I’ve been playing whatif off/on for about a decade now, but don’t consider myself an elite coach so want some feedback if possible. I coach Valdosta State (ranked 12th) in Heartland (D2) in Rupp World (Go CATS!).

Last night I had a formidable opponent and lost by 1. I read all my play by plays before looking at box score but was amazed how few minutes my 6th man (and leading scorer) Anthony Hodge played.

While running uptempo, he only played 12 minutes. I’ve had a couple games like this with him and can’t figure out how to ensure he gets on the court. I typically don’t start him because he’s a weak defender, but he can fill a stat sheet in a hurry (shoots like 56% from 3 with high volume).

Any veterans have advice? I don’t care about the loss so much, but don’t want this to happen in the tourney when he’s such a vital component of my success at Valdosta.

Thank you for your time!

Which sub method are you using, fatigue or target minutes?

Is he on your depth chart at multiple positions or just one?

If he's the backup at 2 positions, you should check the pbp to get an idea of how much he's playing at each position. If he's the backup at PG and SG, maybe he's sometimes being skipped for the 3rd stringer at SG. I'm not a depth chart expert like many others here, but I believe you can then leave a blank spot at 3rd string SG to make sure he plays more there.

Hopefully that's correct and makes sense haha.

Edit: Also, you can change his fatigue setting to "getting tired" to make sure he stays in the game longer (switching between PG and SG during subs).

I took a quick look..... with M2M, and your opponent playing M2M, starters are capable of playing heavy minutes. In your case, both your starting guards have solid (not elite, but solid) STamina ratings. It's kinda just how it works with M2M sometimes. That's why I consider it IDEAL to run with no more than 10 total players. (Any combination of a redshirted player, signing an ineligible, or taking walkons with the other 2 slots).

If you look at the opposing team, his players played a similar pattern of minutes as far as the bench compared to the starters. You can switch to target minutes if you are wanting to get him more minutes. Or as others have said, maybe switch him to "getting tired" setting on the fatigue settings and see if that helps

Posted by topdogggbm on 3/3/2021 5:00:00 PM (view original):
I took a quick look..... with M2M, and your opponent playing M2M, starters are capable of playing heavy minutes. In your case, both your starting guards have solid (not elite, but solid) STamina ratings. It's kinda just how it works with M2M sometimes. That's why I consider it IDEAL to run with no more than 10 total players. (Any combination of a redshirted player, signing an ineligible, or taking walkons with the other 2 slots).

If you look at the opposing team, his players played a similar pattern of minutes as far as the bench compared to the starters. You can switch to target minutes if you are wanting to get him more minutes. Or as others have said, maybe switch him to "getting tired" setting on the fatigue settings and see if that helps

all good advice but high end m2m teams should consider depth beyond 10 a significant advantage. it is highly valuable to high end teams to have that depth to support their vs-press uptempo, which is probably one of the most underutilized strategies in this game. and probably a big part of why press is so rampant in d2/d3 despite not really being out of balance anymore. if you have the stamina / depth to run uptempo 10 deep, i suppose that's fine too. but that 11th guy definitely helps, and i think most coaches shy away from an uptempo vs-press at only 10 deep (granted, they shy away at 12 deep too, so maybe that means nothing)

this is just such a fantastically good question... i really hope the OP answers the follow ups (re: depth chart). this is one of my favorite subjects but i am going to withhold a long answer until other folks answered and then ill hit on whatever is left.

This is how I would do it. I'm sure there are other ways that would work as well.

If he is only on the depth chart at the pg2 spot or only the sg2 spot then he isn't your 6th man, he's just an individual backup.

If you really want him to be your "6th man" I would slot him at pg2, sg2, and sf2. Now he has sub priority over everyone and his minutes aren't dependent on the starter of a single position. (using fatigue sub method)

Thank you all for the responses! To answer the questions (I hope I didn't miss any - and I'll continue to check this):

1. I currently have my settings to fatigue. I made this switch back in like 2011 (lol) because I think the target minutes were always working out weird for me. With that being said, I know the game has changed a lot so maybe this isn't the case.

2. I only have him currently at one position. My depth chart for this game was (which I switch decently regularly):

PG: Maroney --> Hodge--> Wilson
SG: Hendrix--> Wilson --> Marshburn--> Simpson (I usually only run 3 deep here, but ran 4 because one time I have my center in at SG lol)
SF: Williamson --> Simpson --> Marshburn
PF: Orris --> Harrison --> Cutshaw
C: Levering --> Cutshaw--> Harrison

I will say I usually run 12 deep (even though I've almost always been M2M). This year I took a redshirt while trialing internationally recruiting Lombardi which has been really nice. With my team "seemingly deep" (like I said I'm not elite, but I consider my team pretty decently put together for my prestige), I like to run uptempo against press because my team is decent at ball handling/passing. Unfortunately, my assists/turnover ratio went to total crap this game when usually it's better.

If you notice, Hodge did not play much against Nova Southeastern the first game of the year which is what I'm thinking might have made me lose too :(. I do want to note, both opponents were great and I wasn't "expecting" to win either per se.

I will take any and all advice on what I've said before. Regarding, how to structure depth chart and stuff.

Posted by Jitter_Thug on 3/3/2021 6:15:00 PM (view original):
This is how I would do it. I'm sure there are other ways that would work as well.

If he is only on the depth chart at the pg2 spot or only the sg2 spot then he isn't your 6th man, he's just an individual backup.

If you really want him to be your "6th man" I would slot him at pg2, sg2, and sf2. Now he has sub priority over everyone and his minutes aren't dependent on the starter of a single position. (using fatigue sub method)

This is very helpful - thank you.

I agree with Jitter if you want a true 6th man he needs to be listed at multiple positions. One other fine tuning note. Both of your starting guards have nearly identical stamina's. Therefore, assuming no foul problems they will cycle out of the game to start very likely at the exact same time (and probably cycle back in at the same moment too). Given that, setting him at both 2nd PG and SG might not increase his minutes as much as you hope. To combat this, you can set one of your starters at "fairly fresh" and one at "getting tired". This will change the time they sub-out and ideally you get SG sub out, 6th man in. Then, 4 minutes later SG sub in, PG sub out, 6th man rolls to new spot. There's a whole host of other factors that will determine if you get that exact substitution but it will help overall (just not every time)

You may not want to do this since you are rolling 12 deep so all things considered id set the whole team at "fairly fresh" but if increasing the minutes of your 6th man at the expense of other bench players, this will help.

I love a true 6th man. I had one this year in Stanley Lamon, and once I could ditch promises and shorten my bench, the season really came into focus. He was always getting minutes, because I had him backing up the weakest stamina player for most of the season; but when I switched to postseason mode, I put him in the second slot at all 5 positions in many games. Clearly you can’t do that with most players, but most players CAN swing between at least a couple positions. So the key to getting them minutes then is 1) getting them in that second slot in multiple positions, and then 2) creating a stamina/minute gap between the starters at those positions. If the starters are relatively close, I will consider setting the one with better stamina to getting tired (setting your backup to getting tired generally doesn’t do much; unless his stamina is *really* low, like in the 40s or 50s, that’s not the reason he’s only getting 12 minutes). This works best if that higher stamina guy also is a good, athletic defender, of course, if he’s a weak defender, more time on the floor for HIM isn’t going to be a net positive.

The reason to shorten your bench like this is to limit exposure to your weaker players, especially freshmen in the postseason, so your experienced players are carrying the load for you. Then those back-bench players are only in when everyone is winded, to maximize the time your best players get at 100%.

Another option... (I’m curious to know if anyone else tries this lineup. Let me know.)

PG1-Adams, 2-Brown
SG1-Brown, 2-Cooper
SF1-Cooper, 2- Day

This isn’t exactly a 6th man but it creates a cycle where your starter moves to back up a different position, and will open more minutes for a backup.