Hello everyone ... I hope everyone had a great weekend! My weekend was a lot of fun ... I was away from basketball but had a great time catching up with some great friends and people I care about ... which is always needed :)
Unfortunately I was unable to stay for the entire practice last night as I had to leave a bit early for a meeting in Scarborough ... But when I left the guys were working hard for Coach.
So I arrive at the gym about an hour before practice like usual ... Instead of working out myself I came in to work out a couple of the players ... one of the guys wants to work on his shot and correcting some movements that are not needed and another wanted to come in and work on his defense ... so working with the shooter we corrected some of the movements ... had him start close to the basket with propper form shooting and really focusing on the ark of the shot ... as he got more comfortable we moved away from the basket continuing with the form shooting ... I then went back to being close at the basket and had him work on jumpers and slowly moving towards the 3 point line ... his shot has improved a bit but it will take some time to get it to stay ... we will work on it again Tuesday before practice ...
The other guy who came in to work on defense worked hard for me ... I started him off by just working on staying on the balls of his feet ... he is flat footed and seems to always be on his heals so we started with some one foot loading exercises where he stays on the ball of his foot and hops back and forth from one foot to the other ... as he became more comfortable on the balls of his feet we began to widen his hop ... he now had to continue to balance on the balls of one foot and hop two shoulder lengths from his original spot and land on his other foot ... all while in a defensive crouch ... we continued to make that adjustment until he could cover half the key in one power shuffle ... he is improving a lot in this as when I had him perform it the first time he got only 5 in 30 seconds and as we worked on this he is not up to 8 which is still below what most are at but it is an improvement and I am sure as he continues to work on this shuffle he will improve those numbers dramatically ...
Onto practice ... the players did their warm up and we jumped right into it ... we emphasized that this weeks practices are very important as we have our first regular season game Wednesday against George Brown ... and we want to start it off with a 'W'
We showed them the drill that we wanted them to do ... it is one that works on our offensive principles with cutting facing up to the basket and taking your time ... the guys seemed to understand that but lacked the energy ...
So we had them run ...
sent them back to their spots to begin the drill and people were walking so again we pulled them to the baseline and had them ... you guessed it run ...
they didn't walk the rest of the practice and the energy in the gym was high and very positive ...
we also worked on basket cuts and of course our defense ...
A couple of guys were a bit banged up today so our trainer Karla was working her magic with them on the side ... one has a bum ankle right now and the others back tightened up on him as he didn't properly stretch out that area ... I believe they will be popping by her office tomorrow to get looked at again ...
Unfortunately this is where I had to step out and head off to my meeting but I imagine that the rest of the practice was a good one full of energy and learning.
Next practice Tuesday 7:30pm
Coach Hopps
Unfortunately I was unable to stay for the entire practice last night as I had to leave a bit early for a meeting in Scarborough ... But when I left the guys were working hard for Coach.
So I arrive at the gym about an hour before practice like usual ... Instead of working out myself I came in to work out a couple of the players ... one of the guys wants to work on his shot and correcting some movements that are not needed and another wanted to come in and work on his defense ... so working with the shooter we corrected some of the movements ... had him start close to the basket with propper form shooting and really focusing on the ark of the shot ... as he got more comfortable we moved away from the basket continuing with the form shooting ... I then went back to being close at the basket and had him work on jumpers and slowly moving towards the 3 point line ... his shot has improved a bit but it will take some time to get it to stay ... we will work on it again Tuesday before practice ...
The other guy who came in to work on defense worked hard for me ... I started him off by just working on staying on the balls of his feet ... he is flat footed and seems to always be on his heals so we started with some one foot loading exercises where he stays on the ball of his foot and hops back and forth from one foot to the other ... as he became more comfortable on the balls of his feet we began to widen his hop ... he now had to continue to balance on the balls of one foot and hop two shoulder lengths from his original spot and land on his other foot ... all while in a defensive crouch ... we continued to make that adjustment until he could cover half the key in one power shuffle ... he is improving a lot in this as when I had him perform it the first time he got only 5 in 30 seconds and as we worked on this he is not up to 8 which is still below what most are at but it is an improvement and I am sure as he continues to work on this shuffle he will improve those numbers dramatically ...
Onto practice ... the players did their warm up and we jumped right into it ... we emphasized that this weeks practices are very important as we have our first regular season game Wednesday against George Brown ... and we want to start it off with a 'W'
We showed them the drill that we wanted them to do ... it is one that works on our offensive principles with cutting facing up to the basket and taking your time ... the guys seemed to understand that but lacked the energy ...
So we had them run ...
sent them back to their spots to begin the drill and people were walking so again we pulled them to the baseline and had them ... you guessed it run ...
they didn't walk the rest of the practice and the energy in the gym was high and very positive ...
we also worked on basket cuts and of course our defense ...
A couple of guys were a bit banged up today so our trainer Karla was working her magic with them on the side ... one has a bum ankle right now and the others back tightened up on him as he didn't properly stretch out that area ... I believe they will be popping by her office tomorrow to get looked at again ...
Unfortunately this is where I had to step out and head off to my meeting but I imagine that the rest of the practice was a good one full of energy and learning.
Next practice Tuesday 7:30pm
Coach Hopps
Hoppz,
ReplyDeleteI too had a brilliant time this weekend wit cha! Thanx for makin' da trek up North :) It's amazing that you're coming to pracy an hr. early and offering your advice and experience to help your players reach their highest potential (and improve upon their skills). Keep upiddy da positive effort, kiddo! Good luck tomorrow against GBC! I'll be watching Tonz kick butt against Durham :) ttys, P.