Video Breakdown of the Hawks Screen and Roll Defense
I have talked numerous times on this blog about the Hawks screen roll defense and the options that they use. Well today Soaring Down South takes the plunge into video editing. For the most part I thought they came out well. Consider this something you will see more of and something I hope to make better as time goes on. While this is not as polished as Bret over at Hoopinion, I thought that it came out pretty well for my first attempt. All of these clips are from the Hawks Game 1 victory over the Milwaukee Bucks.
This first clip shows the Hawks stepping out or showing against the Buck’s screen and roll. In this sequence Mike Bibby and Al Horford are defending an Erson Ilyasova and Kurt Thomas pick and roll or in this case a pick and pop. Keep in mind that the Hawks will usually switch on everything but in this case they don’t. That is probably due to not wanting to end up with Mike Bibby guarding Kurt Thomas who would have just backed him down into the post. At times the Hawks don’t switch when they don’t fear the screener as a jump shooter which is exactly the case here.
As the screen is set Horford steps out to prevent Ilyasova from going around the screen and forces the pass to Thomas who in turn takes the jump shot. Also in this case the Hawks rotations were sound as Thomas takes the shot with Josh Smith rotating out to get a hand in his face.
The next sequence looks like the same play as the first. This time however, the players involved for the Bucks is John Salmons and Kurt Thomas. The defenders for Atlanta are Marvin Williams and Al Horford. Now I am not sure that this was a called trap but the result would have been the same if it had been. As in the first clip Horford steps out over the screener to stop Salmons’ progress. Marvin traps Salmons and deflects his pass to Kurt Thomas which results in a steal and an Al Horford slam at the other end.
The last clip shows the staple of the Mike Woodson era Hawks Defense. In this sequence you actually see the Hawks switch on two different screens. The first was a John Salmons’ screen for Brandon Jennings in which Marvin Williams switched out on Jennings with Joe Johnson taking Salmons. Immediately Kurt Thomas comes to set a screen for Salmons and the Hawks switch again. This time with Al Horford switching out to guard Salmons. We have seen this ample times in this series. ZaZa Pachulia was not as successful in this match up as Horford has been. In the clip Horford actually gets beat to the baseline by Salmons but is able to recover enough to make the shot attempt difficult and force a Salmons miss.
If you have watched the Hawks this season you have seen this every game. Josh Smith or Al Horford switched out on a smaller guard. To their credit most times they have done an excellent job as has been the case in the first two games of this series.
