Good drills for defense

[TViola21]

hey guys, i am a captain of my lacrosse team but i'm injured right now. Tomorrow and Friday my coach is having me deal with the defense while he works with the offense. What are some good drills and things i can do with the guys?? any advice or help would be greatly appreciated!!

[dschrammie]

What age level are we talking about here? And will there be any short sticks at all for the d to work with?
Things that defense constantly needs to work on:
- slide packages. The defense and ESPECIALLY the goalie must know how the slide packages work and when to call them.
- communication. A defense that is constantly yelling, ESPECIALLY THE GOALIE, can definitely be more dominant.
- clears.
- fast break defense...the triangle!
- if you have defensive middies it would be good to get them working with the long sticks so they understand slides as well. It's usually the middies that are the worst at understanding. Work on their positioning as well. Middies shouldn't be trying to take the ball away, they should be trying to force the ball handler into a double team and forcing them to make a bad decision/pass.

This is, of course, easier to work with if they have some offense to actually go against.

Other things may be the various kinds of checks and how to do them in combinations. Typically I have my d-poles start any combination with a poke. The poke check is so effective, yet so many high school players want to just slap away and they end up in the box.

[TViola21]

high school varsity level...we're not very good mainly because we're VERY young and very inexperienced. thanks for your help!

[TXD2LAX]

Play basketball with them. You can show that you play defense in basketball by where you position yourself, not by just trying to knock people over. Basketball also teaches you stay with your man while keeping an eye on the ball. Also point out that like basketball, in lacrosse, keep your body inbetween your man and the goal.

I hate basketball, but for a young inexperienced team it is the easiest way to show them how to play their man that they will understand.

[CTLaxer]

Have them play with no sticks for a while. That works on footwork and positioning without relying on sticks and checks to make up for the lack of good fundamentals. Also, you can have your defenders hold their sticks behind their backs horizontally by locking them through their arms behind them. Emphasis on this is they stay square with their attackers and forces them to shuffle step/drop step and avoid turning their hips allowing for an easy roll or reversal by an attacking player.

The usual drills to work on are noted above. Fast breaks, 2v1, 3v2, 4v3 etc. Also work on clearing the crease and slides, of which you should already be doing in regular practice and already have drills present.

Good luck!

[TViola21]

Thank you guys so much for all your help...today's (thursday) practice went great and my coach was so suprised with some of the drills i had the guys do. THANKS!!