Thursday, February 3, 2011

Beating the Sag with the Skip

Lately we've had a lot of teams sagging on us in the read and react taking away the basket cuts, back cuts, and drives. Forcing us to be a jump shooting team, which isn't a great option for most teams.

So how do you combat this? You can't drive, can't post, can't cut, and can't get inside.

The answer is easy, skip the ball. Skipping the ball makes the defense have to close out long distances since they are overplaying the help. These closeouts allow our players to make a move and attack with the bounce, and the help won't be in position yet, hopefully, having to come from the other side of the floor. It's why Coach Walberg's DDM was originally called AASAA - Attack, Attack, SKIP, Attack, Attack. Coach Walberg know that in DDM teams would overplay him with help and that's why the skip is vital.

Once you start skipping the ball, the defense starts to sneak out and try to defend the skip. This starts to eliminate the help as players cheat to be in better position to defend the skip. This then opens up the middle for driving and cutting. The other nice thing about the skip is it's always open because the defender is in extreme help in the lane. It's about taking what the defense gives you and exploiting it.

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