In the context of the shell drill, the most important concept is that the on-ball defender must make every effort to (cover up” the ball by forcing the offense to shoot over his or her outstretched hands. After covering up the shot, the on-ball defender should spin an his man on his back to establish contact, and chase down the rebound.

One more often overlooked, and significantly more difficult, rebounding skill that is developed in this drill is the rebounding responsibilities of the weakside defender. It is important for any weakside defender playing off of his man and in the paint to “meet his man outside of the Lane”. Stepping out of the Lane to initiate contact for the box out. This is particularly important because about 70% of missed shots come off on the weakside. For weakside defender who is not active and has not leave the key to establish contact, will probably find himself stuck under the basket out of position to get the rebound. Even worse, that players defensive assignment, who was also on the weakside, is probably in the best position on the floor for most rebounds

When we run this rebounding option from within the shell drill, initially we do nothing ostensibly except for swung the ball and shoot uninstructed. As players develop an understanding of the nuances and expectations of the defense we will begin to introduce different offense of movements before the shot, such as passing and screening away, passing and running a basket cut, flashing a player from the weakside through the key to the strongside, etc. we are putting all the pieces of the shell drill together and asking our defense to complete the play with a successful rebound. This short animation shows the defense adjusting to ball movement and briefly shows weakside defender’s stepping out of the key to meet their assignment for the box out.

This does not mean that we are conceding the perimeter pass; we still want to step into the passing lane and challenge the pass to the player as he moves to a position where he or she is one pass away from the ball.

Again, starting with a 3 man shell simplifies the process and allows the coach to closely focus in on proper defensive footwork and positioning, since the screening action occurs once on every pass.

To start the drill, the offense swings the ball around the perimeter as the defenders adjust their positions accordingly. Defenders should “jump to the ball” - i.e. move when the ball is in the air, as opposed to moving when the recipient of the pass catches the ball. The offense should also have a focus - in this situation, my focus would probably be that the offense must ‘catch and face’ in triple threat every time they receive a pass - this is a critical habit that gets overlooked at times. Also the offense cannot hold the ball over their heads looking for any pass.

Whenever a corner player catches the ball, their job is simply to dive directly tio the basket. The defense then rotates as a team, with the player challenging the ball meeting the dribbler outside of the key -early help! and the other defenders sinking in to the baseline to ‘help the helper’. Note: Help the helper is an important concept - it is the final piece of the rotation that makes it a team effort if a stop or steal occurs - at the same time, I don’t think that it is particularly critical to spend inordinate time on wlaking through the second help defender sliding over to cover the first help defender’s man, then walking the third help defender through covering the second defender’s man, and so on. The concepts are what is most impotant - sink to the level of the ball and make the opnly available pass the most difficult - the pass back out to the ballside guard area. There are specific areas where teams should focus on specifics such as in the following scenario:

Spending too much time on the help the help concept, though, can have the effect of turning defense into more of a math problem than a  basketball tactic.  You want your players able to react without thinking in game situations.

The video shows a couple of ball reversals and the defensive response each time to baseline penetration.

Tomorrow: Defending motion

Sunday:  Rebounding

Monday: Conversion

As has been stated many times, we always want to contain the basketball - we don’t want to get beat baseline, even if we are influencing the ball to the sideline.   This version of the shell covers how we rotate if we do get beat on the baseline side.

Keys:

1.        The help defender must meet the ball handler outside of the key.  We constantly emphasize giving early help. Help defenders have to be aware and react quickly.  If as defender is late on this rotation, he will usually be called for a block.

2.       The help defender must be set - i.e. stationary, no longer moving- with hands straight up in the air.  Defenders constantly get called for reaching and over-the-back (my favorite non-call call - ‘over the back’ is neither a call, or a foul) because their arms are not straight up

3.       The entire team helps by dropping in towards the baseline.  We have to cover the player left open by the defender who helps on the drive.   A common term for this rotation is “Help the Helper”.

1.        Standard pressure man to man defensive principles state that you want to defend in an on-the-line, up-the-line (denial) defensive stance at the top of the key if your man is one pass away.  If you choose to deny you are really working to limit the opponent’s ability to reverse the basketball.  By keeping the ball on  one side of the floor, you will be able to establish a stronger help-side because your defenders won’t have to adjust  their positions with respect to the ball and their man nearly as much as would be necessary against good ball movement.

2.       Another defensive principle states that all defenders should be at or below the level of the ball - if a defender’s assignment is above the level of the ball, that defender should sink to the level of the ball.  Sinking to the level of the ball provides better support against offensive penetration that denial at the expense of conceding the reversal pass.

Once you’ve made that decision, you’re ready to work on defending basket cuts,  Basket cuts can occur from any perimeter position, but the vast majority are made from guard spots above the top of the key.  That cut is what this teaching component of the shell drill focuses on defending.

The defender’s primary keys are:

1.       To keep himself or herself between the ball and the man - by bumping the cutter.

2.       To stay with the cutter - keeping the cutter in his or her field of vision.

On the pass from the top of the key to the wing, the defender should be careful not to follow the offensive player stepping awash from the ball.  The defenders should stay between the ball and the man, maintain vision of both, and create a stationary arm bar that meets the offensive player’s cut back to the ball.  The defender should always maintain ball-you-man position staying between the man and the ball on the cut to the basket.

A final note - the defender should not follow the cutter out to the weak side of the floor from the basket at the end of the cut.  When the cutter clears to the weak side , the defender remains in help position until the ball is passed out to the top of the key - then the defender can adjust and sprint out into one-the-line, up-the-line denial position.

Note: It is easy to conclude that the best way to play halfcourt defense - when keeping the ball out of the paint is a primary defensive goal - is passively, sagging off (of both the ball and off-ball offensive players) to clog the lanes.

In fact, my approach is almost always the opposite - in order to stop penetration, we need all 5 players to be very active on the defensive end.

When we run the shell drill against dribble penetration, we are really working on what we will be doing in a game situation when our on-ball defense breaks down. This may seem obvious, but it is an important point nonetheless. We are NOT emulating what we want to see in games. Ideally, I don’t ever want to see my defense helping to defend the drive - because our expectation is to contain the ball.

If we get beat, we will early help that closes the gaps and forces the ball back out to the perimeter. But - and this cannot be stated too many times - the on-ball defender’s primary responsibility is to contain the ball.

My strong preference is to run man to man pressure defense - getting into passing lanes and disrupting the opponents timing and rhythm. In this framework, if we are defending a player one pass away from the ball, we should be defending in an on-the-line, up-the-line position - On the line between the ball and the man to disrupt the pass, and Up the Line towards the ball in order to support against the drive.

Again, we want to give early help - every time an offensive player sees a driving lane, we want to at least give the impression that we have closed the gap and taken away the drive. Active off-ball defenders can often deter the ballhandler by quickly bluffing toward the ball as if to help before returning to an on-the-line, up-the-line position (Show-and-Go).

If we fully commit to helping on the drive, we will shape up and get directly in front of the ballhandler to stop the drive - we call this going “number to number” with the ballhandler. On the pass out, the help defender must quickly locate his man and recover to on-ball defensive position (help and recover).

As a general rule, when an offensive player’s assignment leaves to help, that player should slide away from the ball and outside of the defender’s field of vision in a ready-to-shoot position - this makes it much more difficult for the defense to recover to the ball and defend the shot after helping.

One disadvantage to this approach is that the player defending the top of the key only plays on-ball and on-the-line, up-the-line defense when the ball swings around the perimeter.

The advantage is that this approach is that it simplifies defensive responsibilities for younger players. Most 4-man shell drills make a distinction between a player defending 2 passes away (this defender usually has 1 foot in the lane) and a player defending 3 or more passes away (this player usually straddles the power line - a term I use with my teams that describes the imaginary line that cuts the court in half).

Power Line

For younger teams, making this distinction can over-complicate things. Running a 3 man shell and having all players defending a man 2 or more passes away from the ball straddle the power line is a good way to make the game simpler. At the younger levels (and even at the high school level) very few teams will be able to take advantage of you having all of your weak side defenders in this position. If you go against an opponent that screens your weak side defenders and throw skip passes to their men - that is a good sign that you are facing a coach who is specifically trying to exploit this piece of your defense.).

2. One wrinkle that I think every coach should consider adding to their shell drill, if they haven’t already, is to start the shell drill with the defenders on the baseline. The coach starts with the ball. The drill starts with the coach throwing in to any offensive player on the perimeter. On the coach’s pass, the defensive players sprint out to their defensive positions…what those positions are - on-ball, denial (on-the-line, up-the -line), or help (pistols) depends on the recipient of the coach’s initial pass.

Adding this closeout component to the shell drill ensures that the defense is active at the beginning of the drill. It also forces players to be aware, as their initial positioning (the spot that they sprint to) will depend on where the coach’s pass goes.

This is the second question from Coach Chris, received in early July:

Q: On M2M defense, do you turn a man baseline or middle and why?

A lot of how you defend the perimeter depends on the size of your big players. Generally speaking, I like to influence the dribbler towards the baseline for the following reason: When we rotate out to help against a player on the baseline, if we are able to stop the dribble we have the ball handler in an area where most players have a difficult time making a productive decision with the ball - behind the backboard, trapped by (usually) a tall post player and his man, with no readily available teammates to pass to (Figure B).

Compare this to a player who drives towards the middle and gets stopped in the elbow area. This player possibly has a straight-ahead 15 foot shot, an easy dump-off pass to the top of the key, and a better passing angle to any of the other three teammates than would be available from the baseline trap (Fig. C).

Influencing the dribble A

Influencing the Dribbler B

Influencing The Dribbler C

This doesn’t mean that all teams should force the ball baseline. This is especially true for teams that are undersized. If you are undersized, forcing ball handlers towards the baseline can be self-defeating if those ball handlers can just shoot over the top of your midgets when they get there.

Also, I think ANY conversation on this topic needs to start with the following disclaimer: You are influencing the ball in the direction of the baseline or the middle, you are not getting beat in either direction. The on-ball defender’s primary responsibility is and always will be to contain the ball. No matter where you “force” the ball, if you force your help defenders to rotate to help over and over and over, you’re not going to be a very good team, you’ll probably be in foul trouble more often than not, and your rebounding stats will be very poor as well (since box-out responsibilities can get confused after the team has rotated to help). The primary responsibility of the on-ball defender is always to contain the ball. No matter which direction we are influencing the basketball; we will always consider it a mistake if we are consistently getting beat in that direction.

These questions came from Coach Chris in early July:

1.  What variations of shell drill do coaches run (i.e. what do you do with big men? Do coaches do something other than 4 out, etc.)?
2.  On M2M defense, do you turn a man baseline or middle and why?

I’ll talk about involving post players in the shell drill today, and tackle the rest of these questions over the next 2 newsletters.

Re: Big Men in the shell drill.

I think you should absolutely include your big man in the shell drill, and play him from the post position:

**I will add a disclaimer here to state that at the youth levels it is especially important that you involve your big men in your perimeter drills and scrimmages, at least to some extent. Everybody, including big men, should be able to catch the ball on the perimeter and make a good passing decision, or step out to the perimeter to defend. In 99% of cases, the coach who banishes a big kid to the post and never lets him or her touch the ball or defend outside of the paint is doing that player a huge disservice**

That being said, you can start out having an offensive post player stand stationary on one block and have the defensive post work on footwork and positioning as the ball gets reversed around the perimeter.

Next, you can have the offensive post flash across the lane to either block as the ball gets reversed. The defensive post should work on bumping the cutter (by making an arm bar) and riding the cutter up the lane, as well as working on fronting or ¾ denial of the offensive player on the strong side post

Placing the offensive player back in a stationary position at either low post, you can start to work on defending penetration. On a drive from the ballside wing – the post should stop the drive. How the mechanics of it work depends on whether you’re fronting the post, plaiting ¾ denial, or playing behind.

On a drive from the opposite wing, the post player must meet the ballhandler outside of the lane with quick help. Post defense is a matter of positioning and angles. I tell my teams – we don’t have any shot blockers – we have quick, active, defenders who understand positioning and angles.

(Do I really believe there is ‘no such thing as shot blockers’)? – No. Of course there are shot blockers. - The reason I send the message in that way is because, very often, players will go for a spectacular block – spiking the ball out of bounds , in defensive version of an “And-1 commercial” – and pick up a stupid foul when it would have been easier to just establish position.)

A few more key areas to work on with post defenders in a shell:

· Defending a cut across the lane with the ball at the top of the key – we swing open to the ball with our hands up and the defender on our back, and then re-establish position on the other side of the lane

· Defensive positioning when defending a player on the weak side low post (i.e. the ball is on the right wing; player being defended is on the left block). At the younger levels, the post defender can often step off of the weakside post into the middle of the lane to better support to strong-side drive. As players develop, post defenders can’t step so far away off of good post-players without getting pinned in the key on ball reversal.

· If you front the post, you should spend some time on the footwork involved with stepping around the offensive post player on the pass from the point to the ballside wing.

· If you play ¾ denial on the post, you should also work on executing an x-step to shift from high side to low-side denial as the ball moves from the wing to the corner.

· Whatever you teach, defensively, it should be aligned with your team’s strengths as much as possible. Whatever those strengths happen to be, the shell drill is a great tool to give any team’s natural strengths the discipline needed to be successful.

Coach Stinson thanks for the press.  I tried to run it last year but struggled with the rotations some. This will be a great help.  Two questions to ask you.  Very difficult to narrow it down, but I will try.  I was looking for an effective but simple way in which to signal and change things on the court.  You know something that would not interrupt  the natural flow of the game.  The second question would be to help me decide on whether to use a continuity offense or a bunch of plays.  I would like to hear arguments on both.

Q:  Help me decide on whether to use a continuity offense or a bunch of plays.  I would like to hear arguments on both.

A: Both have their place, but if I had to choose, I would run a continuity.  this might be particularly true in your case, since the second part of your coaching question  indicates  that you would like the action on the court to be as seamless as possible.  Continuities are designed to be seamless; when run consistently well, a continuity is always probing the defense, looking to take advantage of the first good opportunity.

Set plays usually have the opposite result - the offense usually has to set itself up in order to get into the play, which often requires a break in the action where the offense stops attacking , even if momentarily.  The negative of this is that you are allowing the defense to get itself set at the same time - if you are a believer in pressure offense and in trying to ‘put the opponent on his heels’, so to speak, running set plays every time  down the floor will work against this purpose.

I prefer to run continuities as my primary offense because, more than anything, continuities emphasize team play,  ball movement, and player movement,  Many younger teams that run only set plays find themselves without a plan of attack when they run a play that doesn’t produce a shot.  Too often players respond by trying to break down the defense by themselves with a 1 on 1 move.  Penetration moves are not a bad thing - well-run continuities open up driving lanes all of the time.  But penetration moves that are made just because the player with the ball didn’t know what else to do with it - rarely do anything but hurt your team - the two biggest exceptions to this rule being:

1.  Penetration moves that are made at the end of a quarter, half, or game, and,

2. Penetrating to break down a pressure defense that is stifling your passing or scoring  options.

Set plays are important for those times when you need a shot, and/or you need a shot from a specific player.  Example: As a general rule, I don’t believe in running plays to get 3 point shots because almost any offense can get you a 3 point look at almost any time.  But if we need a 3 to get back in a game  or in a time and score siutuation at the end of a game, I want to get the ball in the hands of the right player - the one who is most likely to make that shot.

Generally, Coaches that run only set plays or who almost always run set plays do so for similar reasons - doing do gives the coach a greater degree of control over the outcome of each possession.  Plays also allow the coach to identify and exploiut specific weak spots in the opponents’ defensive armor.

Lastly, coaches who prefer to play a slower tempo can use play-calling to force players into the deliberate act of setting up every time down the floor before looking for a basket.  This can slow down the tempo of a game significantly.

Coaches sometimes go too far with this and try to turn every game into a personal chess match - this is counterproductive if the coach doesn’t place equeal emphasis on developing  recognition and game-speed decision-making in players - eventually he will find himself against Kings and Queens, while never letting his players develop into anything more than pawns.

To recap:

Advantages of Coaching Continuity Offenses:

1. Continuity Offenses are constantly ion the attack, looking to exploit a defensive breakdown,

2.  Continuity Offenses encourage unselfish play and ball movement

3.  Continuity Offenses don’t have an “end-point”- As a result, players should always have a clear idea of the [plan of attack and should rarely have to resort to one-on-one play  if her teammates are doing their jobs.

4.  Continuities encourage player development by emphasizing good decision-making

Advantages of Running Set Plays:

1. Plays allow you to target specific defensive weaknesses on each possession

2.  Plays Give the Coach Greater Control over shot selection

There you go…NOW, where do you stand?

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