Jim O’Brien Zone Offense
Coach O’Brien has been the head coach at a couple of division 1 schools during his coaching career. He spent time at St. Bonaventure, Boston College, and Ohio State. He is currently the head coach at Emerson college which is a division 3 school in Massachusetts. He is well known for his teams ability to score effectively both out of the zone offense and the baseline out of bounds plays. His teams may have lacked the star power of some schools but he was able to develop/teach players proper execution for competition at a very high level. Here are his comments on developing the Jim O’Brien Zone Offense.
Jim O’Brien Zone Offense
I. Analyze the zone defense
A. Recognize who guards the perimeter
1. Gap the zone
* Put offensive players in the gaps of the zone defense
* Great position to drive
2. Screen the zone
* Screen for the pass
* Screen for the drive
3. Ball fake the zone
* Defense will move with the fake
4. Find the grey areas
* The area where the zone is the weakest
5. Do not let 1 defender guard 2 players (spacing is very important)
6. Don’t allow ball to ball slides
7. Try to get back guys out
* Go to short corner
B. Watch the middle man on a zone
1. Where does he slide?
2. Up & over?
3. Block to Block
C. Baseline defenders
1. Put ball lower on baseline to pull out defender
*opens up short corner
2. Don’t allow them to guard corner & short corner with one person
D. Screening
1. Ball screens
*Not bringing another defender
* Gets ball handlers into the gaps
2. Screen to open the High Post
3. Over aggressive defenders – Pin out
4. Slow unaggressive defenders – Pin in
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Click on the pdf link to download the Jim O’Brien Zone Offense:
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