Best Basketball Books for Coaches on In-Game Adjustments
As a basketball head coach or assistant coach, one of the best coaching methodologies is understanding both how-to and when to adjust the game, offensive, and defensive plans during a live game. Typically done on a coaching whiteboard, understanding both how-to and when to adjust the game plan will not only lead to a higher rate of success, but will also help your players to adjust to the opposing teams strategies.
Below, we are going to look at the best basketball books for coaches on in-game adjustments. These books specifically discuss both how-to and when to make in-game adjustments that will help your basketball team to perform better on both offense and defense and will guide coaches on understanding when are the best times to make in-game adjustments.
Interested in additional basketball coaching books? Definitely check-out our reviews on the best books for coaching a winning youth basketball team and the best basketball strategy books.
Disclaimer
Please note, we here at Ball Are Life are affiliated with both the Amazon Associates Program and other affiliate programs. This means we may receive a small commission from any purchases made via our links below. This is at no additional cost to you. While we appreciate the additional commission, we would never recommend a product or service which does not align with our core values nor any product which we would not, and have not, used ourselves.
Victory is in the Details
Read now on Kindle or Paperback
You know that you have written a successful basketball book when Coach K of Duke University endorses the book, stating, ““Coaches at every level of our sport can learn from Victory Is in the Details. Clearly, the authors thought extensively about the attributes of highly successful basketball programs, and more importantly, relayed it to readers in a way that is practical and easy to understand.”
Victory Is in the Details: Building a Basketball Program supplies both knowledge and growth. Philosophies, concepts, drills, fundamentals, and advice from prominent coaches spice the acronym “P-R-O-G-R-A-M” as the prominent structure of this book. This book’s abundance of details will fine-tune a program and separate the best ones from the mediocre, no matter the level of talent.
Basketball Coaching: A Multiple Option System
Read now on Kindle or Paperback
In Basketball Coaching: A Multiple Option System, coaches will learn multiple option offenses based on how the Kansas Jayhawks adapt to opposing team’s defensive executions. Coaches will learn about the high/low offense, the ball screen offense, and the universal press break, among others.
If you want a simple, yet effective offense to develop high quality shots, then this book is for you. It will reveal many of the counters and adjustments a coach can make during a game to take control at the right moment. This book will give you an offense that has proven itself time and time again as well as the teaching methods to help your players. Guaranteed.
Game Strategies And Tactics for Basketball
Read now on Kindle or Paperback
If you are looking for some plays, quick-hitters and detailed X & O’s, this isn’t the book for you. But if you are looking for help to better teach the X & O’s and, most importantly, apply them in game situations than this is a must read.
Coaches often focus on X’s and O’s and overlook how and when a particular offense or defense should be applied and used during a game. Game Strategy and Tactics for Basketball: Preparing to Win the Sideline Battles serves as a planning guide and a master checklist for all the possible situations that a coach will face during a season.
The book includes both traditional and some “out-of-the-box” strategies to the common situations that coaches face and provides both the pros and the cons of the approaches described. It is not the author’s intention to tell each coach exactly what to do, but to serve as a guide in the decision-making process.
Coaching the System: A Complete Guide to Basketball’s Most Explosive Style of Play
Read now on Paperback
Coaching the System is not your typical coaching book. Rather, it focuses on platoon substitution patterns and hockey-style short shifts, placing a priority on creating three-point looks for your preferred shooters.
This book takes a look at how the three-point shot has evolved in recent years and looks to help both head basketball coaches and assistant coaches to capitalize on those evolutions to create a more up-tempo style of play and control of the game.
Survival Guide for Coaching Youth Basketball
Read now on Kindle or Paperback
Longtime coaches Keith Miniscalco and Greg Kot return to share their experience and provide advice you can rely on from first practice to final shot. From evaluating players’ skills and establishing realistic goals to using in-game coaching tips, it’s all here—the drills, the plays, the fun.
Develop your team’s dribbling, passing, shooting, and rebounding skills with the Survival Guide’s collection of the game’s best youth drills. For plays and sets that young teams can actually run, flip to the Survival Guide’s offensive and defensive playbook. And to get the most out of every practice, follow the ready-to-use practice plans.
Coaching Basketball: 30 Set Plays and Quick Hitters for the 1-4 High Alignment
Read now on Kindle or Paperback
If you really want to create a fast-paced offense, then reading Coaching Basketball: 30 Set Plays and Quick Hitters for the 1-4 High Alignment is a must. Th 1-4 high set is an excellent alignment as it creates more spacing during your offensive run and helps to create additional scoring opportunities.
In addition, it denies the defense from establishing its defensive priorities, making this alignment difficult to defend from the onset. Regardless of the type of defense run, most traditional defensive systems want to establish the following priorities:
- Be able to apply tremendous pressure on the ball and provide help to the on-the-ball defender.
- Be able to provide help in any situation. Protect the rim and low post areas.
- Force the ball out of the middle to one side to establish a ball side and help side, allowing the defense to outnumber the offense 5-3 by virtue of the two help defenders.
- Defend two offensive players with one defender if possible
- Establish good inside positioning for defensive rebound coverage.
- Clog the lane area with help defenders to prevent lane penetration via pass, cut or dribble
Some of the ways the 1-4 high alignment prevents the defense from establishing its priorities include preventing the defense from being able to establish a help side defense, forcing the defense away from the lane area and rim, opening the area up for penetration, and requiring the defense to guard each offensive player, including the ball, with only one defender, and operating the offense from the middle of the court to initiate the attack.
In addition to the advantages the 1-4 high set denies the defense, it is versatile due to the fact all of the plays can be run as mirror images. Any play depicted being run to the right-hand side of the court can be run in its mirror image on the left-hand side of the court.