I have a team with a mixed basketball IQ. Some higher than others.

We are running primarily an open post offense and I'm really working on getting them to run a pass and screen away set instead of just passing and cutting. We've been working on making the read of whether to curl the screen or come off it looking for an open jumper but some of the players just aren't taking to it yet.

I'm thinking of making it one solid rule for now that you must curl the screen and the screener replaces themselves back where they came from. But I might still let some of my better players make that read, especially the ones that can really shoot the ball. I don't want to lose that open three that some of them are good at creating.

Thoughts? Basically some of the players would be 100% curlers and some of them would be readers still.

I see the same thing with my teams. Some of them end up reading screens and others always do the same thing.

I had a high school team... where most of the kids used all the options and read most of the screens pretty well. Then we had one... maybe two kids... that always did the same thing. One would always pass and basket cut. The other would always straight cut when receving an away screen. The other boys knew that's just how it was and they learned to play with them. The other teams never really figured out that those two guys always did the same stuff.

I would be careful about adding too many rules. Kids start thinking too much. Spacing, ball movement, and player movement is all that's important. If there are too many "ifs" (if this happens do that), than players start thinking and the offense goes down hill.

With that said, I would have no problem giving them a rule... you always have to curl the away screen. Especially at first or even just a rule you use in scrimmages to help them learn how to curl. We have done that before.

We usually start with two options when using an away screen:
- curl (most common action)
- reject the screen (back cut).
- we do not allow straight cuts until they get to an advanced level

That is pretty simple and effective. We find that inevitably defenders start cheating getting above the screen to take away the curl and if the cutter looks for it, they can reject the screen and get a lay up. If anything it keeps the defense honest and guessing.

With that said, we teach players to set up the screen (get even with or a step below the screen), then you read the defense. Example of that here:
https://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/drills/3-screen-away.html

Took away the rules last night and just told everybody they are curling. It worked really well. This is an aau team so I was hoping the players would be able to handle the reading, but we've got some new players that just aren't experienced enough yet. So taking away that read and just telling them "here is what you do when we screen" worked pretty well last night. They played faster and maybe with a little more confidence when we scrimmaged.

There were a couple times when one of our shooters would come straight off the screen for the jumper also, so I think it will kind of work itself out. We also worked a ton on our pass, cut, fill, backcut reads last night and I'm really pleased with how things went.

I'll check out your screening video. I currently use a progression of drills I saw from a coach in Canada (Kirby something?). It starts with playing tag and using a screener and progresses from there. The players have really enjoyed it and you could see a noticeable difference in the effectiveness of our screens after we did that drill for about 10 minutes one day.

It's probably Kirby Schepp. If you happen to know where that video is... let me know. I wouldn't mind taking a look at the screening game.

That's it. Kirby Schepp.

The video is on Youtube, titled "Don't Teach Them Plays, Teach Them How to Play".

It's on the Basketball Manitoba Youtube channel and one of the first videos that comes up when you do a Youtube search for Kirby Schepp.