These practice sample and all the drill I have learned are the best. Beats any other website and it was one of the best decisions to become a member .

Thanks a lot. A blessing indeed.

what is carioca, can you explain it to me please. love the site.

Hi Clara,

The player runs laterally. If going to the left, the player crosses the right foot over the left in front of the body, then behind the body. The torso should remain facing straight ahead.

No scrimmage? Our girls love to have a 4 or 5-player scrimmage and we always give them 15 to 25 minutes with minimal stoppage or structure. How do other youth coaches see this?

Hi Mike,

This is just a sample practice. Not something I use everyday. Sometimes, I'll run a scrimmage with minimal stoppage.

However, if you look closer at the sample schedule, the last 35 minutes of the practice is basically a semi-controlled scrimmage to help teach the players. However, you don't want to stop practice for every little mistake to correct. Only the reoccurring mistakes.

I have a question for you (5 & 6th grade girls )coaches. On a traveling team at this age level how competitive do you really need to be.

Hi Rebecca,

Focus should be on fun, fundamentals, and life lessons. At this age, sometimes, I wish they would turn off the scoreboard. Not for the players, for the coaches.

I would take a look at this article. It goes into more detail. http://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/coaching/developmental-league.html

It will be posted in our newsletter on March 10th.

I'm coaching a 12 and under boys team and our practices are limited to 1 hour. I really love the drills and ideas but, how can I fit all of these into our practices?

i need 2 things the first how to defence the tall and big man like shakil onnel if i was short for shakel . another quesion i need teaching film about defence and offence to see it and thanks to all.

Hello Joe,
This is a great site!
I live just outside of Toronto and I can't believe some of the stuff I see from coaches at tournaments for young kids. My son is 9 and a few weeks ago his coach actualy yelled at him for taking a jump shot from 10ft. It made him cry and when I heard about it from my wife I was furious.
There is far too much emphasis on winning and not enough on skill development. You see the same players bringing up the ball time after time even though there is a half court rule on defense.
Imagine at the age of 9 you are already telling 8 or 9 kids that we don't think you are good enough to handle the ball. That is pretty much the message when a kid is told to play the wing shift after shift and barely touches the ball during a game.
Our system dictates that coaches go through a certification process before they can coach at the rep level but the problem is the coaches don't have accountability for their behaviour. It's no wonder kids quit and move on to other activities.
Have agreat day!
Terry

TL -
1 hour is tough to get everything in and with kids this age its even tougher because fundamentals are so important now.
Make a weekly plan of what you need to work on and then separate them to daily tasks.

Terry -
That coach should be laying brick somewhere and NOT working with young kids. Its his job to teach them HOW to play, teach fundamentals and especially at this age... for them to have FUN. Good luck, I hope you can find a better situation for your son.

thanks for your jenerouse .you help me for the drills what i need.i need the program for training to the players from 11 to 15 yearseold if this program yearly or seasenly ... i need it please and thanks for your interest

Hi,

My name is Sabrina and this will be my second year coaching. I was an assistant coach for a high school boys team and a head coach for a boys middle school team. I am about to coach a rec team for 17 and under boys and I have a couple of questions. 1) When you warm up boys that age, is it necessary to go through ball handling drills like the ones listed above and if not what will be good exercises for them. 2) Because it is rec ball and there is no pre-season preparation is it important to include agility exercises within the practice and 3) what would be some good advice about coaching young men at that age level?

The reason for these questions are because I do not want my practices to seem elementary to my guys but at the same time I do not want to miss an opportunity to help develop certain players in all areas assuming that at this point its certain things they should already know.

1) You can use those drills above if it fits your team. Otherwise, we have plenty of ball handling drills and tips here: http://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/fundamentals/ballhandling.html

2) That's up to you. If you want to include speed and agility exercises. This is a great resource for drills: http://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/pr/Alan-Stein-130-Speed-Reaction-Drills.html

3) We have plenty of coaching advice on this website. Go through the left-hand menu and you will find plenty of helpful information.

I am coaching 8th grade girls basketball. Recently we had two scrimmages; we blew out the first, but lost to the second team. My girls revealed more confidence in effort in the first scrimmage, but looked defeated in the second one. After reviewing your plays and advice, I found some helpful tips for success in this coaching season, but I still feel as though im missing something. I feel like I dont have enough time to teach all that my girls need to know. What can I try to improve upon?

Sherrie - You will never feel like you have enough time to teach your players what they need to know. Coaches at all levels (youth to NBA) have that issue. It's just part of the job. That's why you need to constantly prioritize and focus on the critical things. I heard this quote from a Dell CEO once and it always resonated with me... "Focus on the critical few versus the trivial many". This was one of his keys to success.

Remember, these are just 8th graders and the most important things are to teach fundamentals, prepare them for high school basketball, prepare them for life (teach life lessons), set a good example, and have fun. Wins and losses don't indicate the success of your season. You won't be able to measure how successful your season was until years later and you see what type of impact you had on your players. So don't get too caught up in wins and losses. Good luck!

Hi Jeff,

I am glad I found this site and appreciate your views to what should be taught at this age. I coach a 7th and 8th grade girls middle school team and find that the girls always respond better when I tell them to ignore the scoreboard and focus on the little successes during the game. Wins are good, but at this level it is seeing the smiles on their faces when they achieve the small goals we set for game regardless of the score.

Thanks again for this site and keep up the good work.

The problem with youth basketball is three things: 1.) The parent or guardian who has no idea what he's doing coaching his son and thinks his son should get all of the shots. 2.) The parent who has no idea what basketball is and thinks little johnny has to take every shot. 3.) No certified coaches who teach the fundamentals.

I am a 22 year old who wants to be a collegian coach after getting my degree. I have been coaching youth basketball for 6 years now and it always seems like one parent has to question what I do or complain about something. I have compiled a record of about 75-30 winning back to back county championships and an intermural championship as well......... thats not the point......... I have had about 10 of my players go on and start at the high school level, both Varsity and JV including 1 going on to play Division 1 next year. I teach nothing but the fundamentals and we spend ZERO time scrimmaging. We get about an hour and half a week so there is no time to scrimmage. I make it very fun for the kids running similar drills to the above article. The site is very helpful and please keep up the good work. Parents PLEASE let us do our job and keep all of your unhelpful comments to yourself!!!!!!

Hi,

I was wondering where I could get more information on how to do these warm ups you are talking about, such as bear crawl and defensive shuffle.


Thanks!

Leticia

thanks jeff and joe for everythink.. we need this program but is that for everyday to use it or what ...tell me please and thanksssssss

What if you only have an hour an 15 minutes twice a week?

Fran, here is a helpful article that you can take a look at: http://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/blog/index.php/coaching-youth-basketball-with-limited-time-1-practice-a-week/

Hey,
I am coaching a group of 11-12 year olds, but as I train them straight after school, we only get 45 minutes at best to practice. What are the most important drills to work. Also, I have three guys who are keen to learn post moves, yet as I play guard myself, I am ignorant to any particular moves other than the up-and-under. Can anyone help me with this?
Thankyou for this, it will really help out our team who just want to get better, even with an 18-0 record.

Kobe,

Check out the link in the previous comment for some ideas on short practice times. I would spend most of my time on fundamentals in the context of my offense and defense. You can also work on offense and defense at the same time. For example, have one coach watch offense and the other watching defense. You could practice basket cuts and half court motion, while the defense if focusing on positioning, etc.

For fundamentals I would spend most time on ballhandling, footwork, and shooting. I would try to mult-task. For example, work on down screens (getting open and a piece of your offense), footwork, and shooting at the same time.

For post moves I would teach the footwork from this ebook:
http://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/pr/post-play.html

This footwork in that ebook translates to perimeter moves. So everyone learns the exact footwork and you save a lot of time.

I would also incorporate man to man defensive fundamentals as well. Again multi task. Man to man is a fundamental that will really help the players and improve their athleticism.

too long ...we only get 1 hour, once a week

For those of you that have a very short time to practice... I feel for you.... like Jeff & Joe say, there is NEVE enough time to practice..... bottom line... make it FUN.

I used to have a saying with my players
" TAKE CARE OF THE LITTLE THINGS AND THE BIG THINGS WILL TAKE CARE OF THEMSELVES. "

That goes for coaches too.... take care of the most important things... teach a lot of fundamentals and then, let them play.