James Jones: Ball Screen Offense

with James Jones,
Yale University Head Men's Coach;
2026 Ivy League Co-Coaching Staff of the Year;
2026 Joe Lapchick Character Award;
8x Ivy League Regular Season Champions (2002, 2015, 2016, 2019, 2020, 2023, 2025, 2026);
4x Ivy League Tournament Champions (2019, 2022, 2024, 2025);
4x Ivy League Coach of the Year (2015, 2016, 2020, 2023);
2x Ben Jobe Coach of the Year Award (2019, 2025);
2025 Coaches vs. Cancer Inspiration Award;
NABC Board of Directors;
2016 Hugh Durham Award;
2016 USBWA District 1 Coach of the Year;
2016 Advocates for Athletic Equity D-I Coach of the Year;
2016 NSMA's Big House Gaines Men's College Basketball Coach of the Year;
2014 CollegeSportsMadness.com Ivy League Coach of the Year;
Winningest Yale basketball coach ever;
Over 400 career coaching wins;
Member of the 2007 USA Basketball Men's Pan American Games Coaching Staff;
played college basketball for Albany

Using the pick and roll to create mismatches and post entries can lead to easy buckets. James Jones-coached teams have consistently won conference championships and have produced major upsets with their Ball Screen offense. All of this is done by using a ball screen offense that is simple and creates scoring opportunities along with a thorough understanding of the ball screen defenses they are facing. In this video, Yale’s James Jones lays out the details of the ball screen offense that has helped them become an Ivy League power!

Offensive Action
Pick and Roll action can be used in many ways. Coach Jones uses the pick and roll in either a wing ball screen or an elbow ball screen based on certain defensive coverages. Based upon the defense they face, Jones provides multiple drills on how to score against hard hedges, switches, and drop defensive coverages. The drills provided include a strong correlation to their ball screen offense. With an emphasis on reading the screen, guards will come off looking to play off two feet while making quick reads to allow for scoring opportunities.

Coach Jones does a great job in his drills on attacking ball screen coverages, which can be executed with groups of two or three players. This offense can be used with players that are intelligent enough to make proper reads based upon defensive coverages. The wing ball screen will take advantage of a hard hedge or switch that most defenses will look to use in space and create mismatches offensively.

Entries & Reads
Coach Jones philosophy in a ball screen offense is that the screens are used to allow for reads to be made to play with space to find scoring opportunities. The drills he implements repeatedly teach both guards and bigs where the scoring opportunities can be found. Jones teaches the importance of passing for guards - teaching pocket passing and lobs to the basket within a fast-paced drill setting. By showing various scoring actions off of the L Cut Pick & Roll, players can implement basic drills into a game setting. By playing fast and with space within the Ball Screen Offense, his players best know how to attack different ball screen coverages.

By understanding how to attack different defensive coverages, players are able to make easy reads in a simple, yet effective way. Coaches can use this video to learn how to install a new offense, and identify simple reads for players to use coming off of ball-screens.

Customer Review: 5 Out of 5 Stars!
“I would rate this video 5 stars due to the effectiveness of the drills provided on attacking multiple ball screen coverages. Great teaching points and very detailed and well explained throughout.”

62 minutes. 2025.