Drills
Fifty practice drills from the coaches who teach them, each drawn as its own play with the setup, the sequence, the coaching points, and a video or article to go deeper.
One-hand form shooting from two or three feet, the first thing I do at every workout and the first drill I teach a young player. Why it works: there is no…
A shooting game against an imaginary pro: a make is one point for the shooter and a miss is two for the pro, first to twenty-one. Why it works: the consequence…
Archie Miller's Celtic Drill, also called the Bird drill: five spots across the arc, a two-minute clock, and the shooter has to make two in a row at a spot…
Nine spots sweeping the arc from the right corner to the left corner, two shots at each: a three for three points, then a shot fake, one dribble, and a…
Elbow to elbow shooting, in the three-player two-ball Knight version with a one-minute clock: the shooter runs from elbow to elbow, a passer in the free throw…
Three players, one ball, two wings: shoot, chase your shot, pass to the next shooter, and sprint out to close out on him. Why it works: every rep is a two-way…
Three players, two balls, one minute: a shooter runs wing to wing, a passer at the free throw line feeds him every time he arrives, and a rebounder keeps the…
Two chairs stand in for down screens at each elbow extended, and a line at the top of the key takes turns cutting off them: curl, pop, flare, or backdoor on the…
Five spots in a star: right corner, left wing, right wing, left corner, top, and the shooter sprints the long diagonals between them, catching and shooting at…
Coach's Clipboard's team free throw competition: at the end of practice, when everyone is tired, the team splits between two baskets with the score set tied…
The two-minute handle warmup: pound dribbles, kills, the figure 8, the spider, and the crossover, each for thirty to sixty seconds with a ball in every hand on…
Two-ball handling on the move: a line of chairs down each lane of the full court, the first player dribbles two balls up the floor and makes the called move at…
Change of direction at pace: a player dribbles two hard dribbles at a forty-five degree angle, plants the outside foot, crosses over low, and goes two dribbles…
The game sequence rehearsed: approach the defender at speed, make the move at his reach, accelerate past him, and finish. Why: cone courses teach moves but not…
George Mikan's drill: layup right-handed off the left foot, catch the ball out of the net before it drops, land on the other side of the rim, layup left-handed…
The layup lines every team runs, done right. A shooting line beyond the arc at the right wing, a rebounding line beyond the arc at the left wing, two balls. The…
Five cones just outside the three-point line, right corner, right wing, top, left wing, left corner, and a player who starts under the rim with the ball…
Two minutes, twenty-two made layups, left hand only: half the team at each baseline to the right of the lane, the first two players at each end with a ball, and…
Five lines at the points of a star, top, two wings, two baseline spots, one ball, and a pass that goes across the star every time: top to left wing, left wing…
Four lines in a square around the key, two at the baseline corners and two at the sideline extended from the top of the arc, a ball at the front of each. All…
The weave from half court, three passes to a layup: the middle player passes to a wing and sprints behind him, that wing passes across to the other wing and…
The first two seconds of transition: a coach shoots from the free throw line, the two rebounders on the blocks call shot and box out the offensive rebounders…
The shell is where I teach the three relationships every man defense lives on: on the ball, one pass away in deny, two passes away on the help line. The offense…
The closeout is the most repeated defensive action in a game, which is why I drill it until it is a reflex. Setup: three lines of defenders under the basket…
Five cones around the arc and one defender who closes out to each one in turn. Five full closeouts and five box-outs in under a minute with no passer needed…
Shell exposes the help-to-closeout sprint but rarely isolates it, which is why I run this 2v2 version on its own. Setup: two offense on opposite wings, two…
Pure footwork for staying in front of the ball, which is why Jim Boone's pack-line course lists it as a core drill. Setup: five cones in a zig-zag up one third…
Every scheme depends on one defender containing one dribbler, which is why I run this full court and why it tells me who my best on-ball defender is. Setup…
This installs the deny stance and the jump-to-the-ball habit the shell drill assumes, which is why I teach it before shell. Setup: three stationary offense at…
This drill is the difference between stopping the ball and leaving your man, which is why every pack-line program has a version of it. Setup: 3v3, one ball, the…
Players will not take a charge in a game until the fear of the fall is gone, which is why this drill exists. Setup: a line of offense on the right wing with a…
A team needs at least two ball screen coverages so the offense cannot predict the read, and drop is the one I install first, which is why it is the one drawn…
The box-out pivot and the hold, isolated from everything else. Why it works: there is no shot to watch and no rebound to chase, so the only thing a defender can…
The toughness drill. A coach shoots, the defense hits and rebounds, the offense crashes, and whoever gets it plays live until the defense owns the ball. Why it…
One player, one ball, and the pursuit footwork rebounding demands. Why it works: throwing the ball high off the glass at an angle makes the player chase it…
The simplest game-realistic rebounding rep: closeout, shot, contact, pursue, outlet. Why it works: the shot is live and the shooter wants his miss back, so the…
The box-out linked to the first pass of the break, the step most rebounding drills skip. Why it works: a rebounder who has to find an outlet before he lands…
The classic numbers-advantage read, with transition defense and conditioning built in. Why it works: the ball handler has to make a defender commit before he…
The staple conditioner that keeps a whole roster moving through constant 3-on-2 reads and outlet passes. Why it works: nobody stands in a line; every rebound…
Lane discipline and the secondary-break spots, installed before a single defender gets added. Why it works: five players with no defense have no excuse for a…
Transition defense when the numbers are wrong, which is when it actually gets tested. Why it works: two defenders have to touch the end line before they…
Tempo, pass-ahead habits, and conditioning in one timed, countable block. Why it works: the clock and the target make the pace honest, and the only way to hit…
The post breakdown I run first every season. A post player gets a baseline move, a middle counter, and a step-through counter from the same two-foot stop, and…
Post scoring is decided before the catch. This drill isolates that position battle, which is why I use it more than any finishing drill. Two posts, two coaches…
Jack Sikma's inside pivot gives a face-up to bigs who cannot shoot over their shoulder. Every face-up series is built on that footwork, which is why I teach it…
Youth and high school teams lose post possessions because the passer freezes after the entry. This drill makes pass and move a habit, which is why it is in my…
The most common two-man action in the game, which is why I break it in two. The 2v0 teaches the footwork and the 2v2 teaches the two reads that decide…
Every motion and floppy offense depends on the cutter reading the man chasing him. The chair isolates that read, which is why I run it before any screening is…
The flare is the hardest off-ball screen to guard and the easiest to run badly. The chair fixes the shooter's angle and timing, which is why I use it before a…
The counter that punishes a hedge or a switch. It teaches screeners to read their own defender, which is why it is mixed into every ball-screen breakdown I run…
Traveling calls and freezing on the catch are the two biggest youth problems. This drill works on both in five minutes a practice, which is why it opens every…
The game that forces vision and change of pace under a chase without the coach ever saying head up. That is why it beats any stationary dribbling drill for…
The first offensive concept a youth team should own, which is why it is the first thing I teach after footwork. Pass, then cut to the basket, and expect the…
Four lines at one basket, one at each elbow and one at each wing, a ball at the front of every line, and on go the first player in each line shoots. Make it and…
Four groups, four lines just outside the arc, two per side, and every turn is three shots in a row: a three, a mid-range jumper from outside the key, and a shot…
Knockout, also called Lightning or Elimination: one line at the free throw line, two balls with the first two players. The first player shoots a free throw; the…
Rick Pitino's partner shooting race: pairs with one ball, five spots across the arc, and at every spot each partner takes three shots in a row, a drive and…
The three passes every player needs, thrown in pairs before practice: the chest pass, the bounce pass, and the two-hand overhead, ten each, then the one-hand…
A full-court long-pass and finishing drill: lines in opposite baseline corners, a player at each high post, three balls. The first player dribbles out of the…
Reaction and lateral footwork before there is a ball to worry about, which is why Jr. NBA uses the mirror as a first defensive drill and why I warm up with it…
Pack-line programs treat the post entry as the pass that decides the possession, which is why I teach post defense as denying the catch rather than guarding it…
Disadvantaged reps teach transition priorities under pressure that 5v5 never isolates, which is why this is my first transition defense drill every season…
This is the pack line's shell, which is why it teaches two things at once: gap position inside the line and the closeout sprint out of the pack that defines…
Every turnover leaves the defense outnumbered for a few seconds, which is why I rehearse rotating and recovering down a man instead of hoping it sorts itself…
Loose balls are extra possessions and the quickest way to see who on the roster is tough, which is why I run this one with the score kept and the losers…
Jump timing and the second jump, the two things a tip-in or a tap-out rebound actually needs. Why it works: the ball never gets caught, so the only way to keep…
Game-speed conversion both ways, with a winner. Why it works: every change of possession is live, the rebounder has to find the sideline outlet instead of…
The transition defense rules under a real deficit: stop the ball, protect the rim, talk, and sprint back to even numbers. Why it works: with one defender…
Conditioning with a ball that also fixes weak-hand finishing. Why it works: the clock and the make count turn fatigue into a game condition, and the rule that…
The full-court weave with five passes to a layup and a clock on it. Why it works: five passes over ninety-four feet means every pass is thrown ahead of a…
The elbow catch is where high-low, pinch-post, and Horns offenses begin. The pivot and face-up have to be automatic there, which is why I run this before any of…
The second screen is what makes flex, Horns, and every screen-the-screener set work. The timing is the hard part, which is why I break it out of the continuity…
Ball protection and awareness in traffic, in a game where nobody sits out. The eliminated players keep dribbling in a side zone instead of watching, which is…
Heads-up dribbling under pursuit, in the game kids ask to play again, which is why it is in every youth practice I run. The whole team, every minnow with a ball…
Decision speed on the catch with a dribble limit, and a competitive closeout in the same rep. That is why this is my 1v1 drill for players who hold the ball too…
Down screens are the base action of every motion offense, which is why my defenders need a rehearsed rule for them instead of a guess. Setup: 3v3, the point at…
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