My niece's coach is employing a new strategy this year that I have never seen before.

He is subbing kids after essentially every 60 seconds of game time.

I've seen platooning before, but not this extreme.

Has anyone seen or heard of this before?

Honestly, and this is not good 2021 speak, the strategy can probably work in girls basketball. This is because of the lack of skill of almost every player to deal with ball pressure, so by quick subbing you can press, trap and out hustle to create turnovers allowing you to play a style that would normally gas your team.

This coach is basically saying, the best skill his girls have is hustling, and my chances of winning are higher by playing this style.

Now if he's doing this and not employing aggressive traps.... Well then I don't understand the strategy.

ETA, I'm not trying to be a turd, the more I think about it, this could work with HS boys too, they are usually similarly limited in their ability to deal with ball pressure.

The issue is that basketball is such a rhythm and momentum game, and running in short shifts keeps your players from ever really getting in rhythm.

I've seen and talked to coaches (boys and girls) that run platoon systems like this to keep constant pressure. No clue if 1 minute is common or not. Could also be that the coach is experimenting during the non-district schedule.

1 minute seems too short, but I've wondered about something similar to this at various levels of basketball.

The main issue I could see is if there's not enough talent, you might be feeding the second team into a meat grinder rather than doing a smart thing to wear down the opponent. Seems best for teams that don't have standout players, but a lot of people who play at more or less the same level.

Honestly, at several levels of the girls game, a one minute rotation may be closer to 5 full minutes, especially in crunch time. I would probably try to go for two minutes personally, but I was a terrible basketball coach.

Having the time set, and it being short maintains engagement and never gives the opportunity of "I was tired". The skill level of the girls probably isn't very varied so while different skill sets may exist in the rotations, there probably isn't a huge drop off in ability.

Grinnell College is famous for running a constant full court high intensity press that gives up tons of layups, but also forces a ton of turnovers. They sub all five players every minute. They also encourage shooting a three as fast as possible on every possession.

They had a player score 138 points in a game a few years ago. It's basically complete chaos. I could see how it might be fun for a high school program that isn't very concerned about winning.

There was a 1A men's HS team in Texas years ago that platooned five players in and out at the midway point of every quarter. Of the 12 players on the team, nine of them could dunk the ball. There was almost no difference in the "first team" and "second team". They lost in the Regional finals in overtime.

I'm in my 26th year of coaching girls HS bball in Florida. The head coach is in his 27th. He has 575 wins, and was inducted into the Florida HS Athletic Coaches Hall of Fame today. We have a state championship, and five finals appearances. Over 100 girls that have gone on to play on scholarship at the D1 level.

I would never, ever consider the 1 minute platoon strategy. EVER. We run a lot of half court and full court traps, and what we call "blitz", where any girl can go trap the ball if their teammate has them along the sideline. I don't see how any continuity happens with the platoon method. Things have to go exactly to plan for you to get lay ups, because if the other team can score against you, you're gonna have to use half court sets, and constantly changing out five girls doesn't give them a chance for continuity, one minute is effectively one, maybe two possessions.

racerfink said:

---

I'm in my 26th year of coaching girls HS bball in Florida. The head coach is in his 27th. He has 575 wins, and was inducted into the Florida HS Athletic Coaches Hall of Fame today. We have a state championship, and five finals appearances. Over 100 girls that have gone on to play on scholarship at the D1 level.

I would never, ever consider the 1 minute platoon strategy. EVER. We run a lot of half court and full court traps, and what we call "blitz", where any girl can go trap the ball if their teammate has them along the sideline. I don't see how any continuity happens with the platoon method. Things have to go exactly to plan for you to get lay ups, because if the other team can score against you, you're gonna have to use half court sets, and constantly changing out five girls doesn't give them a chance for continuity, one minute is effectively one, maybe two possessions.

---

This.

I coached varsity basketball for years in Texas at the 6A and 5A levels.

I would never do this at any level and it sounds to me like the level of play must be so bad that it really doesn't matter who is in the game…. Either that or the coach is a moron.

Don't think this strategy is being considered by schools that have D1 talent

There's a reason this strategy is not used.

Maybe if all your players are on mid talent level and very athletic but not skilled.

Seven Costanza said:

---

Grinnell College is famous for running a constant full court high intensity press that gives up tons of layups, but also forces a ton of turnovers. They sub all five players every minute. They also encourage shooting a three as fast as possible on every possession.

They had a player score 138 points in a game a few years ago. It's basically complete chaos. I could see how it might be fun for a high school program that isn't very concerned about winning.

---

This is your answer.

That's the strategy being utilized. Probably requires the 15 player roster to have any hope of succeeding. Otherwise you're kicking someone's ass by overworking them.

I'd just inbound to my best ball-handler, break pressure with the dribble, and exploit their lack of organization so fast they'd have to drop into half court or give up a layup.

And then trap them after every make and see how their 5 fresh bodies match up against an organized press.

I think you dramatically underestimate how mistake prone players get at lower levels of basketball. It's not something that's going to work in the NBA, but I could see it working even in D-1 college basketball, let alone women's high school ball. Watch a D-1 game where one team plays press defense almost every possession and see how often they turn the ball over. College basketball is infuriating to watch a lot of the time, because the ball doesn't move and players make bad decisions.

The strategy is to either give up a layup or get the team to turn the ball over. On offense they run a fast break whether it's there or not, and try to shoot within 12 seconds. The ball is rotated and funneled to the best shooter on the floor, which is how the kid scored 138 in a game.

It's not a system you run if you can out talent the other team, it's a system you run when you are trying to confuse/tire out a more talented team.