Sideline and After Timeout play
ATO Horns: Chicago Pin-Down into Handoff
- Court
- Half court
- Length
- 16 steps
About this play
The after-timeout play for a guard who scores off movement: Chicago action, a pin-down into a dribble handoff, run from Horns. One elbow pops to catch the entry; the other corner's player cuts up to set a pin-down for the shooter in the far corner, the shooter comes off the pin-down as the post turns and dribbles at him into a handoff, and the handoff puts the shooter downhill with the post rolling behind. Why Chicago: two screens arrive one count apart, and a defender who guards the first is late to the second. Hudl's survey of the 2025–26 season found handoff-and-screen actions at every level, from the pros down to high school, and this is the reason. The read is the handoff defender: trailing means attack, going under means the pull-up, and a switch means the roller. The counter, from Coach's Clipboard's "Celtics" sideline play, is for the defense that has seen the handoff and cheats toward it: the post fakes the handoff and drives. Save it for the second or third trip: the defenders have to have seen a real handoff before they cheat to it. Common mistakes: the shooter coming off the pin-down before the post has the ball, the post handing off standing still instead of dribbling at the defender, and the roller leaving before the handoff. Chicago I learned from Kelvin Sampson's Championship Productions clinic and Teach Hoops' write-up, the fake-handoff counter from Coach's Clipboard's Celtics, and the every-level point comes from Hudl's season survey.
