How to Shoot a Bank Shot in Basketball

Video Transcript

"Now we're going to talk about bank shots. Bank shots are not only pretty, but they're effective and they're a higher percentage shot when you use them properly, than just shooting the ball at the rim. And that's why they put the white lines up there. To give you something to aim at. They're not up there by accident; they're up there for a reason. It's almost if you liken it to pool, it's all trajectory and geometry. You don't have to understand any of that, you just have to understand that when you're in a certain position, and you put the ball up there off of the glass, it's going to come in and bounce into the rim. That's the benefit of using a backboard shot. You can use it from almost anywhere on the floor. What you want to do if you're outside of the lane, on either side of the lane, when you're up more towards the front of the key, you don't want to use the backboard shot. Those are called bank shots off of the front. You just don't really want to use that, that's not as effective. It's really more effective when you're using it on the side of the court. And just to give you an idea...and this takes practice. You're not going to come out here, and maybe I'll miss my first one, but you've got to just keep practicing and practicing to really get an idea of where you want to hit. See and I missed my shot. So you keep practicing, you can start in closer and use that backboard. And that's a good strategy to shoot 20, 50, 100, 200 shots from this side using the backboard until you get used to it. Keep shooting and using that backboard, and then step back one more step and shoot, and you'll get used to it and you'll be an expert with a great looking shot in no time."