I recently completed a project that teaches players how to play offense in the same manner that we teach them to play defense: five players moving in unison and reacting in principle with every movement of the ball. It’s not a motion offense although plenty of motion is created. It’s not a continuity offense although it has a continuous flow. There are no requirements for types of players or style of play and it can be used in any formation against a man or zone defense: 5 Out with no post players, 4 Out plus 1 post player, or 3 Out and 2 In. Does it sound like I’m having trouble describing it? I had more trouble naming it: I call it the READ & REACT Offense. I know that’s a mouth-full but you’ll see why later. Other coaches who have examined it have different descriptions. Here are a few:
Doug Lipscomb, 4 time State Champion at Wheeler High School and 2005-06 Coach of the McDonald’s Game, called it an “Amoeba Offense” because of its adaptability and flexibility.
Bill Self, coach of the 2008 Kansas University NCAA Div 1 National Champions, said “Every single coach in our sport needs to learn the Read & React Offense. It’s ground-breaking. I believe it’s the future of developmental basketball.”
Coach Andy Landers, University of Georgia’s Women’s Head Coach and Women’s Basketball Hall of Famer, said “It’s a lot of things rolled into one. It’s an organized way to play, but it’s not a set pattern. This Read & React method has the foundation for offensive basketball covered.”
Jim Davis, the former Women’s coach of Clemson University who retired as the winningest coach in all sports at Clemson, called it “The Total Package”.
Rick Barry, Basketball Hall of Famer and the only man to lead the NCAA, ABA, and NBA in scoring, called it a “System that’s not a System.” He went on to say “If anybody looks at this and doesn’t think that this is one of the most innovative concepts to come along in the game of basketball, then tell me, because I would like to see it!”
Nancy Lieberman, another Basketball Hall of Famer and the most decorated female player of all time said, “Everything that’s involved here can help any type of player. And really, it will make a coach a better coach.”
Taking their observations into account, I could have called it the “Developmental-Amoeba Offense-Total Package-System that’s not a System.” Well, maybe not; “READ & REACT” is sounding a little better.
Before I get into the details and structure of the offense, I’ll set the stage with my own background and the problems I encountered. Here’s the short version:
As a 6’2” average athlete with just a little above average ability to shoot, I was able to play in high school and college with a few memorable moments here and there. Under some offensive systems I excelled and in others I was buried and lost. I remember thinking how one system could be so enjoyable and how other offensive systems made me struggle. Surely, I thought, I could do something about it when I became a coach.
Upon graduation, I took an assistant high school job that immediately turned into a head coaching position. Being young, brash, and confident, I launched into the opportunity with optimism born of ignorance only to have my head handed to me with a 6-22 season. The next year was better (fear of losing your job is a great motivator) and we finished with the school’s first winning season in six years.
However, I was still shaken from the realization that understanding how to play had almost nothing to do with teaching and coaching the game. The following years were characterized with me imitating my former coaches and whatever I could pick up from coaching clinics that fit into my understanding of the game.
Fast forward through 24 years of ups and downs in public and private schools and my conclusions were:
1. The success of a “Play” is directly proportional to who’s running the play and inversely proportional to the level of defense. In other words, it wasn’t my Xs & Os that mattered as much as the skills of my Xs and the defense of the Os.
2. The majority of points scored in a game came from “unscripted” opportunities that required knowledge of basketball principles by the players.
3. My collection of principles that I could teach and drill into my players were mostly scattered, unconnected, two-man games like pick-n-roll, penetrate-n-pitch, give-n-go, feed the post and relocate, etc.
4. I was comfortable teaching defense in a 5-player principled fashion and I was comfortable teaching transition (fast break) in a 5-player principled fashion, but when it came to half-court offense, my principles were all two-man or one-man games that left the 3 or 4 players without the ball standing and watching. I didn’t want that, so I ran plays in order to simulate 5-player coordination.
5. I didn’t have time to teach a motion offense (the only principled offense available) to my players. Even if I could, there were problems with what to do with football players that entered our season at the midpoint, or players who transferred into the school, or how to teach the freshman enough motion principles to allow him to immediately function with players who were steeped in 2-3 years of motion offense experience.
My solution took a few years to develop and three more years to test among a variety of both boy and girl teams. Here it is in conceptual form with the philosophy behind it:
When 5 players do what each think is best, mass confusion results and spacing is compromised. To eliminate the confusion and create 5-player-coordination, I gave each player without the ball one and only one reaction to the ballhandler. This simplifies playing without the ball because the non-ballhandler needs only to read the ballhandler and no one else. The player without the ball is not required to read his or her other teammates or even the defense (that comes later). Sticking to this formula means I could drill any reactionary habit into any player with enough repetition. Furthermore, I could build this habit in 2 or 3-player drills. With that being the case, I could build my offense in the off-season and help solve some of the time-crunch problems that are part-and-parcel to every coach’s season.
The toughest part of this process was holding myself to the following criteria: Once a habit is built into the players, I could never come back and ask them to contradict it. I simply wanted to remove “thinking” from the requirements to play offense. I wanted freedom for the ballhandler to take what the defense gives them combined with reactionary habits that would maintain proper spacing and maximize the positions of the players without the ball.
My first “layer” of habits address dribble penetration. This is the kind of one-on-one penetration that has one goal in mind: get to the basket and score. If the ball is stopped by good helping defense, then all four teammates (out of habit) will be possible targets, having moved (by habit) into “passing windows”.
Passing to a teammate is the next most common thing to occur in a game and that’s why it’s the second layer of habits. When they pass, they’ll be rewarded with a scoring opportunity and yet floor balance and spacing is preserved.
With these two layers alone, a youth league team could have an effective offense that is structured yet unpredictable. Players are accountable but the offense is not scoutable. And most importantly , players are learning “how to play” without knowing it.
More habits are added a layer at a time, but only as fast as players have time to absorb them. Each habit is added with an eye on creating a “universal offense”. In order for it to be universal and therefore useful to all coaches, it can never have a pre-requisite like: “you must have these types of players” or “you must make these number of passes” or “you must have a great post player, great point guard, great shooter, etc.”
The next layer involves post reactions to dribble penetration. (Not just post players but anyone who finds themselves in the post area.) Pressure relief is added to counter overplay on the perimeter. More pressure relief is added using East-West dribbles along the perimeter (non-penetrating dribbles). Screen setting follows at this time almost as an after-thought; in the flow of the cuts and movements that the players are already making. Multiple staggered screens now begin to occur. Then the habits for feeding the post are put in. But remember, they cannot (and do not) contradict any of the habits that have come before them. One post, two posts, screening posts, high and low posts are all implemented at this level. The last level begins with the counter for sagging defenses as in help-side man-to-man and all types of zones. Finally, we dove-tail the whole thing into the transition/fast break game in order to create a seamless offense. Most importantly it ties OFFENSIVE BASKETBALL into one cohesive package in the players’ minds.
Let me summarize it this way: It’s simple to teach but has the capacity for all the complexity that can occur in a game. It’s fundamental in its parts, yet novel as a whole. It will make a coach’s job easier, and will deliver a more savvy, higher I.Q. player to the next level – whatever level that may be.