Every Guard Should Be Studying Sabrina Ionescu - Basketball IQ Film Study

If you're a guard, then Sabrina Ionescu is absolutely a player that you should be watching. Going through her film, it immediately jumped out to me that she reminds me so much of Steph Curry. She had a game in the playoffs a couple weeks ago where she had a career high 36. Absolutely went off. So we're just going to go through the film and break down exactly what makes her successful, what takeaways we can have specifically from not just a skill perspective, but from a basketball IQ perspective as well, so that you're gonna be able to take away these things, add them to your own game. Let me know down below what you think of the new type of video format and and also before we get started, make sure you click the top link in my description down below as soon as this video is done to get my free basketball iq, Masterclass is going to help you to score more points, create more plays for your team, and overall be way more successful as a player on the court. Completely free. You can check that out down below. Let's hop into it. So coming off of this first right here, it's almost like a zoom action coming to this little handoff, the defense is at more of like a over and drop coverage. So what you'll see is her defender right here is trailing her over the top. And this, in this case right here, she's coming off this handoff. So it's almost like a ball screen and here's her screeners defender who's playing below the screen and almost like a drop coverage. But what you're actually going to see right here is that as it continues to go, there's a little flare screen being set by Stewie right here for Courtney Vandersloot to get out here for this flare screen. So it's actually a really nice action that the Liberty get to right here. And because of that, it puts this defender in a really tough spot where she has to leave and essentially gives this shot coming off of the screen right there. Now we see another ball screen situation. So same sort of over and drop coverage right here. And what you'll see really throughout the context of watching any great shooter is that a lot of times in ball screens, this is the coverage that defenses have to play because you can't switch if they're decent with the ball in their hands. You're not going to switch that. You can't go under it because they're just going to pull it. And so the option really is to play over and drop where their defender is going over. And this Defender is essentially stopping the drive. But also they want to be in a position to where they're close enough to the three point line that they could theoretically contest that shot right there. So Sabrina comes off of that screen and what we see right here is the concept that great players are able to create and that's what makes them so valuable to the teams. That's the concept of getting two to guard one. So what we see is that her, her defender who plays over is following her. So now we have one, but then this drop defender is completely engaged on her right. So now we have 1, 2 right there. And that now leaves these three to guard. 1, 2, 3, 4. Meaning these are going to be matched up. Matched up, matched up. Her teammate right here is going to be completely wide open as she continues on right here. So that's the value of getting two to guard one. So she continues downhill. Now, obviously, she's a great player and so she's able to shoot that shot probably in and 1. If we really look at it right there. Yeah, that looks like contact to me. So theoretically, right. If you don't, if you didn't want to take that shot, she would be able to get right to just like a little pivot here as two guarding her. And if you have a team that is a good shooter, you can kick it out right there for a three or an attack. But obviously she's a bucket getter. So she just went and got a bucket. I'd be mad, too. So here we see like step up screen action. So again, defense is in a tough position because they have to go over and drop. But this defender is so far off on the drop that Sabrina is able to get the shot up. One thing I want to point out here that I really love is the footwork work coming off of the screen. Really my opinion when it comes to footwork is that there's no one right answer. Especially off the dribble. You have to have multiple types of footwork that you can get to. And we see her right here, hop off her inside foot, landing on two, getting up into her shot quickly. And so what this allows her to do is just get into the shot as quick as possible. So you see that right step there where she'll hop off of that, land on two. She's already up into her shot. That's in this situation, the fastest way to get the shot off right there. So if you want to be a really good shooter, especially in ball screen situations or off the dribble in general, you've got to be able to shoot off of a hop or a 1, 2, but also being able to hop off of either foot here she really just takes one step right to that hop and then she's quick into that three right there. Here we see more ball screen action here and you already know like if you're a great shooter and the defense goes on like that's game over right here. So at this point what we've seen is the dream have Tried to guard her in a variety of different ways and all of them have resulted in either made threes or in pull ups that should have been and ones right here. This right here is such an underrated skill for guards to have, for players in general to have. But for guards specifically, just the ability to feed the post. Like with the team that I coach, this is something that we're big on in our offense is finding seal opportunities. So when I'm if you're this player right here, recognizing when you have leverage and how to be able to seal and create an opportunity for Sabrina to give that pass right there, you can see she's working to be able to get her position to create a good angle right there and then she's going to give that left arm as a target right here. Also being able to be this player with the ball, be able to handle that on ball pressure and still place the ball in a position where only your teammates going to be able to get it. Such a valuable skill to have to first be able to recognize those opportunities but then be able to get your teammates the ball as well right here. So this is something that's super underrated, super important for guards to be able to do. So back to a ball screen look. So here we have drop coverage again but this got a little bit weird because there's all this action going on where it's almost like a back screen going on right here. And this should be the drop defender right here. But she gets so caught up in this back screen potentially coming that there's a miscommunication. And really how I look at it is that this is just kind of poor defense. You basically are putting her teammate in a position where she's unguarded. Essentially drop coverage is miscommunicated. She gets right downhill. But really I think the important thing to understand is you can look at this and say, oh, it's bad defense. Oh, they messed it up and they did. But the only reason that that is is because even at this far out, her defender can't go under the screen because she's Going to pull it. And she's already proved that she can make those types of shots. So this is why I'll always say that shooting is by far the most important skill to have. And if you can't make shots of this consistently, it has to be at the number one priority of your training, of the things that you're doing to get better. Because this is what it leads to is it puts your defender in a tough spot. And if the help defense messes up at all, then you're going to get easy buckets out of it. Like we see right here, kick to another drive right there, close out to attack. This is another situation that I think is really important for players to have. So I kind of mentioned in my. In that the. The basketball IQ master class that I have, like I said, completely free top link down below, we actually talk about this. This is called dominoes. And this is what we want to create as a player as often as possible. So how this really starts off here is that you'll see, okay, Stewie's defender falls, meaning help defense is going to have to rotate. So you'll see 15 rotate across to be able to stop her. What we just created right there is what we mentioned earlier. Two guarding 1, 2, 1. Now we've got 1, 2, 3, 4, and we've got 5 around the outside right here with Sabrina up top. Okay, so by getting two to guard one, that that leads to advantages for the offense right here. So what we're going to see is now that pass gets kicked out to the corner. That leads to a rotation here. This is where the dominoes start to fall. Okay, because one defender lost, meaning her defender fell, one had to rotate over. There's a domino that fell. That means another defender has to rotate out to take her her player. Now we have another domino falling. Now we see her attack this closeout right here. Now Sabrina's defender has to come and step up and help. That's another domino falling. And that means that another defender's got to rotate out to Sabrina on the catch. And we want to, as much as possible, hunt these situations. As a player, if you want to get better at driving to the basket, you get in the rim more, creating more for your team. If you feel like you're not a great driver, you need to recognize situations to attack momentum of the defense. So this is a closeout, this type of thing that happens, you know, hundreds of times every game. But if we can really work on exploiting that, because a defender closing out to the offense is the most Difficult thing that you can do. It's really, really hard to successfully get there, take away the shot, especially when you have a great shooter and then not get beat on the drive. Sabrina knows this, so she's going to attack this closeout, which leads to another easy bucket at the rim for her. Probably could have been an AND one right there just based on optics and what they've already called. But that's why we want to create domino situations and that's what it leads to. So this is where I mentioned her, like being so similar to Steph Curry. It's just in this action right here. And I think it's other valuable takeaways that you can see. Really good players take a lot of pride in setting screens as well. So we see this initial kind of set starts off with her as this screener right here. Okay. So that allows us and allows the defense to focus on somebody else. Obviously you have two really, really good players right here. And obviously you have, you know, Stewie with the ball. So the defense is going to be focused on her. But also you have a really great shooter right here. So she's starting off as that screener. And essentially we're going right off of that to another handoff here. So all the defensive attention is focused on what's going on with this two man action between Stewie and Cordy Vanderstly. And so because of that, we see that right off of that, Sabrina sprints through and gets to that elevator screen. I think another little nice detail with that is look at the angle that she takes right here. She doesn't just run directly to that. She's not just running straight out there. She almost brings that defender down first and then brings her out just to get that defender a little bit farther down so that it's a longer, more ground for her to cover to follow her out there. Another just kind of interesting, like, little detail you see from a player who's really good at coming off of screens. And so again, she brings her down and then gets right back out. And we see at that point, I mean, it's just too late. And that's the easiest look that she's gonna get the whole game right there. But again, just the value of being a screener and taking pride in that and how you can kind of fool a defense, kind of lull them to sleep. Here's another situation where she just reminds me so much of Stephen because again, we see her starting off as a screener. She's setting a ball screen in this action. You have a Little double screen coming here with her and Stewie. So again, the defense is. The attention is taken away from her. And now they're worried about how do we stop this action here. Okay. And then we just see another re screen. Little screen to screen are actually coming from Stewie. And again, we've talked about it. They have to go over on this because they go under. They're risking her being able to hit a catch and shoot here. And this is the same way that teams would play Steph. And actually this action is very similar to something that that the warriors would run too. So she's chased over and she knows. And at this point here, all that I need to do now is read this drop defendants. She comes over. All that she's got to be focused on is what is this defender doing? If this defender is over here taking away the drive or taking away the shot, then she knows that she's going to be able to hit Stewie on this short roll right here where she's going to be either have an open shot or a lane to attack, or she'll be able to attack downhill, get two to guard one by her drawing in. And now, boom, we get an open corner three. So all that happens based on what Sabrina reads when she catches his pass with this defender right there. So it was just an important thing to recognize here again, more work. Great shooter with the force players to play over right here. So she comes over this screen, sees that this drop defender is not taking away that drive. She's not willing to leave Stewie, and it just leads to an easy drive. This is another way that Steph gets downhill so often is because there's so much attention put on chasing him over screens that he gets these easy downhill drives. Just like you see with her right here. It's the value of being a great shooter and then being smart and recognizing, hey, that's got to read and take what the defense gives me. If that defender had been over a little bit farther coming off of this drop, she had been all the way up to the three point line. She just would have hit Stewie on the roll. And then we get a different look out of the offense right there. But there's a really high IQ basketball play from Sabrina right here. And there's a reason why she went for 36. This game. Really, really hard player to guard. Like I said, I think that Sabrina is a player that every single guard should be watching. Every single guard should be learning from. The way that she plays the game, obviously the skill that she has. But then also understanding how she uses her ability to shoot the basketball to create driving opportunities for her and opportunities for her teammates right there. Hopefully you got some value from this. Like I mentioned earlier, make sure you click the top link down below. To get my free Basketball IQ masterclass over an hour long, we dive into some of the super important details behind having a high basketball iq. It's going to immediately lead to you scoring more points, creating more plays for your team, and overall, just being a way better player and being way more successful on the court. Completely free. Check that out down below. If you want me to break down another player's game, drop that down below as well. I appreciate you for watching. Talk soon. Peace.