Reading the Coverage: The Counter Menu
Skilled offence does not run a screen hoping something happens. It identifies the coverage in the first moments and takes what that coverage gives. Against a drop, the handler pulls up behind the screen or throws a floater over the retreating defender. Against a switch, the correct response is speed, attacking the mismatch immediately before help can be organised, or throwing the ball to the bigger player before the smaller defender can establish position.
Against a blitz, the ball has to leave the handler's hands quickly, usually to the screener in the short space between the trap and the basket, from where he faces a numerical advantage and only has to make one simple read. Against an ice, the offence can re-screen from the other angle to force the defence to change its shape, or feed the pocket pass into the vacated middle. The screener has counters of his own, slipping out of the screen before contact if his defender is cheating early, or setting the screen again if the first one failed. The pick-and-roll is less a play than a decision tree in which the defence chooses first and the offence answers.
