Italy offered a blueprint against the USA—but it comes with a cost

Italy lost 55–52 to the USA at the Women’s World Cup. In FIBA’s account, Cecilia Zandalasini described a combination of zone looks, different matchups and switches. Our takeaway is not that one defensive formation has solved the Americans. It is that a changing picture can make an excellent attacking team spend more of each possession identifying the problem.

Delay the first comfortable action

A zone can protect the middle, but its greater value may be uncertainty over who will take the next receiver. Switching can then remove the advantage a screen was supposed to create. Used together with clear communication, these choices can turn an instinctive first pass into a deliberate second look. That delay gives defenders time to recover.

The danger is treating variety as a substitute for execution. An improvised switch without a shared rule can leave a cutter unattended. A zone without responsibility for the weak-side rebound can concede a simple second chance after doing the difficult work. Our preference would be a small menu of well-rehearsed changes rather than a new scheme every trip.

How the USA can answer

The attacking response should be to make the ball travel faster than the defensive handover. A purposeful high-post catch can force the centre of a zone to turn; a baseline cutter then asks the back line to defend two directions. Against switching, an early seal can be more useful than repeatedly dribbling at the mismatch after everyone else has become stationary.

Those are proposed adjustments, not a claim about undisclosed coaching instructions. They also explain why a close result should not be treated as proof that the USA lack solutions. A repeat meeting would include information both sides did not possess before this one.

Our judgment

Italy have made a persuasive case that disciplined defence can keep them competitive against a more celebrated opponent. We would still resist turning one three-point defeat into a prediction of a medal. The next test is whether the same defensive concentration survives a game in which Italy are expected to initiate more of the attack. Our outlook improves if they preserve rebounding and purposeful possessions together; it weakens if their defence has to compensate for repeated live-ball turnovers. Being difficult to score against is an identity. Making that identity win different kinds of games is the next step.

Cover photograph: Unsplash, illustrative sports imagery; not a photograph of the reported event.