I was thinking about switching to the fastbreak offense but I was wondering how it plays against the FCP and what other coaches experience with the match up is.

I haven't been running the fastbreak long, but I've noticed some turnover totals that were absolutely through the roof against press teams. I think I had 30+ turnovers in my NT loss two seasons ago with Colorado. 

I've built a pretty solid FB/FCP team this season with Shenandoah, and we've beaten our only two top 50 FCP opponents this year. We did turn it over an average of 19 times in those two games, but we made up for it by forcing an average of 25. We also fouled out three of the opponents' starters in each of those games. 

Limited information from a limited sample size, but hopefully it's at least somewhat useful. Turnovers are a problem to watch out for (and try to mitigate in recruiting), but you can also draw a whole ton of fouls with that matchup. 

be prepared to run a 12 man rotation with all speed/stamina guys. If you don't do that, you won't be successful from my experience. 

Posted by bbunch on 3/7/2014 1:38:00 PM (view original):
be prepared to run a 12 man rotation with all speed/stamina guys. If you don't do that, you won't be successful from my experience. 

I don't think this is true if you're just running FB without the FCP. If you're running both, I'd agree

agreed bbunch (on the stamina side). as crazy as it might sounds, for quality players, stamina is actually THE MOST important attribute. the reason i say quality players is that stamina is kind of a unique attribute - having good/great stamina doesn't make a bad player any better, it has limited use for mediocre players, but it can make a good player very good and a great player truly elite. this is true of stamina in general. however, in the fb/fcp, its so important, its even highly useful for your low end players. by most important stat, i mean that if you were going to add say 10 (or even 1) points to this player, if you could pick any attribute - IMO its stamina, at least for the large majority of players.

edit: was typing that a while ago, i meant that for fb/fcp combination only

I took a #1 34-0 FCP team into the NT title game against a FB/FCP team and committed a ridiculous number of fouls, losing.  It's part of a pattern I've noticed where, at D3, FB/FCP teams have an edge against non-FB teams that play FCP, because FB seems to draw more fouls and winning the foul battle in a matchup of FCP teams seems to be key.  It also blends well with a lack of perimeter shooting, since fewer 3's taken means even more fouls drawn.  Again, this is probably only true at D3 where gimmicky teams can win championships, but it's something I've noticed.  

Fastbreak was the offense I wanted to run the most when I started playing HD, and now I wouldn't recommend it to my worst enemy...I just don't see any positives to running it with any team makeup.

Posted by colonels19 on 3/7/2014 11:11:00 PM (view original):
Fastbreak was the offense I wanted to run the most when I started playing HD, and now I wouldn't recommend it to my worst enemy...I just don't see any positives to running it with any team makeup.

that was my take also from playing it at my first school - wouldn't recommend to anyone. now, i feel differently. no new coach should ever play it - and further, no coach not competing up around a championship level should really be playing it. you can for fun - but the reality of any game is before you reach high levels of competition, the best way to go, purely from a maximizing success standpoint, is to emulate top performers. with fb being the least played and most differentiated offense, its by far the worst choice from an imitation standpoint. this is precisely which made me so frustrated at my first school.

however, i think fastbreak is very good offense, and is highly appropriate in a number of situations. i just think you need to be prepared to put in the effort to research it, to unlock its potential. i had a great deal of success with fastbreak/man at south carolina in tark, switching to FB when i was half way through my rebuild (up to a b+ from b-), which set me back a bit, but quickly reached the heights - in 2 consecutive seasons, with a- recruited players being 15-20k behind all my elite ACC rivals in money as well, i was able to recruit well enough to have a crushing last-second loss in the title game one season (after leading all game and being the clear favorite - not a huge favorite - but clear nonetheless), and then winning the title the following season. its very difficult to build a title team on an a- prestige, especially in a highly competitive area where you have guys like duke and unc with their a++ and 15-20K more just on conf bonus money, right in your back yard. i think fastbreak was critical in my success there. those also happened to be the first two seasons i hit full IQ in FB since the switch several seasons earlier.

to me what allowed me to win those years, despite great disadvantages to the elite teams in tark, was the versatility and effectiveness of a well executed fastbreak offense. even my title team, i actually didn't even have the most talented starting lineup in *any* of my final four NT games. however, our stars did more for our team than the stars of any of those 4 teams, and i was confident that despite lacking the most team-wide offensive talent, we certainly had the best offense in the country. fastbreak is unparalleled, in my opinion, in terms of allowing you to get incredible efficiency and productive from your elite offensive players, while also allowing highly efficient and moderate levels of production from non-scoring type players who have strengths such as ath, spd, bh, and/or ft%.

all in all, i don't recommend FB to many (although zone coaches in particular, i think should consider the option), but i think for coaches with a strong grasp on the game who are willing to put in the time doing their research (i switched *every* team i had to FB in an effort to study it hard in various situations), fastbreak can be a very valuable tool. the conventional wisdom is its best in d3 and least effective in d1 - but to me this is not true. press is another stamina-draining set that offers substantial advantages if you have the depth. in d2/d3 i think its better to run press than fb, but fb/man is clearly highly effective, too (we pulled back to back #1 overall seeds at my d2 club with fb/man, right around when we finally maxed out FB following the switch - just got unlucky in the post season). in contrast, press is so hard to manage in d1, the depth requirements are higher, and are compounded by fouling - which is not the case with FB. i think FB/man is a very strong set in d1 and is right up there with motion/man as the optimal championship set for most high end BCS schools.

Right now I'm looking at starting to teach the fast break in a couple practices once my players get their last increase in IQ in my current offense so that I'll be able to run it effectively the rest of the season and compete this year (most guys will have A- iq or better so I wouldn't be expecting them to improve much more during the season anyway). After that I was going to start practicing the fast break for next season so my returning players will have some level of familiarity with the offense starting the season. I'll have 6 open scholarships next season so I figure this is the best time to give it a go.

I'm experimenting with FB/FCP combo at one of my schools and it's very surprising (at least to me).  I have a 1500 pt scorer that has a 17 LP and 20 PER (albeit a B+ FT).  He's been an absolute beast the more distro I throw at him, a .521 career FG%.

I don't think that player could score anywhere near 800 pts in anything but a FB offense.

This is D3, I'm not sure how FB/FCP combo works at higher levels, but when recruiting "right" I'd say it's very, very effective.

Would you mind linking his profile? I have a guard this year who lacks any perimeter or low post but he's been playing pretty well off the bench and I think it's just because he's been trying to get to the basket (I have him at -2) and he picks up fouls (b+ ft). It seems super efficient and I'm thinking the fast break could help me recruit players like that then I don't have to focus on recruiting as many pure scorers. 

Sure.  Amazed he's scored what he has, but the production didn't lie.  Jean Bentley

This guy just solidified me switching to FB next season. I didn't look into your schedule at all but I assume since you're ranked #24 you're playing against good teams so these stats aren't inflated too much if at all?

what is being described here with the low lp/per players is one of the reasons i switched to fb, too. i have mentioned this player a hundred times but if anyone doesn't know the story yet, ill tell it again. after a horrible first experience with FB at my first school ever, i didn't play it for years. after i won most of my titles and was all burnt out, i picked up a mid major to run fb/zone, as they were the two sets i knew so little about. we had some decent success, made some NT tournaments, etc. they weren't the priority but i really enjoyed it. eventually i recruited this player - he had like 60 ath, 99 spd, 70 def, 1 lp, 48 per, 99 bh, and a+ ft shooting. he ended up being TOTALLY dominant, on team where the next best guy was your std quality mid major big (75 ath, 90 reb/def or something like that). he scored like 22ppg and was more efficient than any guard i ever had in my life - which was really saying something (all my titles came from guard-first teams). he could have scored more but usually i had very balanced teams, especially at d1, so it was the highest scorer i ever had. sure, his ft shooting helped a lot - but based on his spd/per, even with that 48 per, he was one of the more efficient 2 point shooters i'd ever had at d1. with that per, i was floored - and with high quality fg%, the lack of 3s were made up for by the a+ ft shooting and large # of FTA. he lead an otherwise mediocre team to an elite 8, where we lost a toss up game by 3 to an easy top 5 team coached by a hall of fame coach. this wasn't a priority team of mine, just for fun, and this team with a lesser guard, based on previous seasons, was just a low end NT team.

anyway, this guy was so surprising to me, i'd had the best of the best guards lead teams to championships, and i felt none were as effective as this guy was. he was arguably the best guard i ever had - which was just insane! FB is definitely the offense that stands out from the rest. lp and per definitely help, but low lp/per guys can be WAY more effective as team leaders than they can in any other set - and more importantly - they can be more effective as mid range scorers, too.

it gives a really interesting dynamic - when you get guards who are strong defensively and guard skills wise, and to a lesser but significant extent, bigs who are strong defense and rebounding guys, those players tend to have teh ratings necessary to contribute meaningfully in FB. basically, you get more and more efficient offense out of your non-offensive players in FB than any other set. this lets you really focus on building a defensively strong team, getting strong rebounding bigs, and a strong guard skills PG. then you want a couple really strong offensive players - as you can push these guys harder than any other system, too. my south carolina team that had a crushing 1 point last second loss in the title team and then a title, in the first 2 seasons i ever had full FB iq in high level d1 play, those teams weren't the most talented - our conf had way less money than the powerhouse ACC, i was thick in ACC territory, and we only were recruiting on a- prestige. but our offense was the best in the country. it was because my top players were super effective for me. i had a sg with like 95 ath, 75 spd, 50 lp, 90 per, and good bh, with like b- ft shooting. plenty of teams had guards like this, actually i felt the 4 teams i played at the end of the NT all had more talented starting lineups. i also had a sf who was about as good as the guard. each put of 20ppg VERY efficiently, and because the rest of the team was great defensively (good ath/spd in guards and ath in big), they were able to chip in everything else i needed. because i needed less raw offensive talent than other teams (by raw talent, i was not a top 5 offensive team - despite having the #1 offense in the country), i was able to put most of my talent in defense, a good passing pg, and good rebounding bigs. while we were not quite the best in those areas, we were very, very strong, and basically competitive with anyone.

to me, the FB played right is the only thing that made it possible for that team to win. they weren't a fluke team, they weren't a big favorite but i did consider them the front runner to win it all. down 15K a season to your high level neighbors, with only an a-, its nearly impossible to be the most talented - and i was not (i really do think the s16 teams on all had more talented starting lineups) - but the unique nature of the FB let me get more mileage out of the talent i had, than anyone else was getting from theirs. i honestly do not think i could have been as competitive in that situation with motion, flex, or triangle - and the only reason i mention my newness with FB there, is to demonstrate there is still more i don't know, and to suggest i didn't  get it 100% right. i guess nobody ever truly does, but i have vastly more experience with motion and triangle, and already my level of play with FB made it the superior system. thats all im saying.

i think people vastly under-estimate the FB offense, really i think there is a good chance that FB/man is the preeminent set in all of d1, just a hair ahead of motion/man, for most high end teams. some teams get the luxury of incredibly strong control over healthy recruiting areas, those teams may prefer motion or even press. but for the average high end BCS team, i really think FB/man deserves to be played *vastly* more than it is played today.

My future pg who I'm hoping will be able to thrive in the fast break:  whatifsports.com/hd/PlayerProfile/Ratings.aspx 

He has High-High potential in ball handling, passing and low post, high in speed, stamina and free throw, and average in athleticism and perimeter. I noticed low post seems to help those slashing two point shooting guards be a little more effective, even if they don't have great perimeter.