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Topic: Rethinking Zone Defense
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berniebobcat
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Posted: 3/26/2017 4:31 PM
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It appears that some of the best teams in the NCAA tournament are playing a lot of zone defense. I may be a little selective in my basketball history but it was my impression that John Wooden turned the tide from zone to tight man-to-man when that's all UCLA played and subsequently won all those championships. I believe he thought that a sharp passing team could cause zone defenders to eventually be out of position to defend a shot. What seems to have changed is the greatly improved one-on-one offensive skills of today's players making it difficult to defend without help. Watching Oregon and South Carolina (plus others) do zone defense you have to be impressed with how effective they are in getting help and disrupting the flow of the offense. I wonder if zone is in the Bobcat future?
allen
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Posted: 3/26/2017 6:47 PM
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berniebobcat wrote:expand_more
It appears that some of the best teams in the NCAA tournament are playing a lot of zone defense. I may be a little selective in my basketball history but it was my impression that John Wooden turned the tide from zone to tight man-to-man when that's all UCLA played and subsequently won all those championships. I believe he thought that a sharp passing team could cause zone defenders to eventually be out of position to defend a shot. What seems to have changed is the greatly improved one-on-one offensive skills of today's players making it difficult to defend without help. Watching Oregon and South Carolina (plus others) do zone defense you have to be impressed with how effective they are in getting help and disrupting the flow of the offense. I wonder if zone is in the Bobcat future?

+1
Casper71
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Posted: 3/26/2017 7:39 PM
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BINGO! I said that most of the year. And, in addition to zone, I would say PRESS. Any team that cannot change the pace of the game nowadays. is gonna find it hard to go far.

Question is: do you have the kinds of players that can play zone and press at least a few minutes a game to change tempo. I think NOT in our case.
OUBobcat13
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Posted: 3/26/2017 11:33 PM
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So are you all implying Saul doesn't know what he is doing when it comes to coaching or coaching defense?
RSBobcat
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Posted: 3/27/2017 12:11 AM
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OUBobcat13 wrote:expand_more
So are you all implying Saul doesn't know what he is doing when it comes to coaching or coaching defense?
That depends. #1 on my list of questions at the Cbus Caravan is "Are you "Morally" opposed to any zone option? Player/team skills/ability certainly is a factor. But I think we give away an option that opposing teams ever even have to consider - let alone the switch up disruption that it can cause.

Per Pressure - Some of same applies from above - but my biggest concern is if we are going to play nothing but man - then why the too often lack of pressure on the ball once in half court D? Can't have the man logic vs no zone work both ways......
berniebobcat
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Posted: 3/27/2017 12:50 AM
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"So are you all implying Saul doesn't know what he is doing when it comes to coaching or coaching defense?"

This is not about Saul. It is an observation about a possible evolving trend in the college game. I trust that Saul can see what's happening out there. It may be that our personnel are not able to do zone defense effectively. It brings up the old saw that offensive skills are God-given but you can teach defense to anyone. Like so many old saws, it may not be true.
OUBobcat13
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Posted: 3/27/2017 7:48 AM
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I believe he addressed this question a couple years ago. If I remember correctly, he said that as he builds the program, offense was first, then defense. Last year he focused on man D and improved the defense significantly. I believe Saul teaches and expects flawless fundamentals before moving on to something else. Now that he spent a year mastering Man D, I would expect to see him throw in some more defenses this year.

Kinda the same thought process as teaching math. You have to understand addition and subtraction before you can learn multiplication and division.
Last Edited: 3/27/2017 7:50:50 AM by OUBobcat13
allen
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Posted: 3/27/2017 10:10 AM
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OUBobcat13 wrote:expand_more
I believe he addressed this question a couple years ago. If I remember correctly, he said that as he builds the program, offense was first, then defense. Last year he focused on man D and improved the defense significantly. I believe Saul teaches and expects flawless fundamentals before moving on to something else. Now that he spent a year mastering Man D, I would expect to see him throw in some more defenses this year.

Kinda the same thought process as teaching math. You have to understand addition and subtraction before you can learn multiplication and division.
Everybody evolves, life is all about progression. Whenever we played athletic team like Marchall, Iona and Buffalo, we gave up a lot of points. We even lost to some 200+ rpi teams because of our inability to score at the end of games and our inability to stop people. We did not get a lot of steals or blocks, we are not a defensive power. Zones are illegal in the NBA, because zones would create very low scoring games, if you allow professionals run a zone, it is sort of like aluminum bats in colllege baseball. Saul should take advantage of rules that benefit our team, we should run zone when we can't match up. Buffalo could have hung 100 plus on us, they missed so many easy shots. Are we saying that Saul is a bad coach or that you should stop washhing his car or that we deserve the car washes? No, wash away, gaze away, keep his written directions on waxing the car in protective glass and pull them out when you need a pick me up. We are just making an observation, we believe that at certain times, running a zone may help us.
OU_Country
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Posted: 3/27/2017 11:54 AM
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allen wrote:expand_more
I believe he addressed this question a couple years ago. If I remember correctly, he said that as he builds the program, offense was first, then defense. Last year he focused on man D and improved the defense significantly. I believe Saul teaches and expects flawless fundamentals before moving on to something else. Now that he spent a year mastering Man D, I would expect to see him throw in some more defenses this year.

Kinda the same thought process as teaching math. You have to understand addition and subtraction before you can learn multiplication and division.
Everybody evolves, life is all about progression. Whenever we played athletic team like Marchall, Iona and Buffalo, we gave up a lot of points. We even lost to some 200+ rpi teams because of our inability to score at the end of games and our inability to stop people. We did not get a lot of steals or blocks, we are not a defensive power. Zones are illegal in the NBA, because zones would create very low scoring games, if you allow professionals run a zone, it is sort of like aluminum bats in colllege baseball. Saul should take advantage of rules that benefit our team, we should run zone when we can't match up. Buffalo could have hung 100 plus on us, they missed so many easy shots. Are we saying that Saul is a bad coach or that you should stop washhing his car or that we deserve the car washes? No, wash away, gaze away, keep his written directions on waxing the car in protective glass and pull them out when you need a pick me up. We are just making an observation, we believe that at certain times, running a zone may help us.
Huh? What does the car washing have to do with coaching defense?
bn9
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Posted: 3/27/2017 11:56 AM
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OU_Country wrote:expand_more
I believe he addressed this question a couple years ago. If I remember correctly, he said that as he builds the program, offense was first, then defense. Last year he focused on man D and improved the defense significantly. I believe Saul teaches and expects flawless fundamentals before moving on to something else. Now that he spent a year mastering Man D, I would expect to see him throw in some more defenses this year.

Kinda the same thought process as teaching math. You have to understand addition and subtraction before you can learn multiplication and division.
Everybody evolves, life is all about progression. Whenever we played athletic team like Marchall, Iona and Buffalo, we gave up a lot of points. We even lost to some 200+ rpi teams because of our inability to score at the end of games and our inability to stop people. We did not get a lot of steals or blocks, we are not a defensive power. Zones are illegal in the NBA, because zones would create very low scoring games, if you allow professionals run a zone, it is sort of like aluminum bats in colllege baseball. Saul should take advantage of rules that benefit our team, we should run zone when we can't match up. Buffalo could have hung 100 plus on us, they missed so many easy shots. Are we saying that Saul is a bad coach or that you should stop washhing his car or that we deserve the car washes? No, wash away, gaze away, keep his written directions on waxing the car in protective glass and pull them out when you need a pick me up. We are just making an observation, we believe that at certain times, running a zone may help us.
Huh? What does the car washing have to do with coaching defense?
Wax on, wax off?
GoCats105
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Posted: 3/27/2017 11:58 AM
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bn9 wrote:expand_more
I believe he addressed this question a couple years ago. If I remember correctly, he said that as he builds the program, offense was first, then defense. Last year he focused on man D and improved the defense significantly. I believe Saul teaches and expects flawless fundamentals before moving on to something else. Now that he spent a year mastering Man D, I would expect to see him throw in some more defenses this year.

Kinda the same thought process as teaching math. You have to understand addition and subtraction before you can learn multiplication and division.
Everybody evolves, life is all about progression. Whenever we played athletic team like Marchall, Iona and Buffalo, we gave up a lot of points. We even lost to some 200+ rpi teams because of our inability to score at the end of games and our inability to stop people. We did not get a lot of steals or blocks, we are not a defensive power. Zones are illegal in the NBA, because zones would create very low scoring games, if you allow professionals run a zone, it is sort of like aluminum bats in colllege baseball. Saul should take advantage of rules that benefit our team, we should run zone when we can't match up. Buffalo could have hung 100 plus on us, they missed so many easy shots. Are we saying that Saul is a bad coach or that you should stop washhing his car or that we deserve the car washes? No, wash away, gaze away, keep his written directions on waxing the car in protective glass and pull them out when you need a pick me up. We are just making an observation, we believe that at certain times, running a zone may help us.
Huh? What does the car washing have to do with coaching defense?
Wax on, wax off?
You're supposed to have your hands up on D, so wax on, wax off does kind of work.
Jeff McKinney
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Posted: 3/27/2017 12:08 PM
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Some zones are legal now in the NBA, right?
Jeff McKinney
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Posted: 3/27/2017 12:13 PM
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How do you reconcile our defensive stats as being at the top of the MAC with your accusations that we didnt play good defense this season ?

Nobody in the MAC could really stop Buffalos dribble drive consistently. You have to beat them other ways.
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Posted: 3/27/2017 12:27 PM
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Jeff McKinney wrote:expand_more
How do you reconcile our defensive stats as being at the top of the MAC with your accusations that we didnt play good defense this season ?

Nobody in the MAC could really stop Buffalos dribble drive consistently. You have to beat them other ways.
We are not a defensive power, our stats are inflated by the teams that we played, we did not turn teams over and get easy buckets or block many shots. Whenever we played athletic teams they scored at will and some opponents that we should have crushed beat us because of our inability to match up with their athletes at certain times. I can't really assign blame, we played eight players and you can't press with eight players, but if we are able to add players and we add the same type of players that we have now, we should look at playing some zone, because some team is not going to miss easy buckets and that will be the end of the season. We are not a bad defensive team, but we are definitely not a defensive power. I am just being real.
allen
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Posted: 3/27/2017 12:32 PM
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OU_Country wrote:expand_more
I believe he addressed this question a couple years ago. If I remember correctly, he said that as he builds the program, offense was first, then defense. Last year he focused on man D and improved the defense significantly. I believe Saul teaches and expects flawless fundamentals before moving on to something else. Now that he spent a year mastering Man D, I would expect to see him throw in some more defenses this year.

Kinda the same thought process as teaching math. You have to understand addition and subtraction before you can learn multiplication and division.
Everybody evolves, life is all about progression. Whenever we played athletic team like Marshall, Iona and Buffalo, we gave up a lot of points. We even lost to some 200+ rpi teams because of our inability to score at the end of games and our inability to stop people. We did not get a lot of steals or blocks, we are not a defensive power. Zones are illegal in the NBA, because zones would create very low scoring games, if you allow professionals run a zone, it is sort of like aluminum bats in colllege baseball. Saul should take advantage of rules that benefit our team, we should run zone when we can't match up. Buffalo could have hung 100 plus on us, they missed so many easy shots. Are we saying that Saul is a bad coach or that you should stop washhing his car or that we deserve the car washes? No, wash away, gaze away, keep his written directions on waxing the car in protective glass and pull them out when you need a pick me up. We are just making an observation, we believe that at certain times, running a zone may help us.
Huh? What does the car washing have to do with coaching defense?
exactly the point, we should not confuse the two. I will call your attentiion to the movie Friday when Chris Tucker said that he had mind control over Debo, He said that when Debo told him to shut up, he did, but when Debo left Chris Tucker started talking again. People have brought coach SP into the conversation as if they were washing his car. SP is not here so we can talk freely about how WE feel about running a zone.
Last Edited: 3/27/2017 5:55:48 PM by allen
OU_Country
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Posted: 3/27/2017 12:32 PM
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allen wrote:expand_more
How do you reconcile our defensive stats as being at the top of the MAC with your accusations that we didnt play good defense this season ?

Nobody in the MAC could really stop Buffalos dribble drive consistently. You have to beat them other ways.
We are not a defensive power, our stats are inflated by the teams that we played, we did not turn teams over and get easy buckets or block many shots. Whenever we played athletic teams they scored at will and some opponents that we should have crushed beat us because of our inability to match up with their athletes at certain times. I can't really assign blame, we played eight players and you can't press with eight players, but if we are able to add players and we add the same type of players that we have now, we should look at playing some zone, because some team is not going to miss easy buckets and that will be the end of the season. We are not a bad defensive team, but we are definitely not a defensive power. I am just being real.
Let's be real then: Name a defensive power in the MAC, and tell us why?
bigtillyoopsupsideurhead
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Posted: 3/27/2017 2:10 PM
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allen wrote:expand_more
We are not a defensive power, our stats are inflated by the teams that we played
We played the same teams as everyone else in our conference, yet we had the best defense in the conference. Why didn't the other MAC schools have their stats inflated as well?

I might actually be for throwing a zone in *for a few minutes at a time max* in order to mix things up. But 90%+ of the time we should be playing man-to-man.
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Posted: 3/27/2017 2:29 PM
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allen wrote:expand_more
I believe he addressed this question a couple years ago. If I remember correctly, he said that as he builds the program, offense was first, then defense. Last year he focused on man D and improved the defense significantly. I believe Saul teaches and expects flawless fundamentals before moving on to something else. Now that he spent a year mastering Man D, I would expect to see him throw in some more defenses this year.

Kinda the same thought process as teaching math. You have to understand addition and subtraction before you can learn multiplication and division.
Everybody evolves, life is all about progression. Whenever we played athletic team like Marchall, Iona and Buffalo, we gave up a lot of points. We even lost to some 200+ rpi teams because of our inability to score at the end of games and our inability to stop people. We did not get a lot of steals or blocks, we are not a defensive power. Zones are illegal in the NBA, because zones would create very low scoring games, if you allow professionals run a zone, it is sort of like aluminum bats in colllege baseball. Saul should take advantage of rules that benefit our team, we should run zone when we can't match up. Buffalo could have hung 100 plus on us, they missed so many easy shots. Are we saying that Saul is a bad coach or that you should stop washhing his car or that we deserve the car washes? No, wash away, gaze away, keep his written directions on waxing the car in protective glass and pull them out when you need a pick me up. We are just making an observation, we believe that at certain times, running a zone may help us.
Huh? What does the car washing have to do with coaching defense?
exactly the point, we should not confuse the two. I will call your attentiion to the movie Friday when Chris Tucker said that he had mind control over Debo, He said that when Debo told him to shut up, he did, but when Debo left Chris Tucker started talking again. People have brought coach SP into the conversation as if they were washing his car. SP is not here so we can talk freely about how WE feel about running a zone.
What in God's name are you talking about? That is the worst analogy I've ever read.
OU_Country
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Posted: 3/27/2017 2:45 PM
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GoCats105 wrote:expand_more
I believe he addressed this question a couple years ago. If I remember correctly, he said that as he builds the program, offense was first, then defense. Last year he focused on man D and improved the defense significantly. I believe Saul teaches and expects flawless fundamentals before moving on to something else. Now that he spent a year mastering Man D, I would expect to see him throw in some more defenses this year.

Kinda the same thought process as teaching math. You have to understand addition and subtraction before you can learn multiplication and division.
Everybody evolves, life is all about progression. Whenever we played athletic team like Marchall, Iona and Buffalo, we gave up a lot of points. We even lost to some 200+ rpi teams because of our inability to score at the end of games and our inability to stop people. We did not get a lot of steals or blocks, we are not a defensive power. Zones are illegal in the NBA, because zones would create very low scoring games, if you allow professionals run a zone, it is sort of like aluminum bats in colllege baseball. Saul should take advantage of rules that benefit our team, we should run zone when we can't match up. Buffalo could have hung 100 plus on us, they missed so many easy shots. Are we saying that Saul is a bad coach or that you should stop washhing his car or that we deserve the car washes? No, wash away, gaze away, keep his written directions on waxing the car in protective glass and pull them out when you need a pick me up. We are just making an observation, we believe that at certain times, running a zone may help us.
Huh? What does the car washing have to do with coaching defense?
exactly the point, we should not confuse the two. I will call your attentiion to the movie Friday when Chris Tucker said that he had mind control over Debo, He said that when Debo told him to shut up, he did, but when Debo left Chris Tucker started talking again. People have brought coach SP into the conversation as if they were washing his car. SP is not here so we can talk freely about how WE feel about running a zone.
What in God's name are you talking about? That is the worst analogy I've ever read.
Sometimes I regret asking the question. I think this is what I'd have said GoCats:

https://youtu.be/5hfYJsQAhl0
allen
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Posted: 3/27/2017 6:00 PM
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GoCats105 wrote:expand_more
I believe he addressed this question a couple years ago. If I remember correctly, he said that as he builds the program, offense was first, then defense. Last year he focused on man D and improved the defense significantly. I believe Saul teaches and expects flawless fundamentals before moving on to something else. Now that he spent a year mastering Man D, I would expect to see him throw in some more defenses this year.

Kinda the same thought process as teaching math. You have to understand addition and subtraction before you can learn multiplication and division.
Everybody evolves, life is all about progression. Whenever we played athletic team like Marchall, Iona and Buffalo, we gave up a lot of points. We even lost to some 200+ rpi teams because of our inability to score at the end of games and our inability to stop people. We did not get a lot of steals or blocks, we are not a defensive power. Zones are illegal in the NBA, because zones would create very low scoring games, if you allow professionals run a zone, it is sort of like aluminum bats in colllege baseball. Saul should take advantage of rules that benefit our team, we should run zone when we can't match up. Buffalo could have hung 100 plus on us, they missed so many easy shots. Are we saying that Saul is a bad coach or that you should stop washhing his car or that we deserve the car washes? No, wash away, gaze away, keep his written directions on waxing the car in protective glass and pull them out when you need a pick me up. We are just making an observation, we believe that at certain times, running a zone may help us.
Huh? What does the car washing have to do with coaching defense?
exactly the point, we should not confuse the two. I will call your attentiion to the movie Friday when Chris Tucker said that he had mind control over Debo, He said that when Debo told him to shut up, he did, but when Debo left Chris Tucker started talking again. People have brought coach SP into the conversation as if they were washing his car. SP is not here so we can talk freely about how WE feel about running a zone.
What in God's name are you talking about? That is the worst analogy I've ever read.
I bet it was the worst analogy, lol. Maybe it was the worst ever ever, lol. The MORAL of the story, not the MORAL victories created here is that you are allowed to disagree with coach Phillips, the gentleman who posted was not throwing stones at Saul, he was making a point.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpN3AX3i8qg
Last Edited: 3/27/2017 6:05:46 PM by allen
OU_Country
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Posted: 3/27/2017 10:54 PM
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Have you been into the Meigs County Gold again allen?
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