I'm having major difficulties against any and all presss defenses. I just lost to a 3-17 team in my conference, who took me to two OTs the first time a played them. As a Motion / Man to Man school, would it be possible to get some advice on how to manage against these defenses that I struggle so much against?

Well your main problem I see is low offensive IQs with junior and sophs starting and all freshmen off the bench.

In D3 the deeper more talented teams tend to run press, so its a little bit the press and a lot that they are better than you (just not that last game). With more IQ practice it should get better.

More depth at guard would help, you only have 4 guards on the roster, and one plays full time SF, so your guards are tired, which doesn't allow you to run uptempo and tire out his pressing team.

Passing beats the press.

Everything else being equal, get as much passing on the floor as you can.

Quote: Originally posted by isack24 on 2/10/2010Passing beats the press.Everything else being equal, get as much passing on the floor as you can.

Of course you would take better passing over worse passing, but what would you give up for passing?

Well that particular team is going to be tough to work with because of the depth.

In general, if I play against a lot fo pressing teams (like Wooden D3), I'll take it over per and bh. I'm looking for speed and pass in my guards if I know I'm likely to face the press.

If I know a lot of teams are 2-3, you take a lot of per. It's always a tradeoff at D3, but I think with the amount of teams pressing at that level, passing is never a bad way to go.

Although I start a SG in D3 Wooden with a 20 or so, so maybe I'm a liar :)

But my two PGs average over 90 pass and my backup SG is 70 or so.

i have seen the use of 100 distro with the best player you have on the team work against me on more than one occasion.

usually a goard or sf

Ball handling and passing skills are fairly weak on your team.

I would either try running uptempo to diminish the opportunities where they can press your team

and

Try not to balance your distribution out too much against a FCP. Set it high to 3-4 players.

Maybe have a third guard play SF, but not sure if you have the dept at PG and SG to do that.

I had tremendous troubles last season vs. press. This season has been a lot better vs. the press.

As soon as the iq's and ball handling start to increase your players will handle press teams better. Your only turning over the rock 14.5 times per game which isnt bad for a semi young team.

I appreciate all the advice. I'll try to take it into consideration. Especially in the off season, when I'll try to recruit some decent ball-handling guards for my school.