Exploring basketball's best ideas, strategies, and coaches around the world

Happy Sunday and welcome to all the new subscribers from around the world!

ICYMI: Last week, we highlighted a clever "Hit" strategy coming out of the quarter and halftime breaks. Read the full newsletter HERE.

This Week at a Glance:

🔒 SG Plus Content: Preventing Triple Switches - Short Roll to Post​

☄️ Dr. Dish Ultimate Giveaway: Enter to Win!​

🎧 Slappin' Glass Podcast: Brittany Loney {Elite Cognition}

🥇 Best of the Week: Reverse Offense & Hammer Screens​

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Preventing the Triple Switch

This time of year, it's always worth a second, third, or even fourth look at offensive strategies aimed at attacking defensive switching in the ballscreen. This is especially true as teams begin facing opponents multiple times in a season, as switching can become a powerful tool to disrupt offensive flow and stymie sets or actions late in the year.

In past newsletters, we've highlighted offensive strategies to exploit the perimeter mismatches, like "Drive the Wake" {🔒}...

or through a variety of dribble pitches to attack the big on the perimeter {🔒}...

Today, we'll show some love to the bigs by highlighting a clever "short roll to post" strategy offenses can use to maintain and exploit a size mismatch.

Short Roll to Post

With all switching schemes, defenses have contingency plans to prevent the offense from isolating and attacking through either a perimeter or size mismatch. By utilizing various "Hit" strategies {🔒}, the defense can force the ball out of a perimeter player's hands, shifting decision-making to less skilled offensive players...

Or, in the case of size mismatches, teams have various doubling or zoning methods to prevent the big from playing 1v1 in the post.

Additionally—and perhaps more commonly—defenses that excel at switching can use the "Triple Switch" to rotate the smaller defender out of the mismatch on the roll, replacing them with the nearest defender of size to match up on the rolling big.

Zooming In: Referring to the example above, by deep rolling the big against the switch, the offense presents a clear and easy switch opportunity for the guard and the defender waiting at the rim. As a result, any size advantage the offense may have had is mitigated, and upon the catch, the big is operating against a defender of similar size.

In response to the "Triple Switch," clever offenses looking to exploit the size advantage are countering by short rolling the big to post up the guard around the free-throw line...

Zooming In: As shown above, the short roll to post puts any attempt by the defense to "Triple Switch" in a "grey area." The big doesn't roll all the way to the basket where the bigger defender is waiting to switch, and, at the same time, that defender at the rim is reluctant to leave their matchup and expose the rim to dumb offs or cuts. Therefore, the guard is forced to defend the match up 1v1 on the catch.

From this position, the defense is harder-pressed to solve the mismatch after the catch. Good corner/dunker spacing on the short roll post-up makes an attempt to double or bounce the small out of the mismatch very risky, as it can lead to direct kick-out threes or a dump-off to the rim with little chance for a second defender to rotate over on either.

Forced to defend the matchup 1v1, the big is in an advantageous position to attack smaller, quicker guards with minimal dribbles and fewer opportunities for their dribble to be stripped.

Zooming In: If the big can gain even a slight edge on the guard, one dribble is often enough to leverage their size and finish at the rim. Ideally, these post-ups shouldn't require them to get into their "bag"—the size advantage should be enough to make a quick, decisive move.

The short roll to post offers a dynamic and effective counter to defensive switching schemes, especially when trying to exploit a size mismatch. By maintaining proper spacing and attacking decisively, offenses can create easy scoring opportunities for their bigs without needing to rely on overly complex moves or numerous dribbles.

Together with Dr Dish

Our friends at Dr. Dish Basketball are giving away a Dr. Dish CT+ and a Dr. Dish Home shooting machine to two lucky winners during their Ultimate Giveaway! Visit info.drdishbasketball.com/sweepstakes to enter for your chance to win and learn how you can score bonus entries every day. Giveaway closes March 10th at 11:59 AM.

Slappin' Glass Podcast

Last week we sat down with the Founder and CEO of Elite Cognition, Brittany Loney! In this highly interesting conversation we dive into all things about improving group excellence and decision making, and discusses coaching through volatility and uncertainty, and optimizing the planner during the always fun "Start, Sub, or Sit?!"

Together with Hudl

Want to dominate the court like never before? The Hudl Pro Suite is your secret weapon. From game film analysis to advanced statistics, we've got everything you need to take your game to new heights. Plus, with Hudl Instat, you'll have access to in-depth insights that give you a competitive edge. From advanced video tagging to customizable reports, Hudl Instat has it all. Join the top teams who already rely on Hudl Instat to stay ahead of the competition.

Tactical

📺 Reverse Offense - RIP • Zoom DHO​

"A RIP Screen, Zoom DHO variation for the point guard out of the Australian Reverse Offense."

✚ Pair With: Another variation within the Reverse Offense, rejecting the hand-off to clear space for a 1-5 inverted PNR.

🔒 SG Plus Content: Our breakdown on the Australian Reverse Offense and its various variations.

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📺 Hammer Screen - Screen the RIP Screen​

"A variation of the classic "Hammer" action from Coach Igor Kokoskov."

✚ Pair With: A similar variation, using the RIP Screen to enter the post with double Hammer Screens on the backside.

🔒 SG Plus Content: Our deep-dive into the fantastic playbook of Coach Igor Kokoškov from his stint with Fenerbahce.

Interesting Reads

📚 What's Going On Here With This Human?​

During interviews, I try to create a stillness that helps separate signal from noise, elephants from riders. The easiest way to create conditions of stillness is to talk very little. It also helps to have the candidate you’re trying to see clearly ask you questions. Questions have very high signal value compared to most anything else you can get from a candidate. This is harder to do in practice than you might think—you need to make the candidate feel safe enough to ask their true questions, and you need to answer concisely or you’ll run out of time (which is particularly hard if the person asks good questions). I write down each question and sometimes respond with “I’ll answer, but first I’m curious, why did you ask that?” I’m looking for the felt sense of a “hungry mind” based on the way their questions flow. That’s very hard to fake.

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📚 Pure Independence​

Purpose is different for everyone. Sometimes it’s family, sometimes it’s community, religion, work, whatever.

But independence is more universal. Our desire to be independent, why we want, what prevents us from achieving it, and why some people sabotage their ability to have it, is such a common story across cultures and generations.

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📚 The Inner Game: Why Trying Too Hard Can Be Counterproductive​

The standard way of learning is far from being the fastest or most enjoyable. It’s slow, makes us second guess ourselves, and interferes with our natural learning process. Here we explore a better way to learn and enjoy the process.

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Quote of the Week

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Thank you for reading and have a great week coaching,

Dan and Pat

info@slappinglass.com

We're proud to partner with the leading Sports Travel company in the basketball world, Beyond Sports! Follow the link above to learn more about why more than 600 universities have trusted Beyond Sports for their team's foreign trips. Let them know Slappin' Glass sent you!

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