get the most out of my star player

I was thinking of that as an EXTRA work out... more like a controlled scrimmage so both teams can get something out of it.

My second year at the high school level I got the best job in the district... head sophomore boys coach... no scouting if I didnt want to and always with the varsity and on the bench. Learned a lot.... I had a pretty good team and the Varsity coach wanted to scrimmage us.... he asked me during the srimmage if we always played that way.. I asked him what he meant... he said, so physical.... the answer was yes.... but we played a little tougher against them becuase they were a very good team... won 21 games, they would have killed us otherwise... we held our own.

I get what you mean. I might arrange it one day indeed.

That's a nice example! Have you seen it back in other games after the scrimmage?

What I see is my players knowing how to handle the situation without showing any panic..... kind of like, been there, done that, AND corrected it too. :-)

We ran our press offense EVERY day for at least 10 minutes.... we never panicked, we just went about methodically attacking it or just beating it to get into our offense.

http://www.212movie.com/ Check this out -

Oke! That's great stuff!

Last night I talked to the kid we talked about earlier. He agreed with me that he can be a more valueable player for the team than he is right now. I told him I'd like him to be more of a leader on court. Positively (he used to comment on a negative way to his teammates) coach his teammates on court. He also gets frustrated to much during the game. He had no idea that because the other players look up to him that much, that it effects the whole team when he gets frustrated. I told him to focus on defense and on minimize turnovers. I think he understood what I was telling him. Tomorrow is our next game, I will keep you posted on how he responds to the conversation during the game.

Good luck, I hope it works out for both of you.

Maybe you can talk to him about Sports in general .... things don't always go the way we want them to.... in sports and definately in life. Its all about how we handle things. He needs to understand that they will follow his lead, IF he gets frustrated and down, so will his teammates. When things get tough, IF he steps up his game and is positive, they will follow that too. Thats what leaders do.

Anyone can lead or play when things are going well, its what you do when things are going south that counts. I used to coach football too.... one year the freshman team had the other team down at their 5 yard line, they ran a play - 95 yards and a touchdown. The following year I became the head Sophomore coach... same team, same situation, same results..... I just shook my head and said... OK, NOW WE ARE GOING TO SEE WHAT WE ARE MADE OF! They responded well and we won the game easily.

He needs to relax and have some FUN..... its a game.... not life or death. PLAY HARD, PLAY SMART, and HAVE FUN. IF he is not having fun, he needs to try something else. He needs to have confidence in himself and the team.

Here is something to show that boy -

"Like life, basketball is messy and unpredictable. It has its way with you, no matter how hard you try to control it. The trick is to experience each moment with a clear mind and open heart. When you do that, the game--and life--will take care of itself."

Phil Jackson

We are now 2 weeks later. I had a good word with the kid and he understands his role. For the first time this season we played against a more difficult team. We are very effective in playing against m2m. The first quarter the opponent played m2m and we won that one 22-10. But the other three quarters they played a zonedefense, luckily our fast break worked pretty well. But when they set the zone, we had a lot of difficulty to score. Until the kid we discussed earlier stood up. With 20 points he lead the team to a win of 8 points. Because of his drive he played out the zone. He found the gap in the zone himself and kept on scoring. I gave him a very important role in our 1-3-1 trapping zone, where he is the one 1 in the bucket who needs to coach everyone when they don't rotate the right way. And he did that very good too. The trapping zone in the 3e quarter gave us a run of 11 points to win the game.

I think I can say I'm on the good path in making him a better player. I think if we had played this game a couple of weeks ago, he would yell at his players in the team instead of coaching them.

Remember this.... Life - like Basketball is a JOURNEY and not a DESITNATION. Every day is a learning situation, and hes a young kid, be patient, show him the way - be his role model.

I tried to explain this to a little guy I know, he gets very frustrated when things don't go well for him in certain things he does... I told him to watch college players and Pros, you don't see them getting angry, that is counter productive... it takes away from your game and you lose focus.... not sure I got thru to him but hes 11. I will keep reminding him of this.

Good luck and keep up the good work him and your team. By the way, it wont be long before the word gets around that it will be hard to play YOUR team m2m.... spend a little more time with your zone offense.

Thanks. I am working on our zone offense. After talking to a few other coaches and looking at the forum here I got a pretty good picture of how te play the zone offense. But thanks for the tip!

Let us know how it goes.

Against a zone offense I want to play with 2 guards (1 &2), 1 high post (4), 1 low post (5) and one player who plays just between the bucket and the corner (3).

Against a 2-3 zone I want the guard with the ball to chose a side. He will attrack one of the front two players of the zone. The high post can post up against the second and can be passed the ball. On the moment he gets the ball I want the low post to be in front of his man (the timing needs to be good on that one). So when the high post gets the ball, he can go to the basket, the middle man will step to him, he can pass it off to the low post or to the 3. If he is forced to get the ball on his outside hand, he steps out and the man passing the ball cuts inside by cutting over his man and rotates with the other guard. The other guard comes over the top and if the defender goes with the cutter, the high post and the rotating guard can play 2-1 to get inside to go themselve or pass it to the low post or the 3. My 3's have a good baseline drive and can shoot, so that's a good option too. This offense is also very effective against a 2-1-2 zone. It is all about timing and working hard to get in the spot you want to be. Last game we played it too. It was a very bad opponent, we won 105-8. But the trained the zone offense so we learned again from it.

I will let you know how it develops in the other games.

One college coach told me that attacking zones was very simple... " PUT EM WHERE THEY AINT " Make sure your players are in passing lanes.

I don't agree, if zone offense was very simple, why have we got so much problem attacking one, and when we play against the same team in m2m we are much better?

My goal in offense is creating a 1-0 situation and I only have one shooter, because of that I want to have a 1-0 situation near the glass. If you play in the spots where there is no one, you can only shoot. I want to play my offense and not playing the offense the defense wants me to play. I want to control the flow of the game, not give the initiative to the other team.

It sounds simple... but it really is.... being in passing lanes helps the person with the ball make a good pass... the person with the ball has to attack the zone, force two people to cover him or at least move towards him leaving another player open. Now, how do you break a zone... have a GREAT outside shooter (3s), Have a stud inside that can post people up and score over them IF he can get the ball... or a good point guard who can break down their coverages.

But, thats what makes this such a great game.... some like the Dribble Drive, some like 4 out or 3 out motion... some like the Open Post (like me) and a whole variety of offenses. Pick the one that you like the best and works well for your players.

He there,

I would like to tell you how everything goes right now to let you know if the tips and tricks you guys told me worked or not.

The player we discussed earlier has grown in his play. He became a true teamplayer and haven't asked several games how much points he scored. He only was concerned about winning the game. He broke down a zone defense to win a game and wants his team to play good. One thing that makes it all easier to do for him is that we are winning nearly all the games with big numbers. From 22 January on we play in a higher poule, I'm very curious if he can keep up this leadership in more difficult times.

Coach Sar gave me the tip to arrange a friendly game against the U18 team (I coach a U16 team) to finally get some real opposition. Well I did and we lost, but we didn't lose big, and for the first time we had to play our real offense, because the defense was better then the other teams we played against. It gave me the opportunity to see a lot of points that need to be improved. So it was a very good tip coach Sar!

In the competition we have won all the games and are winterchampions, as we call it. I'm very proud of it. The team is very aggressive (in a good way) in defense so I want to experiment more with traps. I'd like to pop up a new question about trapping. There are a lot of moments to trap. I heard a couple now, for example trapping the man who got the ball after the first inboundpass (in full court man 2 man), or trap the wing on the moment the ball is passed from the guard to the wing. My question is if you guys know any other traps (as creative and unexpected as possible) in man 2 man defense.

I'm glad to hear that things are going well and that you got some valuable experiences from playing the U18 team - You had NOTHING to lose and everything to gain.... it had to show your guys what areas they needed to work on and the better the opponent the harder you need to play.... for the ENTIRE GAME. I'm also glad that your young player has seen the light and become a true team player. IF he handled himself well vs the 18 team he should be just fine vs better talent at your level...... that doesn't mean that you will win every game but at least he is growing as a player.

Times and places we liked to trap -

1- 1st pass from the ball being inbounded under our basket.
2- 1st pass to the wing from the point guard.
3- IF they dribble over half court near the sideline (my favorite)
4- Deep Corners
5- If they dribble baseline - around the short corner ( especially if it is a shorter player... and take advantage of which side and that players prominent hand - right handed player / right side - it helps to take away the pass to the right because of the basket being there )
6- We always doubled the post unless he wasnt much of a theat

One key is to vary where you trap and when... don't let them go to school on what you do ALL the TIME.

My question than is, how do you communicate this. Because if you trap let's say the first pass to the wing from the point guard, than the weakside forward needs to step in and the defender of the forward needs to make sure his man won't get down the sideline before the trap is completed. But how do you communicate this to the team? And who initiates the trap?

This is something that you work on in practice and have a call for it... use numbers if you like.... but everyone has to be on the same page so you get good rotation.

***** You don't have to do it all the time either... maybe first few trips to begin the game, coming out of a qtr or time out.

Things we did all the time because the kids wanted to.

Trap the ball over half court if it was on the sideline... a perfect spot - baseline drive short corner - double the post - These were automatics.

As for the rest, you need to have a call for these *****

How do you work on this in practice? Breakdowndrills for trapping or just repeat the situation on and on?

Definitely break down drills so the kids know EXACTLY what you want them to do and what your rotations are.

The trap just over half court was the easiest for us becuase it was part of our press package.... 1-2-2 ..... and they knew that we would always look for the trap just over half court so we didn't have to make a call for that.

Baseline short corner... if we got beat there we had to step out and stop that so we just made that an automatic trap spot also.....

Doubling the post was automatic too....

Drills these things because your players need to know that you want this and this is how we are going to do it... then as you scrimmage / work on your defense or offense you let them utilize what you have taught.....

My suggestion is to teach one at a time - don't add another until you are sure they understand the first one and can execute it well... otherwise they will lose confidence in trapping and might not try very hard. JMO As you add one at a time it will end up as your trapping package.