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Playing your Role: In order to get more minutes you need to be a star in what you are meant to do in the position you are currently in. I had a player talk to me about wanting to be a main ball handler and asking questions on how he’s meant to get there. I told him that he needs to star in his role right now and score out of there, meaning attacking close outs, knocking down shots, playing defense, little things like that. He continued to talk about how he doesn’t want to be stuck there and I totally understood. But this is the issue with a lot of players today, everyone wants to score the ball but not everyone wants to rebound or get an assist or get steals, everyone’s so concerned with scoring that they try to fit into roles that aren’t meant for them or at least not at that moment which leads to them playing less minutes. So the main takeaway you as a player should understand from this is to figure out what your current role is (if you don’t know ask your coach!) and do those things to the best of your ability. Once you start to make small improvements in the role you’re in it will slowly start to expand.
Training to become better than those above you in the rotation: In order to be better in your role you have to actually put in the time outside of practices and games to become a better player than those around you. The best way to train these skills is by working on whatever little things are a part of your role right now and sharpening those skills, while also becoming better at the skills you may not have that other people on your team in bigger roles may have in their arsenal. I would personally say it should be something like a 60-40 split, 60 percent being skills you may not have that others on your team do, and 40 of things you need to be better at to be better in your role. For example if you’re a shooter mainly, but want to handle the ball, keep doing shooting drills and improving that while also doing a bit more ball handling, this is different for college players/pros but if you’re a highschool player you need to have talent across all facets of the game. Make sure you’re working at your game 6 days a week, knocking out different aspects all the time, with game speed drills that you may not make every shot/rep in. You should always miss more in your workouts because that means things are difficult, do a drill you can’t do well, master it, and then make it harder. If you need drills for anything basketball go check out ANY of the other sections on Drillmindhoops, with sections for partner drills, shooting, ball handling, finishing, defense, and rebounding.
Final Tips in Game:
Talk MORE than anyone else on defense
Any 50/50 balls need to be YOURS, dive if you need to
If you’re a guard, any time you’re switched onto a big, take a charge, if you get a block that’s okay, play resets
If you’re a big, take rebounds personal, not just as an extra part of your stats
Read the game Ex. Apply pressure to see which move a player does, then try it again and predict it for a steal
Don’t force anything, remember you aren’t trying to score 20 points, just getting better in your role to expand it
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