Learn and love the game. PLAY basketball. Today's emphasis shares fun warmups, degrading pressure, and zone offense principles.
Drills. Warm up fun
Dribble Tag: put half the team inside the three-point line at each end. Start dribbling with one player assigned to be "it." When she tags another they become it. Add difficulty with non-dominant hand dribbling or "tricky dribbling" (e.g. between-the-legs) for players.
Capture the flag. Start half the team inside each arc. Each player has a "pinnie" tucked into their uniform pants. A player's goal is to 'capture' as many flags as possible in one minute.
Jumping rope. Make it original. One foot, two feet, alternate, "peppers." Great conditioning workout in a few minutes.
Concepts. Pressure degrades performance. Weisinger and Pawliw-Fry suggest over twenty possible solutions. Embrace a few that work for you. Success means finding solutions.
1. Choose excitement over nervousness. "It's fantastic to get the opportunity to play in a championship game."
Before running tryouts, I encourage the girls as a group to stand out as individuals, to separate themselves. But two minutes earlier, a small girl approached me saying, "Hi. My name is Naomi and I'm excited to be here." She made the squad. I wasn't the selector.
2. Remember your victories. The authors inform, "You did it before, and you can do it again." Bill Parcells reminds us, "Confidence comes from proven success." In "10-Minute Toughness," Jason Selk encourages visualization by storing a mental personal highlight rule.
3. Have a routine. A short routine including a physical component, for example a power pose (above), a mental run-through, and a trigger phrase like, "I got this" focuses you.
Other possibilities include focusing on process, music, a stress ball (held in the left hand), and mindful meditation.
Set Play. Variations of "The Loop" are often attributed to the Spurs but date back to at least Chuck Daly's Pistons.
Lagniappe: Create edges.
Lagniappe 2: Superb zone offense video from Radius Athletics. Note the great spacing. Worth study by all players to understand key concepts like high-low action, dribble to draw two, screening the zone, and throwing behind.
