How we coach

Learning to shoot

Every 1891 practice opens with form shooting, before anything that looks like team basketball. It is the first thing on the floor and it has been the first thing on the floor every week of every season.

How we build a shot

Hand placement first

One hand on the ball, palm off it.

Then balance, eye, elbow and follow through, in that order. The elbow stays in, with no chicken wing. The hand finishes under the ball with good rotation on the follow through.

Nothing about this is quick, and none of it is the part a player wants to spend his time on. It is also the part that is close to impossible to add later, which is why it comes first rather than last.

Why the shot decides the rest of the game

A move a defender ignores is not a move

A player's offensive skills only work if he is a threat to shoot. From there the game gets simple. He catches and shoots, or he catches and attacks the closeout.

That is why our skill work is mostly shooting rather than an even spread across every skill a player could work on.

It is also why a player is taught to catch in triple threat and to be shot ready, which means low in a stance and ready to shoot before the ball arrives rather than after.

Two-ball

The point of it is the off hand

Two-ball ball handling starts around fifth grade. A strong fourth grade group can handle it earlier.

"you don't have to think about using your off hand, you're just used to using it."

A player who has to decide to use his left hand has already lost the half second the decision took.

Eyes up throughout. A player who is looking at his hands is not playing basketball yet.

Where the reps go

Skill work is not the game

We do not pretend otherwise. What the shooting builds gets used in team actions.

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Perfect passing

Five spots around the arc, corner, wing, top of the key, wing, corner. Two-hand chest passes, as hard as a player can throw them. The ball starts in one corner and whoever receives it in the far corner finishes with a layup.

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Villanova passing

The same idea with drive and kick added. Rip the ball low, pass to a teammate who is shot ready, and he turns the shot down to drive and kick.

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Pass cut fill

Cut with purpose. Eyes on the ball, hands shown, and catch in triple threat, ready to shoot or to drive.

Where this goes next

The other half of the floor

"we don't want movement with no purpose."

Shooting is the offensive half. The defensive half starts with guarding the ball and lives in five man shell.

All coaching pages How we train

Tryout dates and registration are on tryouts.