Time To Think About Your Practice

I was walking near a park the other day and several soccer teams were having practice. I saw in each of those practices, there were maybe ten teams working out, all the coaches making the same error. Yeah, it's soccer so maybe this point doesn't translate well. But, yeah, it does, because I see this error tons of times in every practice of every sport.

Kids were dutifully lined up to wait their turn for a drill. The drills were common, most involved kicking the ball at a target, the net, another player or coach, some variation of the same drill. The coaches rolled the ball out in front of the player and the player kicked it.

Some kids kicked it well, most did not, but that's hardly the point. Well, actually, that is exactly the point. How is a young player going to learn to kick the ball well? With enough force? With the correct part of the foot? And eventually manipulating the spin on the ball to maneuver it in flight?

That's easy! By kicking it. Kicking and kicking and kicking. Over and over and over. But what did I see? A bunch of kids dutifully waiting in long lines for their turn to kick. There was a lot of chatter by the kids at the end of the line and very few, if any, managed to hear and internalize what the coach was teaching because at the end of the line they are too far, in time and space, from the action.

Solution? Forget the lines!  I know it's easy to call out "Put a line here" and the kids will all form up like they've been taught. Your practices will look organized and the kids will look like they are being taught by someone who knows what's really going on. It looks great, I get that. But will that tactic get them the most turns at the ball as possible? Not hardly. Grab a parent and have two groups work the drill. Better yet, grab two parents and the coach can oversee both groups. No parents around? Make a player toss the ball to the next in turn.

Yep, your practice will sometimes look like mass confusion, and it will often devolve into chaos. But that is your job as a coach, to organize several activities at once so that your players get the most out of your limited time with them, then keep them on task. And the alternative? Beautiful straight lines with kids doing what they're told. This will make you look good as a coach but this will not make the players as skilled as possible.

More to come..... so stay tuned.

In the last few days I witnessed competing theories in action. At least competing theories regarding what to teach  in youth basketball. I happened to be watching a game on Friday where one team clearly had better, older players than the other. But the younger team came into the game with a much different attitude or approach. Here's what happened:

The older team was determined to run through their set of plays, there were four I think. But their skill level would not allow them to execute a play against even the most passive defense. The younger team was determined to just play. I saw them attempt no plays, there were no "formations" on offense, and they played an aggressive man defense that at its core was "get the ball".  As you can guess, the younger team won. By a lot. And after the first quarter it wasn't even a contest.

But, if you are a follower of this blog, you know that winning is not the point at this age. What struck me like a Stoudamire dunk was that as the game progressed, you could see the younger team embrace their confidence, enjoy allowing their bodies to respond to what they asked of them, and generally have fun playing at such a level that they were completely exhausted by the end of the game.

That, people, is the point.

First Scrimmage

We had our first scrimmage yesterday. And I have to tell you, the kids loved it. I mean they had a blast. But here's the key I want to impress upon you, because you're thinking the kids loved it because kids love to scrimmage. No, I don't think that tells the whole story here. Let me fill in some blanks for a second.

All we have done in practice is work on individual skill development. Dribbling, one on one moves, shooting, that kind of thing. Here's what we didn't do. We didn't waste any time practicing plays or offenses or defenses.

I think I mentioned before that this team I'm blogging about is a girls team. None of whom are expected to make varsity and all of them are terribly inexperienced. We scrimmaged a bunch of boys a year younger, but still stronger and faster than us.

So what happened? We kicked their tails up and down the floor. And it was a blast. WITH NO OFFENSES, NO PLAYS, NOTHING LIKE THAT! That's the point of this blog: how to make your players better players. I remember we scored on three out of bounds plays - scored three times out of three tries, simply because we have been working on how to get open and what to do with the ball when they get it.

And the kids loved it!! They saw how all the hard work - and the KIND of work we've done - is paying off. Besides that, they like scoring a lot of points. That's fun.

Double Tap Dribble

As I mentioned in my previous post, we introduced the double tap dribble two practices ago. As expected, we are quite far from mastering this skill. Still, my post today has two functions.

It's critical that the first thing you teach about dribbling is the pound dribble. You have your players stand on the end line - that's the baseline - and dribble with their right and left hands. No dribble moves. Just pound it. And you have to emphasize to your players that they need to pound the ball into the floor absolutely as hard as they can. Left then right then left again, of course, because most will be weaker with their left hands.

Next, we introduced the side-to-side dribble. You are after developing a swinging motion, rhythmic, their bodies low. Make the players work on speed with this dribble. Side-to-side as quickly as they can. Of course they will mess up - but that's good. That means they are pushing themselves beyond their comfort zone.

Now, incorporate the double tap dribble and have them pull the basketball to the other side with the same swinging motion you've practiced before. One pound dribble with the right, then double tap with the right, then pull it quickly over to the left.

Practice today!! Yeah, time to strap it on one more time. But this post is about a narrow specific dribble skill that you should be teaching - but probably are not. We have had 6 practices so far. Not very many, but with school ball starting soon and busy schedules, that's all we could do. During those 6 practices we have worked primarily on dribble skills and 1 on 1 moves.

Wait! - we do this great drill called the ankle breaker drill. More on that later, more than any other drill this but it has done more to improve the confidence of our kids.

So today we are going to introduce the double tap dribble. This dribble is critical if your players are ever going to pull off a quick, shifty crossover. You know the one, used a lot coming off ball screens, you get the defender leaning one way, then freeze them with a double tap and pull it to the other side lightning fast and  explode to the basket. The defense will be standing there wondering what in the world just happened.

We will start by having the players double tap on one side then pull it over to the other as quick as possible. Right to left for a minute, then left to right for two minutes. The key here is that the players need to have basic dribble skills already: staying low, pounding the ball, doing a simple crossover. This is that next step kind of dribble.

By the way, we teach a crossover only because their school coach will want to see it. We never use a crossover in live action. We always go between the legs or  behind the back. You're probably wondering why.....  Stay tuned.

What, exactly, are you coaching for?

Okay, so I took a small team to a tournament a few weeks ago. The bulk of our team is not very good, but that's okay, we're just at the beginning stages of putting this team together. We're still working on dribbling and scoring - you know, the stuff that good players do. Our younger boy's team is going great and the younger girls team is making huge strides. But this one is a year away from really making some noise. Anyway, we get there and we find that one of our players is sick and can't attend.

Uh oh. It's never, ever good to sign up for a tournament then not play. That kind of stuff gets around fast and that is NOT a reputation you want. So I called some players from another team I knew and asked them to play.

Problem solved, right? You would think so, if your intention is to just let kids play and get better. Sadly, that's not everyone's intention. The coach of those kids I scrounged up got wind of this and through a massive hissy fit. And his players were not even going to play on that weekend. Yeah, having them sit at home watching T.V. is really going to up their game. It seems he had another team in this tournament and he was counting on winning the whole thing with that team. And he didn't want his older kids beating his younger kids.

Now, here's my problem. First, and you will here this a lot as you follow this blog, if you are in a tournament that you can win, then you're in the wrong tournament. If you want your kids to get better, particularly in the early stages of your team's development, you need to play in tournaments where you get pounded every game. Once you're holding your own, it's time to move on to bigger and better tournaments. But more on that later.

"But what about their self esteem? Won't that ruin their confidence?" you ask.

To that I say, "Meadow Muffins." No, your team will be much better off if it is tested - and tested hard - in every game possible.

Second, if you need tournament wins to attract players to your AAU or club team, then you are doing something wrong. Primarily, you're practicing wrong. No, what will attract players to your program is that the players LEARN HOW TO PLAY!! Some players - and their parents - won't want that. And that means you don't want them. They just want to be the star of their junior high team. Okay, fine. Go somewhere else. But their talent will top out by 9th grade. So be it. But you are after something entirely different.

At least you should be.