Baylor is one of the most intriguing teams to analyze, so I will be starting with them first
Baylor's defensive style is perhaps one of the best known in the quidditch world today. Heralded across the country as the "Baylor zone", Baylor plays a zone-style defense that is markedly different from the usual man-coverage seen in the Southwest.
The setup of the Baylor defense is as shown below. The point defender and front beater rotate with the quaffle carrier and control the zone of players shown below. The back beater goes behind the hoops in the case of a long pass. The hoop-chasers, actually do move, often times to step in the way of a pass or to run after a loose ball near their area.
When the point defender is beat, the point defender runs to a hoop almost always in film thus far to the one to the opponent's right (medium hoop). When the chaser is close enough to the hoop that he could conceivably tap in, turn around and block a ball in time, the chaser already at that hoop runs forward and takes point if the quaffle is still outside of the front beater's zone.
What fewer people notice however, is that this minimizes the amount of physicality needed from their chasers. This allows Baylor to very effectively utilize a two male beater set to secure bludger control, thus securing their defense. This style of play is the reason Baylor is #1 in the world in bludger control %.
Naturally, with such a conservative beating game, Baylor does not bring a beater up against a one-beater defense, instead relying on their very physical keepers and chasers to drive past the point defender (something they do very well) and find a short pass near the hoops.
Even against a two bludger defense, Baylor will play extremely conservatively with their bludgers. First, they "test the waters" by sending their most physical beater in play up without a bludger to try to single-handedly get bludger control back. If this fails a couple of times, then only will Baylor bring a second bludger to mid-pitch, only to beat point, back up the defensive beaters and to provide insurance in the case of a loose bludger.
In the rare case that the other team has extreme bludger stability as well and Baylor is unable to force a turnover like this, Baylor will sometimes resort to bringing their lone bludger deep into opposing territory to force a turnover.
How to break the Baylor D and neutralize the offense
Against/With 0: This is a pure match of physicality. If your team is more physical you will score on offense and get the occasional stop on defense.
vs. Baylor 1B defense : The zone play, if Baylor even uses it in this scenario, is significantly weakened by the lack of bludger control, like playing the Sicilian Dragon without... you know, the dragon. The key to breaking down this defense is to force beater overreach, draw the beater out throw a sharp accurate pass to someone by the hoops who can then catch and score.
vs. Baylor 2B defense: As shown by many teams, the Baylor zone is very difficult to attack when it is in possession of both bludgers. A&M and the Lost Boys attack this defense by playing an extremely bludger aggresive/fluid game, and in both scenarios it worked extremely well. The Lost Boys with a diminished roster were beating Baylor 50-20 before the snitch pull. A&M disrupted the Baylor zone so well with creating bludger fluidity that their chasers were able to play their standard offense.
On the other half of things LSQC and UT attacked the Baylor zone in a similar, but at the same time markedly different way. UT demonstrated a perfect example of how NOT to break the Baylor zone in their 150*-40 loss at Diamond Cup, in that Baylor's beaters are too good to frequently turn over control to a bludgerless beater. LSQC and UT still played relatively conservatively in their SWRC matchup, however, both teams brought beaters on offense against the 2 beater baylor zone.
Texas and LSQC at SWRC scored a combined 39% of the times against a 2 beater Baylor defense using this strategy. Baylor was especially wary of turning over bludger control to Texas (as Texas is the more physical team), and that allowed Texas to stick to their conservative style and force 3 drives where Texas was facing a no beater defense.
1B vs. Baylor's offense - Play a tight man coverage. Baylor is very skilled at driving past a point defender, so make sure your beater steps up and is aggresively threatening point to force a pass against tight man coverage
2B vs. Baylor's offense - keep your bludgers back, you cannot afford to turn over bludger control (unless you're A&M or the Lost Boys and can force a Baylor game to be bludger fluid). Your chasers need to attempt to keep Baylor's ball carrier away from the hoops and force a pass, however as he gets closer to the hoops use your beater. If the beater with bludger trying to get control back focuses on the beating game, make sure to create a quick turnover and you'll be against a 0 bludger Baylor defense. This is how Texas managed to be ISR against a more discipined Baylor team that held bludger control for most of the game
Worst Tier 1 Matchup for Baylor: Lost Boys
Yes, the Lost Boys, not A&M. Baylor might not be able to beat A&M consistently, but I do think they are capable of having close, ISR games consistently.
If these teams meet, I believe The Lost Boys should win this one clean OSR. The last time these two teams met, Baylor caught a snitch to force overtime in which Baylor outscored the Lost Boys 70-30 with no snitch grab.
First things first. The Lost Boys were playing with 2/3 of a team. It is pretty easily conceivable that with a full roster the initial game would have been taken out of snitch range. And thats assuming the people missing were average middle-of-the-pack Lost Boys, which... as everyone knows they were not.
Some might argue that Baylor was just slow to get started, and that the overtime performance proves it. This is deceptive. As explained in this post, the unusual overtime performance was due to the Lost Boys' beaters focusing on the snitch game, something that clearly wouldn't have happened as much with DiCarlo back as seeker.
The Lost Boys have one of the top two bludger-fluid beating sets in the nation. Even against extremely bludger-stable Baylor, the Lost Boys were able to not only create bludger fluidity (7 changes), they were able to maintain bludger control (52%). This is extremely impressive. Baylor's entire defense is predicated on their ability to maintain drive control, and their 66% bludger control against Tier 1 teams is the best in the nation. Without stability, without control, the entire Baylor defense falls apart.
Although they didn't show it with the diminished roster for obvious reasons, the Lost Boys are fast. They have the speed and endurance and physicality to create fast breaks and to not allow the Baylor defense to set up (A&M's strategy at combating the Baylor D)
Best Tier 1 Matchup for Baylor : Bowling Green
If these teams meet, I'd be surprised if Bowling Green could notch 40 quaffle points against Baylor's defense. Even before the entire Midwest showed they couldn't perform against a zone in certain conditions, this much was evident. The one time BG faced a SW-style team who held bludger control most of the time it was Kansas (87% BC). Almost all of BG's scores that game came from long-range shots outside the keeper zone. Note that this makes them different from the power shots inside the keeper zone that A&M is sometimes fond of. BG wouldn't have been able to repeat those shots and successfully make them against a set up Baylor defense.
Even against Minnesota, the MW was able to do somewhat well mainly because they were able to grab bludger control for a significant time. BG has shown that it can't hold bludger control at MW Regionals (13% BC against Kansas, 35% BC against Ball State), and while that might have improved with their upgraded beating corps, they are a long ways away from being able to wrest control away from the best team in the IQA in terms of keeping control and stability.
