Complementing your man defense with selective trapping; how to counter that special last-minute offensive play.

You are up by three points with two minutes to play. The opposing coach calls a time-out to set up a play that will put the ball into the hands of his best player.

How do you respond to this? Every coach probably has his own answer. At Bolles, we have been doing it with a defensive stunt designed to produce a turn-over that could seal the game for us.

Remember, the opposing coach has just set up a play against the defense you have been playing for the past five minutes. The element of surprise can spell the difference here.

In our base defense, we play both full-court and half-court man defense. Though we might go to a zone at certain times and in certain situations, in the big games and critical time-and-score situations, we will always rely on man defense to carry the day.

For variety, we will complement our man defense with two stunts that will: (1) give our opponents another look to prepare for, (2) create a surprise tactic that may cause a turn-over, and (3) disrupt our opponents' offensive rhythm.

The two stunts we use for this purpose are trapping the entry pass and trapping the dribbler. In both of these stunts, we initially show our regular man defense.

TRAPPING THE ENTRY PASS

To initiate the trap of the entry pass, we adjust our man defense to allow the pass reception on the wing. The defender guarding the point guard must steer him to one side of the floor. Since we are normally in full-court man defense, our point defender will begin his steering early in the back court.

On the entry pass in Diag. 1, the point defender (#1), after steering the dribbler toward the wing, follows the pass to double up on the receiver with the help of #2.

While the entry pass is in the air, the weak-side defender (3) will rotate to the point to intercept any return pass to the point guard.

To facilitate the steal, 3 must begin cheating off his opponent as the offense crosses the mid-court line. This is a prime reason we have 1 begin steering the ball-handler early.

The ball-side low post defender (5) immediately fronts the post to prevent a quick entry pass to him, while the weak-side post defender (4) moves to a halfway position in the lane to protect the area against cutting or flashing offensive players.

Once the wing trap is set, the most obvious pass to look for is a return pass to the point guard, as shown in Diag. 2. This is the pass we most often steal.

If we do not steal it, the original point defender (1) will sprint out of the trap to the weak-side perimeter player. At this point, we return to base-man defense and the stunt is over.

Our opponents' ball-side post player will often step to the corner to help relieve the pressure on the wing trap [ILLUSTRATION FOR DIAGRAM 3 OMITTED]. We actually invite the pass to the corner.

If the pass is made, the original point defender (1) will follow the ball and trap in the corner with the help of ball-side post defender 5, as shown in Diag. 3.

The ball-side wing defender (2) attempts to deny any pass back to the wing, while the other two defenders (4 and 3) rotate to protect the low and high-post areas, looking for a steal or any pass out of the corner.

If the offense succeeds in passing out of the corner trap [ILLUSTRATION FOR DIAGRAM 4 OMITTED], the original post defender (1) will again sprint out of the trap to the weakside perimeter player.

The weak-side post defender (4) may have to hedge on the weak-side perimeter player until 1 can recover from the corner.

If we did not make a steal on the pass out of the corner, we will be back to base-man defense and the stunt is over.

The offense may try to pass out of the initial trap [ILLUSTRATION FOR DIAGRAM 2 OMITTED] by attempting to pass across court to the weak-side perimeter player [ILLUSTRATION FOR DIAGRAM 5 OMITTED]. The weak-side post defender (4) may be able to anticipate the pass and make the steal, as shown.

If we are not able to steal the pass, we will rotate as shown in Diag. 6 - having the weak-side post defender cover the pass out and rotating the other defenders over.

Coaching point: Try not to be overly concerned with having your 4 defender guarding a perimeter player in the rotation. Remember, this is a team man-to-man defense and we will give 4 help if he gets beat by penetration.

If the cross-court pass is completed, the stunt is over and we are back to base-man defense.

TRAPPING THE DRIBBLE

When trapping the dribbler [ILLUSTRATION FOR DIAGRAM 7 OMITTED], we again want our man on the point guard (1) to steer his man to one side of the floor. The trap of the dribbler, unlike the trap of the entry pass, calls for our ball-side wing defender (2) to overplay and deny any entry pass to the man.

If the offense can make an easy entry pass to the wing, we will be unable to get into this stunt.

As the point-guard defender (1) is pressuring the ball and steering it to a sideline, the weak-side wing (3) comes from the blind side to trap just over the mid-court line [ILLUSTRATION FOR DIAGRAM 7 OMITTED].

At the same time, the weak-side low-post defender (4) must anticipate the pass out and rotate up for the steal of any pass to the wing [ILLUSTRATION FOR DIAGRAM 8 OMITTED].

If the pass to the wing is not intercepted [ILLUSTRATION FOR DIAGRAM 9 OMITTED], defender 4 will trap the receiver with the help of 3 sprinting over from his double-team on the dribbler (passer). The other defenders rotate to cover the lane and look for the steal.

On any completed pass out of the second trap, we must recover to our original assignments and the stunt is over.

As you can see, these stunts do not involve a great deal of risk and do not cause much disruption in the basic man-to-man match-ups. They also do not require great team speed.

The keys include early steering by your point defender, big aggressive traps (without fouling), anticipation, and sprinting out of the traps when a pass is made. You could call these stunts during a dead-ball situation, after a made field goal, or coming out of a time-out.

Used sparingly and at crucial times, these stunts will complement your man defense, add an element of surprise, and create turnovers and bad decisions by your opponents.