36 Comments

1. Zeke — December 23, 2008 @ 1:35 am

   Thats why as a relatively new coach, I love the basic premise of Read&React.

   Where I live, South Africa, there is a profound lack of understanding the fundamentals of the game. Coaching youth as you put in this article is almost non-existent.

   Good article,
   Zeke

2. SportNut — December 25, 2008 @ 12:39 am

   Joe,
   I take a slightly different tact … Even when I used to coach 5th and 6th grade players, I put in 1 or 2 man-to-man and zone set offenses typically with several variations. Other coaches at that level would wonder how I could teach such “complicated” offenses to kids that age.

   My trick was to use a couple simple rules:
   1. After the first 10 or so practices, I would always mention that every player needs to score for this team to be successful. This means that every player when they have the ball needs to face the basket and look for their shot, drive to the basket, or a teammate cutting to the basket.
   2. I would tell the players that the offense is a guideline for player movement, not a rigid pre-defined set of actions. The goal of the offense is to create floor spacing and set expectations on where the players are standing and what actions they are considering.
   3. During practice I would run offensive drills that taught the fundamentals of basketball and then during the following water break talk to the players about how the new skill they just learned could be utilized in the offense. Many times, I would have coaches demonstrate how it could be used within the offensive schemes.
   4. Likewise, I would practice the offense for 10/15 minutes every practice. At first without a defense, then with a 5 person defense, and eventually a 6 or 7 person defense (usually a coach was the 6th and 7th person).

   Did they always run the offense perfectly? Nope, but every year all my players would score, we never had a point guard dribbling at half court yelling for the players to move, and we always had good passing teams.

   Brian
   http://basketball.youth-athlete.org

3. Joe Haefner — December 30, 2008 @ 1:09 pm

   Hi Brian,

   I love the “every kid must score” rule. I also liked how you taught the kids how they may use the new fundamentals within the offense.

   However, from a long-term approach, I am still convinced that we should avoid plays and patterned offenses with youth players. I think kids will often get confused when they should react to the defense or run the pattern. Rather, teach them concepts such as spacing, spots to fill, movements that can occur after a pass (cut or screen), not to stand still for more than 2 seconds, and so on. I believe that we should teach the motion offense.

   Your teaching of the offense may work NOW, but is it the best for the child’s long-term development? Does the structure inhibit the child’s self-discovery (learning things on their own)? So many coaches tell players what to do for every pass and every cut at such a young age that they don’t even know how to think for themselves anymore. I’ve seen games where the kid will look at the coach about 3 or 4 times every possession wait for them to tell them what to do. That doesn’t make a better basketball player. I’m not saying you do this, but that’s what I’ve seen and another reason why I’ve steered away from patterned offenses for youth players.

   What if you take that 10 to 15 minutes every day and practice fundamentals and scrimmage more? Would they be a better player in the future?

   Here’s a comment that somebody recently posted who purchased our Motion Offense product:

   “Great b-ball basics for the 10yr. old girls youth league I coach in. Started using it right away and it took 2 full games for them to get it. Had to scale it way down to pass and screen away, then all of the sudden two ten year olds asked for another option that they could use? Go figure, but they love it and are very excited running it. A great thing I like for me is just letting them go. I am normally a very vocal teacher on instructions during the game. But since the first game, have just been standing back during game action and enjoying the kids’ getting to it. It’s was a strange feeling at first, but I just love it! The team and I cannot wait for the second half of the season, and we’ll be adding more and more as they need it.”

   If you want to check out this and more reviews, you can visit this link: http://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/pr/motionoffense.html#reviews

4. Wim — January 22, 2009 @ 5:48 pm

   And we may not forget to teach all the fundamentals to all of our young players: everybody is a guard, a forward, a center : no specialisation before +/- 14 years.
   Though from the age of 10 they already play most of the time on 1 or 2 spots
   (gard-forward; forward-center).We play mostly an “open post offense”, without a postplayer.
   We teach youngsters to play without the use of screens until the age of 14.

5. Ron — January 22, 2009 @ 6:27 pm

   I can’t claim to be a very successful coach (4th and 6th graders), but I have started using motion offense concepts this year and I think my results are pretty good so far after a pretty brutal year last year (no wins for either team; broke out of my drought big time and had three wins the past weekend). I don’t think I’ve ever attempted to teach any offensive play (I don’t even like lines in out-of-bounds situations). I don’t think you can play five on five basketball with pre-adolescents and expect any type of patterned offense to work. I also do agree that it’s probably contrary to their learning. I’d rather have the kids thinking about and seeing the basketball court and what’s going on rather than worrying about where they need to move next in your pattern.

   I find that at this age, beating the defense is easy if you’re seeing the court. Most defenses are very loose; when defenses put pressure on it’s easy to go over top of them. What I have done in practice a lot this year is a lot of no dribble passing drills, 3 on 3, 4 on 4. I love penetrators and in past years spent a lot of time teaching kids to dribble and penetrate, beat their man one on one, because I thought that was pretty easy as well since one on one defense is generally not good at this age. What I’ve found is that when kids put the ball on the floor their focus goes down to the ground and they stop seeing their teammates (and the defense often). So in practice I’ve spent a lot of time not allowing them to dribble at all. They have a long way to go but I’ve noticed a lot of improvement in ball movement, finding the open man in games. The downside is that sometimes they forget that they CAN dribble!!

6. Joy — January 22, 2009 @ 11:04 pm

   Hi,
   so I’ve thought that I’m the biggest loser because I can’t get my 5th gr boys to retain a single play - however we win every game. I’ve given up on plays and just work on technique, defense, rebounding and the fast break. I’m a coach in training and its so good to hear, for the first time, that i’m doing something right!

   Thanks,

   Joy

7. MIKE — January 23, 2009 @ 2:04 am

   I agree 100 percent about not teaching kids a bunch of plays or running several different offenses. Especially boys, they tend to all want to shoot and attack the basket so it comes natural to them. If you instill the fundamentals, spacing, setting screens and moving with out the ball they will naturally come to understand how the game is played. As a coach I have been fortunate to have some pretty skilled players but even without those certain players teaching all of the above before anything else results in them learning team work and eventually some wins. My goal as a coach at the beginning of the season is not about wins but to make better players out of everybody. If they learn the fundamentals, learn to play defense, everything will fall in to place. Its nice to have the parents come up and say my boy or girl has really improved or the team really played well together. This also keeps parents minds off of the winning thing all of the time.

8. Kenny — January 23, 2009 @ 8:19 am

   Nice article guys, as always. Yeah. I found out the hard way about trying to use a pattern offense, heck any offense, for the 4th, 5th, and 6th grade teams that I have coached over the years. Now, for my 8th grade team, I just teach a skill, do a drill(s), and have fun (courtesy of Breakthrough Basketball). We finished 8-3. Plus the kids were not confused. I just told the kids, spacing and movement. Keep the lane open and if you don’t have the ball, set a screen!!

9. Andy — January 23, 2009 @ 9:13 am

   After 5 years of watching and being involved with coaching youth basketball I can say that the time I seen spent on kids trying to learn a play could have been better spent doing just about anything else. Last year I had to sit on the sidelines and watch as the coach insisted the kids run a play he loudly announced every trip down the court. When our point guard made that first pass EVERYBODY knew where it was going. The opposing guards ALWAYS had a great game against us. Very disappointing season. Disappointing to the point to where my young man decided not to play basketball this year.

   There is hope as we are going to catch a local college game this weekend.

10. David C. — January 23, 2009 @ 11:56 am

    If I had been asked this question this time last year, I would agree that younger kids should NOT attempt to run a set offense. Now, however, I disagree. I’m coaching my son’s 7-8 yr old team. I watched them play last year and they were very unorganized. We were happy if they even attempted a shot without turning the ball over, very frustrating for the coaches, parents, and kids. This is the 3rd year most of these kids have played together, and their win total for the previous 2 years was 2 wins.

    This year we have enough kids for 2 teams, so I volunteered to coach one team. I have been coaching the 16-18 yr old boys team for 5 years prior to this, so I wasn’t completely lost, but I had to take a totally different approach with 7-8 yr olds. The other coaches and I began teaching floor spacing and read and react principles to these kids, not sure how they would respond. Also, we installed a basic 1-3-1 offense that was easy to remember. It gives the point guard 3 passing options: high post, left wing, right wing. Wherever the first pass goes, the player receiving the ball immediately looks to pass to the low post. The defenses usually over-commit and the 2nd pass is almost always open, giving us an opportunity for a shot almost every time down the court. The play begins with a player at each elbow and a player just above each block. The point guard calls out the name of one of the post players such as, “Luke”. Luke then flashes to the high post and the other post player stays on his block. This is very simple, but has proved to be easy for them to learn and effective in getting open shots. We’ve also noticed that our players have begun to freelance a little and are finding holes in the defense to exploit.

    We only practice 1-2 hours per week, but we began practicing about 2 months prior to our season starting. Understand that most of these kids, while only being 8 y/o, are in their 3rd year of playing basketball.

    Hope this helps somebody out there.

11. Jeremy — January 23, 2009 @ 12:00 pm

    Stated very well, the importance of the motion offense is always overlooked. It is especially important to emphasize moving the ball without putting it on the floor. A well run motion with a smooth swing of the floor will always score nearly as quick as a set play, but when that swing of the floor doesn’t equate to a basket there is no breakdown or confusion because the kids are still running the offense. Went 8-1 this year without running a single play. I will be honest it was a little hairy the first three or four games but, as the understanding of the offense and the ability to see a step ahead (basketball IQ)developed there was a calmness and ease of play going on, on the floor!! Great article.

12. Miranda — January 23, 2009 @ 2:03 pm

    What and eye opener!! I’m a first time coach of 5th grade girls, I tried to set and offense and I can tell that its not working at all, so now at practice today I will throw that out and work on screens. If anyone can tell me how to practice with only 5 or 6 players let me know. I think I’ll have them doing a lot of 3 of 2. They get really frustrated with defense because I can’t show them what it will be like with such a small team. Thank you for the article!

13. John — January 23, 2009 @ 3:19 pm

    I agree with teaching principles and not plays. I have eleven kids of which two are basketball brains and understand everything. Four are athleted only and the rest are in space. I teach the principles of dribbling and spacing as any kid who can dribble should be able to take another 3-6th grader to the hoop. When I tried to teach plays I always had 2-3 players on the court with no clue when the play broke down. Now I tell them. You have free range to move around as long as you are not going to another one of our players unless to screen. They always remain spaced out and since most kids on defence are like mine,they forget to guard their guys. Keep up the good work.

14. Gate — January 25, 2009 @ 5:50 am

    I agree whole heartedly about not running too many plays at a young age. I coach my daughters 3rd-4th grade team and have only taught them one play..they get the ball to our smartest player at the foul line..if she’s open she shoots if not she looks down low to a cutter, if that is covered it goes back out to the point and they know to pass around to the open girl. I just try to remind them not to get bunched up and it has seemed to work so far.

15. cheryl — January 25, 2009 @ 10:35 am

    I totally agree. I have been coaching for over 15 years now. Mostly youth league but also a few travel teams. Even with my travel teams 6th-7th girls I try to have one offense with a couple of options for playing against a zone. We always play motion against man.The hardest thing for them to do is recognize when they are being played man to man and when it is zone. Since it is youth sometimes we get a team to play us box and 1 and this totally blows their minds.Any ideas on how to get them to recognize what to play? I do set my 6th grade kids up in 2 different groups,posts and guards. If you teach them to always be opposite of their partners then spacing will stay good. The hardest thing I have found with motion is to get the kids to stay still long enough to have a screen set for them. I also coach a 1st-2nd girls team. I have in past only done a motion with them always but have a new father helping this year and he wants to always run plays. The kids have amazingly learned every position on the play and run it perfectly everytime. The thing that bothers me is that we now have only one kid scoring the majority of the points(his)and the rest of the team is passing and playing defense only. Their only chance to score is off of rebounds. We are undefeated but I don’t think it’s worth it because as you said the children aren’t developing basketball knowledge or how to make decisions. After all every game is different and the player who can make quick decisions will be the one who I want on my team. From now on I will have my daughter with another group and teach them skills. I’ll bet when they get to middle school and high school my kid will have better basketball knowledge and decision making skills. His may be better at running the play but I would take the basketball skilled kid over them any day.

16. ariel rabe — January 25, 2009 @ 9:14 pm

    For kids, I had used 3-2 zone defense following the m ovement of the ball, and on offense I instructed the no. 5 to cross the shaded lane toward the strong side from the weak low post area receive the pass and reverse immediately for a possible penetration or a jump shot or a quick pass to a team-mate along the baseline for a quick jumper. And another was I instructed the no. 5 to position himself along the free throw line, receives the ball, pivots continually until he sees an open team mate for a possible jump shot below the free throw line or inside the shaded lane or whereever an open team mate is positioned for dribble penetration. We lost the game by 7 points (playing only 6 players vs a complete line-up of the opposing team) but we could have won it, down by only 4 down the stretch, if not for a wayward fastbreak play and over-dribbling in the right baselne corner (actually the kid-point-guard got trapped by 2 taller defenders).

17. Kevin — January 26, 2009 @ 8:37 am

    I have been coaching 6th and 7th grade boys now for 5 years and every year I try to teach them some play that will beat a zone defense and every year and leave frustrated with the result. Everyone on this post has been exactly right, even the most simple play, escapes their minds almost right away and even when they do get it, they go through the motions and do not react to what the defense is giving them. I have practice tomight and I am going to work more on screens and passing without dribbling and see how that goes. I really want them to focus more on these things anyway. I don’t know why I didn’t do this to begin with. Thanks to everyone for the comments. This should be a lot of help.

18. mike — January 26, 2009 @ 6:52 pm

    We played aginst a 2-3 zone and could not break it down bcause the 3 were huge(5th 6th)and the two guards were so fast we could not penetrate. So I came up with this idea. Put two plyers on the blocks and two shooters wide and low on the wings. Then have guard bring ball two steps over half court, pick up his dribble and look confused. As soon as the guards run up to trap the two block guys step around and box out the low defenders and the two wings cut to the elbows one will be open for a shot every time

19. Dick — January 28, 2009 @ 8:34 am

    I coach Fresh-Soph level. At times the motion offense works ok. What works best for me is a pattern offense with several options. If i go to the motion 100% it ends up looking like a fire drill….somewhat helter skelter. We get way out of control. it does make for good practice though, when we get back to some structure then our offense works much better.

20. Dale — January 28, 2009 @ 9:24 am

    I coach 7 and 8 boys, and one drill we do is put 5 boys on, in a 1-3-1, then pass the ball around. One by one, I put in a defender until it is 5 on 5. The younger players seem to adjust quite well with the added pressure and seem to keep their composure in game situations. Thanks for the great newsletters!

21. Tom — January 28, 2009 @ 10:09 am

    This is the age old dilema - set plays or concepts and principles. In general, I agree with the concensus of working fundamentals and teaching principles and I have always been a proponent of this. However I do agree with Sportnut and a few of the others that run some plays or continuity offense for a couple of reasons. First, even with the read and react princliples, there are two elements to half court offense that I find critical - they are spacing and relative motion (how all 5 offensive players react and move on the court at any given time). Without some type of structure to the offense, I find these elements are hard to maintain and also challanging for a team that hasn’t been playing together for a long time. If you incorprate plays or continuity, I beleive the key is for players to understand the underlying concept of the offense and where the scoring opportunities are (i.e. overload and attacking gaps against a zone defense) and also have enough freedom to take be able to take advantage of any good scoring opportunity that arises. I am not a fan of rigid offenses that limit scoring opportunities - rather the offense should present options and opportunities for everyone to score.

22. DH — January 28, 2009 @ 1:34 pm

    I coach 11 year old boys and have set offensive plays that are simple.
    The plays are basic fundamentals using the pick and rolls with some
    weakside movement for a second option. I recently introduced a motion offense that has worked realy well. The timing needs to be right and they are getting it slowly. The beauty of it is once the opposition knows the play they begin to cheat. The boys now can read that and go backdoor for
    the easy layup. Of course not all players on the team have caught on, but the more talented ones get it. I feel I need to at least keep intorducing
    new things rather than holding back those who get it.

23. Brad — January 29, 2009 @ 6:05 pm

    I agree, I coach high school basketball and I think the problem with most of the kids I see is they have been told every thing to think and do. When I was a kid we jsut learned to play by spending hours at the local playground. now none of the kids go to the play ground and only play in a structured enviorment. A lot of high school kids cannot SEE the game and only will do what the coach says. I think I need to be a NASCAR spotter and tell each kid “the opening is down the lane now it is on the wing now look baseline” I swear they cannot see it themselves. I spend more time telling them to “play” the game and stop “watching”. I tell them don’t just run the plat be a player

24. Tim — January 30, 2009 @ 11:49 pm

    I teach boys 5th & 6th grade basketball. I tried using set plays which well work agaisnt some teams, But when we played teams that are very good defensively, our set plays didn’t work very well. So the last couple of practises we worked on setting screens, good passing skills and looking for the open man whith alot of movement in & out of the paint, which I believe comes more naturley to them anyway. I think a motion offence is a good one to teach for this age group as long as you stick with the fundamentals and your basic drills.

25. tammy — January 31, 2009 @ 3:10 pm

    Thank you for this advice. I have battled this subject for many years ,while coaching kids 6th grade and younger. It seems many parents and asst. coaches are more interested in flashy uniforms, cool plays and being #1 in popularity. They forget that our youth need fundementals and that is all there is too it. Honestly a player who doesn’t know fundementals looks foolish no matter who they are or what they are wearing! Thank you I feel encouranged again.

26. Hoops — February 4, 2009 @ 4:59 pm

    I think when you teach kids to read and react you are in fact teaching them a play. A good offensive play involves the same concept of being at a certain spot at a certain time and if the pass is not there then go to the next option. This is the the same concept as reading and then reacting. I I believe if a set offense has options then players learn to read react and execute. Most important all players must be reading the same thing and this is the short coming of any offense

27. George — February 13, 2009 @ 11:25 pm

    Couldn’t agree more, I am coaching 6th graders and this year I have practiced exclusively on man to man D, passing, screening and rebounding. We are undefeated and the kids are having fun. They seem to be learning a lot more about the game rather than mechanically trying to step through set plays.

28. Anthony — February 16, 2009 @ 4:50 pm

    I coach 6th grade teams here in Estes Park,CO. we run a 5 out motion–pass-cut–some back cuts and screens-the kids love it–everyone is a point guard. Most teams press-we dont we teach press break—1 ob play with several options–we let the kids call them–9-4 with the smallest enrollment 25 boys in the whole grade.

29. Tad — May 8, 2009 @ 10:51 am

    I have always had small teams and I can’t teach height. I have always gone with run and gun offense and man to man pressure defense. I accentuate the pass. Pass, pass, pass, pass, pass. Beat the defense down the court with passing and get the early shot. This the kids understand.

30. Post Rules For Youth Motion Offense? — September 22, 2009 @ 9:40 am

    [...] Should Youth Coaches AVOID Plays and Patterned Offenses? [...]

31. Terrence — December 8, 2009 @ 10:32 am

    I coach 11 and 12 yr old boys and BEFORE I even teach the principles of screens within the motion offense, I teach them to pass and cut away from the ball. I tell the boys that if we can pass and cut we’ll learn a new option when they’re ready (which is screens). I also tell them that if they continue to go forth and play basketball at higher levels that they will see some form of this offense for the rest of their basketball careers. I’m also working on options within the offense when I see they’re fit to do so. But in my opinion getting open, spacing, and cutting should be instructed before screens.

32. Keith — December 23, 2009 @ 9:28 am

    Joe,

    I work with girls (U11) and teach them to pass and cut to the basket with their heads turned towards the person who receives the pass.

    Also, the girls learned the pick and rolls.

    Basically, that’s it for offense. Most of our points come off pressure defense (m2m) and offensive rebounds.

33. Brian — December 31, 2009 @ 1:47 am

    I have coached MS girls for 10 years. We run a couple of simple motion offenses that do not feature any one player. They deal with cutting to the basket, keeping the ball moving and proper spacing.

    I also coach my daughter’s youth league team and we keep it even simpler. We played a team last year and throughout the game he kept calling out numbered plays. Before the end of the game, he reached #11. Everything was basically for one or two kids. They won, but now those two kids have left the team for some reason and the other kids are clueless. We beat them 24-6 the first game and we didn’t play well because I had a couple sick kids.

    Teach the triangle concept (not Phil Jackson’s triangle offense). Wherever you are on the floor, you should be forming a triangle either with the ball or to help the player with it. Simple and effective.

34. Leilanie — January 19, 2010 @ 10:40 am

    I have coached 5th and 6th grade girls for sometime now, and I discover after the first 2 frustrating years that simple is better. I teach my girls to set up in a 1 3 1 and the high and low post move to the side of the ball and the opposite guard just takes a step towards the free throw line. When the ball is brought back out front we “set” back up. This way they don’t have far to move and they can concentrate on the more important task of, not traveling,not having the ball stripped, making good passed, squaring up to the basket, good shooting form, following their shoots, and crashing the boards.

35. Mary T — February 23, 2010 @ 9:40 am

    My mantra is this: when you get the ball, look to shoot, look to pass, dribble last. With that in mind I teach a 5-out motion offense. They cut and they pass…very simple. I coach 7th grade and our 8th grade coach used the same offense with some modifications. If they remember to pass, cut and fill you have it made. Anything more complicated is an excercise in futility. Happy coaching.

36. Joe — February 23, 2010 @ 9:44 am

    I’ve coached MS and AAU boys for the past 4yrs, and have won several championships along the way. I always have a competitive team and I guess I’ve found the middle ground for both arguments. I spend the first 1.0hr of my practice teaching fundamentals and the next 0.5hr on defense then 0.5hr with set plays run against specific defenses including a simple motion offense. I usually start the season with two or three plays and every practice we run them against each defense. Initially I explain where the weak areas are in the defense and what we want to accomplish with our offense/play. Every practice after that when we go through our offense/plays a different player must go through these explanations. By the end of the year everyone understands where we want to get the ball. They always have the freedom to improvise as long as we get the shot we want. 90% of our points come from good defense (turnovers), and fastbreaks; but when we do need to run a play they run it to perfection almost every time.

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