Need some help. My first year coaching and I am coaching a 2nd-3rd grade team. Best ball handler(age 8 and first year playing) has difficulty slowing the ball down and passing to open players. He dribbles down and looks to shoot rather than passing. I think part of it is inexperience and part of it is excitement. My other problem is that he is my son and I am having difficulty dealing with the coach/Dad issue. I try to correct him as a coach, but I feel like he thinks that I am being hard on him as a Dad. I want to teach him, but also want him to enjoy playing. Any help/advice would be appreciated.

Tough age group to begin with.... and then add the dad / coach thing...... when you are on the floor, you are the coach... off the floor, you are DAD... make sure he knows the difference and that you just want to make him better. After practice or games, take him out for ice cream or a pizza and DON'T bring up basketball unless HE does. Don't mix the two or he will get confused as to how to react to your teaching.

NOW, with that age group..... teach them to pass and catch the ball, simple pass and cut offense and then let them have fun. This should be your #1 GOAL - HAVE FUN.

Run some simple drills.... dribble, come to a jump stop and shot fake and / or pass fake and then pass the ball. Do this from half court at first so they don't get out of control.

One dribbling drill I always use is to have each player performing a dribbling fundamental (can be stationary or moving) and I will hold up a couple fingers and the player has to tell me how many I am holding up. This helps condition them to dribble with their heads up.

As far as coaching your own kid, I am in that same boat. It's his third year playing, my second coaching. If you have an assistant coach, a good idea might be to split into groups during a few drills and make sure your son goes with the AC. Maybe hearing the same message from a different messanger can help.

Also agreed, treat him as any other player and make sure he treats you as any other coach. Try to remember that being harder on him is still showing him favoritism.

You need to watch this DVD. It will clear up the challenges you see and completely change your perspective for the better:
http://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/pr/bigelow-youth-right-way.html

BTW, if he thinks you are being too hard on him then you probably are. Part of learning is making mistakes. Coaching your own child is hard. Let him make mistakes. He will learn with experience. This isn't the nba. It's youth basketball which is meant to be fun. Easy for us adults (including me) to forget that. Steve Nash didn't begin playing basketball until he was 13. Michael Jordan stunk when he was a sophomore in high school and didn't get good until later. Same thing with Bill Russell. Same thing with Bob Bigelow (author of the DVD above and former NBA player). This list goes on.

Don't worry too much at this age. If they have fun, learn to enjoy the game, and learn a couple basic skills, you are in really good shape.

Also, let other kids handle the ball. How do you expect the other players to get good at dribbling if the coaches son is the only player bringing it up? I made this mistake when I coached too. You never know who will be good in the future and the big kids need to learn dribbling skills too.

I think you need to look at 3 things here.

You are a Dad. Are you a coach or are you a Dad who is coaching? How much training and experience do you have? Unless the answer is "a lot" you should not worry so much about technical stuff and realize that he is a young child who wants to have fun. Let him without getting in the way.

Next, you are HIS Dad. That is the toughest job in basketball. The most experienced coaches have difficulty with that (see Bobby Knight, Eddie Sutton, Al McGuire). Let him have fun without you getting in the way. If you are having "coach/Dad" issues, YOU have to adjust. You are the mature one. DO NOT EXPECT HIM TO BE ABLE TO EMOTIONALLY UNDERSTAND AND ACCEPT THE AMBIGUITY OF ROLES WHEN HE IS 8 YEARS OLD!!!

Lastly, in your own words, "age 8 and first year playing." Be patient. I think it will be at least a couple of weeks before he turns into Derrick Rose.

Being and coach and a dad is almost impossible. It is not fair to you or to the kid. However, it is also a great experience if you both handle it right. You need coaching time and dad time. One thing I suggest is to make some time just to shoot around -- Dad and Son -- no coaching. Very hard to do.

As for getting him to pass. It will take a lot of work, but explain to him how important it is. Set some rules -- ie; if he has an open lane, then drive/shoot. If not, he needs to look to pass.

Good luck.

First thanks for the feedback and here is some of my own......

I have no formal training to be a coach; however, from an experience standpoint, I played organized ball from 6th grade thru college intramural teams. I have played all positions thru my career. I did not put myself forward to act as a coach, I was asked during the day of sign ups to coach a team. Given the choice between a team not having a coach or myself trying to fill the role, I thought the latter was best. I have the knowledge of the game, now I just need to work on how to convey it and what to convey to the age group that I am working with.

I do have other individuals on my team who act as point guard as well, so I am not limiting the experience to any one player. I was/am just having difficulty trying to get my son to pass the ball off to other open individuals and was looking for a little advice on ways to foster change.

Take care.

Hes so young I would hate to impose any rules on him... its about fun right now.... but, maybe you can tell him that you would like him to make ONE pass before he takes a shot?

Coaching and dealing with different situations comes from experience... what worked for me might not work for you... and you are working with very young kids so be patient with them and yourself.

Your son's issues are not basketball related, they are chiold development related. You seem to be evaluating to much too high a standard. You have an image of what basketball should be but your image should be what an 8 year old should be.

Do you hold his hand when he crosses the street? Why? Could it be that he does not yet have enough life experience to determine the closure rate of the on coming cars?

Why aren't 8 year olds allow to drive cars? Is it because they have not yet developed the coordination and critical thinking skills necessary to make the decisions needed to drive safely?

Why would it be different in basketball. He doesn't know how to dribble but you want him to pass to an open man. He looks down when he dribbles - he's probably looking for his feet.

You can't see it because your life experience is getting in the way. No matter how slow it looks, the game is moving at a million miles per hour to him. Leave him alone and let him adapt. Find realistic things to teach him. He has to learn to dribble before he learns to find the open man and pass it to him when he is dribbling.

I will share a story. I was conducting a camp for kids. My young assistant who knew everything there is to know about basketball was reffing the game between 8-9 year olds. Every 5 seconds I heard a whistle and he called 3 seconds. I said, "John, stop blowing the whistle and let the kids play>' He said to me, "How will the learn what 3 seconds is if I don't call it?" I told him, "First teach them what the lane is, then teach them the purpose of the lane, then teach them what 3 seconds is, then when you are sure they understand all that, you can call 3 seconds."

It was out of his realm of possibility that 8 and nine year olds did not know what the lane was and couldn't recite the 3 second rule.

On your team, you have NO point guards (forwards or centers for that matter either). You have 8 year olds who only want to play and have fun. They don't want to learn the game, they just want to know what the game is. Once they figure that out, then, they can learn the game