Three Adjustments to Make When Your Basketball Offense Isn’t Working

• By Grant Young

Everyone likes a basketball team that scores effortlessly because it's fun to watch. However, in order to become an offensive juggernaut on the basketball court, there are hurdles you must overcome. There are typical problems every team faces when revolving the offense. 

Coaches must focus on their zone basketball offense troubleshooting when things get stale. Since the game has become a shooter’s league, a majority of teams face the same problems. A lack of movement stings the offense as players become stagnant in their catch-and-shoot role. Players now love to shoot the ball, emulating Golden State Warriors legend Steph Curry. Therefore resulting in a lack of penetration. It has now become one of the most undervalued and underutilized strategies, driving to the basket for a dunk or layup was the foundation of basketball. 

Another problem is a lack of offensive rebounding, which allows the offense to get into a rhythm and create second opportunities to score. As well as a lack of passing which forces drives, forced shots, and forced passes, resulting in turnovers and bad possessions. 

Yet, when there is a problem, there is always a solution. And Bob Starkey has solutions ready to share with you. 

Coach Bob Starkey returned to Baton Rouge in April 2022 to serve as the associate head coach on Coach Kim Mulkey’s staff. Starkey’s impact was immediately felt, helping lead the Tigers to their first national championship in 2023. Throughout the championship season, Coach Starkey worked primarily with the post players (such as Chicago Sky rookie superstar Angel Reese) and developed intricate scouting reports that set LSU up for success against any opponent they faced. 

Starkey came to LSU after one year of coaching at Auburn. From 1989-2011, Starkey coached at LSU with tenures with both the men’s and women’s programs, coaching basketball legends like Shaquille O’Neal and Sylvia Fowles. 

In his ‘5 Things To Do When Your Offense Isn`t Working’ course, Coach Starkey discusses tips and tricks to help improve your offense when things become stagnant. He breaks down how to implement drills into practice and make sure your players get their touches.

Transition Attack

Perhaps the most crucial ‘Plan B’ to have when your zone offense isn’t working is a successful transition offense. Regardless of the level you’re coaching at, you will be at the receiving end of turnovers. And good teams can turn these turnovers into easy transition baskets on the other side of the court. 

Coach Starkey suggests that every team should have a transition offense approach against zones, regardless of whether they’re a zone offense-oriented team. If your team has a quick guard who can pass the ball to wings who are streaking down the lane on defense then you will secure multiple easy transition baskets per game. And that can be all it takes to win some games. 

Coach Starkey notes that he has seen many high school basketball teams only focusing on executing their zone offense during practice if that team is about to play an opponent that has a good zone defense. But he recommends taking the opposite strategy, instead focusing on transition offense. This is because transition basketball is going to work against any team, regardless of what defense they prefer to utilize in the half-court.

Offensive Rebounding

Another excellent thing a basketball offense should focus on when their typical system isn’t working is crashing the offensive boards. 

Coach Starkey believes that offensive rebounding can be even more effective against zone defenses than a traditional man-to-man defense because the defensive players aren’t already guarding their players. As a result, a zone defense needs to go and find players to block out when the shot is up, which allows offensive players (especially the guards who are along the perimeter and therefore easily forgotten about) great opportunities to secure an offensive rebound.

However, Coach Starkey also makes it clear that it isn’t enough to rely on your team’s individual rebounding talent to be a great offensive rebounding team. A coach needs to allocate time during practice to work on crashing the offensive boards, and actively track which players are the best at doing so. 

Combining the few easy baskets around the rim a team can score with solid offensive rebounding (which also takes possessions away from the defense) combined with them being able to score a couple of easy buckets in transition per game could spell all the difference in your team not having enough offense to win a game and getting to the number of points you deem necessary to win. 

Plus, because offensive rebounding is a lot about effort, getting your team to commit to the offensive boards is also indicative of playing tough, hard-nosed basketball, which will help your team in other aspects of the game. 

Shot Selection

“I’ve never seen a good offensive team that did not have defined shot selection,” Coach Starkey says.

It is a coach’s responsibility to have each player understand what shots are good are aren’t good for them and to have every team understand which shots are good or poor choices at various points in a game. 

Bad shots can be detrimental to a team’s offensive rhythm. On the other hand, a team that has good, disciplined shot selection is going to be more efficient, which means it will take them fewer possessions to score than a team with a bad shot selection. 

Of course, having a good shot selection doesn’t mean that players should be forbidden from taking three-pointers. But there’s a major difference between taking an open three-pointer at the end of the shot clock as opposed to taking a contested three at the beginning of a shot clock.