Basketball Dribbling Drills

Just as footwork is the essence of soccer, dribbling and handling the ball is of utmost importance for basketball players. Unless they hone their dribbling skills, they cannot excel in the game and win matches for their team. Along with fitness and endurance regimes, there are drills in basketball which can help players to play to the best of their capabilities. Here they are.

This drill helps improve the wrist, fingers, and arm strength. To do this, a player stands next to a wall, and then dribbles the ball at shoulder height against the wall. Further, the player dribbles at a distance of half an inch or maximum one inch from the wall. The player pounds the ball as hard as he can on the wall, and moves it from left to right, or up and down.

In this one, the player stands at the baseline and then dribbles at full speed up the court. He has complete control over the ball, but at the same time, pushes the ball up the floor as fast as he can, and has total control over the dribble as well.

The final outcome of this dribble is that the player dribbles the ball in a figure resembling an 8. This is done by alternating hands. The player begins by standing with his feet apart and leaning to the right. He then dribbles using his right hand, beginning at the outside part of his right leg. The player then leans to his left, dribbling with his left hand. He then gives the ball a hard tap from behind, while switching hands.

Here, the player dribbles 2 balls, starting from the baseline till the free throw line. The catch is that, he has to hit both the balls on the ground at the same time. Once he reaches the free throw line, he will start a stagger dribble. Here, both the balls will hit the ground at different times.

The player does this stagger dribble till the half court line, switches back to the earlier dribble up till the free throw line, and then again does a stagger dribble till the baseline.

Okay, this may not be very easy, but is fun! The player lifts both his hands straight up in the air, and then locks them to avoid bending them. He then taps the ball back and forth, using his fingertips. As he gets the hang of it, he starts moving the ball at eye level, then the waist, knees, and ultimately at the ankle, carrying on with the drill. The trick here is that, he needs to keep his head up all the time.

This is one of the simpler ones. The court is split up down the middle, and 2 players are involved in this drill, at each side of the court. One is an offensive player, and the other one is a defensive player. The player dribbling attempts to go from one end of the court to the other, but has to stay within the boundaries marked.

On the contrary, the defending player has to try to make the other player 'turn' as many times as he can. This leads them to put in an extra effort for reaching the other end, because the court is split into half.

Go on practicing these drills, because as we know, practice makes one perfect.