Just a random thought about our defensive response to screens.
Defensively, when an opposing big sets a pick up top, our big hedges out on the ballhandler until our guard can recover. This forces the opposing ballhandler well out past any reasonable shooting range and give our defending guard plenty of time to recover.
It also leaves the screen setter open who has to be covered by the weak side defender, which subsequently leaves his man unguarded and has to get picked up by someone else. Occasionally the whole defense breaks down which is why we periodically end up with a wide open big getting an alley oop or wide open layup / dunk. Defenders off the ball and away from the action have to be watching for a pass to the rolling big.
Most of the time, the ballhandler can't even see his big as he rolls off the pick so he cant hit him on the roll. This is a very popular and mainstream (trendy) defense. it works most of the time and statistically very effective. The occasional uncontested layup is considered something that just happens a couple times a game.
I am personally just so-so on this. I'm just a huge believer in the psychological aspect of a game and how that affects performance. Giving up uncontested layups after playing tough D for 20 seconds is demoralizing for you and a psychological lift to your opponent. It's not nearly as demoralizing if you end up with a mismatch that results in a score, but the uncontested part is. I would prefer to start with a soft hedge and see if our guard can fight through the screen and force the opposing guard to hit a 3 on the move. Some teams will be able to defeat that and then you break out the hard hedge.
Again, I'm not really criticizing this defensive strategy from Terry -- it's totally mainstream -- just noting that when at first i thought we had defenders getting totally lost in the paint, they were basically just missing the few times when the guard was able to successfully hit the big rolling off his pick. No matter what you do, you will occasionally get beat by the pick. They work and that's why they're used.
