Even More Basketball Shooting Drills!

You’ll use six baskets. You want to make 2 out of three foul shots at each basket. Begin at the first hoop. If you make your two free throws, move to basket #2. Anytime you don’t make 2 out of 3, you must go back a basket and repeat. The drill is finished at the last basket where 2 shots in a row are required. If you don’t make the two in a row, move back a basket, make the 2 out of 3 and then try finishing the last one again.

This one works your cross-over dribbling skills as well as your basketball shooting skills. Start by placing a cone at the free throw line. Drive to the cone, do a crossover dribble to move past it, then pull up for a shot or go in for the lay-up.

Perform the drill quickly. You can try adding more cones to add difficulty.

You see tons of teams use this as their warm-up. Align the players in single file at the foul line, just to the right of the basket. The first player dribbles toward the hoop. When he’s close to the basket, he bounces the basketball off the backboard.

The next player must catch the ball before it can hit the ground, put it right back up and bounce it to the next player in line. Keep the drill going without ever allowing the ball to hit the floor.

Keep track of how many times you can bounce the ball off the backboard without letting it hit the ground. As variations, you can start the drill from the left side or play elimination style (whoever lets the ball hit the ground is “out” – last man standing wins).

Divide team into two lines, each one on either side of the key at the baseline. Coach stands at the foul line. Player 1 in line 1 has a ball and Player 2 in line 2 has a ball.

Player 1 in line 2 (without the ball) runs at the coach and makes a v-cut as Player 1 in line 1 passes the ball. The cutter catches, shoots, grabs the rebound and then passes the ball to the opposite line from where he started.

This is a continuous motion basketball shooting drill. As soon as the first cutter catches the ball and shoots, Player 2 in line 2 (with the ball) passes to the next cutter in the opposite lane and so on.

A good basketball shooting drill to help create game-like shots. Three players needed. Player 1 begins under the basket with the basketball, Player 2 (defender) at the foul line and Player 3 in three-point land.

Player 1 passes the ball to Player 3, then boxes out Player 2 as Player 3 takes the shot. Player 3 makes a v-cut to the hoop as Player 1 grabs the rebound. Player 1 dishes to Player 3 for the lay-up. The defender should make contact with Player 3 to simulate a tough, game-like lay-up attempt. As the ball goes in for the lay-up, rotate players and repeat drill.

Run a suicide, then run to the three-point line and shoot. Good drill for practicing “tired” 3-pointers. May come in handy at the end of the half or game!

Kids like this one because they get to practice a variety of shots, they can pick which shot to take and it’s competitive. I know, because I remember loving it when my coaches called it.

Position three players (each with a ball) at each end line. Then have three players at mid-court. The drill begins with the three half-court players running toward one of the 3-point lines. The base line players pass the ball out to them as they reach the 3-point line.

Now, the choice is theirs! They can go for the 3-pointer, move up for a jumper or go all the way in for the lay-up. As soon as the passes were made, the 3 base line “passers” have sprinted down to the opposite three point line where they receive passes from the 3 base line players at the opposite end. The 3 original shooters grab their own rebounds and wait at the baseline for the next set of players coming down for the pass. This is a continuous basketball shooting drill – as soon as the pass is made, sprint down to receive your own pass.

The competitive part comes from keeping score. We used to score 3 points for the 3-pointers, 2 points for jumpers and 1 point for lay-ups. Try to score a certain number of points in a pre-determined amount of time.

Position Player 1 at the foul line with the ball. Players 2 (offense) & 3 (defender) are in the low post (elbow). Player 2 will cut around Player 3’s screen block and catch a pass from Player 1. Player 2 then takes the shot.

If the shot is made, Player 3 takes ball and passes back out to Player 1. If the shot is missed, Player 3 should grab the rebound and put it up and in.

You can also run this drill from other spots on the floor to get a variety of shots in.

Great drill to help develop clean free throw shot. The goal is to make it to twenty points. Start yourself off with 10 points. If your foul shot goes in “Swish” without hitting the rim or backboard, you get 2 points. If you miss, deduct 2 points from your score. If you hit the rim or backboard and it goes in, just keep the score the same. If your score falls to zero, you lose. Get to twenty and you win.

Here’s one we would use as a warm-up. Players will shoot from one of three lines and rotate. Set up one line at each wing and one at the top of the key. The first player in each line shoots, grabs the rebound and then passes to the next player in the line they just shot from. After the pass, they then move to the end of the line to their right. Keep this going until each player gets a good number of shots in.

This can be made into a competition by keeping score of each line’s shots. You can also have the players stay in the same line for awhile to work on one shot continuously, then rotate.

Have the team line up at one endline. The first player bounces the ball off the backboard, grabs the rebound and sprints down middle of court to the other end. At the far basket, the player attempts a lay-up, grabs the rebound or missed shot and dribbles back the other way for another lay-up at the basket where the drill started. The next player in line grabs the rebound or missed shot and continues the basketball shooting drill.

Be sure to practice lay-ups from both the left and right sides of the hoop. A variation is to take a short jumper on the first trip down and then finish with a lay-up on the way back, or vice versa. As players get good with this basketball shooting drill, add a defender to make it tougher and also be able to get some defensive work in at the same time.