Playing against bigger players in basketball

Basketball is a game that uses many physical aspects and height is certainly one of them. Contrary to popular belief, lack of size is not necessarily a detriment as much as it forces you to develop different skills. The most important thing is to have a good handle on what you are good at and what you are not good at. If you are good at going to the basket, you must be selective in your opportunities. There might be some players you
can go over (just watch the Knick’s Nate Robinson go over everyone in the lane) but more often than not you will have to rely on quickness (see Allen Iverson). You might want to look into developing some shot that might be particular to your size,such as a floater or a tear drop lay-up. You have to be aware of who is defending in the lane as well. If Ben Wallace is guarding the basket, it might not be a good idea for you to go in there. However, if there is no shot blocker, it might present some opportunities to challenge the post at the right time with the right shot. Once the defense believes that you might go to the hole (and you only have to prove it once or twice a game), he will step back and might open up perimeter shot opportunities. Concentrate on cutting to areas where you can score from and work on a quick release, catch and shoot when you are open, move the ball when you are not. Most importantly, be very aggressive when you don’t have the ball. Make your man chase you when you don’t have the ball. Run your man off screens, constantly cut and screen. Smaller players have to be more active and cagy. Force fatigueonto your opponent. That will break his will and give you a real advantage when you have the ball. On defense, you have to be aggressive and use some basketball smarts. When other teams (at least good ones) get a handle on how you play defense, they will force matchup problems and will post you up. If they don’t know how you are going to play, you can remove that issue. Play the ball hard, then back off, double down to the post and recover,force the dribble away from the screen, cut off the baseline and draw a charge. Be creative in how you play, make them find you and adjust to you instead of attacking you