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Coaching Youth Hoops on Facebook — The group where this week's listener question came from. Come join the conversation.Coach Bill and Coach Collins tackle a question straight from the Coaching Youth Hoops Facebook group: how do you teach shot selection to young players when every kid wants to jack up threes and every parent in the stands is yelling "shoot it"?
The answer is a three word vocabulary any third grader can learn: great shot, good shot, no shot. Coach Bill breaks down how he uses it live in scrimmages, why the follow up question matters more than the label itself, and how the same shot can be a great shot for one player and a no shot for another.
The first question almost every kid gets after a game is "how many points did you score?" Nobody asks how many stops they made or how good their defense was. That single question shapes how young players behave with the ball. Basketball is a team sport, and shot selection is where team play either shows up or disappears.
Coach Bill's youth level definition of a great shot has three parts a player can self assess in a fraction of a second:
You are on balance
There is no hand in your face
The shot is inside your range, meaning a distance where you make a decent percentageA wide open layup is the purest great shot at the third, fourth, and fifth grade level. Get those layups in.
A good shot might be a mid range look with no hand in your face. A no shot is the one where you cannot even hit the rim from that spot, most often a three point heave.
At the high school level Coach Collins does much of this teaching in film sessions. Coach Bill does the same work in real time during scrimmages, and the immediacy is the whole point. The feedback lands while the shot is still fresh.
A questionable shot goes up
Blow the whistle and pause the action
Ask: "Great shot, good shot, or no shot?"
Let the player answer
Whatever they say, do not label it right or wrong. Just ask "Why?"Players will usually tell on themselves. "I had a hand in my face and I was off balance." Now they own the definition instead of just hearing it from a coach.
The temptation is to declare the verdict. Resist it. The follow up "why" is where the learning lives, because it forces the player to run the checklist out loud. Over the course of a season, Coach Bill saw the payoff: players started passing up their own decent look to feed a teammate who had a great one.
Ask them and they will tell you honestly what they can and cannot make. Following through on that knowledge in a live game is the hard part, especially with a parent in the bleachers yelling "shoot the ball" thirty seconds after the coach said not to.
This is where coaches have to be careful, and it takes time to learn each player. Two examples from the episode:
One kid can hit the rim on a three about a third of the time. Another cannot reach the rim at all. Same shot, different verdict.
One girl can slice between two defenders and finish. For her that is a good shot. Another player cannot dribble through two defenders yet, so for her it is not.Coach Collins compares it to a player who can dunk versus one who has to finish with a layup. Different skill levels, different green lights.
When a player says "but Steve just shot a three and you told me not to," the answer is not "Steve is better than you." It is: Steve can make that shot right now, and you can do things Steve cannot do. The key word is yet. This is where you are today, and that is okay.
Pick your three definitions and say them out loud to your team this week. Keep them short enough that a nine year old can repeat them.
Build the whistle and ask routine into every scrimmage. Two or three stoppages is plenty.
Ask "why," then stay quiet. Let the player make the case.
Spend the first few weeks learning each player's real range so your verdicts are individualized and fair.
Talk to your parents early about what a good shot means on your team, so the message from the stands matches the message from the bench."I don't say that's right or wrong. I just say, okay, why? Why is it a no shot?" — Coach Bill
Episode SummaryTimestampsTimeTopic00:00Welcome back, and Coach Collins on retirement, no more grading tests00:33Why a retiring coach should give the new coach space01:37Will he still show up to the games?02:15Sponsors: CoachingYouthHoops.com and HeySai.com03:56Today's topic: good shot, great shot, no shot04:02Why kids default to selfish shots, and the "how many points did you score" problem04:50Coach Bill defines a great shot at the youth level05:31How do players learn their own range?06:00The live scrimmage drill: whistle, ask, let them answer06:42What each category looks like in a youth game07:13Coach Collins on doing the same work through film at the high school level08:16What happens when a player disagrees or points to a teammate09:11Differentiating standards by player without calling anyone out10:15Final thoughts and where to find moreKey Takeaways1. The real problem is scoreboard culture, not shooting2. Define a great shot in terms a kid can actually check3. Coach it live, not just in film4. Let them answer before you do5. Players know their range better than you think6. The standard is individual, and that is the nuance7. Frame the difference without calling a kid outCoach's Action ItemsQuote of the Episode
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