When planning your basketball practices, how much time do you spend on each side of the ball? I want to encourage you to consider spending twice as much basketball practice time on offense as you do on defense. Be sure to measure how much time you spend on offense and how much time you spend on defense.
I would make a slight adjustment to the slogan that “Offense sells tickets, but defense wins championships.” While I agree that you have to be great defensively to win championships, I also believe that offense does a lot more than just sell tickets. It boils down to: “The team that plays the best wins the championship.” Basketball champions must prove that they are the best at both ends of the court. Even coach Dick Bennett, whose teams played great defense, said, “Often great games come down to a legitimate offensive execution in the middle of the court.” In order to execute in the half court, you must spend much of your basketball practice time developing your offensive skills and schemes.
Offensive Solo Skills
Offense involves more individual skills than defense, and those skills are more complex. They need more development time than defensive abilities. You play defense with your heart, your feet, and your head. You play offense with every one of them while having to be able to dribble, pass, catch, and shoot as well. There is also more pressure on offense being applied from defense, the score, and time remaining in the game.
A coach can take a great athlete who has a desire to learn and become a great defensive player and teach him to be an effective defensive player. To be effective on offense, that same athlete must have spent years developing offensive skills to avoid being a weak link resulting in turnovers, missed shots, and ultimately not being protected and respected, resulting in 4 offensive players vs. 5 defenses.
Offensive Team Schemes
No matter how much you force action on the defense, the defense must react to where the offensive players are spaced and where the ball is. While there is timing involved on defense, more practice time is needed to develop offensive timing because the player’s movement, positioning, and spacing must be in sync with the movement of the ball.
The offense can dictate the pace of play and endgame strategy by determining how and when they throw the ball. Offense has the potential to put individuals and the opposing team in foul trouble, forcing them to change tactics, personnel, or both. Without spending a great deal of time during basketball practice, a team won’t be able to control any of those areas in a game. Offensive practice should always be given more time and attention (not emphasis) than defense. Spending more time on offense in practice won’t hurt your team’s defensive mindset if you sell, emphasize, and reward defense.
I like the idea behind tickets/championships that claim to motivate players to play defense. Champions must play defense with pride and passion as individuals and as a team. It’s more fun to play attack than defense. My goal for this essay is to offer my opinion that the offense requires more time and practice to develop to a championship level than the defense. Great defense and great offense together win championships!