car - good to see you back at least trolling these boards. I don't know how much it says about the balance of the defensive styles ... Man is so overwhelmingly preferred that I don't think there are really enough teams - particularly in the Big 6 - running the FCP to make an accurate assessment of whether it's truly balanced at D1.  In Crum, 85 of the human coached teams play Man defense, 25 play FCP (only 9 of the 68 human managed Big 6 teams run FCP and four of those have just taken over their respective team within the last 5 seasons), 20 play Zone, 6 play a hybrid FCP-Zone, and 2 play a hybrid FCP-Man. 

That being said, oldman uses the FCP for his Michigan St team in Crum and has absolutely dominated the world over the past seven seasons going 231-11 (106-6 in conference) while finishing with one Elite Eight appearance, one Final Four, and FIVE National Championships.

Season	Coach	Overall W-L	Home W-L	Road W-L	Neutral W-L	Conf W-L	Rank	RPI	SOS	Prestige	Notes
68	oldman	3-0	0-0	3-0	0-0	0-0	2	0	0	-
67	oldman	32-1	9-0	17-0	6-1	16-0	3	2	18	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion NT (Elite 8)
66	oldman	35-0	8-0	18-0	9-0	16-0	1	1	9	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion National Champion
65	oldman	32-3	9-0	14-3	9-0	13-3	1	3	22	A+	CT Champion National Champion
64	oldman	32-3	10-0	14-2	8-1	15-1	1	2	13	A+	Conf Champion NT At-large Bid National Champion
63	oldman	32-2	9-0	16-1	7-1	15-1	3	2	12	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion NT (Final Four)
62	oldman	35-0	10-0	16-0	9-0	16-0	1	1	15	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion National Champion
61	oldman	33-2	14-0	10-2	9-0	15-1	1	5	43	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion National Champion

In D1 the players are more well rounded which would make beating a press substantially easier, you will have significantly more players that have met the (60 + 60 rule) where as in DIII the press is so strong it almost isn't fair.

In Wooden the Current top 25 for DIII -
     8 out of the top 10 run the press (#10 - Man #6 - zone)
     Out of the remaining 15
          7 - press
          8 - man
          2 - zone

Which brings us a total of:
     15 press
     8 man
     2 zone

For what it's worth, as anyone who plays in Wooden knows, press happens to be run by the majority of the best coaches in that world. Check out a world like Naismith and man is the most run defense among the best coaches. I'm not here to weigh in on a press vs topic but I would like to point out that cause and effect is not always as you would like it to be.

Posted by possumfiend on 5/31/2014 4:18:00 PM (view original):
car - good to see you back at least trolling these boards. I don't know how much it says about the balance of the defensive styles ... Man is so overwhelmingly preferred that I don't think there are really enough teams - particularly in the Big 6 - running the FCP to make an accurate assessment of whether it's truly balanced at D1.  In Crum, 85 of the human coached teams play Man defense, 25 play FCP (only 9 of the 68 human managed Big 6 teams run FCP and four of those have just taken over their respective team within the last 5 seasons), 20 play Zone, 6 play a hybrid FCP-Zone, and 2 play a hybrid FCP-Man. 

That being said, oldman uses the FCP for his Michigan St team in Crum and has absolutely dominated the world over the past seven seasons going 231-11 (106-6 in conference) while finishing with one Elite Eight appearance, one Final Four, and FIVE National Championships.

Season	Coach	Overall W-L	Home W-L	Road W-L	Neutral W-L	Conf W-L	Rank	RPI	SOS	Prestige	Notes
68	oldman	3-0	0-0	3-0	0-0	0-0	2	0	0	-
67	oldman	32-1	9-0	17-0	6-1	16-0	3	2	18	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion NT (Elite 8)
66	oldman	35-0	8-0	18-0	9-0	16-0	1	1	9	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion National Champion
65	oldman	32-3	9-0	14-3	9-0	13-3	1	3	22	A+	CT Champion National Champion
64	oldman	32-3	10-0	14-2	8-1	15-1	1	2	13	A+	Conf Champion NT At-large Bid National Champion
63	oldman	32-2	9-0	16-1	7-1	15-1	3	2	12	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion NT (Final Four)
62	oldman	35-0	10-0	16-0	9-0	16-0	1	1	15	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion National Champion
61	oldman	33-2	14-0	10-2	9-0	15-1	1	5	43	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion National Champion

Nice to see you've built a perennial NT team over there at Minnesota, possum!

And I see jsajsa's point. I think where it appears to apply most would be at D2, where the predominant offensive/defensive makeup varies greatest from world to world.

But I think we can all agree that the effectiveness of the zone still lags behind M2M and Press across all divisions, perhaps least at DI.

And I think we can also agree that the press remains the easiest defense to successfully implement at D3.

Posted by oldave on 5/28/2014 7:59:00 AM (view original):
good info trail.  i had no idea it was that lopsided.

there has been talk for a long time... going all the way back to tarek i think, that press and fastbreak would not be base defenses and offenses, but rather modifiers of +/- variety where coach could choose how often or how agressively he wanted to  press or fastbreak.   that has allways seemed like a great idea to me, but clearly its not an easy programming change.  

i havent really thought it through,  but i think i wish the offenses and defenses were a little more "rock papaer, scissors"  where there was a certain offense that would give you a substantial edge against the press (although it might be a disadvantage against zone, or whatever) .     heck, maybe it does work that way and i just havent figured it out?

The day that happens is the day I stop playing.  I like having my Loyola Marymount O/D.  

cars comment; "But I think we can all agree that the effectiveness of the zone still lags behind M2M and Press across all divisions, perhaps least at DI. "

This i s the way it should be because that's the way in Real Life. The higher you go the less effective the zone is.

Posted by coachvegas44 on 6/3/2014 1:57:00 PM (view original):
cars comment; "But I think we can all agree that the effectiveness of the zone still lags behind M2M and Press across all divisions, perhaps least at DI. "

This i s the way it should be because that's the way in Real Life. The higher you go the less effective the zone is.

That's true to a certain extent, but does HD closely resemble the real life difference in effectiveness? I'm not so sure.

Maybe the data has alluded me, but I haven't seen any HD DI teams with the sustained success of a real life Zone school like Syracuse.

Posted by coachvegas44 on 6/3/2014 1:57:00 PM (view original):
cars comment; "But I think we can all agree that the effectiveness of the zone still lags behind M2M and Press across all divisions, perhaps least at DI. "

This i s the way it should be because that's the way in Real Life. The higher you go the less effective the zone is.

Agreed that the MTM is typically more effective in RL than Zone, but it you want to talk about RL I don't think it's possible to defend the effectiveness of the Press in the game because the Press is not a standard defensive set run by any team IRL.  I just don't think you can have it both ways (i.e., having a Zone D that resembles real life and an FCP that doesn't).  

Posted by possumfiend on 6/3/2014 8:50:00 PM (view original):

Posted by coachvegas44 on 6/3/2014 1:57:00 PM (view original):
cars comment; "But I think we can all agree that the effectiveness of the zone still lags behind M2M and Press across all divisions, perhaps least at DI. "

This i s the way it should be because that's the way in Real Life. The higher you go the less effective the zone is.

Agreed that the MTM is typically more effective in RL than Zone, but it you want to talk about RL I don't think it's possible to defend the effectiveness of the Press in the game because the Press is not a standard defensive set run by any team IRL.  I just don't think you can have it both ways (i.e., having a Zone D that resembles real life and an FCP that doesn't).  

+1 to that.

But I'm not sure at this point that we can really ditch the FCP, because it would alienate a large base of customers. Perhaps a new testing world could be created with only M2M and Zone, as well as an option to spend practice time on the backcourt press; and it would take less time to gain IQ as it can be learned far quicker than a true frontcourt defensive scheme.

It would also make sense to add in a modifier to adjust how much your defense pressures on ball.

Posted by possumfiend on 5/31/2014 4:18:00 PM (view original):
car - good to see you back at least trolling these boards. I don't know how much it says about the balance of the defensive styles ... Man is so overwhelmingly preferred that I don't think there are really enough teams - particularly in the Big 6 - running the FCP to make an accurate assessment of whether it's truly balanced at D1.  In Crum, 85 of the human coached teams play Man defense, 25 play FCP (only 9 of the 68 human managed Big 6 teams run FCP and four of those have just taken over their respective team within the last 5 seasons), 20 play Zone, 6 play a hybrid FCP-Zone, and 2 play a hybrid FCP-Man. 

That being said, oldman uses the FCP for his Michigan St team in Crum and has absolutely dominated the world over the past seven seasons going 231-11 (106-6 in conference) while finishing with one Elite Eight appearance, one Final Four, and FIVE National Championships.

Season	Coach	Overall W-L	Home W-L	Road W-L	Neutral W-L	Conf W-L	Rank	RPI	SOS	Prestige	Notes
68	oldman	3-0	0-0	3-0	0-0	0-0	2	0	0	-
67	oldman	32-1	9-0	17-0	6-1	16-0	3	2	18	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion NT (Elite 8)
66	oldman	35-0	8-0	18-0	9-0	16-0	1	1	9	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion National Champion
65	oldman	32-3	9-0	14-3	9-0	13-3	1	3	22	A+	CT Champion National Champion
64	oldman	32-3	10-0	14-2	8-1	15-1	1	2	13	A+	Conf Champion NT At-large Bid National Champion
63	oldman	32-2	9-0	16-1	7-1	15-1	3	2	12	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion NT (Final Four)
62	oldman	35-0	10-0	16-0	9-0	16-0	1	1	15	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion National Champion
61	oldman	33-2	14-0	10-2	9-0	15-1	1	5	43	A+	Conf Champion CT Champion National Champion

In the interest of fairness, it should also be noted that Oldman is one of the greatest HD coaches of all-time and, in my humble opinion, could and would be ultra-successful no matter which defense he chose to run.

Agreed

DEF is overvalued in the game. Therefore Press, being the most aggressive defense setting, is overvalued. In real life the best defense in college basketball, against a really bad team will force 25-30 TOs a night. Typically a great defense will force about 16 TOs a night and a bad defense will force about 12 a night. There simply isn't the amount of variation we regularly see in HD.

This leads the experienced players to load up on ATH DEF and not give a flip about anything offense. DEF and ATH will beat SPD, PASS and BH every time in this sim but almost never in reality.

DEF is overvalued in the game.

I'm sorry, that's an opinion that you didn't support with any evidence.  I guess it works as a thesis statement.  For the record, individual player defense matters less in Press than Man.

Therefore Press, being the most aggressive defense setting, is overvalued.

I'm sorry, that's an opinion that is only supported by the previous sentence... which was just another opinion.

In real life the best defense in college basketball, against a really bad team will force 25-30 TOs a night.

Okay, a comparison.  Well, a glance at Knight shows a fair number of teams causing an average of over 20 turnovers per game.  They're not all playing really bad teams every night.  When they do face really bad teams, why yes, they force more than 25 turnovers quite often.

Typically a great defense will force about 16 TOs a night and a bad defense will force about 12 a night.  There simply isn't the amount of variation we regularly see in HD.

Where are you getting those figures from?  I'm using the actual statistics from Knight.  Those actual statistics show exactly the amount of variation you describe in real life.

This leads the experienced players to load up on ATH DEF and not give a flip about anything offense.

Please provide evidence - an example or two.  I think you will only find a couple of outliers, mainly coaches who are experimenting.

DEF and ATH will beat SPD, PASS and BH every time in this sim but almost never in reality.

That's another assertion without evidence.  I wish you'd support your opinions and assertions.  This actually isn't coherent, the way you put it.  Speed is a part of defensive effectiveness along with Athleticism, Defense, and Shot Blocking.  Passing helps your whole team score and avoid turnovers.  Athleticism, Speed, Low Post, Perimeter, and Ball Handling all help individual players score.  It's not a zero-sum game.

mfnmyers loads up on DEF/ATH and runs FB/FCP. Seems like he almost ignores every other attribute, and has won at least three titles doing it (two in Crum, one in Rupp). 

I'm not sure if that means the DEF/ATH/FCP combination is overpowered or whether he just had a few good sims in a row. My Maryville team beat one of his title teams by 30+ in the regular season, but he didn't play us (or Delaware Valley, who was the #1 seed that year) in the tournament. 

In the hands of a good coach FCP is better than M2M and Zone (IMO).   The current strategies of creating 5-6 man unbalanced classes really feed into this monster in DII and DIII.

I slightly higher FG% against is more than offset by the extra TOs generated.