Dana Altman's High Post Offense

Dana Altman's Team at Kansas State, Creighton and now Oregon have always played at a fast pace.  This means Altman's team's have a variety of presses in order to force tempo, run some form of secondary break because they expect to run on every possession, and finally run a half court offense that is easy to execute and spreads the floor for the wings and guards he recruits to be able to get to the paint and make play.

Altman's high post spread is a version of Jonny Orr's High post offense.  It has three phases:

The entry phase is the portion of the offense where it is entered after a fast break of another set play by simply filling spots on the perimeter, back doors and pressure releases are executed for the first entry pass to the wing, and false motion much like a Princeton set can be run to mis-direct the defense.

The cutters phase is the part of the offense where the speed cut and elbow cuts are made.  The speed cut is a quick movement designed to get a layup on a defense that isn't playing the offense honestly (jump to the ball etc.) while the elbow cut is a movement that allows talented wings like EJ Singler to catch the ball at the elbow in an isolation to score.  These movements also shift the defense in order to set up the next phase.

The two man phase is the part of the offense where the point guard and the center run a drag pick and roll or a pinch post action at the elbow.  This action allows for the post player to get a switch a mismatch in the post, it forces the defense to rotate to help on the ball screen which will allow the pg to find other perimeter player filling in behind the pick and roll, and can also force defenses to guard a hand off at the elbow.

 

 

 The beauty of this offense is the flexibility and ease of execution.  The offense has off ball movement, a ball reversal, and a terminating ball screen all built into the offense.  This allows Altman to easily get the basics of the offense in, then players don't have to think about high concept reads as much as running the basic motion of the offense and looking to attack when they have an opening.