Newsletter #241

June 8, 2022

Today's Quotes:   "I make my practices real hard because if a player is a quitter, I want him to quit in practice, not in a game." – Bear Bryant / Alabama

 
 

 

Today's Theme:  Making Drills Competitive

Recently, coach Mike May submitted a page on Coach's Clipboard about making drills competitive (Competition in Drills, Your Greatest Tool to Improve Execution).  I'll briefly discuss this here.  Our practice drills were also competitive, simulating game-like conditions.

To be competitive, each drill must have these two facets:

  1. Points criteria
  2. Number of "innings" (reps for each team)

Points criteria - for each drill assign points to those things that you are trying to accomplish.  For example, with a competitive live defensive shell drill you could award a point for each defensive stop, but deduct points for a missed box-out (offensive rebound) or failure to communicate (not "talking"). You might award two points for taking a charge.

In a full-court scrimmage type drill, you could award a point for each made basket, but deduct a point for a turnover.

Be creative and devise your own points criteria.

Number of innings - this is using the baseball term innings.  An inning is each team rotating through the drill 1 time, and you might use 4, 5, 6 or 7 innings in your drill.

A player on each team is responsible for keeping his/her team's score.  When the drill is over, the losers either run or do push-ups.

Even drills that do not feature offense vs defense can be competitive.  The old fashioned full-court 3-person weave can be competitive with each threesome keeping their own score.  Points are awarded for made lay-ups, and deducted for missed lay-ups, bad passes and fumbles.  You can have as assistant time each group with a stopwatch, and the fastest team is awarded additional points to get the drill uptempo.

These are just several ideas.  Create your own competitive drills based on the things your team needs to work on.

See:


 

Michael May is the owner of Practice Planner Live - a great practice planning tool.

Practice Planner Live


Coach's Clipboard Premium Membership - join today! Immediate online access, comprehensive downloadable playbook included with offenses, defenses, plays, drills, coaching and player tips, animated diagrams, video clips, mobile-ready, pdfs for print-outs, and more! More info...
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Put in a new offense or defense this season.
Run a special inbounds or buzzer-beater play and look like a genius!
Use a special defense to shutdown a star player.
Teach your team how to break a press.


 

Email your comments or suggestions.


Coach's Clipboard, US copyright, 2022, James A. Gels

Coach's Clipboard, Box 126, Charlevoix, MI 49720

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