New Detroit Pistons Head Coach J.B. Bickerstaff shared an insightful quote during media day:"Spacing is relative to what you're trying to get out of it."
One possible takeaway from this is that spacing is situational. There should be motivation behind decisions that occupy or create space, and one such motive could be the defensive coverages that a team is facing.
Film Study
Against a conservative, drop PNR defense, where the offense is playing 2v2 with the help defense staying home, it makes sense for surrounding players to stay spread in order to create space for the action:
However, against more aggressive coverages where defenses expend help to disrupt an action, staying spread can instead present challenges.
The clip below from the Minnesota Lynx in Game 1 of the Semi-Finals exemplifies this point.
Facing a hedge, the Lynx are able to get the ball to the short roll. Unfortunately, stagnation in the weakside allows the defense to send help to the action and "zone up" surrounding players, extinguishing the advantage:
Off-ball movement serves as the counter; offensive players should make themselves threats and punish the defense for not matching up 1:1.
A few possessions later, the Lynx faced the same coverage in a similar, empty-side situation. This time, when the ball finds the roll, Collier cuts from the corner, making herself a threat to be defended and disallowing the defense to "zone up". This maintains the advantage and creates on open 3:
A subtle shift in spacing results in a massive payoff!
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