Hang up 2man

This is one of the most important webinars that will create a new understanding of 2man game.  Much of this video uses men's lacrosse examples, but the way I teach these concepts to boys and girls is exactly the same, through pick up games that resemble box lacrosse with boys and girls playing together, on small nets, with tennis balls.

There will be much more content to come on this topic!  Please enjoy!

Double Threat

Please watch this Skill Video!  It is a the BIGGEST key to executing 2man game! 

Split Dodge Double Threat

The Split Dodge Double Threat position is a 2man game skill I've been working on and it's incredibly effective at forcing a switcher to get ready to switch while simultaneously keeping your man committed to you in an up pick situation.  The goal in Hang up 2man is to get two players guarding you and this is a great technique to make that happen!

The Seal Pick

One of the most under taught elements of 2man game is the use of the seal pick.  If you watch virtually any game, you would see dozens of opportunities where if the clear through man or the picker sealed their own man, the dodger would have direct path to the goal of what becomes a double pick.

Seal Pick In Box Lacrosse 

In box lacrosse, the seal pick is used constantly with the intent of trying to free up a dodger for an outside shot.  Watch Peterborough Lakers player Johnny Powless from last year's MSL Final use a Seal Pick to free his hands as his own man drops off thinking there will be a switch.  Powless doesn't give a way that he is going to shoot until the last possible second, which buys him more time!  The switch is sealed and Powless scores a beauty!

Here's an example of how a Seal Pick can be used in girl's lacrosse in a pass down pick down situation.  If the defender guarding the picker doesn't recognize she's being sealed, the dodger will be able to use the double pick (picker and her man) to attack the top side.

Goal line picks tight to the crease in men's lacrosse are very difficult for the defense because if the man guarding the picker doesn't step out to aggressively switch or double, the dodger will get a great shot off.  In college lacrosse offensive coordinators will throw goal line picks in their mix regularly and defensive coordinators drill the communication practice this scenario just as regularly.  

Check out the video below and voice over detailing the Goal Line Seal Pick!  It's pretty awesome because you can do it versus two close defensemen right out of your throwback motions on attack.

In women's lacrosse goal line seals happen at the higher levels of play when the defense more regularly plays the ball behind.  Watch the video below of an awesome Seal and Bump technique executed by Loyola Assistant Dana Dobbie.  Dobbie had her man sealed out of position to jump switch or double the ball carrier and meanwhile, when Dobbie noticed the dodger, Marie McCool was going to miss the Seal Pick, she stepped off and executed the Seal and Bump technique.

In box lacrosse in a very sneaky way, players execute what I have named The  Reverse Seal Pick where the picker holds the defender's stick just long enough that they can't switch, allowing the dodger to get to the middle.

Below are a few examples of the Reverse Seal Pick:

Another important element to Seal Picks is simply in "Sealing your own man first" which is a concept that allows a picker to create separation from his man before a pick.  The more separation you have between you and your defender, the worse position the defender is in to communicate or make the next play, like switch or chip etc.

Watch this perfect example of a picker first sealing his own man, then picking for the ball.

If you want to see an incredible Seal Pick, watch this Spin, Rip, and Seal technique by Randy Staats for Lyle Thompson!

Have fun with Seal Picks

Nations Looks

Here, we are discussing a very interesting variation of 2man game called "Nations." First, let's define what "Nations" is."  A Nations look is a two pass pick and roll. Meaning, if you can imagine a pick and roll where the dodger feeds the picker, a two pass pick and roll or Nations look would be where the dodger feeds a third player who feeds the picker.  Nations looks are both effective in creating offense but also a powerful tool for developing skill and IQ in players.

 Nations looks are utilized regularly in basketball as you can see from the video below.  One reason why Nations looks can work better than the standard Pick and Roll (PNR) is that the rest of the off ball defense has a harder time helping to the "Roll man" in a Nations look than in a classic PNR because the ball movement forces attention away from the roll man.   See below as the two low help defenders would have easily been ready to rotate the the PNR, but are basically stuck in the middle between between their man and the nations cut as the ball moved to the third player.

 In the clip below, the PLL Chaos run a beautiful "Up Pick Nations" look where Myles Jones dodges the alley, Jake Froccaro sets the pick and Myles Thompson is the feeder.  There are a few notable nuances here.

• The Chaos run this play using a short to short pick, which is smart because it almost guarantees a switch.
• The picker sets his pick with his butt while facing the net ad cuts with his stick in his inside hand giving him better angle to finish
• the Feeder, Thompson positions himself so he's available but as tight as possible without being checked and executes a "One time" quick stick pass.
• Jones is the dodger and he does a good job of drawing the switch, but is slow to get rid of the ball.  One of the biggest keys to nations looks is the initial dodger getting rid of the ball ASAP giving the picker more time to receive the ball.  In this instance, Jones honestly waited too long and the play worked because Froccaro's back up pick actually tripped the short.
• You can see the backside defenders are looking to help, but were a little late.  If the Chaos want to run this more than once, they will need to have a little bit more backside movement.

Below you can see the use of an Up-pick Nations look in transition offense of girls high school lacrosse.  This is a great look to run if you have three righty's and one lefty on the attack.  This is basically the same thing that the PLL Chaos ran in the clip above.

Big-Little to an Up-Pick Nations

Here Cornell is running a Big-Little invert vs Yale's COMA slide invert defense.  Cornell kicks the ball up and over to a righty alley dodge with an up pick.  In this case, the aggressive switch is similar to what would have happened even with out the pick: the pole had to slide to the backside dodge.  I like to call it "Mirror Nations" when you basically generate a slide out of a 1v1 and a mirror and look to reverse the ball back to the open mirror man.

 Topside Nations: One of the looks I really like is running an up-pick nations look for the topside dodge, but be able to skip it down to the same side feeder.  This against the grain look is an awesome variation that allows players to dodge topside off the up-pick and snap a skip pass down to the righty feeder and throw a nice right to right pass to the nations cut itself.

Re-Pick Nations

In box lacrosse, the re-pick is a deadly technique because it makes the defense play back to back pick and rolls, which is more difficult than playing one pick and roll.  Often times second pick surprises the defense and they don't communicate well.  Here were were working on a Nations look out of our Re-pick look.

 Clear-Through Nations 

We have discussed how you can run Nations looks on up picks, down picks, re-picks and mirrors.  See below how you can run Nations looks off of clear throughs!  Anytime the defense is sliding or showing off a clear through (similar to a mirror situation) you can take advantage of the Nations look.  See below as USC women's lacrosse runs Clear-Through Nations.

Pick up Games

 we play a ton of pick up games in our household and here's a great example of a 3v3 plus a goalie pick up game where the players communicate and execute a Down Pick Nations.  

Teaching Nations Looks: I love this drill for teaching Nations Looks and two man games. 

• Nations are SO much more than just a good play.  Nations looks teach lacrosse!
• It teaches the roll man to roll to the net
• When running Nations looks, sometimes the defense doesn't switch, which leaves the dodger open on a give and go.  This forces the dodger into the very good habit of attacking the middle rather than fading away looking to feed the roll man.
• The dodger will get in the habit of getting the ball out of his stick quickly.
• The feeder in the nations look learns to see who's open before he receives the ball because it's possible to read if there was a switch or not as the pick is occurring and before the pass is made.

 2man Game and Re-picks

Over the past 10 years 2man game has become a dominant force in men's college lacrosse.  Women's college lacrosse is following suit, with more and more teams utilizing 2man games to initiate offense.  Jesse McNulty and the late great Dave Huntley studied 10,000 shots in MLL Lacrosse  from the 2015 and 2016 seasons and found that 2man game created higher scoring efficiencies than isolation in each of the three positions on the field: out top, behind, and on the wings.  

The reason behind these higher efficiencies in 2man over isolation has not been proven, but here's my opinion as to why:

• Processing and communication: there are multiple ways to play a pick defensively and if either player on defense screws up, the result is often an easy goal.  Isolation is easier to diagnose for the defense.
• Off Ball numbers advantages for the offense: in men's lacrosse if a defense has to slide to 2man game it leaves three to guard four which is significantly more difficult for a defense to cover than isolation situations that leaves four to cover five.  In women's lacrosse the concept of a numbers advantage is exactly the same with four covering five as opposed to five covering six.
• It's still a 1v1: in a 2man game situation a 1v1 still occurs every time, but it's actually more challenging for the defense than the isolation situation.  One advantage for the dodger is the advantage of distraction; for example when a defender sneaks a peak to see where a pick is and the dodger can cuts back against the grain.  In other instances, new match ups will materialize, like a short stick or weaker defenders switching on to your best player.  Finally, difficult approaches, poor positioning, or bad on ball "Shades" are caused while the defense is switching, getting under, or over a pick.  All the while, the offense can adjust where they set picks, and execute slips, seals, fakes and hesitations.

One stat I would love to see from a guy like Joe Keegan who does the PLL stats and has studied all pro leagues, would be the efficiencies of Re-picks versus the efficiencies picks.

Prediction: Re-picks and Hang up 2man will become a trend that will have staying power because of it's potency. 

In box lacrosse Re-picking is more than prevalent, they are used all the time!  Similar to double moves and double fakes,  consecutive picks are more effective than just one pick.  In studying 2man game, I've come to change my paradigm on teaching and thinking about 2man game.  Rather than focusing on pick angles and attacking the middle, dodging shoulder to shoulder, I have come to the conclusion that 2man game at its best is more about trying to get two players to guard one player.  In my podcast with box lacrosse legend, and probably the smartest lacrosse mind I know, Darris Kilgour, he kept talking about creating the 2v1.  At the time I didn't really understand what he meant, but I do  now.

I will be creating a video on the concepts of "Hang up 2man" in the near future for my Men's Coaches Training Program (it's already in the Women's CTP), but right now I want to focus on the Re-pick because I think it naturally teaches the kind of paradigm shift I'm talking about.

The first video I want to show you is from the Major Series Lacrosse Finals from this past summer Peterborough Lakers vs The Six Nations Chiefs.  Shawn Evans is one of my favorite players in the world to watch and here he perfectly executes the concept of Hang up 2man in a Re-pick situation. 

This is a video from the HS girls team I coach in which a couple of righty's execute a great Re-pick.  Notice how the dodger is able to pretty easily get two players to guard her opening up the picker.  Every decently coached team will be able to successfully play one pick, but when the second pick is disguised by a fake dodge and a fake roll to the net, the off ball defender is compelled to switch without early communication resulting in the on ball defender staying on the ball.  Two players on the dodger leaves an open pick and roll.

 Let's dive in to the basics on how to teach Re-picks.  This video is from a couple of summers ago where I was teaching a couple lefties how to execute a Re-pick.  You can listen to the audio as I talk them through it.

• Ball carrier must square up in their dodging posture I call Double Threat which backs her defender off and buys time for a pick because of the threatening posture.
• The picker sets a fake pick and immediately rolls to the net, forcing her defender to change direction away from the ball.  
• The dodger carries (ideally with her inside hand) to a new spot about 6 yards from her initial spot where she was waiting for the first pick and assumes her Double Threat posture again buying time for the pick.
• The picker then comes back to set the second pick, which naturally catches the off ball defender off guard (although in this situation, the defender knew we were working on Re-picks), making communication late and putting her a sub optimal trail position.
• From here it's up to the dodger to try and keep her man engaged while drawing the switch which results in two players on the ball.

OK so now you know some of the basics about teaching Re-picks!  Now, let's talk about the best way to LEARN Re-picks.  Of course!  In pick up games!  As you will hear me in this video, sometimes you have to talk them through a Re-Pick for a few times, but it doesn't take long for the players to get it!  What I was simply saying was something along the lines of:

• To the picker: slip to the net and come back and set it
• To the dodger: carry to a new spot and wait for it

3man Side Action: Double Staggered Picks

This is addition by subtraction at its best, when you can have two picks for the ball. If you break through there is a great numbers situation backside!  I love this look!  

Here's another 3man side action with the PLL Chaos that creates a lot of space for Dhane Smith to attack.  The backside spacing wasn't great, which made the degree of difficulty of this play greater than it needed to be.  The Crome sent a slide, which is a 4th player to the dodging side, which should have left a simple read of two guarding three on the backside. 

3man Action Pocket Passing

Here is another example of a 3man action opening up space and allowing the feeder to operate in the pocket in early offense.

Down Pick Refusal, Re-Pick the Rollback

Here is an interesting re-pick action where Byrne splits underneath on the initial pick, but the picker hunts Byrne's rollback setting up a beautiful screen shot!

Big-Little Behind, D goes under

Ryder Gansey does a masterful job of backing his defender off with his Double Threat Carry to set up his split to the right at an instant when his man was exactly stuck on the pick.  The D wanted to get under picks, but got caught up and Garnsey was able to come around and bury the RH shot!

Swing Pick in Early Offense

This clip is a great example of a Swing Pick, catching the defense off guard and openign up and easy opportunity for Currier.  Swing picks are deceptive because it looked like a pick for the top side, then the picker jumped over to pick for the underneath, leaving both the on ball defender and picker's man late and fooled.  Normally, dodging shoulder to shoulder isn't a great idea because it will cause an automatic switch, but a Swing Pick can be an exception to that statement.

Pocket Passing

Watch Dhane Smith operate from the Pocket of an on ball 2man game while he's scanning the other side of the field, finding Josh Byrne on the backdoor cut!  Watch how the Up Pick/Slip engaged two defenders opening up Byrne's opportunity to slide down the backside!

Pairs Offense Backside Action

This is a perfect example of Miles Thompson's off ball IQ.  Just as the lefty pair had gotten a step topside and Thompson read the adjacent slide/show from his righty partner, he back cut his own man, occupying him just enough to give Dhane Smith time to catch and shoot a screen shot for a goal.

Garnsey Invite Over

When a defender wants to keep a match up and is putting pressure on the ball carrier, it is a perfect time to "Invite them over" the pick, putting them in a permanently trailing position.  Garnsey does this perfectly here!