It's time to shoot

Editor’s note: This story is the second in a series that is looking at how the Jay County High School boys basketball team prepares each week in practice. The next story in the series will run in January.
Plays against man-to-man defense.
Sets to use to counteract a zone.
Half-court. Transition.
Out-of-bounds plays and end of quarter looks.
After spending its first practice day of the week working on defense, Tuesdays for the Jay County High School boys basketball team are mostly about offense.
“We do a little bit of offensive break-down fundamentals, and then as we get going we’ll run a lot of our offensive looks, things we think we’ll need to use (in games),” said Patriot coach Craig Teagle. “We’ll also do just ball-movement type drills. A lot of shooting, reading screens, coming off ready to shoot.”
Part of the reason for the focus on offense has to do with location. On Mondays, when the team focuses on defense, it generally practices in the auxiliary gym.
On Tuesdays the Patriots are usually in the main gym, where they play half of their games.
“I love to get as much shooting as we can on the main baskets so we’re ready for Friday and Saturday nights,” Teagle said.
After warming up, Jay County begins working on its fundamentals.
The Patriots want to keep the ball in triple-threat position — having the ball ready to shoot, pass or dribble — at all times. They work stepping toward the pass rather than waiting for it.
And a mantra repeated over and over throughout the evening is “fake a pass to make a pass.”
“He preaches that so much,” said JCHS senior Darren Bogenschutz of Teagle. “That’s one of his biggest things.
“You get the defense out of position and get the guy open you want to pass it to.”
After working through some 3-on-3 and 5-on-5 situations, the Patriots spend the next 20 minutes on shooting drills, including two-line shoot and stagger shoot.
On the first, eight players work in pairs of two all shooting at one basket. They’re executing the options they have when coming off of a screen.
If they’re being chased, they curl around the screen. If a defender cheats up, they flare away. If they come off a screen and aren’t open, they return and the defender gets re-screened. If the defender being screened steps out, the screener slips away.
The defense over-playing the screen calls for a back cut; over-playing calls for the offensive player to “replace himself.”
“It’s basically our six main moves,” said Teagle as his players weaved in and out, passing, curling, slipping, cutting and shooting in front of him. “Every time we come off a screen … we’re reading what we’re going to do.”
In the stagger shoot drill the Patriots review what they’re supposed to do when two of their teammates are setting screens. This time around it’s eight players rotating seven balls while all shooting on the same basket.
Following the drills for screening and shooting, Jay County runs through its offensive sets. It practices everything in its repertoire for both zone and man defenses, with a focus on what Teagle expects to see from the coming opponents.
The Patriots start in the half-court set with the varsity offense working against the junior varsity defense. Then the junior varsity transitions down to the opposite end and vice versa before starting over in the half-court again.
“Hard to guard, hard to guard, hard to guard,” Teagle yells as he players run around screens and make cuts in order to get open. “Be sharp, be sharp, be sharp. Lots of ball movement.
 “Flare, flare, flare. That’ll get you open all night on the back side.”
Teagle said early in the season the team works only in the half court in an effort to work on cuts, reversing the ball and attacking the defense at the correct angles. As the season goes on they add one transition and then a second, but not more than that.
The coach noted that he’s not big on scrimmages, preferring to have his team play in spurts with time in between to stop and teach.
What he was reinforcing to his team Tuesday is that against man-to-man defense, screens are the key to getting open. Against a zone, it’s about setting up in gaps and forcing the defense to make decisions.
“In man our main goal is we need to screen well,” said senior Brock McFarland. “We’ve kind of struggled with that this year. …
“And then the key to breaking the zone is just getting the ball in the middle. Once you get in the middle you can kind of do whatever you want. … When you get in the middle, everyone has to pay attention to you.”
Regardless of what kind of defense they’re playing against, Teagle will often give his varsity players a bit more of a challenge by putting seven defenders on the floor against them. Senior Scott Schwieterman said that is one aspect that he finds especially helpful.
“When there’s extra players, the lane will be more clogged,” he said. “So we have to focus more on shot fakes and being strong with (the ball). So in the games it’s not that much harder.”[[In-content Ad]]