signal from the bench (right clenched fist pounding open left hand) that we are going to trap a ball screen to keep the dribbler from taking a pull up three point shot. Of course, you have to be aware of the ball screener that you are leaving to go set the trap. If the screener is a good shooter, then your next rotation to that player is the key coaching point. COACH’S CALL
Guarding a dead 3 point shooter after an offensive rebound with a 2 point lead. I 96 think this is something that needs to be practiced repeatedly in the practices that lead up to a game against a superior three point shooter. If ’t you have a two point lead, even though it is not natural, “When players, it doesnare in have a call that when a shot is taken, the person guarding trouble that dead three point shooter is not going to leave them to foul go for a rebound or for a loose ball. COACH’S CALL mean to not play ” defense, it means to Whether or not to put a defender on the play extra smart. inbounder at the end of the game when the 97 other team has to throw a full court pass. This one is determined by your personnel. If you have someone who can be a distraction, that is a good play. Make sure they don’t run over a screener that the other team puts on the baseline. COACH’S CALL
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130 Winning Special Situations POST GAME SITUATIONS
Chapter 11 Post Game Situations
This is very important, but did not really fit into any of the other categories
Players safety and leadership after the game. I have never taken it for granted that our players are going to get off the floor without an incident. I have been involved 98 in three incidents after the game was over. One involved another team’s player shoving our player in the handshake line and the other two involved fans attempting to follow our players to the locker room.
I always assign one of our assistant coaches to stay out of the handshake line to observer what is going on and have our coaching staff spread out (one in front, one in the middle and one at the end of the line) as we leave the floor.
That might sound a little paranoid, but I would much rather be safe than sorry. AUTOMATIC
’t do something “Don stupid permanently .” just because you are temporarily upset
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130 Winning Special Situations PRACTICING END OF GAME SITUATIONS
Chapter 12 Practicing End of Game Situations
Each of these scenarios should be incorporated into your preparation (preparation involves the planning that the coaching staff does off the floor, and the execution that you work on during practice) for your situations.
Repeat and rehearse Have both an overall season plan so that you cover each of the scenarios below and your notes prepared ahead of in practice so that time for every practice’s daily practice plan. You don’t your players thinking can react in need to take the time to think through the details during without practice and waste practice time. games.
Players “Coach.” To get players thinking strategically in practice, at times, I name one 99 of the players as the “coach” during the situations segment of practice. I rotate it so that each player is the coach at some point during the season. My purpose is to make them think more deeply than they would as a player.
Their requirements as the coach are that they are only a strategic coach. They cannot correct or get on a teammate or an official (our coaching staff are the officials). The second requireme nt is that they must execute the end of the game as we do. In other words, no playing defenses that we don’t use, no drawing up their own plays, must use timeouts to stop the clock the way we do, etc.... In short, they are “coaching” for me to see if they know how we want to play the end of the game. If they violate any of the requirements it is a technical foul on their team.
I expect them to ask me how many timeouts they have, whose possession arrow it is, and what the foul situation is. If they don’t, I make the situations the worst I possibly can for their team (ex: no timeouts, opponent in double bonus, etc…) If they ask, then I make the situations to their favor. That way, I have them thinking like I want them to think as a player in games.
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130 Winning Special Situations PRACTICING END OF GAME SITUATIONS
No Timeouts Remaining Your players need to able to execute all of your last 100 second plays, situations, and strategies with no timeouts remaining. The way to accomplish that is:
Keep them simple Practice them regularly—not every situation every day, but at least one situation per day. Players will execute with confidence in games if they have been prepared through practice. Be consistent—run the same play for the situation every time rather than making the call on the fly at the time. Have a signal for when you are out of timeouts that is clear to the players and that they know what it is. We tell them as the last thing before breaking the huddle when we have called our last timeout. If our opponent calls timeout after that, we remind them again when leaving that huddle. We also have a signal that I give when the clock is stopped to remind them that there are no timeouts remaining. I wave my arms in a similar manner to what an official does when he or she is “It’s the little details waving off a basket at the end of a quarter. Our that are vital. Little players know that when that comes from me, I ” things make the big am reminding them that we have no timeouts remaining. things happen.
Possession arrow. If the arrow is going John Wooden your way on a loose ball scramble at the 101 end of the game, and your players know it and have practiced it, it can save you a timeout. Practice with it going each way.
Fouls to give when you are ahead. 102 There is no way to execute this in a game unless you have taught it and rehearsed it in practice. Also, there is no need to foul just to foul, or to foul too early. If you
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130 Winning Special Situations PRACTICING END OF GAME SITUATIONS have a foul to give, you might want to save it to: scramble for a loose ball, fight for a rebound, or fight for rebound position more aggressively, or reach if you get beat on a drive, knowing that a foul is not going to put your opponent to the line.
Fouls to give when you are behind. If you know that you will soon be entering 103 your catch up game, you will want to make sure that your opponent is in the bonus when you need to start putting them at the line. Keeping track of this is especially critical for a team that puts a major emphasis on not fouling.
Playing through bad calls. At times, warn your players that during today’s 104 scrimmage, your coaching staff is going to make one or two intentionally bad officiating calls to simulate bad calls in games. . Make sure that you have those bad calls as a part of your practice plan rather than just throwing them in if you are upset with their performance of the players in that practice.
Whether you are or are not in the 105 bonus. Always let your players know when practicing situations the bonus or double bonus status of both teams. Also, you need to be able to practice substituting players for free throw shooting and taking out your poor free throw shooters in practice so that everyone will be ready for that in the games.
Best player (or certain players that are tough to 106 play without) in foul trouble so that you are substituting offense for defense, or foulers for regulars. There are times that you will pull your subs back from the bench if the clock does not stop at the end where they will be going in.
Best player (or certain players that are tough to play without) not available 107 fouled out or out due to injury. This situation is different than # 106. In #106 you are taking this player in and out of the practice situationally as you would in a game to
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130 Winning Special Situations PRACTICING END OF GAME SITUATIONS protect him from fouling out. However, you also need to practice once in a while with him completely unavailable. Have those players sit out of your five minute situations portion of the practice. Make sure to inform him and everyone on the team what the purpose is for what you are doing before you do it. It is not a demotion.
Let the other team score. The time to let the other team score is: 1) There is a 108 timeout, 2) you lead by more than three points, 3) they have no timeouts, 4) There are 5 seconds or less remaining on the clock. You do not need to take the ball out if they do score since there are less than 5 seconds to go, they can’t call timeout to stop the clock, and they can’t tie with one shot. Stand all of your players in the lane with instructions to not move—not even for a rebound if there is a missed shot. As with all situations, make sure to practice it.
109 Playing through a bad play or a bad play by a teammate. Give players a method for dealing with mistakes. Mistakes are a part of almost everything we do when improvement and competition are the areas of focus. This is our mindset for dealing with mistakes, so that we can profit from them, but not allow them to have a negative effect on the future.
1) Recognize the mistake--so that we can learn from and correct it with the expectation that we will not make the same mistakes over and over. “Ask not what your 2) Admit the mistake--don't make excuses or blame others. teammates can do for you, ask what you can 3) Learn from the mistake--don't make do for your .” the same mistake again. teammates
4) Move on from the mistake--we Magic Johnson definitely do not want a mistake to influence what we do in the future by dwelling on the past mistake.
Giving players a method for dealing with mistakes takes the focus off the mistake itself and puts it on the steps to move on. Since this sequence needs to take place in just a few seconds during practice or a game, we use the phrase "play through it" to get our players to move on if we feel that they are dwelling on mistakes.
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130 Winning Special Situations Specific Time and Score Situations to Practice
Chapter 13 Specific Time and Score Situations to Practice The decisions that you have made about your philosophy are going to determine whether or not you call timeout in each of these cases. How many timeouts you have left will impact that decision as well. Remember to check to see whether you and or your opponent are in the bonus.
Over the course of you also want to practice each of these scenarios with 25, 15, 10, 5, and 3 seconds remaining.
My belief is that when trailing by one possession, you want to get the quickest good shot attempt that you can and not hold for the last shot of the game. I don’t want a forced bad shot just for the sake of getting off a shot, but I do want to get a shot off in time that in case we miss it, we have a chance to score off the offensive rebound, or to at least foul and give us enough time for a good possession after the free throws by our opponent. You need to look for the best shot available, so if it is a 2 or a 3 doesn’t matter as long as it is a shot you would categorize as a good shot.
I always like to work from inside out on every Genius is the art of possession out by taking the ball at the basket on a taking infinite pains. post feed, a drive, or by passing to a cutter and All great achievement looking to throw out for a three if there is no has been characterized opportunity in the lane. I think that is even more by extreme care, important if you are trailing by one point with less infinite painstaking, minutest than 30 seconds to play to attack the basket rather than to the settling for jump shots because most defenses will be even detail thinking “don’t foul” and could be playing less aggressively. Elbert Hubbard One of the tough things is to make sure that your team is aware of when you are committing unintentional fouls when you are behind and then changing that strategy once you tie the game or take the lead. We use the coach’s right wrist grabbing left arm for the foul signal and then an open hand to show that we are no longer fouling.
I have placed a download link at the end of the book with a quick planner for putting together your situations practice schedule.
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130 Winning Special Situations Specific Time and Score Situations to Practice
30 seconds to go in quarters 1, 2, and 3
110 Have your second squad vary the defense that they are playing.
Our execution would be bardi
30 seconds everyone yells “Clock!” Coach Vince Lom said that fatigue makes Our execution without have to say anything is that cowards of us all. we go into our delay game and we are in automatic “4,” nothing but a wide open layup. You could Make sure your team is continue to run your regular offense while in “4.” conditioned to execute
your plans atgame. the end At 15 seconds our point guard will get the ball and of the we will move into our 1-4 high set.
At 12 seconds the point guard yells “Set” and that starts our play. We run Butler (Diagrammed in #54).
Our goal is to shoot at 5 seconds. If the other team rebounds or inbounds, we will force the ball to the sidelines in defensive conversion (#52)
All of this takes place without having to make any calls from the bench because we have practiced it to be prepared.
Down 4, your ball at half court, 30 111 seconds to go, clock stopped In this situation, we want to score as quickly as possible by taking a good shot. Scoring quickly never involves taking a bad shot because taking a bad shot eliminates your chance to score. By a bad shot, I mean a rushed shot that is not the way the player normally shoots or one that is not a shot that player normally takes in the flow of the offense. We have a ball screen series that is our “hurry up offense” that we run instead of our normal motion when we are behind in the last two minutes.
There are two scenarios to prepare for—we have timeouts remaining, we don’t have any timeouts
Our normal play is to call timeout the last two minutes of a game if we score a field goal and the clock is running. That helps me to substitute offense for defense, or put in our players who we can use fouls for to save our regulars from fouling to stop the clock and picking up an extra foul.
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130 Winning Special Situations Specific Time and Score Situations to Practice
But, we also practice having no timeouts, and picking up in a man to man press immediately after the basket goes in. Regardless of whether or not we are able to get a timeout called to stop the clock, I favor a man to man press over a zone trapping press at the end of a game like this. The reason is that we are matched up to be able to stop the clock by fouling.
If we do not score, then we foul immediately if the defense gets the rebound.
Up 1, opponent scores a field goal to 112 take the lead, 10 seconds clock running. Our rule is that if there are less than 5 seconds and our opponent scores a field goal where the clock is running (not a free throw where the clock is stopped) we call timeout, if we have any remaining. If there are more than 5 seconds, we get the ball in and push it up the floor until the dribbler sees that we don’t have an advantage—at that point the player with the ball calls timeout. If he can get a shot or get to the basket, we will take that. My philosophy is that pushing the ball immediately at the defense is the best way to get an opportunity for an open shot or to get to the basket in open court transition than it is to set up a play to run against a set half court defense. However, if we don’t have an advantage, we will call timeout and look to run our sideline game winner.
Underneath your basket inbounding trailing by 2, 5 seconds to go. Since we are 113 behind, ideally we want a catch and shoot to allow time to foul if we miss. However, we might need one dribble or one pass to get a good shot off. We do not want to hoist up a bad shot that has little chance of going in and that the defense is not going to foul us on.
Our rule is that we add two seconds for each pass and two seconds for each dribble. So, with 7 seconds time for 2 dribbles or 2 passes, We want to take the shot with no less than 3 seconds on the clock to allow for an offensive rebound put back “Always have a plan, opportunity. and believe in it.
In this case (5 seconds to go) we allow one dribble Nothing happens ” by accident. or one pass to get a better shot—but not both. Chuck Knox
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130 Winning Special Situations Specific Time and Score Situations to Practice
I have illustrated a play against a man to man in #114 that can get you several opportunities for a catch and shoot. We would use that play for either #113 or #114.
Underneath your basket inbounding trailing by 2, 2 seconds to go. In our system, 114 this is a very different situation than #113 because there is no time for a pass or dribble. We need an immediate shot. We want to take a normal shot, not hurrying to beat the clock. I also don’t want our players looking to “draw a foul.” I want them to take the shot that has the best chance of going in. Leaning into the defense does not increase the odds that the shot will go in. Officials are not usually going to be fooled by that type of play. If the defense fouls us, that is fine, but I want our player focused on putting the ball in the basket.
Here is an example of a play that you can use in either situation #113 or #114 that I call “Triple.” It is our last second underneath the basket inbounds play against man to man defense. If you are going to use it at the end of the game when you need a catch and shoot basket, I would not use it during the course of the game. If you have a play that you like to use at the end of games already, I would consider using this as one of your inbounds plays during the course of a game.
#3 screens for #2
4 screens for 3 and 5 screens for 2
Continued on next page
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130 Winning Special Situations Specific Time and Score Situations to Practice
5 screens for 4
2 breaks long as a release
Down 2, you are shooting 2 free throws, 3 seconds remaining, clock stopped.
115 This can play out several ways, so it is good practice to see how your players will react.
If you have anyone in the rebounding spots with 4 fouls, substitute a defender who can use a foul if necessary for them.
Scenario #1 Makes both free throws. Now you have to defend for three seconds to force overtime. To give your team time to matchup and keep the opponent from inbounding the ball quickly, send a substitute to the scorer’s bench after the official has given the ball to the shooter. Explain to your players exactly what to do, why you are doing it, and then practice it exactly as you want it done. In this case, the player needs to understand that if he gets to the scorer’s bench before the shooter receives the ball, then he will be waved in before the ball is shot, rather than after the free throw is made. If the shot is missed, you can always pull that player back to the bench rather than have him go in the game if your only reason for making the substitution is to give your team a chance to match up. If you stop them, play at least a 1:00 overtime. Your second team has a chance to work on their end of game full court play or throw to half court and call timeout. Make sure that your defenders do not foul trying to intercept a long pass. Catch with two hands if they have the chance.
Scenario #2 Makes the first, misses the second. This is why you need to make sure that your rebounders don’t have four fouls. You want them to foul over the back on the rebound to save as much time on the clock as possible. They need to grab the ball with two hands. It is possible that they can get the offensive rebound. If not, they need to get a foul. See idea #79 for going over the back on a rebound.
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130 Winning Special Situations Specific Time and Score Situations to Practice
Scenario #3 Misses the first and you need to miss the second intentionally. See #76 above
Sideline inbounds half court, trailing by 2, 15 seconds to go. We run our game winner—described below in #117, but we don’t force the pass. If it isn’t there, we 116 inbound the ball and run our high ball screen play with shooters in the corner. We want to get a shot as quickly as possible to be able to foul and extend the game if we miss. We want to take a good shot, not hurry, and not try to draw a foul. Put the ball in the basket.
117 Sideline inbounds half court, trailing by 2, 3 seconds to go. We call this play Denver. We do not run this play during the course of the game. We save it for the 4th quarter and overtime to win or tie the game.
The play is three shown in the diagrams. Diagram 3 is continued on the next page.
All players on the court watch the inbounder. The play starts when he/she receives the ball from the official.
Taking the time to slap the ball is a waste of a second on the five second count.
#1 is best inbounder #4 is best leaper #5 is best poster #2 is best deep shooter #3 is best three point shooter
If one player fits more than one position, then you will need to make adjustments based on your personnel
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130 Winning Special Situations Specific Time and Score Situations to Practice
I like to throw the lob, but hit the first available player.
We have been able to throw directly to the post #5 in games as well
Choose your options depending on the time remaining, whether you need a two or a three and the abilities of your players. .
Opponent’s ball, half court inbounds, tie game, 30 seconds to go. This is a good 118 scenario, but I would also practice a tie game with the opponent inbounding from under the basket, and full court—especially if you are a pressing team. Also work on various times remaining. 15 seconds, 8 seconds, 3 seconds. You can use the special situations planning sheet link to download a pdf to quickly plan for hundreds of scenarios.
You need to know how you are going to play this situation. We are a packline program, and don’t extend our defense as a part of our normal scheme, so that is how we would play this. If you are a pressure or a trapping team you can play that the whole time, or call it back at 12 seconds to defend the paint.
Make sure your players know the foul situation. We play the fouls in this scenario as we would in #102 (Fouls to give when you are ahead) if we have five team fouls or less.
Down 2 points, going the full length of the court inbounds, 3 seconds, clock 119 stopped 1 timeout. Our number one option in this case is to throw the ball to half court and call timeout. We then can run our half court inbounds (just outlined in #117 above) play as opposed to our full court play. See #77 and #81 above
In a highs school boys varsity game, we have been able to throw from the opposite end line from our basket with 2 seconds to go, to half court and call timeout. We had one second remaining— threw an alley oop pass off of Denver (#117) and scored at the buzzer.
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130 Winning Special Situations Specific Time and Score Situations to Practice
Down 2 points, Going the full length of the court inbounds, 3 seconds, clock stopped out of timeouts. This set is run by Purdue with 3-6 seconds on the clock 120 needing to go the full length of the court. Practice with a defender on the inbounds passer and not on the passer.
After #1 curls, 2 backscreens for The triple stagger is set for #1. 5 in a screen the screener action and 5 goes straight to the rim.
Up 2 and the ball 1:00 to go. Without a shot clock, if we have a lead with less than 121 one minute remaining in the game, our goal is to hold the ball and run out the entire 1:00 on the clock (Call timeout if our possession of the ball is in doubt)
The only shots we shoot are wide open lay ups and free throws. A shot other than a lay-up is not tolerable--even if it goes in. A missed lay-up is not tolerable. A turnover (contact is not an excuse to lose the ball) is not tolerable. We know that they are going to be coming after the ball, so we have to be tough with the ball. Again—if possession is in doubt, call timeout.
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130 Winning Special Situations Specific Time and Score Situations to Practice
Tied with the ball 1:00 to go. How you 122 play this will depend on your philosophy of when you can hold for the last shot. Practice with the defense trapping or playing a denial type of defense. If that is the case, even if you want to keep possession of the ball the entire minute, you must look at the basket for layup opportunities. This is a good time to allow the second unit to foul without Most people have the being dirty to teach your first team the importance of will to win, few have being tough with the basketball. the will to prepare to win.
Up 1, inbounding the ball, no timeouts. Bob Knight 123 Practice this situation with 3 seconds, 10 seconds, and 30 seconds on the clock. Play the situation out once the inbounds pass is either in to the offense, or stolen by the defense.
The fouls situation is important in this case because if you turn the inbounds pass over and have fouls to give, you can use one to set your defense, rather than allowing the opponent a quick run out from the steal. See #83 for more specifics.
Your ball, full court inbounds, up 1 point, 5 124 seconds to go, opponent pressing. Have a play different from your normal press breaker to get the ball inbounds. Some things to consider:
1) Run the play to get the ball in to your best free throw shooter. 2) Be prepared (by practicing) for the defense to not guard the inbounder and double team the player you want to get the ball to 3) Both being able to run the end line and having to stay on the spot. 4) Put in your hands team in (see #85 above)
If you are face-guarded, have an option to throw the ball long over the top of the press to relieve that pressure.
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130 Winning Special Situations Specific Time and Score Situations to Practice
Converting to defense when you miss a free throw, up 1, 10 seconds to go. One of 125 toughest things to defend is a missed free throw. It is an automatic test of your conversion defense, The offense is more organized and prepared than on a rebound of a missed field goal. We practice converting to defense off a missed free throw frequently.
Players should communicate to make sure that everyone knows who has who in the flow of the transition. You can put the players close to who they will guard on the free throw lane, but as everyone begins running, I think it is more important to make sure that everyone is guarded—especially the player with the basketball.
Do you have a foul to give and what will determine if you are going to use them? Our defense is much better in the half court than in conversion, so if we have a foul to give, I will use it.
Down 10 3 minutes to go. This is a great situation to practice because it can play out so many ways and the players don’t know exactly what is coming—just like a game. You 126 have a chance to see if your players know what you want them to know about playing the last two minutes.
Down 5points with 1:00 to go in the game with the ball This is another good way to 127 get several situations to practice. Just like #126 above, there are several ways that this can play out. This is s good one to use if you don’t have enough time to play out three minutes
Up 3 other team ball under their basket 5 seconds to go, no timeouts. Since they 128 cannot stop the clock after they score and we would not have to inbound the ball if they score a two point basket, we play one player on the inbounder and the other 4 outside the 3 point arc to prevent a game tying 3. It produces some unusual defending angles. It doesn’t occur in a game very often, but it is worth covering a couple of times a year.
In addition to having your opponent inbound the ball from under their basket, have the inbounds pass come from the sideline as well.
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130 Winning Special Situations Specific Time and Score Situations to Practice
Other team misses a free throw on purpose., 129 You have a 2 point lead, 2 seconds to go. Just like you need to work on missing a free throw on purpose, take a little bit of time to work on rebounding and
ular being ready when the situation looks like the opponent is Spectac going to miss on purpose. achievementeded is alwaysby prec 30 seconds to go in a quarter other than the 4th, unspectacular 130 opponent’s ball. If your opponent is going to hold preparation. for the last shot, are you going to trap or apply pressure to cause a turnover? If so, it is important to work on Robert H. Schuller either scoring in transition, or when to pull it out and set up your end of the quarter play.
Conclusion I hope that you have found a few ideas in this book useful and that for all of the times you disagreed with my thinking, it caused you to think about ways to improve the special situations’ execution.
Teams that excel in special situations:
Have a plan and consistently stick to that plan Practice special situations regularly if not every night Have players who are confident in their plan and tough enough to play through those situations that don’t go their way
You can use this URL to download a tool to help you quickly organize and plan a meaningful special situations segment for your practice:
http://www.coachingtoolbox.net/specialsituationschart.pdf
If you have any questions or comments, you can contact me at [email protected] or by calling 765-366-9673
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