Princeton play
Princeton: Point Away
- Court
- Half court
- Length
- 10 steps
About this play
The most common Point action: the top player enters the post at the elbow and screens away at the opposite elbow for the weak-side wing. Why the screen is often a fake: the wing reads his defender, and a defender chasing over the screen or pressing up means reject it and back cut to the rim, which is the outcome Hooper University, Stanford's film study, and Thomaidis all show most often; a loose defender means tight curl the screen to the rim. The screener second cuts back to the top as soon as the wing goes, because a quick second cut is what turns the post's catch into a shot or a closeout to attack. When the post hits the second cutter he follows his pass and sets a middle ball screen (Thomaidis); DeForest's version keeps the post high after the screen. Counter shown: the scouted corner defender drops to take the back cut, and on the ball screen the big hedges high while the corner helps again, so the handler rejects the screen, which Thomaidis says should happen a good percentage of the time, and finds the corner shooter lifting off the baseline. If the pass to the top is denied, the post dribbles at the guard for a back cut or a handoff. I pieced Point Away together from Lisa Thomaidis's Canadian National Team playbook, Hooper University, Coach Lee DeForest, and the Stanford Daily's film study of the Cardinal women; if you run Point, read all four.
