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Acknowledgment - Production of this manuscript has been the most satisfying of my labors for Prentice-Hall, Inc. It has also been the most difficult and challenging of my three basketball books. It has been satisfying, for defense has come to be the symbol of the good fortune we have experienced in basketball here at Oglethorpe University. The task has been challenging because of the need for specifics, details in minute parts which every coach can understand. Along with this desire to present detailed, proven procedures, there has been the urge to offer more revolutionary ideas.

01. Case Defense - A goodly share of the credit for a good defense can be traced to the mental attitude of the team's players. Their defensive attitude should be aggressive. Too many athletes get the idea that defense is passive. Passivity creates negative actions. Aggressiveness is positive. The top defenders are all aggressive minded and aggressive acting athletes. Even while defending a goal, the players should all be inspired to think and act like attackers.

02. Fundamentals - The fundamentals of offensive basketball can be listed by all coaches. High school players can list them. They have been enumerated and well defined for a long period of time. If coaches were asked to list the fundamentals of defense, they would all give different answers. Defensive fundamentals are rather vague and nebulous. Required skills vary from team to team and from coach to coach. Surely it is time we accepted a given list of fundamentals so that they may be defined and taught in a more precise and exact manner.

03. Pressure - Each player must be conditioned to change quickly from offense to defense. This mental trick must be learned before any kind of defense can become operative. Defense is a state of mind. It can be passive, active, weak-kneed, indefinite, or masculine and aggressive. To perform offensive skills properly, an athlete must be relaxed and confident. To execute defensive skills properly, he must be the very antithesis of relaxation. He must be tense, coiled, and aggressive. He must be in a fighting frame of mind. He must be combative.

04. Sinking - Sinking man-for-man defense was made famous by Coach Hank Iba from Oklahoma State. Used properly, it becomes a strenuous, hardworking, multi-purpose defense. Used improperly, as is so often the case, sagging defense practices result in little more than a rest period for four men while one man gives token effort and attention to the ball handler.

05. Standard - Before any zone defense can be studied, we must understand that the word zone is not synonomous with immobility. In years past, zones defenses have amounted to little more than a cluster of men standing with arms outstretched. They had virtually no movement. They were not aggressive when guarding outside shooters. They waited for a shot to be taken so they could rebound and take off with the ball. Most zone defenses were employed so that defense would not be too strenuous. Teams that used this method wanted to save their energy for the fast break and offensive play.

06. Matching Zone - The matching zone defense has evolved as one result of the many offensive formations employed to attack zone defenses. Obviously, it is futile to defend a 1-3-1 offensive formation with a 2-1-2 defensive formation. For each zone defense there is a counteroffensive formation to attack the most vulnerable areas of the defense. Therefore the need for a flexing zone defense that would "match up" a defensive player with each offensive player becomes apparent.

07. Pressure - A number of good zone pressure defenses are currently being used. Zone pressure has become more popular than man-for-man pressure in recent years. Of all pressing defenses we have personally observed during the past two seasons of play, man-for-man was used only twice. There are a number of sound reasons for this swing to zone pressure.

08. Combination Defenses - There is a growing trend toward stunting defense. A combination of zone and man-for-man tactics is one of the oldest types of stunting methods. The major objective is to confuse the offensive team and force them into a game they do not desire to play. "Make them play your game" is one of the oldest truisms. If an offense is allowed to run its plays or patterns just as they have practiced them, they are surely going to win. They should always be pushed out of their practices routines as much as possible.

09. Alternating Defenses - One of the soundest defensive innovations is alternating defenses on signal or cue. The rotation may be from zone to man-to-man or it may be from man-to-man to zone. Alternating defenses will also work using various types of man-for-man defensive play.

10. Concealed Defense - There is nothing more embarrassing to a basketball coach than to spend an entire game attacking a man-for-man defense—then learn the opponents used a zone. Those coaches who have been in the game for any length of time will probably recall just such an affair. The object of concealing the defense is to confuse the opponents so they will attack with the least appropriate offense.

11. Rule Defense - The search for an all-purpose basketball offense has been consistent since the game's inception. Each coach strives to develop a "sure-fire" method that will score under all circumstances. This glittering will-o-the-wisp has probably eluded all efforts to date. Even so, the struggle, the search and the effort have brought offensive basketball to a point far nearer its potential than defensive basketball has reached.

12. Defensive Rebounding - The development of basketball, like that of most sports, has followed the line of least resistance. It is natural to develop the easy part first, then move to the more difficult. Basketball offense has received the major share of attention since the inception of the game. In recent years defense has also come into the limelight. The basketball fan is becoming aware of the contribution made by the defensive player. Sports writers are beginning to give outstanding defense the tribute it deserves.

13. Tactical Defense - Most of us have a tendency to think of tactical situations in terms of offense. The jump ball, out-of-bounds, and free throw line-ups are generally considered to be excellent scoring opportunities. Unfortunately, only one team will have an opportunity to score: the one that gets the ball. One team will be required to take the defensive. Generally each team will have the same number of scoring and defensive chances during the course of a game. It will be necessary to "defense" these situations just as often as we attempt to score from them. Often there is hesitation among players when these plays occur, indicating little practice time has been given to them.

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