Posted by isack24 on 1/10/2011 2:03:00 PM (view original):
I'm sure this:

• changed the performance hit from fatigue so that it won't be as linear, but instead performance will decrease more rapidly as a player gets tired

didn't hurt press teams.

But he also says something like "made minor logic tweaks."  I'd be interested to know what those were.  I've noticed the press getting stronger over the past few seasons. 

Like I said, though, and no one has addressed, I think recruit generation has helped press at D3.  Less elite bh/pass PGs = less guys capable of not turning the ball over.

the press getting stronger over the last few seasons, IMO, is purely a result of people figuring out how to play it. you used to be able to largely ignore defense. now that will kill you. it takes time to make those kind of adjustments!

Posted by ike1024 on 1/10/2011 10:48:00 AM (view original):

Posted by udm_mike on 1/10/2011 10:45:00 AM (view original):
I've noticed that it's almost all about IQ's.  If you have a team with good iq's (as long as speed/ath and stamina aren't brutal), then you're going to be fine.  If you don't, you'll be horrendous.

Are you saying that press teams with high IQs will be fine, or teams playing against press teams will be fine?

Press teams with high iq's will be fine.  My Elite 8 run last year was a bunch of upper classmen with avg to above avg speed/stamina/def.  We rarely had more than a point or 2 advantage in speed or stamina than the opponent.  It was my nod to porkpower's super class (6 seniors, 5 jr's, 1 redshirt jr).

I think my strategy against pressing teams has done a 180 since pre-update.  Before the update the general consensus was that when you played press teams you more heavily emphasized your guards or any players with significantly above-average BH/P for their positions, and I followed this conventional wisdom.  Frankly, pre-update I never really got the hang of beating pressing teams.  Post-update with the initial foul explosion it became clear to me that if I wanted to beat pressing teams one easy way to do that was to maximize the number of fouls they would be committing, so I started emphasizing my bigs.  Ever since I have upped the distro to my inside scorers and lowered my 3 pt. settings against press teams.  Even as fouls have been dialed back a bit this has remained successful, and it is certainly the case that on average even good pressing teams are fouling more than they were pre-update.  This strategy is particularly successful against press teams with anything approaching a thin front line.  A couple of decent post scorers and a slasher can really force pressing opponents' 4th and 5th bigs into playing significant minutes due to foul trouble unless their foul trouble settings are quite aggressive.  That further emphasizes the rebounding advantage I probably already had and typically backups might be younger, making my inside scoring strategy increasingly effective while they're in the game.

Interesting.  Seems counterintuitive to me to let guys with lower ball handling skills run get the ball more, but I see why it would work.  Maybe I'll give that a shot.

For what it's worth I took a look at the elite D3 teams in Allen.  Pretty loose definition of elite: top 20 RPI this season (we're in the conference tourney) and/or A- (or better) prestige.

29 teams met the criteria.  I'd say rumors of the press' demise were a tad premature.  Here is the breakdown:

15 press
10 man
2 zone
1 press/man
1 press/zone

At the risk of hijacking the thread, this surprised me.  One, I figured there were more dominate man teams than press.  But two, the dearth of zone teams surprises me quite a bit.  And one of the two really stretches the definition of elite.  It's a B prestige, #17 RPI that has 10 upperclassmen (6 seniors, 4 juniors).

KuJ, not sure how you get 29 teams in the top 20... but

IBA DIII it's 8 M2M, 3 FCP and 1 zone team in the top 20 RPI's with A- prestige or better.

Crum is 8 M2M, 3 FCP, 4 Zone and 1 man / fcp combo of the 16 that qualify.

Allen is 4 M2M, 8 FCP, 2 Zone, and 1 Zone/scp combo.... don't pronounce the rebirth of VD's Majik just because a few dynasty coaches have survived in one world.

The press has been nuetered no matter what some of you want to say or believe.

The press is more challenging than before, but in my opinion it can still be run successfully at a fast pace if you have a few things:

- 11-12 players you aren't afraid to get 10+ minutes per game
- Speed (60+) at the guards
- A backcourt than can rebound
- Good ball handling and passing. I find the more turnovers I commit, the fewer I generate on D

He got 29 teams because he said top 20 AND/OR A- or better prestige.

Posted by smokindavis on 1/11/2011 2:30:00 AM (view original):
He got 29 teams because he said top 20 AND/OR A- or better prestige.

Yup, my bad... missed the OR. I got the top 20 with an A- or better prestige being an "Elite Team"

Tho... I'm not sure the (13-8 #82 rpi team with an A-) , or the (9-12 #96rpi with an A-), or the (13-7 #121rpi also with an A-),,, (Just lookin at Iba) would be considered "Elite" and should be added in.... as far as I'm concerned they could be running a defense they don't even practice and be playing as well.

Well, here's maybe why I am having a problem and none of you are seeing it as an issue.

In Wooden (and I know I missed teams, mostly because in a brief search, I only found 13 sweet sixteen teams from last year):

Teams with A- or higher:

Man: 4
Zone: 3
Press: 13
P/Z: 1
M/Z: 1

Teams in the Sweet Sixteen last season (and I missed three somehwere):

Man: 1
Zone: 0
Press: 12

So, anyone who wants to argue that the press isn't alive and well in Wooden can probably look in the mirror and see a liar.

Wooden D3 is definitely the press happy world. I made a thread about it in Wooden's last NT where all Elite 8 and almost the entire Sweet 16 were press. Tark is where you see parity between man/press/zone and Rupp is pretty balanced between man and press. This is just a quick look at the A+ prestige teams. 

Hey - I said I was taking a loose definition of elite.

I think the Wooden numbers are really interesting.  One of the biggest problems here is sample size.  It's why I fudged what it meant to be elite.

I think the other problem is selection bias by coaches.  Prior to the update 75%(?) of D3 dynasties were press.  Those are also probably the coaches most likely to weather the storm during the new release.  And they are also the ones that are most likely to thrive in its aftermath.  Some of these coaches probably switched defenses and, given what has been in this forum, likely switched to man.

More or less, I think there is a chicken and egg probably here.  Is there a "rebirth" to the press?  Or is it simply that majority of the elite coaches are at schools running the press and they were likely to thrive with either of the three defenses?

I was planning to dump press and could have swore I changed my practice plan for Drew from 25min press to 25min man after game 1. Last night, after seeing my IQ jumped from A- to A on several players in the press, I realized I probably forgot to click the button to finalize the changes.

Anyways, I think at this juncture, even if m2m is slightly superior to fcp, teams with A or A+ prestige would probably stay with fcp just to maintain prestige and get better players. A wrong time to switch could drop your prestige to the B range, or maybe even slightly lower, and the advantage man (potentially) offers does not negate the potential for worse recruits. 

Posted by dahsdebater on 1/10/2011 4:18:00 PM (view original):
I think my strategy against pressing teams has done a 180 since pre-update.  Before the update the general consensus was that when you played press teams you more heavily emphasized your guards or any players with significantly above-average BH/P for their positions, and I followed this conventional wisdom.  Frankly, pre-update I never really got the hang of beating pressing teams.  Post-update with the initial foul explosion it became clear to me that if I wanted to beat pressing teams one easy way to do that was to maximize the number of fouls they would be committing, so I started emphasizing my bigs.  Ever since I have upped the distro to my inside scorers and lowered my 3 pt. settings against press teams.  Even as fouls have been dialed back a bit this has remained successful, and it is certainly the case that on average even good pressing teams are fouling more than they were pre-update.  This strategy is particularly successful against press teams with anything approaching a thin front line.  A couple of decent post scorers and a slasher can really force pressing opponents' 4th and 5th bigs into playing significant minutes due to foul trouble unless their foul trouble settings are quite aggressive.  That further emphasizes the rebounding advantage I probably already had and typically backups might be younger, making my inside scoring strategy increasingly effective while they're in the game.

this is very much true. when i was pressing and saw how bad the fouls were, and how bad fatigue could burn you, i realized that the change to make bigs fg% a lot higher would totally screw me as other coaches moved to use more big men, resulting in the scenario you described. i think it is a great strategy, even though (as isack pointed out) it goes against the conventional wisdom to give it to your ball handlers. its just too powerful of a combination, the press giving up more fouls and the consequence of that going up dramatically.

it doesn't help that the press thrives on powerful guards, which usually means the best pressing teams were behind the curve on bigs, and/or low on depth with bigs. to me, it was an impossible situation - it was a bad one that was going to get a lot worse as people adapted to the change. seble has breathed the life back into the press but honestly i think it will continue to get harder to build press teams who are the most likely to win the championship - even if they are more than 50% to beat the 2nd best team, they can easily not be most likely to win the championship.

I agree with the notion that press is easier to attack now than before the change. Of coursebefore the change it was riduclously powerful -- not even a level playing field -- and thank God they finally fixed it. But I still think it's very, very possible to win and win big playing press, you just have to know what to emphasize and how to set up your team.

I won a couple titles running press after the switch (including the first season after the switch, when fatigue/fouls were worse than they are now). Both of those teams went 35-0. Plenty of other examples at all levels (my conference mates at UVA and Va Tech have won titles with it in the last few seasons, and another at Clemson is consistently elite). I really think WIS has done a nice job taking the press from what for a couple years was an overly powerful weapon to something that's more in line w. the other defenses.

And I think part of the problem is that people had gotten so used to the press being overly powerful, that they now feel that it's totally neutered, when in reality I think that it's pretty well in line. (Not perfect, but pretty well in line.)