College Tournament 5 - Lesson 2 - Swing Game

One of our major weapons last weekend was our swing game. It was beautiful to watch, and it was one of our go to options that would pick apart a defense. The interesting thing is that in our final match up, Bowling Green Alumni really focused on slowing down our swings and made an additional effort to coral the swing (Coral in this case means stopping the swing first and then moving in for a tighter mark).

Pictured Above: James Donovan marks David Street in power pool play at UPA Championships (Photo taken by Lisa Di Diodato).

This is one good adjustment to slow down a swinging game, and unfortunately, we couldn't capitalize on what opens up when the coral over commits. I still haven't come up with the perfect readjustment, but here are some thoughts.

When we played Johny Bravo in Florida we played a similar defensive style by really aggressively corralling the swings. Bravo countered with adjusted cuts that allowed for the inside break throws that the Bravo throwers had. That's option one, but it depends on the strength of your throwers.

Another option I've been mulling over is the idea that from a swing going break side, once it is stopped, the thrower looks for an open side small throw and then cuts for the give and go. The advantage here is that the corralling defender is out of position making the give and go cut even more advantageous.

I don't know if there is a lesson here, but it's something that I'll need to think about more to make our swing offense better.

PJ