Use this great rule for your team that I picked up from Alan Stein:
Do not allow players to bend over and put their hands on their knees when they’re tired. If so, discipline with some conditioning.
Have you ever tried this when you’re tired? It’s tough, and it’s supposed to be. This little intangible will help tremendously in building your team’s mental toughness.
Not to mention, it messes with the opposing team’s psyche if you never look like you’re tired.
This is a short video taken from the Nike National Skills Academy. Kevin Eastman who is an assistant coach for the Boston Celtics is shown throughout the video. If you look closely, you’ll also notice players like Kevin Durant, Kevin Love, Derrick Rose, Sherron Collins, and other great players from their high school days that are currently at the collegiate level and in the NBA.
4 Ball Handling Tips From the Video:
1. Hold position, be strong
Too often, many players let a little contact throw them off their game. The first drill in the video is meant to get players to handle the ball and maintain their ground through contact.
2. Crossover outside your knee
In the video, Coach Eastman says to cross outside your knee to keep it more game-like. It’s crucial to do this, because it keeps the ball away from the defender after you cross over.
3. Use eyes to sell fakes
Eyes up to shot fake – Before you shoot the ball, you usually look at the rim. By looking at the rim, this helps sell your shot fake because the defensive player thinks you are about to shoot. When I played, I rarely pump faked. I aggressively set my feet, focused on the rim, and put the ball in shooting position. By putting the ball in my shooting position and aggressively setting my feet, I could often drive by defenders, because they would often close out too hard or jump because it looked like I was going to shoot. If they did not close out hard, I pulled up for the jump shot.
Eyes down to shoot – If you put your eyes down, the defensive player thinks you are going to drive and that may cause the defender to give you some cushion which opens up the jump shot.
4. Get out of your comfort zone
In order to get better, it’s crucial to challenge yourself and make mistakes. To me, this is one of the biggest problems with youth and high school players. Too many players are worried about how they look when they practice. That was one of my biggest problems in high school as well. I didn’t like to make mistakes, so I never pushed myself outside of my comfort zone.
If you practice only things that are comfortable, then you will never improve very much.
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