This drill will teach your players how to maintain proper defensive stance and move across the court. Divide your team into 2 groups. Each group will start from a corner of the court. The first player in the line will assume a good and effective defensive stance. When the coach blows the whistle, the players will shuffle their feet maintaining their stance, from the corner to the foul line, to the D, to the half-court line, to the opposite D and then to the opposite base line and then sprint back to their starting corner.
Trap Drill
Divide your team into groups of 3. Two players will be on defense and one on offense. The player on offense will try to dribble the ball past the defense, while the two defenders attempt to make the offensive player stop dribbling or lose the ball.
Mirror Drill
Divide your team into 5 groups. Designate a leader for each group. All the other players in the group must face the leader and try to mirror their movement. If the leader moves left, they move left, if the leader moves forward, they move forward etc.
1 on 1 Defense
Divide your team into two groups. One group plays offense, one defense. Have each player matched up with a player from the opposing team. All the offensive players have a ball and are lined up on the half-court. The defensive players are 3-4 feet away from the offensive players. The objective of the drill is for the offensive players to get the ball past a certain line to score a point. The defensive player has to stop them, make them stop dribbling or lose the ball to score a point. The defense will also score a point if the attacker cannot get past the line in less than a designated amount of time.
2 on 2 Deny Defense
The goal of this drill is for the defensive players to learn how to keep themselves between the offensive player and the basket. Have one player on offense and one on defense. The goal of the offense is to move the ball over a designated line down court by passing and dribbling the ball. The objective of the defense is to position themselves in between the offensive player and the line as well as deny any passes between the offense. Defense gets a point if the offense cannot move the ball past the line in a designated amount of time and 2 points, if the defense manages to steal the ball from the offense.