What attributes are the important with guards playing a zone? I know there was some discussion about low post players.

How important is speed in a zone and compared to other defenses? If you play a 3-2, does that mean less speed in required than a 2-3 in order to cover perimeter shots? What is the impact of athleticism compared to other defenses?

IMO, speed is de-emphasized for guard defense in zone. It matters, but less than it matters for man, and quite a bit less than it matters for press. Obviously more is better, as with anything. But the benefits of elite speed are not as great as they are for man or especially press, so I feel comfortable emphasizing other things.

In reality, zone really only helps you hide 1 bad defender. You still need a high average in ATH and DEF to compete. The 3-2 treats your SF like a guard, so yes SPD plays more of a role than in the normal 2-3 where ATH would be more important at the 3 position.

For both the 3-2 and the 2-3, I rank speed above ATH in the defensive metric for guards (and SF in the 3-2).

I run mostly 3-2 and I find it hums nicely with my high speed teams. I have less experience in the 2-3 but colonels ran it exclusively at Mt. Olive and I played him 3 times a year for 15 or so seasons. His teams did way better at defending the 3 than I expected when he had a pair of 90 speed guards.

As for how 3-2 and 2-3 differ, to me, it’s really a matter of personnel. If the guy I want to play the 3 has better speed than rebounding, I’ll tend to want to play 3-2, because his speed is better utilized than his rebounding (or in some cases, his rebounding deficiency is less noticeable). If he’s a better rebounder, I’ll default to 2-3, for the same reason. In zone, the best 3s are able to do both.

This is an excellent topic. And I don't have knowledge or experience to add anything of merit. But it does make sense that having high speed guards in a 2-3 would be very beneficial. As they need to cover more ground.

As far as bigs, I've heard coaches mention that they don't care to much about the speed rating in general. But is speed something that needs to be considered for bigs in a 3-2?

(and after this.... back to guard questions. Good thread)

Other than High D1, speed for the 4/5 in the 3/2 isn't very valuable. It has some weight, but not a ton. BLK, DEF, ATH are probably 90-95 of the metric.

In the 2-3, I think speed is like 15ish% of the equation for the 3/4.

FYI, I recieved this is a response from a ticket.

" For example, in a 3-2, the SF is evaluated in the same way as the PG and SG, where speed is more important. In a 2-3, the SF is evaluated the same as the PF since they essentially play the same role."

Now it could be SPEED is more important than ATH or it could mean SPEED is more important for guards than posts but I am pretty sure he was implying the former.

Posted by Trentonjoe on 6/26/2018 12:20:00 PM (view original):
FYI, I recieved this is a response from a ticket.

" For example, in a 3-2, the SF is evaluated in the same way as the PG and SG, where speed is more important. In a 2-3, the SF is evaluated the same as the PF since they essentially play the same role."

Now it could be SPEED is more important than ATH or it could mean SPEED is more important for guards than posts but I am pretty sure he was implying the former.

Really? Looks like the opposite to me, but I don’t know the full context of the ticket. Were you asking specifically about the value of speed vs athleticism? If so, I’m surprised they gave you an answer.

Just at first glance, I would assume the answer just means the SF is treated like a guard defensively in the 3-2. Speed is more important for guards than it is for bigs.

My CSU Chico team is a prime example of what I am talking about. My three “guards” are about 55 ath 80 speed 75 defense. Not great but pretty good.

In conference play against 9 other nt quality teams, we have 43% ofg and 31 3ofg%. It’s third best in a very good conference of 10 humans.

i don’t think it would be as good with an 80 ath and 55 speed. Do you shoe?

Posted by Trentonjoe on 6/26/2018 12:06:00 PM (view original):
Other than High D1, speed for the 4/5 in the 3/2 isn't very valuable. It has some weight, but not a ton. BLK, DEF, ATH are probably 90-95 of the metric.

In the 2-3, I think speed is like 15ish% of the equation for the 3/4.

As I said before, I have NOTHING to verify my thoughts. It's just assumptions about unknown things for me.

But I would expect speed to be weighed more for the 4/5 positions in 3-2 zone, than I'd expect speed to matter for the 3/4 positions in a 2-3. Because of the open spacing on the floor.

To keep it in perspective, i'm not saying the 4/5 would need to have guard-like speed. I just think speed would be necessary here, much more than other defensive sets. And when discussing speed for 3/4 spots in 2-3, they aren't covering as much spacing on the floor.

But i'm probably thinking too hard. I do this often. (Its funny to say that too. Because there's SO MUCH attention to little tweaks in this game. And when I show this game to people that I think would like it, they ALL say "that's way too much going on for it to even be fun". To all of us it's kind of second nature. But it's always funny to me when i'm told that i'm thinking too hard)

I reread some conversations I have had with admin and I think I overstated the value of speed in the 2-3 for posts. I think the 3-4 in the 2-3 and 4-5 in the 3-2 value speed (and just about everything) pretty equally.

Posted by Trentonjoe on 6/26/2018 4:14:00 PM (view original):
My CSU Chico team is a prime example of what I am talking about. My three “guards” are about 55 ath 80 speed 75 defense. Not great but pretty good.

In conference play against 9 other nt quality teams, we have 43% ofg and 31 3ofg%. It’s third best in a very good conference of 10 humans.

i don’t think it would be as good with an 80 ath and 55 speed. Do you shoe?

I suspect 80-55-75 would be fine at D2. Hard to say how it would be relative to what you’re doing. Many styles can be successful, it’s usually a matter of developing a plan and executing it.

At Oregon this season, I’ve been exclusively press/3-2 this season, my starting “guards” average 91-84-90. We have a comfortable Pac10 lead in OFG% and O3FG% in conference, top 20 in the nation in both. In Naismith, the guards on the UV team that went to the championship game in year 98 averaged 90-75-92, the starting SG had a speed of 61, the two SF I used were low 70s.

This years OK St team is surprisingly effective in the 3-2, though I’m usually playing 2-3, because I hate “wasting” Rhodes’ rebounding as a “guard”.

Posted by Trentonjoe on 6/26/2018 4:14:00 PM (view original):
My CSU Chico team is a prime example of what I am talking about. My three “guards” are about 55 ath 80 speed 75 defense. Not great but pretty good.

In conference play against 9 other nt quality teams, we have 43% ofg and 31 3ofg%. It’s third best in a very good conference of 10 humans.

i don’t think it would be as good with an 80 ath and 55 speed. Do you shoe?

Hmm I'd be curious to see an experiment to determine this. I actually would think that defensively the high ath guys would be just as good as high speed.

Look at Myers's teams they might be close.