The Kee to Coaching: Ball Screens
Good Afternoon! I hope that everybody has been enjoying the great weather that we've been having across the country. Things have been busy at Keuka, as we are in the process of rounding out our 2017 recruiting class. We have heard "YES" from a number of talented prospects, and we are excited to see how the team takes shape.
Continuing on with my Final 4 Coaching Nuggets, this blog post is dedicated to Ball Screens. Ball Screen Offense seemed to be the common theme from each coach that presented, and is something that I was really excited to learn more about. Over the last six seasons of my coaching career, teams that I have coached have run some type of ball screen motion. I'm a big believer in the offense, and it is something that I feel I teach really well. I have tons of Ball Screen sets drawn up on FastDraw, and I look forward to implementing them with my future teams.
Speaker: Randy Bennett, the Head Men's Basketball Coach at St. Mary's College
- 3 Point Line has changed basketball
- Ball screens have changed basketball as well
- Need better athletes to run the dribble-drive, but ball screens are great equalizers. Allow for your team to penetrate the defense when you're not overly athletic
- Penetration leads to lay ups, drop offs, and 3's
- Penetration forces long close outs
- Ball Screens force bigs to come out of the paint and guard
- Ball screens allow an offense to hide non-scoring bigs. It also gets them easy baskets. They don't have to make post moves
- Everything is dependent on the roller. Bigs have to roll hard. Guard with the ball has to recognize where the help defense is coming from
- Spacing is key. Recruit shooters
- Screeners need to sprint to the screen every time
- Tell guards to stay off the sideline. Harder to trap them when they are more centered on the court
- When teams "Ice" or down the ball screen, teach guards the snake dribble
- When teams hard hedge on wing ball screens, keep an off-guard in the ball side corner. Look to throw back to the guard in the corner and enter the ball into the post
Speaker: Avery Johnson, Head Men's Basketball Coach at the University of Alabama
- When setting a drag ball screen with your 4 man, have him set it at an "AJ" angle (a 45 degree angle). This is great for Point Guard's who aren't great shooters. Makes it harder for the defender to go underneath the screen, and it allows the guard to get downhill
- Likes to keep the ball side-corner empty when setting ball screens. Give the guard more space to create and potentially refuse the screen. Also allows big to pick and pop
- Really emphasis and teaches guards to reverse pivot and pass
- Have to have guys that can shoot!
- Teach guards the right pass to make
- "No Pick 6's" or Live-Ball turnovers. If a player is trapped and in trouble, throw the ball out of bounds and set up your defense.
Speaker: Steve Moore, Head Men's Basketball Coach at the College of Wooster
(Touched on setting ball screens as well as guarding ball screens)
- Do a few things really well
- Don't need a ton of defenses. Keep it simple and execute
- When defending ball screens, if 4 man sets it, switch it. Don't give up the pick and pop. If 5 sets it, switch it
- On flat ball screens, switch. Have guard pick the side of offensive player's strong hand. That's probably the way that the ball handler is going.
- Is a big believer in switching screens
- Switching takes the offense out of comfort zone. They'll try to force lob passes into the post and 1 on 1 penetration
- If you want to have the ability to switch, recruit long, versatile players
- When a guard gets switched onto a big, the guard can be extremely physical with post defense. Refs don't want to call fouls on guards defending the post
- Work a lot on big men guarding guards, and guards fronting the post
- Wants to force guards to take pull up jumpers
- Will trap ball screens against teams that can't shoot
- Ways to counter the hard hedge (Slips, screen to a ball screen, flat ball screens, and sprint to the ball screen)
- Ball screens force the defense to help. When a defense helps, its harder to rebound
