Basketball Moves: Open Floor Change in Direction

When a defense comes at you with a full-court press, it can be difficult to fight across half court.

Being able to use a change in direction in the open floor can be crucial for your team’s offensive success when facing these situations.

As an offensive player, there are many times throughout a game where you will need to change direction with the basketball. There are four different ways to perform this:

• Crossover in front of the body
• Between-the-legs crossover
• Behind-the-back wraparound move
• Spin move

Some instances can call for more than one of these moves in a sequence.

DRILL

To work on open floor directional changes, you can add this drill to your practice.

• Set up cones to imitate defenders in the open court.
• Dribble toward the first cone and use one of the four change-in-direction moves to drive past that cone.
• Attack the second cone and use a different change-in-direction move.
• Complete the drill by quickly dribbling up the court to advance the ball.
• Practice in repetition while executing different change-in-direction moves.

You can also use a pass to break up a pressure defense. However, if the pass isn’t available and you need to dribble up the court, make sure to use these moves to get by defenders and into the offensive side of the floor.

There are many skills players should work on to find success on the hardwood. One of the most underrated skills is deceleration. Check out this drill with Paul Fabritz to work on deceleration.