How to Run a Basketball Defense: Full Court Press

Video Transcript

"Hey, it's Coach Rudy. I've won championships as a coach and a player. Let's talk about the full court press. My favorite is what I call the diamond and one. All right, and what that means is I've got a player at the other free throw line, two at the half court line, one at the top of the key, and one underneath the hoop. That's the diamond. And that's the one. Now, how it works is as follows. However they get the ball in, this guy just kind of shades to either side, if the ball comes into this guy--the ball comes in on this side, this guy drifts over, forms a funnel, and drives the ball to this guy. He comes up, and now they form a trap. This guy comes here, cuts that off, this guy comes this side, looking for this pass. Ball goes in the middle, this guy traps, drives him up to this way. There's a trap here, all right. Somehow the ball gets here. We hustle, hustle, hustle, this guy comes here. These guys are all flying back down the court. We either take a charge or we get a steal and go that way. Let's talk about the reasons that we do a full court press. Number one, turnover. There's a lot of pressure here in order to get the ball up the court. Number two, to get a quick shot. Somebody once and while breaks free and they get the ball up faster than they need to. The third reason is the steal. It's not designed to take the steal, but we'll take it if we can get one. It's good for younger kids, good fundamentally sound for younger kids. It's good for high school kids, and it's also good for colleges. You'll see a lot of people run this particular press. It's called a diamond one, a lot of pressure, funnel the ball, trap the ball, and all the trapping positions, everyone flies back. We take a charge, get the quick shot, get a rebound, or we get the steal, want people flying back, and we're going the other way to get a layup or a dunk on our side. Diamond one."