What are the tryout procedures for basketball?

Answer 1

For a high school Basketball team, tryouts are usually divided between the freshman (frosh team), the sophomores (JV, or Junior Varsity), and juniors and seniors (varsity).

Each coach will hold their tryouts at different times, and it is best to hold the tryouts for 2 hours each.

Here is an example schedule:

Varsity: 3-5 pm

Frosh: 7-9 pm

JV, or Junior Varsity: 5-7 pm

Each coach will usually have a different style of tryout because every coach is different. Some coaches prefer to judge players solely on in-game situations. These coaches will generally have tryouts involving warm-ups, a drill, a game, running, a break, and repeat without the warm-up.

Other coaches prefer to test the stamina of players and have many drills. They will generally have a practice that includes a warm-up, running, a drill, another drill, running, a break, and repeat with different drills. An example drill may be a 3-2 situation, where 2 players are on defense while 3 are on offense. Two offensive players will then become defensive players, and a new offense will come on.

Other coaches prefer to change it up every day. Some days they may have the players participate in many shooting drills with running here and there, while other days may involve high-intensity drills and little shooting drills.

Tryouts should last a week or so, depending on time requirements and if the coaches can make it. Often times there are preseason games very soon after tryouts, so coaches prefer to choose within a week. Some coaches prefer to have at least one, if not two preliminary cuts to keep the players who actually are in competition for making the team and get rid of those who aren't athletic enough, barely play basketball, can't shoot very well at all, etc.

After a week, the final selection should be made. Varsity is always the hardest to make, as two classes (juniors and seniors) are trying out, and the best of the best are on varsity. Frosh is in the middle, because although there tend to be more people than JV, they are in the same class (freshman). Junior Varsity is perhaps the easiest to make, as the freshman who didn't make the frosh team tend to not tryout again, and some people that made the frosh team decide that the time requirement was too much.

Very few players tend to move up. The exceptional freshmen move up to JV and the exceptional JV players move up to Varsity. Frosh players generally move up when they are just too athletic or quick, and JV players usually move up because they have very good handling skills and are fast or because they can dunk. It is very rare for a frosh player to move up to varsity.