Transition Offense by Justin Duke

Written by Coach Peterman

I have coached at the NCAA Division 2 (Southwestern Oklahoma State University), NAIA (USAO), and JUCO Levels (Blinn College and Carl Albert State College) as well as high school. I just felt that fellow coaches especially young coaches need to constantly work on their “game”. Just like the basketball players that we coach. We as coaches need to improve ourselves. That is my story and why I do this blog.

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Early Offense

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August 5, 2012

Transition Offense

Our offensive philosophy is very simple and easy for our players to understand. We want to run our transition offense at every opportunity (make or miss) and beat our man up and down the floor every possession. We constantly tell our players that nothing negative ever comes from sprinting up and down the floor, only better opportunities. I love using the term “sprint-break” as it really sets the tone and emphasizes the importance of getting better looks in transition and putting that constant pressure on the defense. We take a lot of pride in our conditioning and believe we will wear teams down over the course of a game. Plus, practicing transition offense is a lot more fun and beneficial to our player’s development that running sets of lines, Sweet 16’s, etc. for conditioning purposes.

One of the major benefits of the “sprint-break” is that it limits our ball-handlers responsibility. Getting the ball in-bounds and up the floor quickly negates a lot of the pressure from the defense, makes us tougher to press against, and also limits our point guards decisions. We also designate an inbounder on all dead ball or made baskets. This helps us avoid confusion and allows our other post player to get up the floor as quickly as possible.

Below are some of the principles of our transition game that we try and enforce in our practices to be successful:

1. Sprint the floor every time! Get your head around and know where the basketball is. All players should be ready to either receive a pass or relieve pressure on our press break if needed.

2. Always pass ahead to the open man. Passing is always quicker than dribbling and we have confidence in our post player’s ability to catch the ball, take a dribble if they are open, or jump-stop.

3. Don’t make the “maybe” pass…. as in maybe it gets there, maybe it doesn’t. We talk about this constantly when working on transition and the importance of putting pressure on the defense without being out of control and turning the ball over.

4. Inbound the ball to a primary ball-handler at the free throw line extended or higher. We prefer to outlet high and use the area between the free throw line and baseline if we can’t get open to relieve pressure. It’s much easier to come to the ball and get open than it is to try and get open laterally.

5. Secondary Break – We must reverse the basketball and take quality shots. The hardest thing for us to teach is when our opponent has defended the initial (and secondary) attack and we need to pull back and run our offensive set. We must be very disciplined not to get out of control and take ill-advised shots. I loved when I heard a coach say the toughest thing to do on offensive is pass up a good shot for a great shot. Great quote!

Attached below are some successful fast break drills and options that we have gathered to help us be successful in running our break.

We have a new contributor in Justin Duke. He is the Scio High School Girls Coach and Havoc AAU Boys head coach. He played at Linn Benton CC for two years and in the IBL for one season. I think that you will like his basketball plays.