Making Free Throw Shooting An Important Part Of Practice
How to Practice Free Throw Shooting
Before Memphis lost to Tennessee, Coach John Calipari was ask about his team’s year long struggles from the foul line. He stated that although his teams foul shooting had been very poor throughout the season, he believed when they 'had' to make them they would. In other words, he thought in a close basketball game his Tigers would have the mental toughness to make free throws. I would assume if you ask Coach Calipari the same question after his team shot 8-17 from the foul line and lost to the Volunteers he'd have a different answer.
Even though there is a mental aspect to shooting free throws, we can't forget the most important aspects which are developing a pre-shot routine and practice. However, practice doesn’t mean just shooting free throws. Your team must practice shooting foul shots just as they would in a game situation. This article won’t focus on the mechanics of shooting free throws other than the pre-shot routine. The purpose of this article is to help your team’s free throw shooting by using improved practice strategies.
Unlike Coach Calipari I don’t think teams can make foul shots in games if they can’t make them in practice. This is why you have to make your free throw shooting practice as productive as possible. Every great free throw shooter I've watched has always had a pre-shot routine. Some routines are elaborate while others are very simple. Either way, elaborate or simple your player’s pre-shot routines need to be the same before each free throw.
Having a pre-shot routine builds confidence and relieves pressure during important foul shots, such as the ones Memphis missed vs. Tennessee. As a player it's much easier to make an important foul shot if you're concentrating on your pre-shot routine rather than your team being down by two with 3 seconds left in the game.Another Important thing the pre-shot routine does is it makes your players practice foul shots the same way every time. This repetition of not only shooting the shots but shooting with the same process each time is what develops great free throw shooters.
As a coach planning your practice sessions is very important. You know you have to work on your offensive plays, defensive sets and maybe fit in some out of bounds plays or press breaks. Many times you're under time constraints while trying to plan a practice or you're team may really struggle with one aspect of the game and you're forced to spend a great deal of time working on your weaknesses. In this process coaches often times undervalue the importance of making their teams work on free throw shooting, yet many games are decided at the free throw line. I would suspect this has been a problem with Coach Calipari at Memphis. Judging by his comments about his team being able to make foul shots when they had to make them, I'd guess foul shooting is not correctly implemented into their practices.
Tips for making free throw shooting a productive part of your teams practice sessions.
1. Keep stats of makes and misses during practice. If players know stats are being kept during practice they will stay focused while shooting free throws. Often time’s free shooting is done at the beginning or end of practice and players tend to speed through the session. Keep stats and your team will remain focused.
2. Coaching staff should watch the players shoot. If you want your team to improve at the free throw line, stay with them while they shoot free throws. Don't take a break while your team is occupied. To some this may seem obvious but I've seen many coaches tell their teams to "shoot some free throws" while the coaching staff is watching film or occupied doing something else. This undervalues the importance of free throw shooting to young players. This also gives you the opportunity to help your players correct any flaws they have in their shot. Read the Bob Huggins interview later in this article to get a better understanding of this principle.
3. Practice free throws in the middle of practice sessions. To really let your team know how important free throw shooting is you can practice foul shots during the middle of practice instead of the beginning or end as many teams do. As mentioned before this will help your team stay focused and not feel rushed. I don't think free throw shooting is something you have to practice during every practice session unless your team is really struggling from the line. I do, however, think you should make the time spent on free throw shooting as productive as possible. As we've all seen, if a team does something wrong during practice they will do it wrong during a game. So make sure your players are not just shooting free throws during practice but they are shooting them with a purpose. Each player should be going through their pre-shot routine and doing things just as they would in a game situation. The coaching staff should watch the players, provide instructions and keep a few stats to verify your team’s free throw shooting strengths and weaknesses.
I want to give one more example of making free throw shooting an important part of your basketball team’s practices. This example involves another highly respected collage basketball coach, Bob Huggins. Huggins, the head basketball coach at West Virginia University was recently beaten by Pittsburgh on a last second three point shot. During the game WVU missed some important foul shots which allowed Pitt to make a comeback and eventually win the game. In the post game interview Huggins made a comment about his teams free throw shooting (7-17) saying if they'd only made their foul shots they would have won the game. He went on to say, "we work on free throw shooting every day in practice and then we come out here and can't make 'em, I don't understand it". I was surprised by what Jay Jacobs, the WVU sportscaster said to Huggins after hearing his comments. Jacobs said "You know Huggs, I attend alot of your practices and yes your team shoots free throws but there doesn't seem to be any structure during this part of practice. The players just go through the motions and I'll tell you Huggs, they miss em in practice too". To this Huggins had no comment.
The following game Vs. Rutgers, WVU shot 23-26 from the free throw line. I'll bet Huggins made some changes to the way his team practiced free throw shooting. He no doubt made free throw shooting an important part of practice. I'll be writing another article about free throw shooting soon which will deal more with the actual mechanics of shooting foul shots. Check the articles section often as I'm currently working on what I hope to be some very helpful resources for basketball coaches.
