Playing Zone

Every year Syracuse does well, a bunch of coaches decide that they are going to play 2-3 zone exclusively for their high school or college program.  In theory, it's a great idea.  How many teams play nothing but zone for a whole game? How many teams work on nothing but playing against a zone all week in practice?  I would say very few and a few teams do because they want to be prepared but their whole practice isn't based on the zone.

Here are some things that I really like about playing zone.

It changes the pace of the game.  The offensive team is forced to slow down and actually look for a decent shot instead of immediately forcing the ball down the defenses throat.  Here in Minnesota, Shakopee HS plays nothing but 2-3 zone and it has forced other teams to slow down and be very deliberate, just the way Shakopee wants to play.  Win for the zone team.

Playing zone also makes the offense stagnant.  With the dribble drive (or offenses similar) becoming more and more popular among coaches, the defense wants to give the offense a change of pace.  The constant movement isn't there anymore.  There are generally two to three guys standing still and that's exactly what the zone is supposed to do.

The last thing a zone does is force certain players to make decisions and shots from areas they generally aren't comfortable at.  This is a huge positive for the defense because not all coaches want their bigs to be the focal part of their offense.

I really like zones and a bunch of different zones but a lot of it depends on personnel.  I think that too many coaches will get out of their zone because the offense scored on the first or second possession.  Just because a team scores doesn't necessarily mean that they have the zone figured out.  Stick with it for a little longer and if they continue to get great shots then it's time to get out of it, but not after one or two possessions.  Imagine if coaches got out of their man to man when scored on for two straight possessions.