Alright this one is going to be short and sweet, we are going to look at the Nets pick and roll defense, because as I pointed out earlier today, defending the pick and roll is key to stopping Brandon Jennings and the Bucks.
‘
Before the screen even gets used, Brook Lopez is putting himself in correct position to “hedge” the screen. What I mean by hedging the screen is that Brook is going to show at the ballhandler, allow for the defender to get back and then retreat to his man. This is all about rotation, if you rotate correctly, you can keep the ball out of the paint, and that is your best bet when defending the pick and roll.
In this case though, the ballhandler attacks Brook Lopez. Brook does the correct thing and stays with the ball handler, if he tries to switch, he will just give up an easy lay-up. The problem here is that Bobby Simmons doesn’t switch the screen, he continues to follow the ballhandler instead of getting in front of the screener Roy Hibbert, and prevent his roll to the basket.
Brook forces a tough-lay up to go up, but because Bobby Simmons didn’t get in front of Hibbert, he has inside position and gets the easy rebound and putback.
—
Defending the pick and roll is key because the Bucks have a great PG and a real good big man. The one good thing is that Jennings tends to shoot jumpers from the pick and roll rather attacking the basket, which makes hedging and getting back to your man easier. We will see what happens tonight.
