All of the practices and scouting and preparation has taken place and it is finally time to play the games. But before tip, there is the pre-game routine that has to take place. The pre-game routine needs to be done in a way to get every player ready mentally and physically for the game. A few questions we need to ask ourselves when we analyze the pre-game routine. How can we as coaches achieve this? What time do we arrive before tip? How long do I speak in locker room before warm-ups? Do I need to bring players back into locker room during pre-game? What do the players need to accomplish during the pre-game? The answers to these questions as well as others will help to shape your own pre-game routine. I am going to layout what I do and how I have come to these positions and I hope you can use some of this information for your benefit.
Arrival
Home Games
Arrival times for your players at home games will differ with what you put an emphasis on. Do you want your players getting in shots before a game? Do you want your players running around the floor before pre-game? At the high school level, most games are taking place after a normal day of school. This limits the amount of time the players have to concentrate on basketball activities. This reasoning shapes some decisions I make. If there is no school on game day, then I bring the players in for a shoot-around early in the day. This serves to make sure the players get up out of bed and not sleep all day. Secondly, it gets them moving a little and getting some shots up in the day. If we have school then the players are dismissed from basketball activities until report time. As a varsity coach, my rule is the players must report before the tip of the JV game. As a JV coach, the players were to report 1 hour before tip since there normally was not a game before the JV team. I do not require players to be there early to get shots up because I normally see all the players at one end or the other goofing off. Very few quality shots are being shot during this pre pre-game.
Away Games
I try to take 1 bus on away trips. If we absolutely cannot take 1 bus due to seating then I adjust this. However, 2 bus trips are the exception and not the rule. As the varsity coach, I set all of the departure times. But the schools I have been associated with have always wanted to keep departure times on 15 minute intervals. This means we could leave at 4:15 but not at 4:10. Because of this my arrival time is between 45 minutes to 1 hour at the away school before the JV tip. If JV tip is at 6 then I want to arrive between 5 and 5:15. Anything less and the JV team is rushing. Anything more and too much is spent sitting around waiting for the JV to start. My rule of thumb is every 45 minutes of bus travel, an extra 15 minutes is added to trip time. Anything less then 45 minutes, then no additional time is added. So for instance an hour and half trip is a 2 hour bus trip. 1 hour and 30 minutes has two 45 minutes in it so I add two 15 minute additions to the trip to get to the 2 hour time frame.
Tournament Games
Tournament games carry the added burden that a loss means the season is over. If the arrival time is off then the players may not play there best basketball game. The arrival time for tournament games has changed every season. I try to arrive an hour before tip. However, one season we played poorly the first game. The players and team liked to get to the game and sit around quite a bit before going into the locker room. So I adjusted my arrival time up a half hour. The next game we arrived an hour and half before tip and played great. The next season we had a completely different group of players and they wanted no downtime. They wanted to get off the bus, go straight into the locker and start changing immediately. So I adjusted arrival time down to 45 minutes for that team. My advice is to talk to your leaders to try and figure out what will work best for your team. If you play poorly and still win, then I will change something in hoping that it helps our level of play.
Pre-Game Talk
Once the players are at the venue, then the next agenda is the pre-game speech after the players are changed into their uniforms. I let the players decide when they go into the locker room to change. My players have from the moment the JV team comes out after halftime until the start of the 4th quarter. My only real rule is they must be completely dressed before I come into the locker room for the pre-game talk. I do not speak much during the pre-game speech. I put everything that needs to be said into scouting report the players get the day before the game. I will put 5 to 7 keys onto the board and let the players read those keys themselves. With the scouting report and the keys, I have said everything that I need to say. There is not anything else that I need to tell my team about. I will enter the locker room between 5 to 10 minutes real time before the clock starts for pre-game. This is about 2 to 2:30 minutes of time on the game clock of the JV game. This gives me just enough time to emphasize the main focal points for the game before the pre-game warm-up clock starts.
Warm-Ups
Do you want to return to the locker room during the warm-up? Early in my career I did. I wanted to give out defensive assignments. Now I do not. I put the defensive assignments on the scouting report. My team knows the day before who is starting for us and who is likely to be starting for the opponent. If a change is made then I will tell the individual players who defensive assignments have changed during the warm-ups.
I want the warm-ups to accomplish one thing. I want my starters to go hard and get through their initial wind and onto their second wind. From what I have read, scientists are not in agreement as to why this occurs in the body but it is something that scientist agree happens. The first wind usually takes about 10-15 minutes to occur. Then the second wind can happen which can last for a very long time. I want my players to go hard and sprint to get into the second wind. This can keep a starter from having to take an early break from getting tired even though they are in great shape. Everything that I do as a coach has a reason and if it doesn’t then I either need to find the reason, change it or scrap it. During the 20 minute pre-game routine our focus is to get the players fatigued so they can start working on their 2nd wind right at tip.
20 Minutes before Tip
Where I coach, we have 20 minutes for warm-ups before the game starts. I am going to show you my general warm-up layout but understand my warm-ups change every year with each team. I try to make the movements of the warm-up as closely resemble typical moves our offense makes during the game. Depending on my personnel, our offense will change year by year. This change will also be reflected in the pre-game routine. Here is what I have as a blueprint.
20-17 minutes left: Right hand layups and jump shots
17-14 minutes left: Left hand layups and jumps shots
14-11 minutes left: Ball handling drill ending in a shot
11-8 minutes left: Shooting drill where players are cutting, passing and shooting
8-5 minutes left: Our primary offensive shots. If we are a drive and kick team then we will drive and kick. If we are a post centered offense then this will be post moves with post feed kick outs.
5 minutes left: Free shooting
Less than 1 minute: Go to bench and get ready for National Anthem
This layout covers fundamentals as well as the movements they we should be doing during the game. It is also broken down into 3 minute intervals so the players are constantly moving during the entire 20 minutes. I also make sure dribbling, passing and shooting are all taking place during the time as well.
Pre-Game Introductions
Finally the National Anthem has been played and the introductions are all that is left before tip. Again, I do not speak much during this time. This is the time for the players to be a team and have a little fun before tip. During the opposing team introductions, I will make sure the players know their matchups as the players are being introduced. Aside from that, I am reviewing my scouting report and going through the most likely scenarios I think could occur and how to respond to each so I can hopefully make decisions early in the game effectively and efficiently. The last thing I do, and this only happens against the absolutely best players we play, is to adjust out tip formation to put our defender right next to the opposing teams best player. This makes sure we do not give the best player an easy bucket with having our defensive matchup not set. After that adjustment is made when we need to make it, the ball is thrown up and the game starts.
I hope you might be able to take something from this and apply it to your situation.