Why should a point guard drive to the hole?

1. It gives you an opportunity to score.
2. It gives you an opportunity to pass.
3. It gets the defense moving, freeing up teammates.
4. It makes you a lethal member of your team.

Tony Parker, Steve Nash, Chris Paul, Jason Kidd are all-star point guards who use this extensively.  They practice driving to the hole because it’s one of the best moves a point guard can have and works very well with the point guard’s speed and size.

Click “More” to learn how to drive to the hole like a pro.

1. Attack your defender head-on

If you’re not close enough to a good defender, you won’t be able to pass him.  Get close enough so that you can explode past him, but not so that he can swipe the ball away.

If you are dribbling, slowly dribble forward right at your defender.  This way, he won’t know which way you’ll blow past him, and it will force him to back up.  If he doesn’t budge, then even better.

Be wary if he tries to reach in at the ball.

2. Make a “Fake”

Fake out the defender to get him moving in one direction so you have an opening to go in the next.  A point guard should always have an arsenal of fakes – I’ll teach those later.

Done properly, a move will freeze the defender in his spot, which will lead you perfectly to the next step…

3. Explode

Put the ball on the floor, get as low as you possibly can, take your first step (which needs to be strong), lean forward, and dribble as hard as you can. 

Take a smaller first step – it gives you more power to burst away.  Most novices make the mistake of taking too big of a first step.  You can’t explode fast enough like that.

4. Pick up your dribble

Once you’ve exploded and dribbled close enough, pick the ball up two steps ahead of time.  You’re fastest when the balls in your hands so pick it up as soon as possible.

Warning: Do not pick up the ball if you didn’t lose the defender.  This will lead to getting your shot blocked or turning it over.  Just dribble back out and restart the play.

5. Take your two steps

The two steps lead to your layup, so make sure that if you’re driving from the right, your 2nd step is your left foot.  If driving from the left, your 2nd step should be your right foot.

At full speed, you can start your two steps a bit past the free throw line.  Take big, long steps.  If you’re coming from the side, try to judge the distance as best you can.

6. Practice each skill individually

The entire “driving to the hole” process is complicated.  The best way to master this is to practice each step individually to build this into your muscle memory.

Create a routine.  Example: Spend 15 minutes practicing “fakes”.  Then practice timing your two steps perfectly for a layup (I spent weeks getting this into my muscle memory).  Finally, work on your explosion – practice exploding for three steps, stopping, then starting again.

Do this everyday by yourself, and then hit the gym to perfect this in the court.

As a freshman, I screwed up by not doing things the right way.  The coach would bench me, yell at me, and embarrass me.  It was tough and I didn’t know what I was doing wrong.

I almost quit.

Almost.  After I followed these 10 point guard tips, I fought my way back into the starting line up, proving everyone wrong.  Now I run as the starting point guard.

What are these tips?

1. Work on the Fundamentals

The difference between a street baller and a true varsity player is that the varsity player has solid fundamentals.

Work on your dribbles.  Work on your chest passes.  Work on your bounce passes.  Work on dribbling with your head up.  Work on moving your feet.  Do drills to improve your first step.

At the level you’re playing in varsity, fundamentals are key to helping you keep up with the game.

2. Practice

From high school to varsity is a huge jump in skill level.  To get to that level, practice hard and long.  Spend 3-4 hours everyday hitting the courts shooting, dribbling, running, and training.

Also, don’t be late for practice – make it a priority.  Being on time will count as putting your hours in – with increased discipline comes increased skill.

3. Read and Study New Point Guard Tips Everyday

Albert Einstein studied, day and night, theories of chemical reactions before actually performing his experiments.  He’s now the most famous scientist in the world.

Just like Einstein, study your basketball day and night.  Read all the articles on this site.  Bookmark this site – new point guard tips are posted everyday.

In Varsity, it’s about understanding concepts, plays, and new ways to improve.  Learn these concepts from players, on-line, wherever.  Be a student.

4. Ask a Veteran Point Guard

What better way to get great tips to play point guard in varsity than from someone who IS a varsity point guard?

Ask the point guards what advice they have.  Ask the centers and forwards what type of point guard they would like.  This will give you a ton of practical advice that you can work on right away.

5. Be a Team Player

You may have been an all-star in high school, but you might not in varsity.  Understand that you’re a freshman and you have much to learn.

Don’t get upset if you’re not starting.  Don’t get upset if you’re not on the starting unit.  Take one for the team.  The coach will appreciate your trust in his decision and will eventually trust you back to play starting.

6. Play with Passion, Desire, and Motivation

Nothing is worse to a coach than a freshman who comes in slouching in, walking slowly, and not smiling.  You’ll notice that in pick-up basketball, nobody really plays with a fire in their eyes.

That’s because those with the fire are rightfully on starting lineups at their team.  Give it your 110% every night with every chance you get.  This is the varsity way.

7. Work on Your 1-on-1 Game

The quickest way to be varsity material is to play non-stop 1-on-1.  Playing 3-on-3, 4-on-4 basketball does not give you enough hands-on time.

Playing alone doesn’t give you the pressure required.  Your 1-on-1 game is really important to boost your shot, dribbles, and layups.  In Varsity, all players have a great 1-on-1 game.

9. Keep Your Grades Up

I almost got kicked off my basketball team because my grades were failing.  At first, I didn’t understand why, but now I realize it was a good decision.

Be a smart player – coaches love a player who has good grades.  It shows that you’re a well-rounded athletes, and will trust you more to play on his team.

As a point guard, one of the worst situations is when all your teammates are being closely guarded.  There’s no one to pass to, the shot clock is ticking, and the defenders are closing in on you.  What’s worse, your teammates aren’t even trying to get open – they’re just standing there!

You end up forcing a shot, making a bad pass, or turning over the ball and end up on the bench or on the sidelines for the rest of the game.

So what do you do?

Excellent point guards know how to make people open when there is nobody to pass to.  They make things happen and create magic.

Here’s three critical things you can do when your teammates aren’t open.

1. Be Vocal With Your Teammates

If your teammates aren’t open, then tell them to.  You’re allowed (in fact, you’re encouraged) to assert yourself vocally because as the point guard, it’s your responsibility to lead the floor.

If you watch the best point guards in the NBA like Chauncey Billups  or Jose Calderon, you’ll see that they’re always making wild gestures, moving their mouths, and pointing their fingers left and right.  It’s because they’re being vocal and getting their teammates open.

Use your hands and your voice – tell them to spread out, to set each other picks, to set you a pick, to make a cut inside.  It’s your call so make it.

Your coach will also trust you more as someone who can control the floor if you are expressing it.

2. Move Yourself

Are you taking the ball up slowly, and standing there waiting for people to get open?  Are you lacking energy, and excitement?

This might be why they’re standing around and not getting open – they’re following your lead!  Move quick, move smart, and move around to set an example and have your teammates get open.  Energy is infectious – positive AND negative.

Also, at the movie theatres, what do you do when someone sits down and blocks your view?  You move.  In basketball, your defender’s always trying to block your view.  Move around to get a better view and passing angle.

3. Drive and Kick

This is an advanced technique used by some of the best point guards.  Coaches love the drive and kick because it messes up the defense, it opens up your teammates, or it sets you up for an easy layup.

The drive and kick, in a nutshell, is when you “drive” to the basket, drawing in multiple defenders, opening your teammates.  Then, once you have drawn the defenders, you “kick” the ball out to your open teammate for an easy shot.

If multiple defenders don’t come after you, then you can drive straight to the basket for an easy 2 points.

The drive and kick is difficult because of the skills that are involved.  You need speed to blow past your defender, handles to drive with your head up, and court awareness to find your open teammates.

If you can master the drive and kick, you will almost be guaranteed to be a top caliber point guard.

The drive and kick if done right, is one of the most lethal moves a point guard can have.  But be warned, if done wrong, it will result in many, many turnovers.

Without someone on the floor to take responsibility for those, your team is pretty much lost. Think of New Orleans without CP3. Or the Suns without Nash. They’re a completely different team.

It’s crucial to be a point guard that does not only possess the basic skills of one, but to have the advanced skills that transform you from a wannabe to a true point guard. Being a true point guard is how you will help your team win, make your coach look good, and put you on the starting line up for longer periods of time.

Here are a few questions to ask yourself to test whether you are a true point guard or not. If you answer no to any of these questions, then working on any of the skills you miss will automatically improve you to becoming much better as a floor leader.

Is passing your utmost priority?

Passing should be your number 1 priority always. The Generals of war never fought the battle unless necessary; they only directed the fight. As the General on the court, you should dictate who shoots the shot by passing, and not be doing the shooting yourself.

Are you trying to make your teammates better?

As the floor General, your commitment is to make your team look as good as possible. Your job is to shine by doing all the behind-the-scenes work. By letting your teammates get the glory, the coach will see that you recognize your role as a point guard and will trust you to lead more often.

Are you directing traffic on your team?

One overlooked area of a point guard is the ability to direct the traffic on your team. To make sure your teammates don’t collide and that there’s no overcrowding. The floor needs to be spread out, and players should always be running around, setting screens and rolling off of picks so that your team can break down the defense.

Your job is to co-ordinate this, whether verbally or by example. Steve Nash, when bringing the ball up, will always run to a spot that helps spread their team out the furthest to give more room for players like Stoudamire to do their job.

Are you acting like a leader?

A true point guard is a leader, so you should act like one. Be the first on the floor, show the most passion on the court, run the hardest. Your job is to gain your teammates trust so that command them. But first, you must show that you can be respected and trusted.

I was overwhelmed with the amount of things I could practice and read about out there. There are so many great basketball drill sites out there, but none catered specifically for a point guard.

So I made the mistake of practicing them all. Three years later, if there was one key skill I could tell an aspiring point guard to learn, it would be this.

Dribbling

Dribbling is the number one key skill I would tell anyone that wants to be a strong point guard to work on. Dribbling is so important because, as a point guard, you will be the one most responsible for bringing the ball down the court and taking good care of the ball.

A point guard who can dribble well but cannot shoot is always better than the point guard who shoots a lot but cannot dribble.

Personally, I can’t shoot well, nor can I drive really quick. But I’m still trusted to be the one to carry the ball up because I can dribble like hell. When I have possession of the ball, my team trusts that I won’t lose it, and that defenders cannot trap me.

It doesn’t matter that I can’t shoot because it’s not my job to. I do my part by getting the ball up the court, attracting defenders towards me, and using my dribbling skills, dribbling past them and passing to someone who can shoot and score an easy 2 points.
Some of the greatest point guards are the ones who never shoot, but are the ones who run around the court dribbling like the ball is attached to their hands. Some examples of these players are Jason Kidd, Steve Nash, John Stockton, and even Magic Johnson.

These guys all were amazing dribblers. None of them are amazing shooters. And they’re all hailed as legendary point guards.

Another benefit to being a great dribbler is that the rest of the game starts to get really easy for you. When you can dribble as naturally as you walk, then you can imagine how much fun the game will be. Instead of focusing on making sure you don’t lose the ball, this will free up your mind to focus on where the rest of your teammates are standing and who the best person is to pass to.

When you can dribble well, you can really control the pace of the game. You can run around defenders, and navigate to spread the defense properly. You can keep your head up more and look for that cutter.

When you keep your head up because you dribble so well, you’ll lessen your turnovers because you’re more aware of where the defenders are. When you’re more aware, you’ll also make better passing decisions.

The point guard’s most important statistic is their turnover to assist ratio. Once you can boast yourself to be the best dribbler on your team, you can boast yourself to be the starting point guard, and will be given access to controlling the ball.

To be a great dribbler, you must be able to dribble at full speed, dribble at half speed, change directions while dribbling, dribble with both hands equally, have a bunch of dribble crossover moves, and many more.

Later on, I’ll cover more experiences on the most important dribbling fundamentals to learn from a point guard’s perspective.

I don’t know whether they want you to know the secret or not of how they became elite. It doesn’t matter though, because I doubt this is a new secret to how they became so successful and was able to enter the NBA.

The reality is that most people don’t realize the effort that these guys went through to get to where they are now. And what most people don’t realize, is exactly the secret that all the NBA Greats share.

That secret is…

Practice, Practice, Practice

Gilbert Arenas. Arguably one of the top NBA point guards in today’s game. He is in the gym practicing 13 hours a day, just shooting shots. He even has a cot in the gym where he sleeps so he doesn’t waste any time.

Steve Nash. The world’s greatest point guard. At the age of , he slept with his basketball. He dribbled to the grocery store when his mom asked him to run errands, and never was without a basketball. Practiced 8,9 hours a day, just practicing his ball-handling, shooting, and dribbling.

Pistol Pete Maravich. The best player college basketball has seen all time. He has the most beautiful handles, the most show-stopping behind the back passes, the most ‘pistol’ deadly shots. How he got there? He worked on just passing to himself for 9 hours a day.

As you see, becoming an NBA point guard is not impossible. With the same commitment, and want to be there, you can become an elite player.

What will separate you from the rest of the pack is your willingness and time spent practicing. The more time you put into it, the better you’ll be.

The rest of this site will soon have many drills, workouts which I used to help me become a starting point guard on my high school team. I became zero to hero in less than a 1 year span, from practicing for over 3-4 hours a day.

I worked on dribbling, shooting, passing, and even improving my vertical jump. Now I’m a decent basketball player, who can run the floor whether it be pickup ball or even a full court game. Our team won our division finals last year, and we’re looking to have a repeat performance.

Want to be an elite point guard?

That was a silly question. Of course you do. Becoming a true point guard is actually a very straightforward task.

It takes time, dedication, and an eagerness to learn. To learn the 5 must-have skills of a point guard is a great start to achieving your goal and grabbing that starting position from the coach.

These 5 following skills are the skills that almost all coaches look for in a point guard to lead the floor and command the team on the court.

1. Court Vision

Court vision is the most important skill that a point guard must possess. The role of the point guard is to be the floor general. He must command the team like a captain commands a ship

Court vision is the ability to locate all your players at all times, and to always know where they are standing, and where they will run to.

Great court vision leads to great passes and more points scored, resulting in more wins and more playing time.

2. Speed

What do the top NBA point guards Steve Nash, Tony Parker and TJ Ford have in common?

They’re incredibly quick and nimble on their feet.

Speed forces multiple defenders towards you so you can dish the ball out to an open teammate. Speed allows you to break down the defense to create holes and open up passing lanes.
Speed is what starts off the offense, to get the offense moving on its feet so more chances arise and better shots are taken.

3. Confidence

As the captain of your team, you MUST have confidence.

The captain never reveals fear, for he goes down with the ship. Show to your teammates that you guys are a great team, and run the floor and handle the rock with confidence, and your teammates will automatically respect your decisions and trust you more with the ball.

4. Ball Handling

Great ball handling skills are super super important for a point guard because he can focus more on controlling the flow of the game and less on whether he can perform a proper crossover.

The better you handle the ball, the easier it is to keep your head up and spot your teammates for that critical pass. Work on your ball handling every day, because there is not one point guard I’ve talked to that does not stress ball handling as a critical skill.

5. Strong Jump Shot, 3 Point Shot

The jump shot is the point guard’s primary weapon.

As a point guard, your job is to stand around the top of the key and see where your team is, so you can tell them where they should go.

Let the big men play on the inside, so playing on the outside, you’ll want a really nice shot. A lethal point guard is one who works on his threes and his jump shot to be a consistent threat.

Defenders will have to cover you up close, so that will leave the rest of your teammates with one less defender to worry about.