Basketball Drills

Here are some of my coaching takeaways for building a basketball program from Bill Parcells’ book “Finding a Way to Win.”

• When an organization stays the course and holds fast to their philosophy, through good times and bad, they work from a firm foundation. They gain an identity. They stand for something.
• Every organization, whether it’s floundering or ruling the roost, needs a calm, clear vision. Only people inside the group can chart its course; outside voices must be kept in their place.
• Division from within is the most dangerous factor that can ruin any organization.
• When selfishness is tolerated, the entire organization is in jeopardy.
• The chances my team takes are calculated – only fools gamble at random. But you can’t play safe and pursue your vision: you can’t shrink from risk and expect others to follow you.
• Explain what you’re trying to accomplish…when people understand the point of the risk, they’re more likely to give their all, in the effort, and less likely to second-guess afterward.
• It’s one thing to hate failure; it’s another to fear it.
• When you fail to give your staff meaningful tasks and input, you wind up with robots and yes-men. You stop getting quality advice and innovative ideas.
• Every way isn’t my way. The challenge is to find the best way, and then collectively commit to it.
• Confidence is only born of demonstrated ability.
• You can’t build an accountable organization without leaders who take full responsibility.
• Coaches should be judged on three things:
  Do players have a design that allows them to function on game day?
  Are the players prepared to deal with contingencies that may confront them?
  Do the players behave the way the coach wants them to?
•  A competent coach should be able to field a team that is strategically sound, that plays with discipline, that doesn’t beat itself.
• Leadership is the most visible thing there is – because if it’s not visible, there is no leadership.
• No Excuses – excuses and alibis are the main enemies of accountability. On my team we simply don’t accept excuses for failure.
• Nobody cares what you’re up against. The sooner you put those issues out of your mind, the sooner you can direct your focus toward the real issue: pushing your team toward victory.
• Establish clear expectations – people can’t become accountable unless they understand exactly what you want.
• Never blame a game on a player.
• Be Hard on Yourself–Confident leaders freely admit their own mistakes. And by doing it publicly, they set an example for others to take responsibility.
• Without new ideas, your organization will stagnate.
• Coaching is an act of communication – of explaining what you want of people in a way that allows them to do it.
• I consider preparation the most enjoyable part of my work, and the most challenging. To the extent my teams have succeeded, I’d say that solid preparation – not talent or strategy – was the primary factor.
• The more you prepare beforehand, the more relaxed and creative and effective you’ll be when it counts.\
• We don’t want our players to think during a game we want them to react – thinking takes too long. Have the correct moves ingrained in practice so instinct guides them to the right place at the right time.
• A team’s practices will predict its performance just about every time.
• Whenever I send my team into a game with some new wrinkle or adjustment they aren’t fully prepared for, it blows up in my face more often than not.
• Well-prepared leaders plan ahead for all contingencies, including the ones they consider unlikely or distasteful.
• Good Preparation begins with Organization:Before my staff meets with our players, we have to budget our time for the week, set our priorities. We decide which points we’ll emphasize in depth, what we’ll go through quickly, and what we’ll skip altogether.
• People perform most reliably when they’re sure they can handle the task at hand-and that sureness comes only with specific preparation.
• When leading a group toward important achievement, don’t compromise your standards based on people’s complaints or conventional workloads.
• You’re constantly balancing mental preparation against physical wear and tear. As the old saying goes, you want to work smarter, but not always harder.
• I emphasize the obvious all the time, especially with a younger team, because it’s the obvious things that beat you if they’re not taken care of.
• The road to execution is paved by repetition.
• Be a Teacher, Not a Drill Sergeant
• To teach you have to listen as well as talk. When we experiment with something new in practice, our players’ feedback is invaluable.
• Trial and error is part of the process; it’s rarely fatal to try something and fail. The greater danger lies in hiding behind tradition while the world keeps turning. Resourceful managers tinker and adapt until they find the winning formula.
• There are always problems on a football team, as in any other business. And there are coaches, and managers, who can sit around indefinitely expounding upon those problems. Those people will not help you find a way to win.
• Resourcefulness is simply resilience – a refusal to quit or give in, even when all seems bleak.
• You’re not truly successful until you’re challenged at the top level of your ability – and you consistently marshal your best effort.
• The main threats, the ones that tear you down, are all internal: complacency, distraction, all the petty jealousies that come with the distribution of credit.
• In a competitive environment, to remain the same is to regress.
• Measure Excellence by Performance, not Reputation.

• I wouldn’t ask a player to do something I wouldn’t do with my own kids. I don’t want them to think that I would ever compromise them.
• The team that makes fewer mistakes will generally get the opportunity to win, even when the opposition has more talent.
• The disciplined team has to get beat by somebody; it refuses to beat itself.
• There is always a way to compete, even against superior forces, but it requires strict adherence to a calculated plan.
• Mental errors reflect poor concentration or inadequate preparation.

• A Physical error can also result from poor concentration, but physical errors are typically caused by an athletic mismatch, where you’re up against someone whose ability is greater than yours.
• What sets disciplined people apart?
  The capacity to get past distractions
  Focus on the task at hand.
  The willingness to condition mind and body for the task at hand
  An ill-disciplined body makes for a weak mind.
  The ability to keep your poise when those around you are losing theirs.
• Organizations can’t improve without setting the highest standards. But they also need to measure achievement against their real potential at a given time.

• What the quick-fix guys miss is that there’s a process at work here – there are steps you need to take to build a successful organization, and if you try to skip one you’ll trip.
• The disciplined course isn’t always the daring course or the exciting course. It’s the course that gives your organization the best chance to prevail.

If you are interested in reading some samples from inside the book or purchasing the book on Amazon, you can either click the link below or click the image of the book cover.

Finding A Way

This is a 3 minute and 30 second video of former Wichita State Head Basketball Coach Gregg Marshall going through a one on one defensive drill during a Wichita State practice.

Make sure your sound is on as you watch.

If you are interested in learning more about the entire DVD that this sample came, click this link. Anyone who purchases anything from the store receives one of my basketball coaching eBooks as a bonus. Just email me and let me know which one you would like to receive!

Make sure your sound is on.

If you are interested in learning more about the entire DVD that this sample came, click this link. Anyone who purchases anything from the store receives one of my basketball coaching eBooks as a bonus. Just email me and let me know which one you would like to receive!

This post is an edited summary of a series of posts that Coach Brian Anglim made regarding ways of being intentional about getting to the free throw line.

A big movement in the basketball world has been the usage of advanced analytics. Author’s such as John Hollinger and Dean Oliver have offered great insight into how games are won and lost. I first got into statistical analysis when I read the book “Basketball on Paper” by Dean Oliver. A big concept in this book is offensive efficiency, which is measured by calculating the number of points a team would score over a period of 100 possessions. It is a great way to measure how effective a team’s offense is disregarding the pace of the game. For example, watching Georgetown might seem like a great offense but they don’t seem to score much? The reality is they are a very efficient offense but they don’t score a lot of points because they use so much clock they get a limited number of possessions. These types of advanced stats allow a coach to go beyond the scoreboard.

Digging deeper into these numbers we can hope to discover what factors create a great offense. Some interesting insights that I got from Vance Walberg, is the point value of different types of shots. For example:

• Inside Shots: teams shoot 60 percent on these shots; being worth two points per successful attempt you get 1.2 points per attempt
• 3 Point Shots: teams shoot 35 percent on these shots, but being worth three points per successful attempt, you get 1.05 points per possession.
• Free Throws: teams shoot .70 per free throw, when you calculate the value of two attempts you get 1.4 points per 2 shots

 

• Mid-Range Shots: The percentage on these is barely higher than that off three point attempt. Let’s say for this example our team shoots 43 percent from the mid range (which is high number), on a per possession basis they would score .86 points per possession.

Going through this exercise we can develop a hierarchy of the type of shots we are looking for from our offense. Free throws are by far the most efficient shot. So, it would stand to reason that should be the shot you are striving for. What types of shots are you trying to get out of your offense? The standard answer is open shots, but what type of open shots? Layups, threes, mid-range shots, or shots that give you a chance to get to the free throw line? We should be designing our plays, offenses, and teach fundamentals skills that lead to the three most advantageous shots – free throws, shots in the interior (which often lead to free throws), and threes.

Getting fouled is a mistake made by the defense, but there are a number of things that you can do to encourage teams to make this mistake. Not only by its points-per-possession value are free throws efficient but it puts teams in foul trouble, gets them into the bonus sooner, and also gives you a chance to score a three point play.

Here are some considerations when designing your offense to get to the free throw line:

1. Isolation actions
2. Low Post Attack
3. Driving Game
4. Transition Attack
5. Cutters
6. Offensive Rebounding

No single shot statistically has a greater effect on on-court offensive success than the free throw. Offensive efficiency needs to be seen not only in field goal percentage but in fouls drawn from the opponent.

Many coaches see the “foul line game” won with post play. I think this is a limited view as there are multiple ways to get the ball in the post/paint area. An idea I got from Don Meyer was to chart paint touches and how you got those touches. These could be from post touches, penetration, cuts, screens (curl cuts need to be an attacking cut), transition, and offensive rebounding. Big guys own that low box game but to have a balanced attack you need to also work on your penetrating “foul line attack”.

Finishing Skills

The most basic layup is the speed layup. This is the classic inside foot, high jump off of one foot shot that players need to be able to execute full speed. It’s the uncontested layup that we often see on the fast break. However most half court layups are contested and these are the type of layups that lead to three point players. You need your players to hunger for three point plays rather than settle for two.

Below I will list six different types of layups that will improve your player’s ability to make contested finishes.

With all of these attacking finishes, the player needs to “finish strong”. In my mind, “finishing strong” means that we are looking for contact so that we might play off of it. It means that we are going to have a strong grip on the ball, maintain a strong posture to handle the contact, and most importantly to concentrate solely on that finish and not even think about the hit we might take. Our players need to know what it is and practice being that type of player.

1. Reverse Layup – this is where we extend the ball to the other side of the rim, to protect against the shot blocker. We once again encourage the player to get a shoulder or hip into the defender and then extend to the other side of the rim. Players need to be able to make this shot with either the inside or outside hand depending on the defenses position. A big key to this layup is to extend up and outward in your jump. For speed layups we talk about taking off like a rocket, for a reverse layup we want to take off like a jet.

2. European Step – the European game has definitely invaded America. The “Euro Step” has become a staple of any advanced player. The European step is a direct step at a defender followed by a lateral step to avoid that defender. You get the defender thinking you are going right at him and then step laterally to avoid him and finish the play. Despite attempting to avoid contact I am constantly seeing players get fouled on this move, the the defender will often hip check the player.

3. Extended Layups – this is the layup where we extend our layup hand outward away from the defense. This is something we might do if a player is riding us on our hip and we need to move the ball away to make that finish. In this type of finish, we crave contact as it allows us to pin a player to one side of our body and use the extended hand to keep away from the defense. A great term I heard was to “lay the ball up with long limbs”.

4. Power Layup – this is the where we get the shoulder of the offensive player into the middle of the chest of the defensive player. If we can achieve this position, the defender will have to go across the body of the offensive player to get to the ball. This is a great way to get fouled.

5. Inside Hand Layup – the “fundamental” way we teach layups is always with the outside hand, but sometimes we have the defender on our outside shoulder. Going through the fundamentals way would expose the ball. In this instance, an inside hand finish would be most appropriate, you see “Princeton” offense teams master this type of layup as there back cuts often lead to it.

6. Wide Layup – this is another finisher that doesn’t lead to many fouls, but is a necessity to prevent defenders from drawing a charge. In this move we take a driving angle toward the post box instead of at the rim, this angle forces the shooter to extend his layup into a hook like shot. This was a type of finish that I first heard about from Hubie Brown, he referred to it as a running hook. The key to this type of finish is that we drop the shoulder so we can really extend the ball up. Here is a great video of the shot and how to drill it. He has some other interesting finishes as well.