Categories: Defense  Footwork  Offensive Moves  Passing  Shooting  
Ages: All Ages  Youth  Middle School  High School+  

Purpose of the Drill:

The purpose of this drill is to work on certain aspects of your defense while incorporating shooting and offensive moves.

Instructions

• The player passes the ball to the coach and then closes out on him defensively.
• He the defensive slides to the sideline and cuts back to the wing or corner to receive a return pass from the coach for a jump shot or move.

Points of Emphasis:

• Active hands and feets on the closeout
• Hips and but down on the closeout and defensive slide.
• Proper footwork when receiving the return pass
• Hands ready, knees bent, hips down when receiving the return pass.
• Finish high.
• Incoroporate various moves into the drill from the triple threat.
• Work on this from both sides of the court.

Motivation/Teaching Tips:

• Time the drill.
• Make a certain number of shots.

If you have any other drills please feel free to share them with us in the comments section below.  Also, let us know what you thinkg about this drill.

See you on the court.

Rich Stoner

Elite Basketball Training, LLC

The big question is when do they find the time to do this.  I firmly believe that there is plenty of time in any day to accomplish all that you need to as a basketball player.  If you have a Saturday morning practice, ask your coach if you can come in early or stay later.  If you have a day off, take an hour or two to go to a local gym or park to work on your game.  The fact is, basketball skill development and training can take place on many days and times during the season and it should.  Players with better skills will make the team more successful because team success is dependent upon the overall skill of your players. 

If you are looking for basketball drills that will help you improve your game use the search engine on this site or visit the Elite Basketball Training youtube page.

As always, share your thoughts on basketball skill development during the season in the comments section below. 

See you on the court!

Rich Stoner

Elite Basketball Training, LLC

There is also a new testimonial below from one of my most recent trainees, Kevyn Douyon who is a starting guard at Bishop Ahr High School in Edison, New Jersey. 

The Star Agility Drill: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_oQ35ySpLc

Sports Performance Training: http://www.youtube.com/user/elitebasketball?feature=mhum#p/a/u/1/16JPNwHbak0

Box Agility Drill: http://www.youtube.com/user/elitebasketball?feature=mhum#p/u/3/F18OSmX5eRg

Coach Stoner -
 
We would be remiss if we did not take the time to THANK YOU for the time you spent with Kevyn during the last few months during the Elite Basketball Bootcamp. During that time Kevyn has seen and felt tremendous results from your training sessions. If you recall at the start of these sessions we identified all of the areas of his training that would be targeted to specific aspects of “his game” on the court. Suffice it to say, the training has exceeded all of the objectives we identified at the start of the training. The results are evident in his play – he is quicker, more explosive, and stronger. The overall training has help him elevate his game and prepared him for the rigors of varsity high school basketball. In addition to the positive results you can see, the training has made him more confident both on and off the court. He did not miss a single session and enjoyed every minute of the training. He is definitely looking forward to starting the next session with you in the spring immediately after the end of the basketball session.
 
Thanks again and looking forward to working with you again very, very, soon!!!

Hope that you enjoyed the videos and let me know what you think in the comments section below. 

See you on the court!

Rich Stoner

Elite Basketball Training, LLC

Purpose of the Drill:

The purpose of this drill is to work on various double and single moves off the dribble while either finishing at the rim or taking a pullup jumper.

Instructions:

The player will attack the first chair and use a double move (ex. double crossover, between the legs crossover, etc.). They then attack the second set of chairs with a single dribble move and finish at the rim or with a pullup jumper.  Repeat on the opposite side.

Points of Emphasis:

On the double move, set your defender up with the first move and then make the second move quickly. Make sure the player is low going around all chairs. Try to get their shoulders as low as the top of the chair. Finish high either at the rim or on your jumper. Use a variety of finishing moves and attack moves.

Motivation/Teaching Tips:

Make a set number of shots on each move before moving onto the next one.

As always, if you have any variations of this drill that you know or any other drills that you feel would be beneficial let the Elite Basketball Training community now about them in the comments section below. 

See you on the court!

Rich Stoner

Elite Basketball Training, LLC

Two Friday’s ago I attended the Garden State Coaches for the sixth straight year and as always, it did not dissapoint.  As far as basketball clinics go you would be hard pressed to find a better lineup than the one that they had there that day.  Kevin Eastman, Mike Fratello, Fran Fraschilla, Hubie Brown, and Joe Paglia all gave great presentations on various topics that I will be posting for you guys over the course of the next month, or so, leading right up to basketball season. 

For those of you who do not know, Kevin Eastman is an assistant coach for the Boston Celtics  and one of the foremost authorities on individual skill development for basketball in the world.  If you have ever seen him speak before you know he speaks in lists, and lots of them.  Man does he over deliver which is why I always try to get to see him when he comes out this way.

So let’s get started right now with Kevin Eastman’s thoughts on leadership and talent.

1. Do you occupy the seat or do you execute the position?
2. Leadership can build and leadership can destroy.
3. Talent can but does not always mean leadership.

There is physical talent and mental talent, the mental talent makes for better leaders. Consequently, we do not want talent on the team; we want the team to be talented.

The “ed” in talented stands for “Extra Dimension.”

Talent puts points in the basket.  Talented does the following:

• Makes teammates better.
• Makes the team better.
• Makes himself better by taking care of 1 and 2.

I thought these were fantastic points that Kevin made and I left them up to you to interpret.  Please let us all know your thoughts on any or all of them by responding in the comments section below.  Thanks.

See you on the court!

Rich Stoner

Our mission that day was to get my weight room set up and prepared, not only for this week’s group training sessions, but also the Grand Opening and Athletic Expo that will be taking place at  The Fields this weekend.  The open house is going to be full of activities and energy as there will be food, drinks, demonstrations, give aways, and discounts. There will also be local papers a D.J. to keep the party going and, the radio station, Magic 98.3.  Rumor has it that professional soccer players from The Red Bulls and professional basketball players from The Nets will even be there! 

So please stop by between 10am and 2pm and enjoy the day, especially on Sunday when I will be there the whole time (a previous engagement is keeping me away on Saturday) promoting The Highlight Reel – Central Jersey’s AWESOME recruiting services and conducting my usual INTENSE workouts in the Elite Sports Performance training center.

Just to give you an idea of what The Fields is really like, I took the liberty of filming a short video tour of the facility.  It is kind of rogue and in some cases a little  Blair Witch Project, but overall it gives you a great idea of what this place is going to be about.   So check out the video and I hope to see you all this weekend at The Fields in East Brunswick, NJ.

Train hard, be efficient and I will see you on the court.

Rich Stoner

Another activity that she has managed to pick up at quite a young age (most likely from me as well) is talking. She started talking before she was one and she seems to keep adding to her vocabulary on a daily basis. She even knows some Italian! Seriously, she is one of the few people that I know that can go on an hour and a half car ride and literally talk to the whole way. As a result, we usually know what she wants and when she wants it. This can be quite helpful as a parent, but what does it have to do with basketball?

Having been a basketball coach at the high school level for over a decade, the most common deficiency that I have picked up on has been a lack of communication. This lack of communication takes place on various levels including player to coach and player to player, and can really be a detriment to the team as a whole.

Communication is important on so many levels in basketball. Primarily, it keeps your teammates informed. Communication keeps them informed of where you are on the court, where the ball is on the court, where you might be cutting or moving to, and consequently, it will allow them to move into better positions based on that knowledge. For example, while playing defense in transition, my players are taught to call out two words immediately while starting to sprint back down court. The defensive player that is ahead of everyone should call out “basket,” meaning that he will be sprinting right to the lane in order to cover the basket. Another player should call out, “ball” in order to let everyone know that he will be stopping the ball in transition. Based on these two calls, the rest of my players know where they need to fill in as they reach the defensive end of the court. In this situation and all other situations, communicating keeps the players informed. Consequently, because the players are informed, they can react better to the situation and produce a more desirable result.

Keeping on the defensive end of the court, talking can also serve to intimidate and oponent. My players are always taught to close out and call, “ball” as part of a a way to let their teammates know where the ball is on the court so that they can move to the proper help defensive spots, but also as a form of distraction and intimidation. Communicating to distract is actually a technique that is also used by martial artists. Anyone who is a martial artist or has seen some of the old Bruce Lee movies or even The Karate Kid knows what I am talking about.

On the offensive end, communication from player to player will allow your teammates to know exactly where you are going on the court and that you want the basketball. Anytime that I work with a post player, they are taught some key components to playing the post like staying low and calling for the ball verbally and by showing a hand (remember, communicaiton does not always have to be verbal). By calling for the ball, it shows his teammate not only that he WANTS the basketball but also where he wants it thrown. Communicating on the offensive end can also serve to misdirect your opponent. For example, when my players make a cut back door, they usually sell the cut by stepping up the line, showing their hands (as if they want the ball on the perimeter), calling for the ball, and then cut hard back door, once again showing their hand in order to show where they want the ball passed. This form of communication can misdirect the opponent in a couple of ways. First, it can make them believe that you really want the ball on the perimeter thereby making it easier to get the back door cut. Second, throwing your hand out once you have made the backdoor cut can actually help draw a help defensive player away from his own player and leave someone else open for an easy shot.

Finally, I also mentioned communicating with your coach. This is extremely important because the coach needs to know what is going on with you for the team to be successful. It is for this reason that I ask my players at half time or during practice if they have anything to add that they might have picked up while playing. This can be a very important and useful variable since the players are the ones playing on the court and have a different perspective of what is going on. I may not always use what they have to tell me, but I do always listen. I cannot stress enough how important this level of communication is. It will go a long way towards building the players’ confidence, make them feel like they are a vital part of the team, and provide useful information for the coach.

So what can basketball players learn from my often chatty little girl? That communication is important on so many levels, coach to player, player to coach, coach to coach, and player to player. However, it does not matter who is communicating to whom, communicaiton always serves to keep everyone informed, and an informed team will ultimately be a better team.

Train hard, be efficient, and I will see you on the court.

Rich Stoner

One of Coach Eastman’s main concepts that he feels should be included in every skill building workout is weak hand devlopment.  Working on this skill in a variety of ways will allow players to pass, dribble, shoot, and finish with their weak hand.  This can be done in a variety of ways, but one of the more basic ways is seen in the video below.  This video will show you how to incorporate weak hand development into a workout for beginners.  There will be videos to follow really soon on more advanced weak hand development drills, but if any of you know of some other ways to work on your weak hand please let the Elite Basketball Training community know about them by responding in the comments section. 

Train hard, be efficient, and I will see you on the court.

Rich Stoner

In addition to the Skills and Drills Clinics, Elite Basketball Training will be expanding on its successful Half Day Hoops Series from last fall.  In its preliminary year, the Half Day Hoops Fest was run over the course of two days with great success as many parents liked the opportunity for their son or daughter to work on their basketball skills on their days off from school.  This year, we are giving them even more opportunities to do so as the Half Day Hoops Series has been expanded from two sessions last fall to include five sessions this fall.  Each session runs for three hours and if you sign up for all five sessions you can get in at the low cost of $150.  That’s only $10 per hour!  To register please click here ==> HALF DAY HOOPS SERIES.

Last but certainly not least, Elite Basketball Training is running its first ever fall session of the widely popular Elite Basketball Bootcamp.  Basketball training is not always about skill development and the Elite Basketball Bootcamp is a great way to increase your strength, speed, agility, vertical jump, and conditioning on the basketball court.  As parents and players have become more aware of this, this summer’s Elite Basketball Bootcamp saw its enrollment increase to four times the amount it was last year.  These workouts are intense, use alternative training methods, and are geared toward basketball players that are serious about taking their game to a whole new level.  Equally as exciting, this fall the Elite Basketball Bootcamp will run for an extra week and will be held indoors at The Sports Zone Fitness Center in Edison.  For more information and a registration form click here ==> Elite Basketball Bootcamp. 

As always, I keep the number of players attending my clinics low to ensure that those attending receive as much individualized attention as possible.  So don’t miss the opportunity to work on your basketball skills, strength, and speed this fall.  SIGN UP NOW so that you can become an ELITE BASKETBALL PLAYER. 

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