Princeton play
Princeton: Open Phase (Dribble-At from the Top)
- Court
- Half court
- Length
- 9 steps
About this play
The 1-2-2 the offense lands in when the post has stepped out to the top, usually after a teammate curled the drift screen, and the bridge from Carril's offense to modern five-out spacing (Thomaidis's Open Phase, DeForest's Five Out, Hooper University's flow out of Chin). Why it works: with the post on the arc the paint is empty, so the dribble-at rules run with no help inside. The post dribbles at a wing, who back cuts, and the corner lifts off the baseline for the pass; the back cutter stops and posts, and if he is not fed he clears to the same corner. After the pass the post screens across for the weak-side wing. If the wing comes for the handoff instead, he turns the corner, and if that is covered he takes the ball across and dribbles at the other wing. Counter shown: the scouted defense switches the cross screen, so the post seals the smaller defender and dives for the feed from the wing, because a switch on a big screening for a guard is the mismatch the offense is built to find. The Open Phase is also where the modern hybrids (Furman's five-out Princeton, the Kings' and Nuggets' hub-center handoff games) begin. I learned the open phase from Lisa Thomaidis's Canadian National Team playbook, Coach Lee DeForest's Five Out pages, and Hooper University's note on how Chin flows into 5-out; Furman's version on Coach Tony Miller's channel shows where it goes from here.
