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Category: X’s and O’s
Quick Hitters: Zone Up
For the last almost two seasons I’ve been the head coach of the Aalborg Vikings in the Basketball League in Denmark, Europe. I took over mid-season for the first year, and we weren’t able to run the Dribble Drive, as we had to focus on defense.
For year two we started out running the Dribble Drive but mid season we replaced our import players with three new ones. I didn’t think we’d have time to teach it to the new players in time for the playoffs, so we went with set plays.
However, we ran a lot of set plays and quick hitters out of the Dribble Drive formation, as we were already used to playing out of that set.
Now I’ve made the transition to the GM job in the club, so I’m going to share the best of those quick hitters with you this summer. Some are in the Dribble Drive book I published, but this first one is not.
Zone Lob Play
This is a very simple screen-the-zone alley-oop lob play against most zones except the 1-3-1. One TV-announcer told me this season that he couldn’t figure out why the other teams didn’t catch on to it, as we used it every time we faced zone defense.
The answer to that question is in the deception. All of the real action takes place behind the defense and away from the ball:
Diagrammed it looks like this:
DVD Reviews
One thing I hear a lot of questions about are the various DVD sets about the Dribble Drive Motion. Are they any good? Are they good enough? Who are they for? Below I’m reviewing some of the best known Dribble Drive DVD’s on the market.
Just press the cover picture for the review.
Vance Walberg DVD Reviews
John Calipari DVD Reviews
Fundamentals: Dave Smart 2-Set Review
Zone: Jerry Petitgoue’s Open Post Motion Offense
Paperback Dribble Drive Book Offer
As most European leagues are now in pre-season, and our friends in the US are gearing up for it, we’ve also put the price of the Dribble Drive paperback down from $21.99 to $19.99.Find the offer on the right.
Walberg Advanced Dribble Drive Review
Last spring Coach Walberg released three new Dribble Drive DVD ses through Championship Productions, and after having used them (and a lot of other sources) to write my last book, it’s time for a review. The DVD’s released were:Advanced Dribble-Drive Offense: Zone & Transition Game, $119.99
100 Drills and Sets for Implementing the Dribble Drive Offense, $79.99
Walberg also released a defensive DVD set at the same time:
Vance Walberg: Half-Court Pressure Defensive System, 79.99
I don’t personally use Walberg’s defensive sets, so I’ll leave the defensive DVD out of the review.
See the reviews below. (more…)
New book out now! 200 pages on the Dribble Drive
The brand new and greatly expanded version of my book is now available to buy on Lulu.com and as an eBook.The book now has 200 pages and has been completely rewritten. I’ve taken out chapters on the Dribble Drive Zone Offense and the Complimentary High Post offense, and instead I’ve gotten to the bottom of the Dribble Drive, and all the little details of the offense.
I talked to Vance Walberg this week and that finally settled the last few issues of X’s and O’s, and now I’m ready to publish. I really think this book covers everything there is to know about the Dribble Drive.
There really is no comparison to the first book. This one is 100% better (and 100% longer). Look for the new chapters on fundamentals, the break down zone, passing and cutting, the pick & roll, the S-gap, switching and sagging defences, post play, including how to play with two post players, and an added 45 pages of drills.
Get the e-book (Paypal download,
$21.99$19.99)
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Kentucky and the Dribble Drive
I’m sure a lot of you guys around the world are following the NCAA tournament. If not may I just remind you that all the games are available right here:
With my interest in the Dribble Drive I’ve been following coach Calipari’s teams for years, but mostly in the post season, as very few NCAA games are shown in Europe during the regular season.
One thing which surprised me watching this season’s Kentucky matches is that they have pretty much gone away from the Dribble Drive as an offense, and I think they look stagnant because of it. There is a lot of pass, stand around. Pass, stand around waiting for a pick-n-roll. Pick-n-roll, hesitate.
Dribble Drive Fast Break; The Spurs Way
I read an interesting blog post today (via TrueHoop). It’s interesting because to me it reads like an article about how to run the dribble drive fast break, and especially how hard it is to stop a player who attacks the basket at speed. And this is at the highest level, with the San Antonio Spurs.
Here’s the interesting quote:
In watching San Antonio, it doesn’t even feel like they’re looking to run fast breaks as a team, it really just feels like Parker increasingly looks to take off on one-man forays. Usually, TP breaks one of the cardinal rules of transition basketball: he never has the numbers. Really, almost never. He converts at an amazing rate, considering that he always seems to be going 1-on-3 or 2-on-3.
This phenomenon really stood out to me in San Antonio’s 103-94 win over Chicago on Nov. 17. I went back at looked at Parker’s clips on Synergy Sports for that game. For the season, Parker has been producing about 1.3 points per possessions (PPP) on transition plays, a strong rate. In the game vs. the Bulls, he was credited with 11 points on 5 transition plays (2.2 PPP). I mean, the Bulls are a good defensive team that plays hard – this is a crazy number. Indeed, a play-by-play analysis of the video showed that the Bulls were getting back on defense… but they still couldn’t stop Parker. Here’s a play-by-play breakdown:
1) 2-on-3 break: TP Bucket
2) 1-on-3 break (4th defender collapses at end): TP Bucket
3) 3-on-3 break (4th defender chases in at end): TP Bucket And 1
4) 2-on-3 break: TP Bucket
5) 2-on-3 break: TP BucketNot once did Parker have the numbers, yet he converted every single time. Another thing I noticed is that, on any break above where it was 2-on-3 or 3-on-3, the non-Parker Spurs always looked to spot up behind the three-point line, rather than run to the basket, and were really trailers more than what we commonly think of as active participants in fast breaks.
It really might be the most bizarre fast-break approach I’ve seen: they have one little guy who gets the ball and dribbles like crazy, as he runs a one-man break which he can finish uncommonly well, even against the numbers, and even though he’s not a physically dominating guy – he essentially can’t even dunk in a game! And his teammates don’t even look to run to the basket, they’re just running to the line.
So Parker can go 1-on-3 and still score. An experienced Dribble Drive coach shouldn’t be too surprised; We know that when a offensive player is at full speed and is driving to the rim at full speed it’s almost impossible to stop him without fouling him.
We know this from running the Blood Drills every day.
Obviously most our players can’t finish like Parker, which is why we have the post to clean up the misses, but the principle is the same.
Walberg and the Wall Street Journal (and the Knicks)
A recent article in the Wall Street Journal about the New York Knicks and their use of statistics offers a lot of support to the way Coach Walberg thinks about basketball.
Dribble Drive Zone System eBook Out Now!
In my original book there is a section about the Dribble Drive Zone Offense, and I have now expanded that section greatly with the new information from coach Walberg’s latest DVD’s (Walberg Advanced Dribble-Drive Offense: Zone & Transition Game).The new eBook is 23 pages, and includes:
- X’s and O’s for the Fresno 4-out Push offense
- X’s and O’s for the Fresno 3-out “2-Game” offense
- How to combine Push and 2-game into simple offensive system
- Six different set plays in two different series which fit seamlessly with the zone offense.
The book can be purchased for $9.99 through uploadnsell.com, which takes you onto Paypal: The Dribble Drive Zone Offense System eBook
Finally; For those of you in the US: Good luck for the start of your season!
Staying true to your style
I think one of the most important things you must do when running any offense is to stay true to it with everything you do. By that I mean that you can’t teach two different styles of play and expect the players to understand both and especially be able to play both.
If you’re running the Dribble Drive, I think it becomes very hard to run a slow-down offense as a secondary offense – and don’t even think about running the DDM as a secondary offense.
You have to get your players into the right mindset. If you’re running a screening motion, you have to instill patience and if you’re running the DDM they have to be in attack mode.
When I started running the DDM we would walk it up, make sure everybody were in the right position, and then start running it. In other words, we were relying on the X’s and O’s to provide the baskets, and ran it like you run sets. The problem was that the players never got into the right attack mindset.
That’s where I think both Calipari and Walberg have revolutionized the game in a way. There is no fast or secondary break. In it’s purest form both use the DDM where they are just attacking off a basket or a rebound. The ball must be pushed, and it can go anywhere going up the court, and no matter where the ball goes you just follow the basic Dribble Drive principles
While with the Dribble Drive you have to be in attack mode 100% of the time, you might also be forced to run sets and quick hitters. There’s nothing wrong with that, but I wouldn’t use sets which change the mind-set of the players. Quick hitters or sets may be useful to open up the defense for the Dribble Drive, but don’t ask the players to run complicated sets that require patience and a different mind set.
