Low screen creates high-low opportunity

From Pat Fitterer, Washington State Basketball Coaches Hall of Famer.

When you have a tough point guard who loves to set screens, this is a perfect play to create an in-close scoring chance for one of your post players.

Why use it

Post players don’t enjoy being screened by guards. Many times, these big players try to blow up the screen, which takes the defensive focus off what it needs to do and allows you to take advantage.

Set up

Start in a low double stack with the forwards closer to the baseline on both sides of the lane. The guards are directly in front of them. 1 has the ball at the top.

How to play

2 and 3 move toward the ball, then pop to their respective wings. 4 comes to the left elbow and receives an entry pass from 1 [1]. After making the entry pass, 1 immediately sprints down and screens 5’s defender. As 5’s defender attempts to fight through this screen, 5 curls around the traffic into the middle of the lane. 4 makes a high-low pass to 5 on the curl for an easy score [2]. Many times, a play is shown to one side but remember, you can run this on either side based on the low-doublestack set. This shows the movements when 5 pops high and the high-low pass goes from 5 to 4 [3].

Technique

With not many passes and actions to execute, this is a great play when you need a quick score without having to run through a lot of movements.

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