Basketball Coaching Ideas Using Time Management for a More Effective Basketball Practice

Since the invention of basketball, coaches have been looking for ways to make their practices more efficient. Players have limited attention spans, gyms have scheduling limitations and there is only so much physical and mental work we can do before we hit a point of diminishing returns. We all have a limited amount of time to work with our teams and we want to get the most out of the time. How do we do that?

Prioritize

You can’t coach everything every day. Decide what you think is most important and concentrate on that. The things that are most important get the most time. The most important things should also come first in practice. You can have different priorities each day if you like or the same priority each day until you are satisfied. If you have the same priority on multiple days, be sure that the drills are similar. That way you don’t have to re-teach the same concepts.

Have a Practice Plan

Having a practice plan with the drills and aspects of the game you want to work on and the amount of time you want to devote to each thing. Write it out so you don’t lose track in the heat of the practice session. The best time to develop your basketball coaching practice plan is after the preceding practice. You will have a firm idea of how your team progressed and what direction you need to take in the next practice. Planning just before practice will cause you to feel rushed and that will negatively influence your practice planning and your demeanor on the floor with your team.

Schedule In Blocks

Once you have prioritized, decide how much time you want to use to work on each aspect. For example if you have decided you have to work on defense, man to man offense, rebounding and scrimmage put them in blocks. If you have 1.5 hours to work in practice, you might want to allot your time as 30 minutes for defense, 20 minutes for man offense, 15 minutes for rebounding and 25 minutes for scrimmage. Inside of those blocks, you can break down the aspects that you feel are important. Use small time periods (5-7 minutes) to maximize effort and attention span.

Multi-task

Use basketball drills and situations that might allow you to work on multiple aspects at once. In the above example of scheduling blocks, first on the practice plan is 30 minutes of defense followed by 20 minutes of offense. While emphasizing and teaching in your offense block, you can continue to reinforce the defensive work you had just finished. When you get to the scrimmage block, as a coach, the score should not be important. Scrimmage using whatever offense and defense you have worked on in the practice blocks. Use the scrimmage to continue to reinforce the offensive principles from earlier in practice.

Use Pre and Post Practice Time

Some of the time limitations are facility based others are player based. You really don’t want to start practice without at least most of your team present. School schedules and personal schedules are difficult to match. If the facility is available to you, use the time when only a few of your players are present to work on skills. If your practice time is 2:00 pm – 4:00 pm and your whole team can’t be there until 2:30, use the time from 2:00 to 2:30 to do skill work with the players that can be there. That will give you a good amount of time, not only to teach skills, but also to give your players individual attention and bond with them. It moves the skill work out of the body of practice so you can concentrate on your team priorities. It is true that some of your players might miss out on the skill work. Skill work does not have the same need for facility or teammates that team practice demands. You can always address the skill needs of the players that can’t make it to pre-practice by scheduling them at a time when they can attend.

Jeff Haefner is the author of the free Basketball Coaching eBook that will help you win more games. Check out www.breakthroughbasketball.com/freebooks.html for free basketball drills and plays and dozens of coaching tips and tricks.