Point in the Paint Small Sided Game

I got to spend my afternoon with Chris Hopkins (@coachhop21). Chris is an assistant at Edina and has spent time in the college ranks. He's one of the better young basketball minds in the Twin Cities and I always learn something when we get together. He also writes a pretty good blog that covers a wide variety of topics -  http://coachhop.blogspot.com

Along with all the Beilein stuff, Princeton stuff, and whatever else we talked about, he shared a small sided game with me that I really loved. With my transition to games based teaching, I am always looking for more, new, better ways to teach the game.

The game is called Point in the Paint and the objective is simple, get the ball into the paint. Teams have one full shot clock (35) seconds on offense and get a point each time they get the ball in the paint. The defense's job is to stop them from getting the ball in there. Play X number of possessions each team and determine a winner and a loser.

It's a very simple game, but obviously very powerful. What's the best way to score - get the ball inside! This is a game that emphasizes exactly what we want offensively while training our defense to prevent that from happening. You can teach the defense all the different stuff to take away paint touches while helping the offense creative ways to do it. Coach Hopkins talked about how competitive the game became, which I also love. I can't wait to try it out this season!


***Edit:
On Twitter Coach Eason (@GLbball) added that he plays this game and also gives a point for a ball reversal because it's what he wants his team to do as well. Thought that was a nice tweak.