OT: Coaching Help 2.0

[Gutter King]

Here are my suggestions based on your limited practice schedule. You don’t need set plays but you do need to teach your players how to set a legal screen. You don’t need plays but you should drill two out of bounds under your own basket plays. Set one or two solid screens and you can get some easy baskets from those plays. There’s always a couple of kids who won’t shoot. Make sure everyone shoots in practice. Nothing kills a possession like when the ball is in a kids hands and he’s only looking to pass. Also, I would promote shooting threes. Kids are usually not closely guarded at the three and missed threes result in some random bounces that may allow for additional possessions. If you’re practicing once a week I think it’s easiest teaching zone defenses. I taught my daughter’s 5th grade team a 1-3-1 with a trap in the corners that they learned fairly quickly. Good luck. You’re behind the eight ball with your lack of practice time.

I agree with promoting shooting threes, and I hear A LOT of random people against this...but in reality, they need to build strength so that when they attempt other shots there's less moving parts. This is very important for developing a clean shot early IMO.

You'll have to teach them form simultaneously with building strength, you can't have one without the other. Boys it's less difficult because they have more strength, but I open the shooting stage of practice with three three pointers each, the first of which the highest they can get it. You want to break them from doing the two handed shove, and build their muscle memory with how the trajectory should be. This also allows them to calibrate a little easier.

Otherwise, QDOGs post is probably the best advice in the thread. Just simple effective stuff. Something else to do is if you do have a player willing to drive and shoot, don't forget to instruct another agressive player to crash the weakside glass. 7th/8th grade is mostly about garbage scoring, this is a very simple way to score two or three more baskets a game.

 

[cp176]

You obviously haven't watched a middle school basketball recently. Kids don't need to be told to shoot 3s. They jack them with abandon... and FAR too often.

In our youth program certainly grades 2-6, we used the 3 point line to floor space and to work on entry passes to the post.

 

[Waquoit]

When I was a kid, the good teams all ran some plays.

 

[Hey Adrien!]

This right here. I coached this age level for years with limited practice time. Literally worked on picks, spacing, zone defenses that are not the norm 1-3-1 and 3-2 and junk box and one.

I will never teach zone!

 

[dogpause]

Your athletic director is an idiot. Set plays don't win at the middle school level. Fundamentals do. Honestly, they aren't going to win much at ANY level if you've had 3 practices and 5 games in two months without a freakish athlete or 2 on your team. That means they're only touching a basketball, what, once a week on average? That's absurd. You will simply never win with that kind of schedule unless

Tell him you need practice or games 5 days a week if he wants the program to improve. My one year of middle school we had practice or games 6 days a week. Practices were 2 hours in a full gym. That's how competitive basketball teams work. If he wants to have a rec team, continue to have the kids play or practice 1x per week. He's being moronic. Research shows you need 3-4 practices per game if you want to maximize improvement.

Please feel free to copy and paste this response in an email to him DM me for my extension at work if he wants an AD to AD chat.

It's nice to have a couplefew plays at that level so kids can start to learn how to run plays for high school. But the CONCEPTS are so much more important.

Exactly! When you make the players better, you make the team better. John Wooden worked on fundamentals every day, as do most other successful coaches at all levels. Bad coaches always get caught up in "calling plays". They think the game is about them, and that it makes them look smart.

To the OP, you're in a impossible situation. The lack of practice time severly limits what you can accomplish. I understand that court time is a supply and demand issue, but it's not good for the players, the program, or the coaches.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

I will never teach zone!

The 1-3-1 run as a 3/4 court or half court trap is a great defense for middle schoolers, and a lot of fun for the kids. It is particularly effective if your team is not great because you don't end up in ISO hell like most youth man-to-man defenses do. It has the added bonus of other coaches don't prepare for it.

 

[Chin Diesel]

When I was a kid, the good teams all ran some plays.

The dilemma is 3 practices in 7 weeks.

 

[alphasigko]

Ditto… but you should have out-of-bounds plays. ;^)

So should our Huskies!

 

[husky429]

Exactly! When you make the players better, you make the team better. John Wooden worked on fundamentals every day, as do most other successful coaches at all levels. Bad coaches always get caught up in "calling plays". They think the game is about them, and that it makes them look smart.

To the OP, you're in a impossible situation. The lack of practice time severly limits what you can accomplish. I understand that court time is a supply and demand issue, but it's not good for the players, the program, or the coaches.

Jay Wright and Hurley Sr. are guy I admired for the fundamentals they taught. I went to a coaching clinic they both presented at and I remember Wright explaining that he literally goes back to BASICS on rebounding every single off season.

That guy going to the league? He's doing the same drill you teach a 6th-grade girls team with until he gets it right.

 

[ConnEd]

Press and run. You need easy buckets in the open floor. I like a 1-2-1-1 with your best ballhawk on the third line to intercept the passes over the top and your best on-ball defender up front to harass the ballhandlers into the traps. Press break would be my other top focus since they'll be pressed until they prove they can break it (and score). Both are also fast-paced with everyone involved, so the kids stay tuned-in during practice.

Scoring against set D's, especially zones, is not easy at this level. Teach the basics on offense. Give-and-go and pick-and-roll/pop. You're probably lucky to have one kid that can set a decent screen. Off-ball screens can work, but the kid getting the screen almost never waits for the screen to arrive. Against zones, focus on getting your best scorer to find seams from the weak side while the rest of the kids just move the ball quickly and cut to space.

 

[Northbound]

At your level it’s about fundamentals, realistically you’re making sure that your players have those dialed so the HS coaches don’t have to start at square one.

It’s like HS coaches better make sure their players have fundamentals, effort and an understanding of base concepts. I coached in college (different sport), but it drove me nuts when guys didn’t have basics nailed because it hurt everyone.

I know a lot of HS coaches across sports for my business and they are all involved in 6-8 grade teams in some way. Football they want their pop warner folks running their HS offense, basketball it’s get the fundamentals sorted and stress defense. You get it.

 

[M.S.G.]

You obviously haven't watched a middle school basketball recently. Kids don't need to be told to shoot 3s. They jack them with abandon... and FAR too often.

When I coached middle school ball 10+ years ago, I had a no 3s in games policy (unless absolutely necessary) that the kids and parents hated.. a few parents confronted me.. when one of those kids became a 1,000 point scorer and we won 18 games their junior year all of those were forgotten

Sadly the high school game is 3s and layups now; and you need to adjust to it or be ruined by it.

 

[husky429]

When I coached middle school ball 10+ years ago, I had a no 3s in games policy (unless absolutely necessary) that the kids and parents hated.. a few parents confronted me.. when one of those kids became a 1,000 point scorer and we won 18 games their junior year all of those were forgotten

Sadly the high school game is 3s and layups now; and you need to adjust to it or be ruined by it.

My dad didn't let me shoot 3s until 8th-grade no matter what my coaches said, and I made a D2 roster at 5'10 on a good day. Worked out for me!

I still find the high school game enjoyable because of the defense. It better not go the way of the league

 

[Mr. Wonderful]

Press and run. You need easy buckets in the open floor. I like a 1-2-1-1 with your best ballhawk on the third line to intercept the passes over the top and your best on-ball defender up front to harass the ballhandlers into the traps. Press break would be my other top focus since they'll be pressed until they prove they can break it (and score). Both are also fast-paced with everyone involved, so the kids stay tuned-in during practice.

Scoring against set D's, especially zones, is not easy at this level. Teach the basics on offense. Give-and-go and pick-and-roll/pop. You're probably lucky to have one kid that can set a decent screen. Off-ball screens can work, but the kid getting the screen almost never waits for the screen to arrive. Against zones, focus on getting your best scorer to find seams from the weak side while the rest of the kids just move the ball quickly and cut to space.

You're teaching middle school girls to run and press?

What kind of monster are you?!

 

[Doctor Hoop]

I coached briefly at that level before my daughters gave up basketball. The best course to wins at that level is to focus, in your limited practice time, on defense and rebounding. Get the kids to stay in front of their man, switch on picks, and box out. Those are things that can be learned relatively quickly in practice. Then have them do a lot of shooting games and ball handling - which can be worked on with a defender working the footwork and rebounding. Running plays would be futile without those skills.

Of course having more than 3 practices in 2 months would be beneficial.

 

[M.S.G.]

I had a unique situation last winter, the varsity coach at the high school in district knew his numbers were down and didn’t trust the MS coaches, I was planted in there for a year to work specifically with the 7th and 8th graders, and it paid off - he was able to take FIVE of the now 8th graders for his HS JV team and they are basically the best 5 he has.

Still boggles my mind that HS teams can poach from the MS in district if their numbers were low.

 

[JohnFSilver]

You have to have practice to run plays. You should have plays, not just run Around unorganized, but practice is why you join a team.

When does team Learn about teamwork and work on fundamentals?

 

[Waquoit]

I was on a HS CYO team. We only got the gym for an hour a week. Since it was during the “energy crisis”, the pastor decided we could only use the lights for half the court. And when the guy heard grousing, he decided to audit the collection envelopes for the entire roster. And when it was found out that nobody was handling in collection envelopes, he disbanded the team.

 

[Umami Zen]

My two cents-Your lack of practice time changes everything. If you have good multi-sport athletes on your roster who have decent instincts-I would utilize a press as a weapon to generate offensive opportunities. Wreak some havoc like Shaka did at VCU. Your defense becomes the catalyst for your offense. Rebounding fundamentals would be another focus. Can't score without the ball. Spacing and cutting to the hoop-Simple concepts that are effective at this level.

 

[Hey Adrien!]

My two cents-Your lack of practice time changes everything. If you have good multi-sport athletes on your roster who have decent instincts-I would utilize a press as a weapon to generate offensive opportunities. Wreak some havoc like Shaka did at VCU. Your defense becomes the catalyst for your offense. Rebounding fundamentals would be another focus. Can't score without the ball. Spacing and cutting to the hoop-Simple concepts that are effective at this level.

I forgot to add, our conference only allows press for the last two minutes of the fourth quarter, but we've tried a little bit of halfcourt trap too (with mixed results, and we'd need more practice to really get that right.

One thing we've really gotten better at is transitioning to offense after causing turnovers or grabbing defensive rebounds...unfortunately the transition offense is still a work in progress! The team can't make shots, but actually move very well without the ball during half-court possessions.

Long story short is you have an open roster and have little practice time. Oh yeah, it's also middle school. Are the kids safe? Are they learning about basketball? Do they support each other? Are they respectful to you, the officials, the opponent and the game? The more of those questions which get answered "yes", the better you are as a coach.

The answers to all questions are "yes", which explains why I guess I'm a really good coach for this age/level of basketball and thank you for saying that.

Being at a small school with no tryouts, it's really about the luck of the draw of the kids you've got. Over the last nearly three seasons, my guess my overall record is something like 3-21, but I actually have an undefeated season under my belt -- we had a kid who ended up playing D3 basketball, another kid who ended up a starting G for an LL CT public school and then a bunch of other kids that profile the kids I typically get: athletic kids, most of which are not from the USA, but work hard and are good teammates. If I wanted to, I could have won every game by 25, lol. About 97% of the parents are super cool too...there's one dad this season who isn't thrilled with our "lack of development", but I'm at an age where I can respectfully shoo off that bad juju.

A lot of my practices have focuses of "non-negotiables" that I might notice in a game that has nothing to do with skill. For example, on Thursday, we were completely out-rebounded, so basically I'm going to split the roster into three groups (three hoops available for practice) and have one kid practice shooting jumpers for 2 minutes each while the remaining students fight for rebounds. Two points for every made basket, but then one point for every secured rebound, no matter which team gets it.

 

[alphasigko]

I was on a HS CYO team. We only got the gym for an hour a week. Since it was during the “energy crisis”, the pastor decided we could only use the lights for half the court. And when the guy heard grousing, he decided to audit the collection envelopes for the entire roster. And when it was found out that nobody was handling in collection envelopes, he disbanded the team.

I am sure that you were shocked at the time, looking back, are you still shocked? I wager NOT!

 

[mauconnfan]

Oh sorry thought this was started by Dan Hurley in regards to inbounding the ball, my bad!

 

[uconnfan68]

Honestly, with that little practice? A BOB or SLOB shouldn't even be a concern. Just show the kids to stack and wing it.

How’s that working?

 

[husky429]

How’s that working?

I never coached a team that practiced once every two weeks, nor did I coach 11-year-olds who don't actually play basketball. So I'm not quite sure.

"Stack and wing it" is better than 5/6 of the BOBs that Hurley drew up yesterday, though.

 

[uh-no]

legit thought this thread was gonna be someone "asking" for help drawing up inbounds plays