How do you beat a zone deffense?

[chipper89x]

my team went up against a zone the other day and we got owned. can any one tell me how to score on a zone? thanks

[bigfootprep53]

skip passes

[jrmelax16]

to beat a zone you need to pass a lot and get the defense moving so you can get the open shots. so work it around and dont give the defense a chance to settle down. if you have someone that can shoot a good shot from outside that might help as well.

[CTLaxer]

Double cuts from the same side/location will also work.

[FPDefense]

beat your man, cause a slide and pass to the open man. If they don't slide go to the goal.

[cslaxer#1]

you really shouldnt dodge because a zone is meant to prevent penetration. Use quick passes and crisp cuts to open things up.

[whslax1990]

speed, quick passes, dont give them time to settle.

[stinisonfire]

beat your man, cause a slide and pass to the open man. If they don't slide go to the goal.

A zone defense is set up so that way you don't have to slide.

[WHEELAX2]

same way you beat a man down defense, or score on a fast break.. move the ball faster than the defense can move..

[quickslick444]

skip passes... skip passes... skip passes

[Superman]

sorry. but skip passes arent a good idea. i dont know where you guys play but around here skip passes are easily batted down and usually result in a turnover. wheel hit the nail right on the head. you just have to have quick passes and eventually you will find an open man who will have enough time to shoot.

[WHEELAX2]

sorry. but skip passes arent a good idea. i dont know where you guys play but around here skip passes are easily batted down and usually result in a turnover. wheel hit the nail right on the head. you just have to have quick passes and eventually you will find an open man who will have enough time to shoot.


yeah.. I too had the same internal alarm go off when skip passes were mentioned.. they are quite risky.. unless you are moving the ball very very quickly.. it's not something I would encourage..

[laxpro]

Lots of cutters into the middle of the zone
and lots of outside shots

[laxpro]

sorry for the double post

[CTLaxer]

Skip passes work fine as long as you can handle the ball well enough. Careful though, cause there's nothing a zone D likes more than having a team try skip passes when they have horrible stick skills.

[njlaxpunk10]

Hard cuts through the middle of the zone, and quick effective passes will mess up a zone defence at any level. My school plays a house zone, and constant cutting and quick passing gets their heads spinning, and then they miss a cut or two....you get the idea. Thats the best way to do it through a game.

For a play, a quick give-and-go is a good idea. I bet you're thinking, "But the zone is just going to collapse on the guy who goes to the crease! He is going t get smashed." Key tp the play is to have a big strong shooter camped out high on the crease, and feed the ball to him when the guy who is usually on the crease slides to pick up the recipient on the g-&-g. Thats exactly how it will happen, my team destroys teams with this play. Concidentially, our crease guy in our 2-3-1 happens to be our leading scorer.

Hope that helped.

[crazydrew86]

you have to draw a slide then dump the ball to where the slide came from. on my team whenever we play against a zone we make sure to have a player screening the gaolie so if we have an open shot from the perimeter the goalie will have a harder time saving it.

[aof09lax]

my team went up against a zone the other day and we got owned. can any one tell me how to score on a zone? thanks

The key to beating a zone defense is getting the zone to collapse. There are Three ways that you can do that. One, have a man take his d-man iso and as soon as he gets pretty deep into their zone, dish it off to the outside for a shot. Two, get guys cutting from up top and have men fill in the space that the cutter just left. The d-man has to follow the cutters stick for at least a little while so that he doesnt get a pass inside, so that means there is open space up top and (for at least for a couple seconds) you have a chance to get a close shot. Three, force a d-man to play two-on-one. This will force them to bring a d man out of his regular spot to help out, dissinegrating the shape of the zone.

[eamiddy16]

overload a side and make lots of cuts

[Torque42]

work it arround find a seam then cut, drive at x toward GE if you can, keep going and shoot if not pass out to the open man

[AngryLongStick]

Space. Play wide. Stretch the zone out. I've played a lot of zone in my day and the best way to beat it is simply by playing wide. Slowly just draw the d-men out further and further until they are playing up by the restraining line. From there it is pretty simple.

[nptlaxgoalie121]

I don't know if this was said but set picks off the ball so you can get an open guy cutting.

[nofear45465]

Make sure after every pass the passer cuts. and move the ball fast and often, but dont force anything.

[boxlaxman]

overload a side and make lots of cuts

I'm glad someone finally said this. Overloading a side is the only way to beat it.

The best formation is the 2-2-2 for a zone. 2 crease men create problems for a zone espcially if the play low and away from the ball. You can colapse a zone if you attack from X and you can draw a zone out if you attack from the wings or the top.

A wide 2-2-2 or a "ladder" works well because most zones are predicated on the 3-3 concept.

[TAITERSALAD31]

another good way to beat the zone is the wheel concept..... get the wheel movin and throw back.. this gets the zone moving and eventually the "D" will mess it up, usually leavin the crease wide open for a dish

[Pitibear]

I really like the wheel, overload, and give-and-go concepts as presented. Use these as they work with your play set...

however:

The standard "formula" for beating a zone is:

1. Keep the ball moving, both around the perimeter, and in-and-out to cutters, whenever possible. We have a team rule that nobody is aloud to hold the ball for more than 3 seconds. It is not iron-clad, but all players must thik to get rid of the ball as quickly as possible. when the ball movs the defense has to move, thus making decisions, and possibly mistakes.

2. Isolate-and-overload...I haven't heard my favorite word, "isolate," here, yet...your objective in ball and player movement is to take one little part of the field, and create a 2-on-1 in just that 'isolated' field part. Then get the ball to the open guy, and shoot.

That's the concept, move the ball, all players keep moving (wheel, cutting through, or other), isolate, get the shot...

[jpturner]

Another implementation of the idea to overload an area of the zone is to run extra man plays which typically involve overloading an area with more than 1 player for a shot. If you have 3 plays, run a different play each time down. I also like a 4-2 formation (2 men behind, 4 men spread acrosse the face of the goal 5 yards above the top of the crease), because all of the top players have a shot.

Good luck!

[lVlike]

Speed my friend.

[NBLAX]

The benefit of an offense playing a zone defense is that you can take outside shots. Bounce shots from outside(of course a good player sohuld shoot these)

[scruffy221]

try to spread 'em out. then dodge in and cut 'em up. or pass to the slid from man after penetrating.

[hulllaxplayer]

Indeed.



and that. This also means you have to be able to make that pass. Why is it that often times when players cut, people seem hesitant to make the pass to them?

They dont want to get there pass picked off...

[MeTHLax18]

usually switching the offensive formations would confuse the de.

[GAlax3]

skip passes, overload plays, just work it around till the d messes up, take more outside shots

[boxlaxman]

I also like a 4-2 formation (2 men behind, 4 men spread acrosse the face of the goal 5 yards above the top of the crease), because all of the top players have a shot.

This is a good formation IF...they do not pressure the ball behind. It works on seal picks and high cuts. The wing of the 4 guys in front, steps in and seal picks for the crease guy on his side. The crease guys then pops up and out with the outside hand and catches and finishes high to low.

Hopkins used this for years in the 90's....

[TRELAX]

draw em out and send cutters

[Jmaxlax66]

work the ball quickly,draw the man, get him and his slide to bite and you got an open man....remember in zone you got plenty of time theyr not gonna play you out that far and if they do, burn them and look for your open man

[KLax87]

great advice. we played a zone for my HS team..i play wing D. a lot of passes will guarentee someone blows a slide. good ball movement plus cuts thru the middle = goals. also, you can lure some defenders out, draw them out of the zone then blow by and have an unsettled 6vs5 in your advantage. overload one side..esp around the crease...goodbye zone

[I Am Legend]

find a gap and make a pass to the inside. Cause slides to happen.

[GBSLax25]

Have all your players making cuts. Lots of off ball movement will befuddle a zone defense. Our HS team used with (looking from X up) 1 -3-2 offense that we found pretty effective. Also bang the ball around. Cuts and skip passes and very quick passes will cause a zone defense to move more than they would prefer.

[NorthernViking]

run a 4-2 with 2 attackmen behind. They drive a side and have to be able to beat their man. The 4 up top should be cutting alternately, and once the zone begins to collapse to the ball, you shold have at least one, possibly two options up top from 7 yds. or closer.

[mattlax743]

make alot of cuts. or run a 2-3-1. PM me if you want more details

[FitchLaX24]

beat your man, cause a slide and pass to the open man. If they don't slide go to the goal.

This is the easiest concept to grasp and it is definatly the absolute key to beating a zone D.

[Quinnifer]

At our school we ran a 2-2-2 zone set up like this
X.......X
.....X
.....X
X.......X
.....v
Only one team had more then 11 goals against us and the way they did that was by driving from X and dishing it to the middie cuttin towards the goal from up top. The middie up top would cut when our D had our heads turned.

[Lax attack11]

My team does a lot of picks and picks N rolls. It works really well for us.

[LoyolaMiddie878]

a lot of cuts, a lot of picks, a lot of passing.

[tigernationiga]

At our school we ran a 2-2-2 zone set up like this
X.......X
.....X
.....X
X.......X
.....v
Only one team had more then 11 goals against us and the way they did that was by driving from X and dishing it to the middie cuttin towards the goal from up top. The middie up top would cut when our D had our heads turned.
quinnifer your zone looked more like this with all six guys standing still with their sticks in the air:

X ... X ... X
X ... X ... X
..... v ....

they did a lot more than that to drop 17 on your team. they constantly shifted from a 1-4-1 to a 2-3-1. Never let you guys get comfortable. In fact, you seemed to have more success against them when you finally went man-to-man. But by then it was 8-0, right?

[laxlover8]

Got 2 rather stupid question....
1. what 's the relation b/w sliding and Zone/Men D?
both zone and Men D needs sliding????

2. tigernationiga and quinnifer share different models of zone defence, how do each defender define their respective zones?

(I have no experience in running Zone D)

[eddavis3@earthl]

Just overload a zone. Cuts, picks, and stacks... No Zone D can withstand this kind of pressure. The only reason to play a zone is to defend against the ISO threat of lopsided match-ups, right?