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!