Joe Viray on Team USA using 'Too Small' to prove that they are still too big to be toppled by the rest of the world
Joe Viray on Team USA using 'Too Small' to prove that they are still too big to be toppled by the rest of the world
How a play between two of this generation's best basketball players continued Team USA's dominance.
Olympics Coverage So Far
Assigned Reading
Joe Viray on Team USA rectifying past shortcomings by literally not being short
Joe Viray on Team USA's sound defensive preparation against Serbia
Video Highlights
Explain: Steph Curry saves USA Men's Olympics vs Serbia (with LeBron, KD, Booker and Embiid)
2024 USA v Serbia, 4th quarter
2024 USA v Puerto Rico (sorry NBC won’t allow embeds)
Joe Viray on Team USA using 'Too Small'
As a devoted student of all things concerning the Golden State Warriors — nuances and minute details included — I’ve come to learn a lot about what makes the team tick, the philosophy behind their gameplay, and what Steve Kerr has tried to do with a squad that has won multiple championships in a span of a decade.
Part of that process involves watching their bench, focusing specifically on Kerr, and trying to deduce his play calls. Over the years, patterns have emerged, once-foreign hand signals have become quite familiar, and a playbook that seemingly was as hard to read as a geometry book became simple mathematics.
But that doesn’t mean there’s nothing left to learn. Kerr does add at least one new thing every season — which means new plays/concepts to learn, new options off of that one play to look out for, and — perhaps the hardest thing to do for an analyst such as myself — trying to deduce what hand signal Kerr has assigned to that play.
Take for example, the inverted pick-and-roll.
Inverted pick-and-rolls are nothing new as an overall basketball concept, but the Warriors have been incorporating more and more of them over the last three seasons — thanks to a certain superstar guard who’s not new to doing some of the blue-collar work role players are typically assigned to. Steph Curry is the quintessential screening guard, not only because he’s especially good at setting them, but because he’s willing to set them, which is rare for someone of his stature.
Whenever the Warriors have Curry set an inverted ball screen — that is, a smaller guard such as himself setting a screen for a ball-handling wing or big — they do so through one of two main ways:
As an option off of their “Head tap” half-court set (the play call being Kerr tapping the top of his head):
As a straight-up pick-and-roll possession, where Curry steps up to set the high ball screen:
Over the last few years that the Warriors have run the step-up inverted pick-and-roll set, I’ve operated under the assumption that it isn’t something Kerr actively calls — rather, it seemed to be something based off of feel and instinct, two traits the Warriors have built their read-and-react offense upon. The decade-long mind meld between Curry and Draymond Green allows such a scenario to happen; when two teammates have been together for that long, verbal cues become less of a necessity if the minds become a collective unit.
It was to my surprise when, during a few games last season, Kerr appeared to be hovering his palm close to the floor — apparently a play call, one that I haven’t seen before. What usually followed after that play call was the step-up inverted pick-and-roll.
Peep at the hand signal Kerr used to tell his players to run it:
In an unexpected mash-up of basketball tactics and basketball showmanship, Kerr appeared to be using the “too small” taunt as his cue for the Warriors to run an inverted pick-and-roll — which is both hilarious and makes a ton of sense. After all, if Curry’s defender switches onto the bigger ball-handler, the defender would often be too small for that wing or big to handle. The other side of that equation: Curry would often be too fast and too nimble for a slower and bigger defender.
Of course, the rule of thumb for most defenders when it comes to guarding Curry is to stay attached at all times — which makes switching hard to do. Driving opportunities have been created for the likes of Green and Jonathan Kuminga because of that reticence to switch off of Curry, whose screening willingness and gravity creation makes him an elite advantage creator.
However — what if, just what if, the ball handler partnered with Curry was equally elite at advantage creation through his paint touches and drives to the rim?
Which is why it’s low-hanging fruit for Kerr and Team USA to bring over the inverted pick-and-roll and have Curry set those screens for his longtime nemesis turned respected peer and, dare I say it, a good friend — in LeBron James.
During the exhibition games, Curry and James were honing their partnership on the court together — and continuous reps of “Too small” played a huge part in their chemistry building:
“I’m a good screener and can cause some confusion for a guy like (LeBron) having the ball,” Curry said to Joe Vardon of The Athletic. “We do it a little bit in Golden State where you have somebody else having the ball and me setting it, and I have a lot of different actions you can run, but if you get (LeBron) going downhill, good luck to anybody trying to stop him and having me come off into space.”
The last part of the quote above is what makes this version of “Too small” especially deadly — deadlier than the Warriors’ version where Curry’s is the only keystone. A switch is deadly, since James can slice through smaller players with the ease of a hot knife through butter. Both Curry and James punish reticence to switch: if Curry’s man doesn’t switch off due to fear of Curry getting open in space, James will find himself with an open driving lane; if James’ man doesn’t switch off of him due to a fear of giving up a driving lane (or fear of handing James off to a smaller teammate), Curry will find himself open in space.
Which is what happened in the gold medal game against France. With Curry and James running “Too small” — their go-to action when nothing else in the half court has worked — Curry’s man hedges out to avoid a switch onto James. But Curry responds by slipping out toward the wing and punishing his man’s late recovery:
But in comparison to another “Too small” possession later on in the game — with three minutes left in the game and France shrinking Team USA’s lead to three after a Victor Wembanyama put-back dunk — the one above didn’t have the kind of stakes required of both James and Curry to dig deep and know what has to be done in a very tense environment.
Again, the theme of reticence rears its head. Guerschon Yabusele being slightly late — even for a millisecond — to switch off of James and toward Curry slipping into open space renders him in an untenable position: his left foot leading out and unable to keep close to Curry, who pulls up with relative ease to increase the lead:
In hindsight, it was the shot that broke the French camel’s back. There was no stopping a red-hot Curry from drilling shot:
After shot:
After shot — including the final nail in the coffin:
After all the arguments about world championships, entertainment vs. IQ (both of which were in full display by Team USA in the gold medal game), and international teams hell-bent on proving that America’s rule over basketball is over, all it took to prove that the stage was still too big for the rest of the world was reminding them that they were still too small — figuratively and literally.
Timpf had a nice breakdown showing that each of Steph's final four threes made of the gold medal game was the result of Steph in two man action: three of them with LeBron, one with KD, and each time the defense tried something else: switch, hedge, double, etc and each time Steph burned them. On the very last one, both Batum and Yabusele left Steph as soon as he passed it and KD just hit him right back. Batum rushed in but by then it was ... night night time.
I think the warriors call it "short", heared it multiple times during games. Lebron also called the play in the showcase and olympics