Special thanks to Bob for sending this one in. If you’ve every struggled with [tag]rebounding drills[/tag], you MUST try this out!
A [tag]basketball[/tag] [tag]drill[/tag] that my 4th grade boys team begs me to let them do at EVERY practice is Animal Ball. I started using this drill a few months ago to increase my teams aggressiveness in rebounding and it has worked very well. I don’t do this at every practice because I want the drill to retain its appeal with the boys.
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I use a couple of variations. Sometimes I set the drill up as an “every man for himself” situation (my favorite) with each player competing against the others. At other times I split the group into two teams and have them compete team to team. We run the drill only on half court. The rules are that there are very few rules.
The only rules I give the boys are:
You have to dribble the ball
You can’t tackle another player
No intentional tripping
With those as the only rules you tell the guys to go for the ball and score as many buckets as they can.
To compete with any chance of winning this “game” (especially every man for himself), the boys have to be physical on the boards. You should save this for the last 5 to 10 minutes of a practice.
I also give an “Animal of the Game” award after each game to reward the player who has demonstrated physical play, especially in rebounding. The rewards can be as simple as candy, a certificate for ice cream, sports arm bands, etc.