“Real (stupid) men play man to man ONLY”

Back in 1999, I got the head coaching job at Plano Sr. H.S.  That same year they opened up Plano’s third and final senior high school, named Plano West.  We played Plano West one Saturday morning in a tournament (you know, one of those 9 am third game guarantee games in a tournament that nobody really wants to play, least of all against a cross town rival you will play twice during the district season), and the results changed one of my coaching philosophies.

We played them that morning and they ran a matchup zone (a staple of David Piehler’s repertoire), which we didn’t handle very well, and long story short we got beat by ten.  Anyone who knows me knows I hate to lose, and the only thing worse than that was:

· We lost to a brand new high school (and I had to live with the shame of being the first old Plano school who lost to the new one)
· We looked like idiots because we didn’t know how to attack a zone (after all, real men play man and I am the manliest of all men, so what would I know about breaking down a zone, since we don’t run it)
· It appeared that my team was ill prepared (which, frankly, we were) and that is on me and quite embarrassing professionally

So, I sat home all weekend and stewed about how poorly we played.  More importantly, I was embarrassed with how ill prepared we were to handle this type of defense.  I then made one of my best executive decisions of my head coaching tenure at Plano Sr. H.S. – I learned how to run a matchup zone.  I walked into practice on Monday and told Phil (Parlin, my trusted assistant), “If running a matchup zone gives anybody else half the trouble it gave us on Saturday, then we need to learn to run it.”  I needed to check my macho ego (after all, only wimps runs zones, right???), and do what was going to make us a better basketball team (sound familiar coaches, asking your players to do what it takes to make your team better?  Make sure you are willing to do the same, or you are somewhat of a hypocrite).

A little background would be that I don’t believe much in full court pressure.  I know that it’s critical to be able to change the tempo of the game when it benefits you; however, I also believe that you cannot press good teams all night long (you will give up more easy stuff than you will get).  So, with that said, I felt that learning to play the matchup zone would allow us to change the tempo without going to the standard approach to changing tempo – which is to extend man to man pressure full court.  Learning how to run a matchup zone would allow us to change tempo without necessarily pressing.

When teams are behind and we switch to a matchup zone, they tend to get tentative and waste a lot of time figuring out what we are doing.  When they are ahead and see a matchup zone, they have a tendency to settle for jump shots (it’s the nature of the beast, guys settle for jumpers versus “zones”) and if you can rebound a lot of teams will shoot themselves right out of a game.

So, we decided to learn to run a matchup zone…

Without knowing up from down, we knew that the basic idea was to run man principles within a primary area of the floor.  Man principles:
1. Guard the man with the ball, keeping your body between him and the basket
2. Deny the next pass if your man is one pass away
3. Provide backside help if you are two passes away

These principles would be no different than normal with the primary difference being that you “passed a guy off” to the next man in the next “zone” if he cut through.  This, of course, puts a premium on communicating!!

What we came to realize is that matchup zone is merely man to man where you switch all screens!!!  What we found out through trial and error, and later had confirmed by Jim Boeheim from Syracuse University at a clinic, was that the NUMBER ONE PRIORITY of running the matchup is to keep your BOTTOM GUYS DOWN  (This piece of terminology refers to X4 and X5 here, staying down below a line that runs sideline to sideline through the middle of the lane).

What we came to realize is that every time we got beat, the same thing kept happening.  If our X5 guarded 2, the ball kept getting entered into the short corner (#3) who would then attack the rim or dump to #4 who was “diving” the rim.  The primary reason is that X3 turns and faces our 3 man and doesn’t see the man dive to the rim.

So our priority was set:  When on Defense, keep our bottom guys down, and when on Offense get their bottom guys up.  We realized that we needed two things to happen in order to break down a zone.

1. Get a side to side overload (we call it a 4 & 1, which means we need 4 guys on the ball side and one guy spotted up opposite).  If you see a team that gets a 3 & 2 (meaning 3 on the ballside and 2 opposite), they will almost always end up settling for jump shots.  A 4 & 1 will get you layups and dunks.

2. Try to attack from the BOTTOM UP (our terminology for attacking from the baseline up the floor, as opposed to the free throw line DOWN) by getting the ball into the short corner.

Notice on this frame, we set our 2 man at a point that is the line through the middle of the lane.  We call this the line of indecision (meaning that it’s the point where X2 and X5 have to decide who guards the wing). 

If X5 comes up, we dump into our 3 man in the short corner and that is where all the dominos start tumbling… meaning 4 dives, and then your backside wing is wide open for the skip).

We noticed that when X5 stays down all you get is ball reversal jump shots.  However, whenever you got X5 up, you could dump into the short corner.  By the way a critical coaching point is this:  Teach your guy on the short corner (who needs to be an athletic attacking type of player) to play with his heels on the baseline.  That way, when he catches it he is facing the whole game.  He can skip opposite, he can attack the rim, he can pass to the dive guy coming from the elbow, but he is in a beautiful place to evaluate the game.

How you line your guys up is your choice.  You might want to put a good shooting 4 man as your skip guy, and pin 5.  You might want to take our set above, and have 5 set a fade screen on X1 to spot up your best shooter (this is what we did for John Roberson, Texas Tech signee) opposite the play.

As always, the more ball reversals you get before settling in and attacking the play will only make it easier.  Do not settle for jumpers, attack the short corner and rebound like pit bulls if you go up against Matchup Zone.

Video 1 – Notice this is a “Top Down” attack, in that the bottom guy came up to guard the wing.  However, we entered to the high post and when the bottom guy didn’t recover quickly enough we could dump DOWN to the short corner guy.
Video 1 Download

Video 2 – Notice how open the high post is, if he were in position to “drop” to the rim.  However, he was late.  Also, notice that the skip guy should be more towards the top of the key and he will be WIDE OPEN!!  The short corner guy has a great vantage point to get you the ball, but get in the right spot!
Video 2 Download

Video 3 – This is the best example of what we call a “Short Corner/Elbow Drop” that we are always trying to get.  Notice that as soon as the ball goes into the short corner, both the middle and bottom guy of the zone turn their backs on the high post (who is diving to the rim). 
     Note: if you have a big athletic kid throw it up to the front of the rim and dunk the heck out of it.
Video 3 Download

Video 4 – Notice when we hit the dive guy, our skip guy was out of position.  Make sure to spot up wide, and if they choose to help down bomb the 3 (exactly what Florida did every time Lee Humphrey’s man helped).
Video 4 Download

Video 5 – Notice this time we got the entry off a ball reversal.  When the ball goes to the high post, if your short corner guy can seal the bottom of the zone, he will be wide open for a dump down.
Video 5 Download