1. Start the practice by warming up.2. Close th4 practice with team drills.
3. Vary the drills every day so they don’t become monotonous.
4. Explain the purpose of the drills and you will get a better response.
5. Don’t continue the same drill too long.
6. Teach in small doses and give these doses frequently.
7. Follow difficult drills with easier drills and vice versa.
8. Teach new things early in practice when players are still fresh mentally and physically.
9. Stress shooting drills every day.
10. Stress fundamental drills daily.
11. Analyze each day’s practice while it is still fresh in your mind (before you leave, work out that day).
12. Early season practices are progressive in intensity and build up as you get nearer to playing games.
13. Use small organized groups of 3 to 5 players in teaching the fundamentals.
14. Don’t have 4 or 5 players standing around while 6 are working; have them all working all the time.
15. Shooting drills should be game-like (and working in pairs rather than alone).
16. Stress defense and offense on alternate days, but still work on each daily.
17. I believe, and have said many times, that most of our championships were won on defense.
18. How many of you coaches spend more time on defense than on offense? Offense takes more time because you must do things with the basketball. You have to learn to shoot the basketball, pass the basketball, dribble the basketball, protect the basketball, stop and turn with the basketball. You don’t have to do these things on defense. There is no question in my mind that the coach who spends more time on defense is not using his time properly. They are equally important, but it takes more time for offense than it does for defense. This is because of the object involved.
19. On days when offense is emphasized, the top 7 of 8 players will be on defense and second-line players will work offense. Many things I have mentioned here apply to both offense and defense.
20. When players come on the floor, they have been told certain things they need to work on. Early in the year, they shoot a number of free throws in succession to develop a rhythm and style for each individual – later on they seldom shoot many in succession, usually 1-on-1 or sometimes 5 or 10 in succession.
