Practice Planning

The past week I was reading one of the recent publications from BCAM (Basketball Coaches Association of Michigan) and found the article by Dr. David Hoch, who is the Athletic Director at Loch Raven High School in Towson, Maryland, important enough to share with community coaches as well as our high school coaches. The article, “Planning Practice – Blueprint for Success,” deals with developing practice plans, and making them more efficient and effective. Although he is primarily discussing basketball, much of what he writes about can apply to other sports as well. The following are some of his suggestions…

• Restrict practice sessions to two hours. Beyond this point, you get negative returns.

• Consider teaching new techniques, skills and plays in the first-half of practice while the players are still fresh and attentive.

• Do not continue any drill “until we get it right.” All athletes learn at different rates and it may take several days of repetitions until the skill is mastered.

• Also, every segment and drill on your practice plan is there for a reason and is important. Everything needs to be covered in order to ensure that the athletes are getting the full benefit of the practice session.

• Use only drills that teach or reinforce the skills and concepts that are part of your system. There isn’t enough time to use popular drills that others – even well-known and successful coaches – use unless they complement your approach.

• Take each aspect of your offense and defense and create your own “Breakdown Drills.” Practice these individual parts and then put them back into use as part of the Whole-Part-Whole Method of instruction.

• Develop a list of alternative drills to teach the same skill or concept. As the season progresses, vary the drills to keep things fresh and interesting for the athletes while still reinforcing the desired skills.

• Use part of your full-court press break as a warm-up drill. Not only are you preparing the athlete’s body for the rigors of practice, but you are also reinforcing concepts that will be used in games.

• Try to incorporate game-like conditions in order to make the conditioning drills at the conclusion of practice more fun and relevant for the athletes. Sprinting after a loose ball or finishing a fast break makes sense to a young person as opposed to merely running sprints and they both accomplish the physical purpose.

• Set the standard that the coach will strategically schedule water breaks for the athletes. By being included in the practice plan and timed, optimum efficiency and results can be obtained.

• Instruct your athletes at the beginning of the season that they should stop and listen whenever they hear the whistle. Total attention is necessary in order to hear the next instructions or corrections to the execution of a drill.

• Considering alternating intense drills with those who may be a little less demanding, but still instructive, in order to maintain maximum participation by the athletes. Without this consideration, you may find some athletes pace themselves in order to make it through a practice session.

• Use assistant coaches and, perhaps managers, in drills in order to allow the athletes to get as many repetitions as possible. Learning is an active and not a passive process. Standing and waiting for one’s turn is not an efficient approach to master shills.

• Shorten the length of practice sessions as the season progresses into the last third of the schedule. The players have already learned and incorporated the skills and system. The goal should be to prevent athletes from getting stale.