NBA Defense: Philosophy

A breakdown of modern NBA defense.

Oct 10, 2023

After diving into NBA 5-Out offense over the last few years, I wanted to study modern NBA defense and how they attempt to slow down offenses in this era of pace, space, and shooting. We will touch on overall defensive philosophies, the 3 main “moments” of defense in the NBA, and the specific coverages, rotations, and execution.

Latest Breakdown:

Overall Philosophy

Each team has its own specific philosophy based on personnel and coaching preferences based on past experiences and analytics. While there are general defensive principles that pretty much all NBA teams adhere to such as protecting the paint and sprinting back in transition - every team will approach their defensive system differently. In every defensive system, teams have to rely on conceding certain shots since it’s virtually impossible in 2023 to stop everything an offense or the shots some of these players can make. Throughout NBA history defenders can be in the perfect position, stance, and timing and it just does not matter when it comes to the highest level of individual scoring, but that is even more apparent in 2023 with 7-footers shooting step-back 3s, and the incredible 1 on 1 shotmaking from players like Luka, Harden & KD.

The interesting wrinkle for teams in 2023 is the defensive philosophy when it comes to defending the 3-point line and the shots they are looking to concede or encourage their opponents to shoot. A perfect example of this is looking at top-10 defensive teams and their defensive 3-point attempt rate, or the % of shots their opponent took from 3. Here is the top-10 teams (regular season from Cleaning the Glass) and their rank in 3PA rate and the % of shots given up from 3:

Cleveland Cavaliers - 6th 33.7%

Memphis Grizzlies - 24th 37.5%

Boston Celtics - 15th 34.5%

Milwaukee Bucks - 5th 33.7%

Chicago Bulls - 28th 39.3%

New Orleans Pelicans - 25th 37.8%

Miami Heat - 29th 39.7%

Minnesota Timberwolves - 10th 34.2%

Phoenix Suns - 7th 33.8%

Philadelphia 76ers - 19th 35.6%

As we can see, the numbers are all over the place with certain teams taking away 3-point attempts and other teams stopping the ball while protecting the paint, and allowing teams to take 3-point attempts. We will dive into more film and ideas behind this in the future breakdowns but essentially I personally believe it comes down to the level of comfortability the coaching staff has with their rim protection & length. For example, teams like the Cavs & Bucks have 3-4 of the best rim protectors in the paint so it makes sense to be more aggressive when covering the 3 point line, where the Heat switch so often and have Bam away from the paint that helping and even overhelping at times to negate this disadvantage of rim protection.

Below we can see the Cavs staying more attached to the perimeter spacers and less focus on helping on the drives, but stay in more space when defending the 2 on 1’s on the perimeter.

Miami however is more willing and aggressive helping in the lane on drives like from Jokic here where almost all 5 Miami players collapse in the paint.

This could be something that Frank Vogel and the Suns use more this season with Nurkic as the primary rim defender when the offense drives to utilize their off-ball length with players like KD.

3 Moments

Point Of Attack

Point of attack defense is most often referred to as perimeter defense focusing on guarding the ball and the ability to contain the ball. I personally view point of attack defense starting in transition and as soon as the other team gains possession of the ball triggering the start of defense. While this can differ in high school with teams pressing on misses and makes the pickup points of NBA teams - especially in the regular season - is normally around the 3 point line and pushed up to half court at times.

Teams in the NBA have made it more of a habit to pick up higher in the postseason to slow the other team down and burn valuable time off the shot clock. Below is a chart showing points per possession vs time remaining on the shot clock from Nylon Calculus, clearly as time goes down on the shot clock so does PPP in the NBA.

(Source)

Teams like the Heat & Trailblazers make it a habit to go from a 2-2-1 press and fall back into a 2-3 zone.

Running this is not anything new or groundbreaking in the basketball coaching world but for the NBA this can be extremely valuable as shown by the Heat during their NBA Finals run this past season.

Not only does this make the offense take more time overall in the possession, but solving a zone (matchup-based) can be difficult, and in the NBA can be a good curveball to have. I did a breakdown from the past season on the Trailblazers zone and how the Heat zone works from a few years ago.

Side note: after listening to Joe Mazzula on JJ Redick’s podcast, the Celtics will definitely run some sort of zone/matchup defense this season.

Coverages

Blitz, Switch, ICE, Drop, Hedge, ICE to Switch, Blitz to Switch….NBA coverages can get complicated very quickly and can be scout/situational based instead of a staple of a defense. Deciding on the main coverage when defending ball screens, hand offs, pin downs or post-ups ups are crucial to a defensive scheme and the core of what the regular season defense will look like.

Here Bam is in typical Drop coverage against the ballscreen in transition in the regular season vs the Hornets.

In the postseason, most of the adjustments and coverage changes take place, with defenses having to give different looks to the best players on earth who have seen these coverages for 10+ years.

Here Bam blitzes Murray off the handoff to get it out of his hands and force the ball away from the basket.

Rotations

Rotations are the movements behind the coverage or after the coverage is executed or breaks down and this is where the philosophy becomes more clear to see. Where teams help from, rotate to, and how they rotate all play into a defensive philosophy and plan.

This can also change based on their opponent through scouting and personnel decisions as well - especially in the playoffs.

In the coming breakdowns, we will address the following in more detail and look at some early-season film to see if anything new stands out.

Transition Defense

Ballscreen Defense

Help Defense

Closeouts

Switching Concepts

Putting It All Together

Enjoy!

Coach Pyper

Half Court Hoops - Coach's Cut

Discussion about this post