If you’ve ever thought about becoming a great basketball player, you will have seen that it takes a lot of practice and dedication. Even if you’re only playing fun, don’t you want to play well? This article is sure to offer you advice on how you can improve your game.

Practice hitting your free throws. These shots look easy on television, but are actually hard when you are doing the shooting. Practice this technique regularly. Begin by bringing the ball up to eye level. Picture yourself going through the shot in your mind, with the ball sinking through the net. Shoot the basketball exactly as you saw in your mind.

TIP! You need good balance when you shoot. Everyone has seen professional basketball players make a shot from 20 feet away as they are falling.

You can learn to trick the opposing team. Consider the back pass. Perform this pass by holding the ball using your dominant hand. Then, bring the ball back behind you. Then, quickly snap your wrist toward the location where you want the ball to end up. This is a very useful trick to confuse the opposing team.

If you’re shooting isn’t what you’d like it to be, make sure that your shoulders are in the correct position. If you do not have your shoulders positioned properly, you will not make the shot. Make sure your shoulders are always square towards the hoop. Your dominant shoulder should also be lined up perfectly with the rim.

You need to be quick to play good basketball. Try to play faster than your opponents for an advantage. Consistent, repetitive drilling is the key to speed. Don’t play too fast and risk your chances. This can cause you to get out of control and make careless mistakes.

TIP! You should learn the best way to throw a great bounce pass. Bouncing the pass to the receiver should be at their waist.

Passing the ball through your legs is a useful maneuver if the opposing team is right on top of you. Refine this skill by bouncing a ball with force between the legs while stepping backwards or forwards. If you manage to master this, you will have a tremendous advantage during games.

To maximize your layups, take off with the foot that opposes your shooting hand. If you play to use your right hand to shoot, you’ll want to use your left foot to take off. Your body remains balanced while you move towards the basket.

Make your forearms and hands stronger so you can handle the ball better. Curling your wrists also help you improve your own dribbling. You can’t just stand and shoot for the whole game. Your ability to handle the ball will affect your success on the court.

TIP! Work on pass catches. You should practice catching errant passes, along with perfectly executed ones.

If you want to stay in a good defensive position, simply avoid breaking out of your defensive stance. To do this, avoid lurching or stepping across the floor; instead use smaller, shuffling steps to move with your opponent. Keep your feet from crossing to make it hard for your opponent to get by you.

Keep changing up your pace to help keep your opponents on their toes. Plant a foot and start to straighten your body. The guard will assume you’re slowing down and start to straighten up, too. Like them, push and run past them.

Strength Training

TIP! Practice playing a man-to-man defense and zone defense. The majority of the game is in that area, but be careful about a team who changes things up.

In order to improve your game, make sure you do plenty of strength training. Those who do very well at this sport have a combination of stamina and strength. Even young kids can improve if they exercise the right way and strengthen their core. As they grow and gain skills, they will be even better players. When you’re an adult you have to be sure to do strength training to do well on the court.

Keep low as you defend. You will become faster and react faster. Stay in your defensive stance all the time. When you must break from your stance in order to block shots, make sure to return to form right away.

Use a 2-3 zone as a way to trap opponents. You can do this by having guards wait for the point guard to come at least 10 feet past midcourt. They can then trap the point guard. While that is happening, your forwards should race out to the opposing wing players. Your point guard must then launch a pass in a way that is easy for your forwards to steal.

TIP! Don’t bulk up if you want to be good as a jump shooter. Strong muscles are certainly useful for basketball, but you can overdo it if you plan to play on the perimeter.

If you want to improve your outside shooting skills then you need to take hundreds of shots each day from all over the court. To improve even more, practice preparing for a shot quickly after dribbling the ball. Be sure you look at the target as you’re in mid air. All these techniques give you the feel of actual game play, and this will help you become more accurate.

Now, you can take some action by using the tips and tricks this article has given you to do. Practicing what you already know and implementing what you don’t know will enhance your basketball playing abilities. If you work hard on your game, it’ll get better every day.