skullsplitter

Had our jamboree today and we did well. It was a lot of sweeping as I had heard, with a few tries to the inside. I ended up going outside more than I had planned because that's what was available. We ran a 6-3 and totally stuffed the other team inside and out. My boys were flying to the ball. A reverse would have killed us.

Per a previous post I am new to the youth football scene. I am coaching a 3rf and 4th grade team. I've been told that most of the plays last year were sweeps or various other outside runs. Is this the norm? I had planned to run some up the middle teaching both the line how to block for the middle plays and the backs how to run hard up the middle. Sweep left and sweep right is easy enough, but it seems to lack any learning of the game. Am I off base here?

Thanks for the replies? Now how often do you think this age should practice? The 3 weeks prior to our first game we can have 2-5 1.5 hour pratices a week. 5 a week seems a little much to me. I'm thinking 3 should suffice.

I was asked to take a 3rd and 4th grade tackle team yesterday and practice starts Monday. I assisted on 8th and 9th grade teams about 18 years ago and that was my last involvement with football. I'm struggling on where to start with this young of age group and don't have a lot of time to prepare. Can any of you offer some suggestions to get me on track?

I'd push your league to ban double, triple, and quadruple teams at this age. What are they learning by swarming the ball handler like that? Your kids don't learn much either like that. Our leagues in K-3 have to play man to man and can only leave their man to help on a pick or im someone has lost their man. Are your kids ready for picks? Maybe try to have them pcik for the ball to get your handler a little more space and time. I have a team of 2nd and 3rd graders and some of them caught on to picks quickly while some are still lost. As far as catching passes, like Rob said work it hard in practice. I also like to stress to the kids to be ready for a pass. I'm always in their to ear to have their hands ready and eyes on the ball. We do drill in practice has to pass x amount of times without dribbling before a shot can be made. Start with a low number of passes and work up sa they get better.

Curious if this is your first time coaching? Have any of the boys played organized b-ball before? Trying to run any kind of offense at this level is a huge challenge. Getting them to understand the importance of spacing and ball movement seems to go out the window within the first few min of a game. Possible suggestions: -playing knock-out -split them up into two teams - form circle and see which team can complete the most passes in 45 seconds -blood & guts (play with 3 players) every player for himself type thing - person who scores most wins -dribbling relays, dribbling drills where coaches hold up fingers - kids have to yell out how many to help them dribble with head up -hustle drill - players line up under basket facing half court. line up basketballs at half court (one less basketball than player). on whistle players sprint to half court and grab a ball anyway they can. player left without ball is out. remove one ball and repeat. If you do scrimmages, make it harder for them like: -3 vs. 2 mini half court scrimmage -scrimmage with no dribbling allowed is a great way to teach getting open/helping out Thank you both for the response. This my 2nd year coaching. I coached 2nd grade last year. I was not going to do it again, but they were short a coach so here I am. I learned last year that normally you get 10 kids very near the ball with the offensive 5 all yelling for the ball. Sort of why I'd like to get them to learn some spacing this year. All of my boys this year have at least one year of organized ball under their belts. I've done some of the drills you suggest.

First off let me say that this is an incredible forum. I'm glad I found it. Now on to the question. I'm coaching a 2nd and 3rd grade boys team. We've had 4 practices and have 2 more before our first game. The first 3 practices were heavy on dribbling, passing, shooting, and rebounding. The 3rd was the same except that I introduced some defense. The 4th we focused on defense. I'm wondering what to do with the next 2 practices. Do I try to introduce a basic play for the game or just keep hammering the fundamentals? I was thinking a watered down version of the 4-high if I go with a play just to keep the boys spread out.