Coaching- open or closed?

[Coachpete]

What are we all teaching as far as defensive stance. As a player I grew up with closed but over the past few years I'v been converted to open. For young players it gives them far more opportunity to help. A recent discussion with BG revealed he favours using both. Closed in full denial one pass away but everyone else open. Any thoughts?

[aussieBaller]

A recent discussion with BG revealed he favours using both. Closed in full denial one pass away but everyone else open.

That's what I teach U12

I generally like to teach one pass away in a almost-closed denial,
everyone else open, but sometimes yu need to close a bit on post players to make sure a easy pass isnt lobbed in.

[Hogsbreath]

I find with the one pass away closed - the U 12's tend to lose vision of the ball and cannot react to help defend a dribble penitration quickly enough. If they are in open stance it is just a slide to help instead of a drop step and slide.

Open all the way for me.

[SLICE23]

I agree with Hogsbreath,
Open stance with a hand in the lane allows u12 & 14s to help on defence and not lose sight of their players and the obvious it stops penertration...

great concept for under 12 to get them in the habit of playing help.

as far as game caoching i only coach our aba development squad, they range from 15-20years old, so that is why i use the almost-closed concep with one pass away.

[Wallitron]

I agree with BG's concept. To me, being in the passing lane and being in a position to help are mutually exclusive. If you are in open stance and trying to deny, it's difficult to stop a back door cut on your player without grabbing their shorts.

I think NSW are still teaching open, and I scratch my head when they turn around and ask why we don't play hard in your face defense like the Vics.

Someone mentioned it was better for help on dribble penetration. Do you really want help from the closest defender? Is there any reason why this help shouldn't come from the weak side? I'd rather them have to beat one player off the dribble, and then make a cross court pass in traffic from where the help came. The alternative is quick help but an easier pass to the now open player on the strong side.

[Hoopdog]

1 pass from the ball: full denial with "elbow to chest" to deny backdoor cut, 2 passes from the ball: open stance and stepping off to the split-line to give help and maintain ball/player vision, basic shell drill philosophy.
Yes the weakside defender MUST sag to the split line to provide help.

[SLICE23]

My opinion and it has been very successful for me it comes down to age group and level,
Juniors open stance u12 & u14s then u16s and up 1 pass away closed stance 2 passes away split line.

[Optimal Crime]

What's the difference between the two?

[Coachpete]

What's the difference between the two?

Closed is probably what you're most familiar with. This is where when guarding your man you face them with your arm out to block a pass and you look over your shoulder to where the ball is.
In open stance you basically face the ball at all times. We say "toes to the ball" The idea is to try and maintain a "flat triangle" with you having vision of the player you're guarding and the ball.

[Wallitron]

Yeah, supposedly one other "important" point for open stance is which hand/arm is in the passing lane.

Closed will have the "ball side" arm in the passing lane.
Open will have "your player side" arm in the passing lane.

I've been told the selling point here for open is that if you jump in the passing lane and get a deflection on the pass, the ball would be in front of you resulting in a fast break. With closed, the ball is behind you which slows you down if you force a turnover.

[Coachpete]

Yeah, supposedly one other "important" point for open stance is which hand/arm is in the passing lane.

Closed will have the "ball side" arm in the passing lane.
Open will have "your player side" arm in the passing lane.

I've been told the selling point here for open is that if you jump in the passing lane and get a deflection on the pass, the ball would be in front of you resulting in a fast break. With closed, the ball is behind you which slows you down if you force a turnover.

That's one of the selling points. The clincher for me was after a discussion with a very succesful coach who was an open convert. He put it in terms of......if you grabbed someone who had never played basketball and asked them to stand 3 metres away from someone holding a ball and tell them they had to be ready to react if that person tried to run at them how would most people stand? I bet not too many would turn their back and look over their shoulder. Open stance is just a natural way to stand to help out.

[coach_me]

Having coached both juniors and seniors the best advice is to teach both.
If you are playing a team that penetrates alot, and you require lots of help defense to close down driving lanes - Open stance will work best.
If you play a team that is very structured then closed stance and denial of the next pass in offense could be to your teams best advantage as you will take your opponent out of their comfort zone. This will make a structured team play unstructured ball.

:P

whats more important good help d to stop the penetrator or being able to stop the ball penetrating on the dribble???

:wink:

[mexican]

I strongly agree with Coach X. i think so much time and effort is put into teaching help D that some coaches arn't spending enough time on contaning the ball handler

by the way i teach both, last season i had a raw group of U/14 that played open (although once the ball handler picks up the dribble everyone is in full denial). I now have U/16 that are polished players and we play mostly closed stance

Whats the best way to contain?
Up and In or Playing Arms Length Away?

[mexican]

as usuall it will depend on your teams ability in this case how good we are at lateral movement and the qualtiy of the opposition.

i usually run with Playing At Arms Length Away and watching the players waist so we dont fall for ball fakes, shot fakes ect
The moment a opposition player looks to be a poor ball handler we play up an in to apply ball pressure on that player.

For at least 5mins a game sometimes more everyone on the court plays Up and In to increase to intesity and place added pressure on the guards

I'am interested to hear your thoughts on these two techniques Coach X

I'm for up and in and "jamming" the pivot foot so as the offence cant go forwards without going through the legal defence,, force them sideways.. hard thing with up and in is defending for 3-4 dribbles. Arms Length away is good for staying infront of an opponent however the leg room and arm room gives the offence room to put on a quick first step of a legit fake etc etc.