Event: Sun at Mercury
32 points from Diana Taurasi, plus some smothering defense, led the Phoenix Mercury to victory against the Eastern Conference leading Connecticut Sun. The Mercury are 3-6, but have won 3 of their last 5 games.
Taurasi was very active in the game, not only scoring, but helping out on the boards and creating opportunities for her teammates.
The rest of the team did a great job on double teams and smothered anyone in the paint, forcing the Sun to shoot from outside. During the first half, the Sun kept it close with three point efficiency, but could not sustain it into the second half.
More, including a link to the gallery, after the jump.
I love defensive games. They ellicit a lot of reaction from the players when fouls are called, and when the defense collapses on a player, anything can happen. Anticipating the double teams and rotations is often as simple as looking for the biggest mismatch or waiting for someone to dribble into the wrong defense.
With a double team, often a player will pick up their dribble inside, ready to make a post move. Quickly, a second defender collapses on before the ballhandler can pivot to see the weak side. The weak side is now cut off, and the rest of the defense will rotate over to the strong side.
This leaves the person farthest away wide open, but the offensive player would have to pass through the double team to effectively reach that player. Everyone else is covered on their side, and they can no longer move.
While all this is happening, I’m looking for a good image of a player turning the ball over, or getting fouled by an overly aggressive defender. The entire sequence of events can be very exciting, from start to finish.
Another type of double team is the weak side help. When a player can penetrate and create offensive opportunities, the defense will sometimes go zone, or have someone patrol the lane as a help defender.
The defender knows they have help in the paint, but must force the ballhandler into the proper area, often the baseline. The baseline acts as a defender, since stepping out of bounds would force a turnover. A larger front line defender controls the paint, and the assigned defender covers the the outside of the ballhandler, effectively trapping them. The rest of the team rotates as needed to making the easy pass to the open man difficult.
The ballhandler now has to quickly try to move out of that situation, which takes time off the shot clock, or they will pick up their dribble if they get too deep into the paint, or look for the open man, perhaps catching the rotating defenders on the wrong person.
With the weak side help, I like trying to get the same images as the standard double team, but often the ballhandler is fighting through the double team, bouncing off large forwards and centers as they try to escape the trap. I also like seeing the disparity in size, as often a small guard is diminutive in size compared to the forwards and centers that trap them.
One last image. When a team is down by a fair amount, often times frustration can set in, and that can lead to interesting images. I remember seeing this image and thinking to myself that you’ve probably had a pretty bad day when you get knocked to the floor, and someones handing you your own sneaker.
If you check out the gallery, you’ll also see the other side of this, as the bench often will get excited as their teammates on the floor build a healthy lead and pull away from their opponents.
The rest of the gallery can be seen at: