Film Session: Duke center Jahlil Okafor
By Fran Fraschilla | ESPN Insider
Duke center Jahlil Okafor has 140 post-up points this season, good for one of the highest rates ever.
Players such as Duke’s Jahlil Okafor don’t come around college basketball very often. In fact, unlike in the days of Patrick Ewing, Hakeem Olajuwon and even Tim Duncan, they don’t stay very long, either.
So enjoy watching this 6-foot-11 freshman now before he leaves for the NBA draft in June. He will be the No. 1 pick.
I’ve watched Okafor since after his freshman year at Chicago’s Whitney Young High School. I worked with him at the LeBron James Skills Academy and saw him dominate international competition at the FIBA Under-19 World Championship in Prague before his senior year.
What makes Okafor so special is that he knows who he is as a player. Blessed with a unique combination of great agility, soft hands, keen timing and fundamentally sound footwork, he operates almost exclusively in the low post. This is his playground, even though he could operate on the perimeter effectively if he chose.
I’ve tried to watch every offensive possession of Okafor’s freshman season, and I have come away impressed as a coach. He is shooting 68 percent from inside the arc, with most of those shots coming at the rim. I can’t remember, in the past decade or more, a freshman who has more back-to-the-basket polish than he does. In fact, according to Synergy, since 2006-07 only six major-conference players have scored at least 250 points on post-ups. Okafor is poised to join this group.
Player School Year G Points PPG
Jahlil Okafor Duke 2014-15 15 140 9.3
Greg Oden Ohio State 2006-07 32 298 9.3
Blake Griffin Oklahoma 2008-09 33 269 8.2
Festus Ezeli Vanderbilt 2010-11 34 272 8.0
JaJuan Johnson Purdue 2010-11 34 266 7.8
Jared Sullinger Ohio State 2011-12 37 286 7.7
Jared Sullinger Ohio State 2010-11 37 272 7.4
Let’s look closer at Okafor’s game and break down some of the things he does exceptionally well as a post player.
1. Catch and Look Middle
In the low post, Okafor almost always catches and looks middle. By doing this, he gets to read 95 percent of the floor.
When he looks over his inside shoulder, Okafor can locate where his own defender is. If the defender is on the high side, Okafor can spin baseline easily because of his uncanny footwork. And if the defender plays behind, Okafor will work the ball off the dribble to the middle of the lane, where he can use his jump hook.
By looking to the middle of the floor, Okafor can locate the help-side defense in anticipation of double-teams, along with the guards who will “drop and dig” on the basketball. It’s not unlike a quarterback reading defensive coverages to pick up a blitz. And finally, when Okafor looks to the middle, he can locate his teammates spotting up or cutting to the basket.
Here against UConn, Okafor sees that Huskies defender Phillip Nolan is playing erect, limiting his lateral quickness, and that the help-side defender is hugging his own man. So Okafor spins to the basket somewhat unimpeded and dunks.
Here in Duke’s win at Wisconsin, Okafor catches and looks middle again, and when Badgers defender Nigel Hayes stops his spin move to the baseline, Okafor stays patient. See how he uses his dribble to play back to the middle before spinning again to the baseline and scoring.
By the way, Okafor, unlike a lot of young post players, is equally adept at posting on either block and over either shoulder with excellent effectiveness. This keeps teams from treating him like a one-armed bandit and forcing him to a weak hand.
Hall of Fame coach John Chaney used to say: “The middle is 'we,' the baseline is 'me.' " In other words, if you look to the middle, you can do more for your team and yourself. That epitomizes the effectiveness of Okafor in the low post.
2. Play off the lane
Okafor also operates well just off the lane in the low post, where he can face up to make a quick move or back into the post off the dribble.
I always had a rule for feeding the low post. We tried to pass from the wing below the foul line extended. If you drew a direct line from the passer to the low-post player to the basket, you could see that the pass took the post player to the basket if the defender played on the top side, or would put the post in a position to catch the ball in the lane.
In this sequence, notice how Quinn Cook -- the passer -- is set up in a direct line with Okafor and the basket. This allows the big man to catch the ball as deep as he possibly can. In this case, Okafor catches the pass with one foot in the paint. This allows him to turn and shoot at close range over his smaller defender.
If we fed the low post from above the foul line extended, that entry pass from the wing on a straight line would take the post player off the lane. That was not an optimum play for me as a coach because, for most college post players without an offensive repertoire, that would render them ineffective.
Fortunately, when the Blue Devils feed Okafor above the foul line extended on a pass that takes him off the lane in this sequence, it still puts him at an advantage. He has the shooting touch to make shots straight on or off the backboard from 10 feet. And he is mobile enough to drive to his left and his right and then spin off pressure when necessary.
3. Play the high-low game
In Duke's recent game versus Wake Forest, Demon Deacons coach Danny Manning (a pretty good college post player in his own right) had 6-9, 255-pound Devin Thomas trap Okafor as soon as he caught the ball in the low post. This good, hard double-team took away his ability to be patient and survey the floor and forced him into two early turnovers.
Interestingly, in Duke's loss at NC State on Sunday, Okafor struggled on a number of double-teams the Wolfpack sent his way early, but then quickly adjusted. He made a couple of quick post moves before the trap arrived. Then he passed to the opposite side of the floor or to fellow freshman Justise Winslow cutting. Finally, Okafor dribbled out of the trap to the perimeter, eliminated it, and then adroitly dribbled himself back inside to a one-on-one opportunity.
One of the ways to neutralize a post-to-post double-team -- and the only time I advocated a pass from above the foul line extended -- is to feed the ball from the high post, where the other defender has a greater distance to cover in order to trap. In the Blue Devils' case, they play the high-low game effectively, which allows Okafor to get two feet in the deep paint so he can utilize his offensive skills one-on-one.
Watch how Winslow and Okafor play high-low.
Okafor ends up sealing his man away from the basket to create room for a lob pass over the top of the defender. And Winslow’s defender is unable to get inside the double-team in time.
4. Broken plays
Because Okafor is so agile and fundamentally sound for his size, he can turn broken plays into points almost effortlessly. What are broken plays? These are plays that happen in a game that have very little to do with organized offense.
So, for example, when Okafor runs the floor, he can catch sometimes inaccurate passes on the move, gather himself with balance, and make soft touch shots. In addition, he is a terrific putback finisher on offensive rebound opportunities. Balls fall awkwardly into his hands and he’s not unprepared. Finally, he understands the geography around the basket and can contort his body and score even when he looks to be out of position.
Conclusion
The biggest challenge that awaits Okafor the rest of the season, in my opinion, will not be physical but rather cerebral. He is a dominant player on the college level and will require maximum attention from every opponent on Duke’s schedule.
Where he will continue to improve is in his already outstanding basketball acumen. Okafor faces a test of wits with some of the best coaches in the game in the ACC for the next two months. So he will need to be able to recognize the different defensive schemes designed specifically to stop him.
But don’t worry. He is a quick study, and it’s going to be fun to watch him grow up before our eyes before we say goodbye to him at the end of this college basketball season.
