How to Keep Score in Five-on-Five Basketball

Having problems keeping up with the scoring in team basketball? Follow these quick guidelines and understanding the game will be a lot easier.

Things You'll Need

• Pencils
• White Paper
• White paper

Instructions

1. Award 1 point for each free throw made. Free throws (also called foul shots) are attempted after a foul has been committed on a player who was in the act of shooting.

2. Add on 2 points for each successful basket made against the opposition.

3. Award 3 points for each successful basket made from beyond the 3-point line, which in the National Basketball Association (NBA) ranges from 22 feet to 23 feet 9 inches from the basket. A 3-point shot in the Women's NBA is 19 feet 9 inches from the basket.

4. Note that additional points are awarded in various other situations. Technical fouls, illegal defense fouls and flagrant fouls often result in free throws.

5. Understand that the team with the most total points at the end of regulation time wins the game. Barring overtime, NBA games last 48 minutes and college games last 40 minutes.

Tips & Warnings

• Pickup games - recreational games played with no officiating and no formal scoreboard - are scored differently than regulation 5-on-5 games. Rules vary among pickup games, with players setting the terms before the start of play. Made baskets usually count for just 1 point; shots made from beyond the 3-point line sometimes count for 2 points. There are no free throws in pickup ball - fouls result in possession of the ball only.

• For rules in other areas of the game, see Related Sites.