Techiques and Drills for
Improving Lateral Quickness

Improving your lateral quickness is a very important part of becoming a better player.

Lateral quickness is important on the offensive and defensive ends of the floor, and in a variety of circumstances.

What's the best way to improve on this part of your game? Hard work.

Here are some drills and exercises to help you improve on your lateral quickness.

The best way to improve your footspeed and lateral quickness is to play a lot of basketball, and play good, solid defense while you are out on the floor. It may sound simple, but playing lots of basketabll against good compeition will improve just about every part of your game.

But the key is to play against good competition, and to really push yourself while out on the floor. It's easy to get lazy when you are playing pickup ball in the off-season and summer time. But to really improve and get better at your game, you have to really challenge yourself and play with intensity.

For example, make it a point to guard the other team's quickest player. Really make a decision to guard that player closely, and not let them score the basketball. Jump out into passing lanes, slide on defense, and make it tough for them to score. That will really help your defense improve.

In addition to playing in game, there are lots of drills you can use that will help you improve your lateral quickness. Here is a list of some of the ones that I believe are most effective:

Defensive slide drills

Even though you probably hate doing them, they'll really help you improve your ability to play defense and have quick feet.

How many players do you think do defensive slide drills on their own, during the summer? Probably not a lot. So guess what? It's an easy way for you to set yourself apart from everyone else and gain an advantage over your competition.

Jump rope drills

As mentioned before, jumping rope is a great exercise to work on your leg strenght, jumping ability, and quickness. The key is to do it quickly. If you jump rope very slowly, very methodically, you won't get the same benefits you will if you jump rope quickly, and really make yourself work hard.

Running stadium stairs

This is another great way to work on your overall leg strength, stamina, and your jumping ability. Again, they key is to really push yourself, work hard, and go through this exercise with a purpose. Keep up a good, fast pace, bring your knees up high, and really push yourself. You'll see the results.

If you work hard, and do the drills mentioned above, you should see a marked improvement in your footspeed and lateral quickness.

Cone drills

Cone drills are great quickness drills. Cone drills involve placing cones in various spots on the court or on a grassy field. You can then do various drills involving sprints, slides, and backpedaling, to and from and around the cones.

Agility ladder drills

Agility ladders are often associated with soccer or football, but they're a great training tool for basketball players as well. Agility ladder drills force you to move your feet quickly, helping develop footspeed and balance, which are some of the key components to lateral quickness.

Using the drills and training tools listed above, and really working on this area of your game, you should see results fairly quickly.

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