How To Make The Defense Pay For Overplaying
In my opinion, the Utah Jazz run the most set plays in the NBA. They have a number of different playcalls that they can turn to in any situation. To me, it is what makes them so much fun to watch. The one problem with running a lot of set plays is that teams are going to be able to scout you and know what’s coming. This is when you rely on your players to improvise and make the defense pay for overplaying a particular set. We saw a perfect example of this last night:
The first part of the play is when Earl Watson enters the basketball to Andrei Kirilenko at the elbow and then cuts off of him towards the wing.
As this happens, the play is designed for Paul Millsap to cut along the baseline and use a double screen set off the ball on the weakside.
However, Ersan Ilyasova seems to know what is coming and he tries to jump Millsap’s route around the screen. If you take a closer look, Ilyasova is actually in a box out position to try and prevent Millsap from using the double screen. Instead of forcing his way through (and maybe picking up an offensive foul), Millsap simply cuts back towards the corner.
Ilyasova is unable to turn around and get to Millsap in time to close out on him and bother the shot, allowing for Millsap to knock it down. Here is the play in real time:
Just a great job here by Millsap. He sees what the defense was doing and simply counters it. Andrei Kirilenko needs some credit here as well. He doesn’t assume that Millsap is coming off of the double screen, and he is ready to quickly make the pass to Millsap when he breaks the play off. That is key considering that Millsap needed to get the ball right away to get an open look. Good job all around.
