Posted by scaturo on 5/6/2014 9:46:00 AM (view original):
Posted by scaturo on 5/5/2014 9:25:00 AM (view original):
Zone Experiment #1
DEFENSE:
Guard Average: 52/64/61 (ATH/SPD/DEF)
Forward Average: 63/39/62
Center: 42/2/53
REBOUNDING:
Forwards: 11 and 51
Center: 87
BLOCK:
Forwards: 27
Center: 77
My opponents two main scoring options are:
1. A guard that takes about 60% of his shots as threes.
ATH:41
SPD: 67
PER: 69
BH: 75
This guy has an advantage on my guards. I will be playing a +2 defense to try to limit him.
2. A guard/forward that relies on ath/spd to score.
ATH: 67
SPD: 57
LP: 34
PER: 35
BH: 66
Less than 10% of his shots are three pointers and he seems to get fouled alot. I think this is the type of guy that the high block center will help on it. We'll see.
Interesting results.
The guard I was worried about went 4-12 (2-7 for 3FGA).
The guard/ forward actually played the 2,3,4 and 5 during the game. I don't have the time to isolate his shots per position but he went 9-19 (1-1 for 3FA) and took 11 FTs (although 4 were when we were intentionally fouling).
As a team, my opponents shot a little over 42% for 2 point shots and a little under that for 3 point shots.
We had been playing a 3-2 previously. As expected, the 2fg% was lower in the 2-3 and the 3fg% was higher. Although,the computer "adjusted" my defense at 1/2 time from a +2 to a +0. Against the +2 my opponent was 2-7 (pretty much our season average) against the +0 they were 3-5.
After touching base with scaturo, we thought it might be constructive to add the opposing coach’s viewpoint on this game, particularly since I run a lot of zone. I'll give both my thoughts going into the match-up from an offensive standpoint attacking the zone and running the zone against scaturo's offense. I check out the forums all the time but never post, so forgive me if I ramble on trying to get all my points out.
First, his team had run 3-2 at -5 the 2 or 3 games before mine, so I was thinking there was an above average chance this would be what I faced. It ended up that he went 2-3 at +2. Because of my lack of perimeter shooters and offensive options in general, I would probably choose a 2-3 if I were coaching against myself, or at least a 3-2 with a negative 3 or greater. I have only shot about 20% of shots from 3, and that is just to try to keep some balance, as the % is low at 31.6. To combat this, I start the guard/forward (the 2nd threat mentioned) at guard and drive inside mostly to pick up fouls. I have alternated starting him at PF and C and 1st back-up at post positions when starting at guard because of lack of rebounding and quality depth at guard. Since I like to run mostly a 3-2 and only occasionally flip to 2-3, post rebounding is pretty critical. I only have a couple of decent rebounders and one is a freshman, so I have to rotated my G/F into post positions since he has a least mediocre RB with ath and spd that might help to some extent. (I messed up recruiting for a couple of seasons and I don't have good guard or post depth but have 6-7 guys who would be decent SF.)
When looking at a 3-2 at -5, scaturo has two really good defensive players at the 2 and 3, but both are young with B and C IQ's. When I thought I would be facing both in the backcourt 3-2 (-5), I bumped up guard #1 (listed as scoring option 1 by scutaro) to I think +1 where I normally might have him at -1 or 0 depending on the opponent. I also increased his distribution. As you see from the results above, that didn't work out so well (4-12). Scoring option 2 also had increased distribution at -2 since he had good but young defenders, while this option was an A+ IQ senior. Running a triangle offense for this team, I also had two players in the lineup at the 3 and 4 that were more for defensive and rebounding purposes that did not factor into the offense. My center (ath 72) I did give the ball to some since I thought I would be facing a 3-2, and if nothing else wanted his center (the best rebounder on either team) to draw some fouls, but this guy isn't a great offensive option.
When I look at scaturo's offense, he has three players that drew my attention. Two were guards that have come off the bench, sometimes starting and shoot a fair amount of 3's, where no one else shoots from the perimeter with much frequency. I think his team had been shooting 3's about a third of the time or slightly less and I had two primary players where almost all of this came from. I know I doubled the main 3 point shooter, and I think I doubled the other since they weren't on the floor much at the same time. The reason was so that I could go go negative (-1 in this case) with my 3-2 since I was highly concerned about getting beaten on the boards. Again, his center had 14 points of rebounding on my best rebounder. I thought I could survive since without losing too badly on the boards since his other rebounders were not as good, but I did want to play negative. To note this, I didn't want to play a 2-3 since my SF is good defensively (73) but a poor rebounder (33), and I thought their primary offensive threats were guards shooting 3's, where the 3 player perimeter defense can be very effective. Their other threat was their center, who ended up scoring 19 points. Since I regarded him as the third priority to stop, there wasn't any adjustment here, except that I wanted to try to get him in foul trouble. He did end up with 4 fouls with about 12 minutes left in the game, but I don't know if the game plan had any influence on that. Also, I should mention I wanted to play uptempo due to the fact he has a walk-on and redshirt, while only having three upperclassmen. In this case the decision to run uptempo had more to do with depth than thinking I had a better squad. Plus, I thought I could get some of his good younger defenders in foul trouble with enough possessions.
The results: in terms of rebounding, it ended up being very even. Both teams got just over 38% of offensive rebound opportunities, which seems kind of high on both ends. His 3pt guys shot 4-10 and 2-9, so mixed results there, but the overall shooting % due to the large number of 3's ended up .382 (21 of 68 shots were from 3). Fouls played a big factor, especially toward the end with international fouls, where I went 22-29 and scaturo's guys went 10-13.
As for the general conversation on zone, I'll say I'm a lot more comfortable running a 3-2 than 2-3. If I can get 2 good post players, that are decent athletes, can rebound and block shots, I can out-rebound opponents, and I've had a large margin in my favor for blocked shots. When in the 3-2 also, I seem to be able to have a long-term competitive advantage of lower 3pt% from opponents. Even my weaker teams can end up on the D3 leader boards in this category. From my way of thinking, double-teams are easier from the zone than man. In M2M, you are leaving someone open, not in zone (I don't know to what extent the engine recognizes this, but I have had many good results from double-teams). On 2-3, I don't know if I have figured it out well enough to consistently run it. I elect to run it time to time when the majority of the opposing scoring comes from the post (and usually I try to have a very good defensive player is at SF). Averaging in poorer rebounding forward when I have two good post players is usually what stops me from running that. Plus, when I go 3-2 at -2 I can usually not have rebounding problems when I have the right guys in the post, while being more effective against guards than anything 2-3. I have fun with zone since it seems to have more layers of strategy where I can control the game than the other defenses. Now if M2M let you decide who to guard with what player, it might be a different story, but for now I can mix up what player I play where to some extent to combat M2M without hurting my defense.
Anyway, I hope this was useful to someone.