That Basketball Life

This is another installment in our series on the best basketball dribble any player can have in their tool belt, the crossover.

After our players have mastered the drills in dribbling part 1 , we quickly move them on to a tougher progression. A word of note here.  We always want to push kids outside their comfort zone.  We believe that this is the zone where they get better.  With this in mind, we never wait for the kids to perfect the tail end of part 1 before we move on to part 2.  Once you start seeing them getting the hang of the toughest drills in part 1 it's time to move on. The intermediate part of our dribbling progressions will introduce a lot more movements of the ball in the horizontal plane.  In the beginner phase we spend a lot of time teaching our kids how dribble up and down or in the vertical plane.  Our goal is for them to get the feel of dribbling the basketball.  Once they advance to part 2 we introduce the movement along the horizontal plane.  In addition to this we also introduce varying heights of dribble along the vertical plane which is very important in a dribbling progression.

One of your responsibilities as a coach is to make sure that every player on your roster is pushing themselves outside of their comfort zone.  As we've discussed many times in the past it is outside the comfort zone where a player will increase their chances of making significant improvements.  How do you consistently push your players to their limit without pushing too hard?  A lot of that lies in each player.  Some players just naturally want to get better and will push themselves hard.  Other players are less motivated and need pushing to get up to speed.  Your job as a coach, is to know your team and do what needs to be done for your team to improve. The best way to do this is to stress competition.  You need to show your kids how valuable competition is and make them thrive in it.  I like to do this in 3 ways:  Talk to them in before our first practice.  What I like to tell them is  "We will play many games this year.  In some we will be losing, in others we will

In continuing our series on the complete player, the next topic of discussion is dribbling.  There is so much to this specific topic that we will break down this section into multiple parts.  The parts will cover progressions from beginner to elite.  In this specific section we will be discussing what drills to do with kids that are just beginning to play and do not yet know how to dribble. The interesting thing about this specific topic of conversation is that I can't seem to find video which will help me with my discussions.  It's as if most people who make the effort to post something on line about the topic of dribbling completely skip over this part.  Maybe it's because it's boring and way to simplistic, but just like in anything worth taking up we need to build a solid foundation before we build up.  Here is a link to a post that I wrote a few years ago that has basic progressions for beginners. Points of Emphasis  Below are the points you will want to stres

In our first installment on the topic of The Complete Player we will cover layups.  One of the most important facets of the game of basketball is being able to finish around the basket.  As a coach you need to start your players early on feeling comfortable making shots around the basket.  The one mistake made by many youth level coaches however is that they focus way to much on the basic layups and not enough time on the rest. Basic Layups Coaches need to start kids off with basic layups.  Teach them how to dribble to the basket on an angle and to jump off the leg closest to the basket while shooting the layup with the same hand as the side of the basket you are shooting on.  To get kids started you can use the following progressions. Take stationary shots from the spot on the floor where the layup will be shot.  Emphasize the use of the backboard.  Do not rush to the next step.  Make sure the player is comfortable with this step before you go to step 2.  This may take more than