Youth Basketball - Shooting

Now, on to youth basketball drills and the topic of shooting. In my previous reading and research on this subject I remember reading a book my the famous basketball player named Pistol Pete Maravich. In it, he said that his dad would not even let him shoot the ball when he was to small to reach the basket. Remember, back in those days they did not have all of the adjustable basketball goals that we have nowadays. In this book Maravich said that his father made him do nothing but dribble the basketball constantly as he was a young boy. His dad did not allow young Pete to waste time trying to shoot baskets at a ten foot goal that he was not strong enough to reach. This may sound odd but really makes sense when you think about it. Here young Maravich wants to shoot the ball and score because that's the glamorous part of basketball. Everyone wants to score in basketball. His dad knew that superior ball handling would give young Pete a big advantage in later years and it sure did as he went on to be the all time leading scorer in college basketball history in his three years of varsity basketball at LSU in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Anyway, I would recommend to you to follow this lead here and not worry too much about shooting the ball as a youngster but have your player concentrate on becoming very comfortable dribbling the ball. Now, as they seem comfortable dribbling and you want to show the player how to shoot this is VERY important. Do not let your child start off by shooting the ball with two hands and pushing the ball up. This is the single worst thing you can let your child do. It is important that your goal at your house be low enough that your child had no problem reaching it. Then it is important that your child be shown that if they are right handed, then their left hand is placed on the side of the ball only to hold the ball in place and guide the ball. Their right hand will end up shooting the ball by itself. That's right, even little kids need to realize that you only shoot the ball with one hand. I have a close friend that is coaching 9th grade girls and he says they can't shoot well because many of them are shooting the ball with two hands and they are playing varsity basketball at a small school as ninth graders. Kids needs to be taught proper shooting as youngsters. I had a very good athlete on my 6th grade boys AAU basketball team and there he was plain as day shooting the basketball with two hands like a little untrained baby. I got him doing it right and he greatly improved his shooting ability. Great news here is that I just found the Pistol Pete video on how to shoot the ball properly. It is well worth your time as a coach or parent to watch this video as it will show you EVERYTHING you need to know about shooting the basketball properly. Watch it below this post.