10 Rebounding Drills to Help Your Team Dominate the Glass

1. Shuffle Rebounding

This is a simple rebounding drill to start with your team to work on rebounding fundamentals.

• Set up in pairs about 10 feet from each other.
• Each pair should have a ball, and the one with the ball can either roll or bounce the ball to the left or right of their teammate.
• They then have to shuffle their feet to get in front of the ball and either scoop it up or catch it at the high point.

The point of this drill is to shuffle your feet and get square in front of the ball and then pull it in tight to secure the rebound.

2. Golden Egg

The goal of this rebounding drill is for the defensive team to hold the offense from getting the ball for 5 seconds when the coach blows his whistle.

• The coach will place the ball in the center of the circle.
• Then he will blow his whistle and the offense will try and get around the defense to grab the ball.
• Once the offense gets the ball, or the defense holds them out of the circle for 5 seconds, the drill is over.

If you have a lot of people, you can split it up into two different groups and do 3’s instead of 4’s so the offense and defense just switch off every few possessions and no one is ever waiting.

3. Spotting your Man

The point of this rebounding drill is to work on spotting your man and running out to box them out when the shot goes up.

• Have all five of your rebounders on the inside of the paint facing the basket with 5 offense players sitting around the key.
• The coach will shoot, and each defender has to turn, spot their man, and run out to box them out.
• Each shot, the offense can move around a little to make the defense have to find them, but they are not going for the ball this drill.
• Once the ball misses or goes in, the defense should try and catch the ball only allowing the ball to bounce once.

You can do this with 3, 4 or 5 people it does not matter just do not let the offense get the ball. Each side can switch after a few points, aka rebounds. 3 or 5 is normally recommended.

4. Weakside Rebounding

The weakside rebounding drill is used to work on boxing out crashing opponents from the weakside on longer shots.

• Two defenders will be in play, one on the block and other on the elbow.
• Two offensive players will be on the court, one on the wing and the other in the corner.
• The coach will shoot from the opposite wing and the two defenders will have to box out the crashing defenders and not let them get the ball.

Weakside rebounding is very important as most offensive boards are on the weakside. Making sure you focus on rebounding all over the court can keep your opponents from getting too many second chance points.

5. Number Rebounding

This rebounding drill simulates in game scenarios where you have to find, communicate, and box out the offense.

• Start with three outside shooters and three people in the paint.
• Each player in the paint has a number 1, 2, and 3.
• The coach passes to a shooter and calls out a number.
• The corresponding number goes and boxes out the shooter.
• The other two defenders have to communicate to pick, and box out the other two perimeter shooters.

You can rotate your team around until everyone gets ample opportunities to rebound the ball. This drill can take a few minutes to get but is a very good drill to work on dominating the glass.

6. 2v2 Rebounding

This is a competitive rebounding drill that helps work on in-game rebounding and work down on the block.

• Two people set up at the top of each elbow with an offensive player behind them.
• The coach will shoot and then make or miss, the defenders have to box out and get the rebound.
• If they get the rebound just pass it out to the coach for next round, if the offense gets the ball, they can try and score.

The offense will then rotate to defense to keep everyone continuously involved. And up to the coach, if the offense scores, the defense can have to run once up and down the court before they get back in line to make sure they are not allowing any second chance points.

7. 1v1 Post Scoring

This competitive rebounding drill works on post defense, offense, and rebounding and can be worked on by the forwards and centers while the guards work on another drill.

• The two players will be on the block, one on offense, and one on defense.
• The coach will start the drill by passing the ball into the block.
• The offensive player will then try and score.

The drill will continue until someone scores. So, if the offense misses, the ball is live and whoever gets the rebound will go back up and try and score.

8. Outlet Passing

A good skill that goes with rebounding is outlet passing. And a great drill to work on rebounding, the outlet pass, shooting, and fitness is this outlet pass drill.

• Start by splitting your team into two groups, one on each baseline.
• One person from each line should stand at half court, and the other on the block with the rest of the team behind the baseline.
• The drill can start by the person on the block passing it off the backboard to themselves and jumping up and grabbing the rebound.
• Then they will turn and outlet the ball past half court to their teammate who dribbles up and takes either a 15-foot jump shot, or 3- pointer depending on their position.
• The person who sent the outlet pass will replace their teammate at half court, and the next person up will stand on the block.
• This person will then grab the rebound from the made or missed shot and repeat the outlet pass.

Focus on high pointing the ball on rebounds and making a good, firm pass to the outlet to improve these important basketball skills.

9. Rebounding Fitness

This is a perfect rebounding drill to work on getting or keeping your players in shape while improving your teams rebounding ability.

• Split your team into two groups one on each side of the court.
• Each side starts with a ball.
• The first person will pass the ball off the glass to the person who is behind them, and they will go up and catch the ball at the highest point.
• Then the passer runs to the other side of the court and jumps in the back of that line.

The players will be running up and down the court and jumping for rebounds. If the ball hits the ground, at the coach’s discretion, you can just reset or have a punishment like running sprints, running an up/down after the drill, etc.

10. Last Man Standing

This can be a fun, competitive rebounding drill and can have a running incentive at the end if the coach wants.

• Start with everyone in the paint ready to get a rebound. (There can be 3 rounds to this drill, or you can change and shorten it as you please.)
• The first round begins by the coach putting up a shot.
• Whoever gets the rebound can then go out and take the next shot.
• This round is over when 5 people have gotten a rebound.
• After this, those 5 teammates will go back in the paint until 3 people grab a rebound.
• And the final round will be required of the players to grab a rebound and score the ball.
• The coach will take the shot from three, and then whoever grabs the rebound has to go up and score the ball.
• Whoever scores first wins.
• If a foul occurs, they will shoot a free throw and if that is made, they win.

The point of the shot being from the 3-point line is to give longer, and more random rebound angles. Your team will enjoy this drill which is very important to keeping everyone having fun and working hard at the same time. Work on all these drills and perfect them throughout your season, and your team will be dominating the glass every game.

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