From the YMCA to the NCAA, zone defenses have become a go-to strategy for many amateur basketball teams.

But at the sport's highest level, the National Basketball Association, true zone defense remains as rare and successful as a Zach Randolph 3-point shot.

No current NBA team uses zone as its primary defense, and excluding outliers like the Golden State Warriors, Dallas Mavericks and Toronto Raptors, who utilize zones in no more than 10 percent of their defensive possessions, few NBA squads show much interest in the scheme.

Even Toronto head coach Dwane Casey, who designed the zone that helped Dallas stifle LeBron James and the Miami Heat during the 2010-11 NBA Finals, admits that.

"You've got to be a good man-to-man team in the NBA before you start putting in the zone," said Casey. "The zone we have is based on man-to-man principles more than zone principles. I didn't think about putting in zone in Toronto until our man (defense) was solid. I didn't want to distort the idea and say, 'Hey, we can play zone if things don't work out.' Our rock has to be our man-to-man (defense)."

Anyone who's taken a recent NBA 2K title online might wonder, then, why the 2-3, 3-2, and especially the 1-3-1 zone, have become more popular than the traditional man-to-man schemes employed by most NBA teams.

NBA 2K14's recent King of the Court tournament, for example, culminated in a finals matchup where both competitors used a trapping 1-3-1 defense for the majority of their best-of-three series. Unlike some Major League Gaming events, this contest wasn't an example of two pros exploiting the game with obscure or difficult-to-use tactics. Instead, King of the Court mirrored the style of play seen in most online ranked matches of NBA 2K14.
 

Until Visual Concepts' programmers, artists and animators can make zone defenses as risky as they are in the real NBA, gamers will continue to flock towards zones for all of the unrealistic advantages they provide.

The biggest issue is NBA 2K14's cramped court, which simply feels too small in relation to the physical proportions and lateral quickness of its players. Animations that allow defenders to slide and warp across the court without any friction have decreased on the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, but they remain frustrating whenever they do appear.

Defenders with high awareness and athleticism ratings, such as LeBron or Rajon Rondo, can display superhuman reaction times and impossible recovery speeds while pursuing the ball. Only in NBA 2K14 will you find basketball players who are able to move faster than the ball can be passed, swung or skipped.

Trapping zones should be a physically draining method of defending, yet this style of play does not fatigue defenders at an appropriate rate in NBA 2K14. Zoning up also allows teams to use smaller, more athletic forwards like Kevin Durant or Paul George at the power forward position, without fear of being dominated in the low post by a bigger, stronger offensive player. Equally disheartening is the tendency for open AI teammates, especially those who are set up in the corners, to blindly run off into the paint, where all the congestion lies.

Combine all these defensive advantages with NBA 2K14's slow pass velocity, floaty pass trajectories and lengthy pass animations, and it's easy to see why offenses can have so much trouble beating zones, even using a lineup of skilled perimeter players.

Most discouraging, is how these design flaws are not specific to NBA 2K14, but instead, are problems that have persisted since zones debuted in NBA 2K2 on the SEGA Dreamcast. Defending dunk machines like Vince Carter, "Frobe" Bryant, and now, LeBron, has always been best accomplished by going zone, regardless of the number next to the 2K.

While zone defenses continue to be a necessary strategy in amateur basketball, and have found a niche in the NBA, they are still improperly balanced on the virtual court, and should have no role in an NBA 2K game.