Coaching Kids Under the age of 10 Part 1

As we move up the age ladder we like to continue pushing our players both athletically and in terms of basketball.  When the kids hit the 9-10 year old group we continue building on their basketball knowledge.


Since we teach a lot more concepts at this age group we will have multiple posts covering our 9-10 year old topics.  Additional topics covered will include the intro to man to man, and more detailed looks into game situations.  In this post we will be covering how we expand our offense and build off of the basics that the kids learned at the 7-8 year old level.  Our goal is to teach the kids proper positioning and as they get older and start to understand this concept, we start taking the leash off of them and let them use their creativity.

As we mentioned in our post on coaching kids under the age of 8, we first like to introduce our kids to the concept of floor balance.  As 7-8 year olds we also teach them 2 basic ways to start the offense (v-cuts and dribble at).  At this age level we continue to build on what we've taught the kids.  Specifically we teach them a few more ways to begin our offense.


  1. Dribble Handoffs - This is a great play to use against a man to man because it almost always seems to cause confusion.  This play in essence is a handoff/ball screen.





  2. Backdoor - This play is also a nice play to teach against pressure defenses.

    
Positioning During Dribble Drives
Aside from offensive starts we also like to show kids at this age where to position themselves when there ball enters the paint with a dribble drive.  Positioning varies depending on where the ball enters the paint from.
  1. Middle Drive Options - This describes what should be done when the dribble penetration occurs from above the baseline.


  2. Baseline Drive Options - Baseline drive options cover how players should position themselves when the dribble drive enters from the baseline.

Post Movement - In addition to the above we also like to introduce our posts to basic post movements.   There are 3 different post movement option that we use.  All 3 of them are fairly similar with the big difference being how the post men line up at the start.
  1. 1-4 high


  2. 1-4 Low




  3. High/Low







Be back with more on this topic soon!

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