The NCAA Tournament is back! Kicking off with the First Four with some pretty good games to start it off and some decent X’s & O’s. We are going to be looking at some of the best sets throughout the tournament in these breakdowns and if you want to see any specific plays or actions that you would like covered you can reply to any of these, or reach out on Twitter!

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Strong Dribble - SEMO

A good set that most NBA teams run and Nick Nurse really brought to light when he took over as offensive coordinator for the Raptors, this play starts off with a normal stagger screen for a guard to come off.

Then the ball is flipped back to the point guard who comes right off a ballscreen attacking downhill.

Strong Dribble Back - SEMO

A great counter to the first play is to start off with the same action as before but use it as a decoy after flipping it back to the point guard.

Although it is not a great screen that is set here, the throwback would have been open if setup and executed better since we can see the big defender really paying attention to the drive baseline.

Here is a cleaner example of what this play looks like executed better:

Horns Duck - SEMO

A common look to get a deep seal, the ball is entered to the elbow out of Horns and uses the opposite corner to duck in on the weakside and in the middle of the floor where there is little or no help.

This is setup by using a flare screen for the passer to take any potential help low away from the opposite big’s defender.

Chicago Backdoor - Texas A&M Corpus Christi

With Steve Lutz spending time as an assistant with Purdue it makes sense he uses their base offensive system and sets in his playbook. If you want to know more about this “Chicago” set, I did a deep dive breakdown on it here:

Half Court Hoops - Coach's Cut

Purdue Boilermakers Chicago Set

Matt Painter’s playbook is deep, creative, and full of counters and specials to surprise defenses for easy scores. Over the next few breakdowns, we will look at the base sets they run most often with the counters in the next post. Half Court Hoops - Coach's Cut is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becomin…

a year ago · 7 likes · 4 comments · Half Court Hoops

Half Court Hoops - Coach's Cut

Purdue Boilermakers Chicago Counters

In the first breakdown, we looked at the basic “Chicago” action that Purdue runs most often as one of their favorite sets. They have 25+ counters out of this one action that Matt Painter has run and added over the last 5 years in my study of his playbook…

a year ago · 2 likes · Half Court Hoops

The play starts off with a screen on the wing to free up the entry pass and then an exchange low to continue opposite.

Normally this set would go into the point guard screening in the middle of the floor for the big to receive a pass in the middle of the floor.

When this is overplayed, either as a call or read, the big backdoor cuts for the easy layup.

Purdue will also run this action for Edey:

Horns Quick STS - Texas A&M Corpus Christi

A great set out of Horns with multiple actions out of it starts off with a Ram screen to free up the pass to the elbow.

Then the guard screens over the top toward the wing with intentional split cut to reject and then open up.

After the cut into the paint it flows into a cross screen/down screen for a post up.

Ram Spain - Pitt

Pitt & Miss State did not have the best sets, but found a solid one with Pitt going into Ram Spain action starting off with a downscreen for the ballscreener first.

A great read here where the big who set the ballscreen turns and sees he can free up the shooter by screening down.

STS Lob - Mississippi State

Mississipi State ran a good lob set by faking screen the screener action, starting off with a quick backscreen low.

Then instead of coming off looking for a shot, a great sell here to stop and screen in the middle of the cut freeing up the lob.

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I hope you enjoy this breakdown, and as always thank you again for all of your support and for sharing my work.

Outwork Yesterday

Coach Pyper

Half Court Hoops - Coach's Cut

First Four Day 1 Sets