Changes in External Load When Modifying Rules of 5-on-5 Scrimmage Situations in Elite Basketball.

Vazquez-Guerrero, J, Reche, X, Cos, F, Casamichana, D, and Sampaio, J. Changes in external load when modifying rules of 5-on- 5 scrimmage situations in elite basketball. J Strength Cond Res 34(11): 3217-3224, 2020-Constraining tasks are very frequent during the team sports training process; however, most of the effects of these coaching decisions are unknown, which leads to less controlled performing environments, with less chances to promote improvements. The aim of this study was to determine the effects of modifying rules of 5-a-side scrimmage on the physical performance of professional basketball players. Data were collected from 12 elite male players (age, 29.6 ± 4.5 years; height, 1.99 ± 9.6 cm; body mass, 92.1 ± 11.9 kg) from the Spanish first Division of Basketball during thirty-three 5-on-5 scrimmage situations over a 18-week period. Physical demands were assessed using WIMU PRO Local Positioning System (Realtrack Systems, Almeria, Spain) and included total and speed-ranged distance covered, player load, peak speed, number of high-intensity actions, number of total and high-intensity accelerations and decelerations, and peak acceleration. A repeated-measures analysis of variance was used to test the differences in all variables, considering playing in half-court (HALF), half-court and transition (HTRAN), and full-court (FULL) conditions for the 5-on-5 scrimmage drill. Results showed that during the HALF condition, there was less distance covered (effect size [ES] = 3.55), lower peak speeds (ES = 3.00), less player load (ES = 2.79), lesser number of high-intensity actions (ES = 1.45), and lesser number of high-intensity accelerations (ES = 1.44) and decelerations (ES = 1.31) than in FULL. In HTRAN, players covered more distance (ES = 2.42), presented higher player load (ES = 1.88), higher intensity actions (ES = 1.02), and peak speed (ES = 4.22) than in HALF. In conclusion, physical demands can be modulated changing the rules and court size using 5-on-5 scrimmage situations, and this factor should be taken into account when designing training drills and when fine-tuning periodization.

Changes in physical demands between game quarters of U18 elite official basketball games.

PURPOSE: The aim of this study was to describe the physical demands during U18 elite basketball games according to the game quarter and to identify a smaller subset of variables and threshold scores that distinguish players' physical performance in each quarter. METHODS: Data was collected from ninety-four players who participated in the study (age: 17.4 ± 0.74 years; height: 199.0 ± 0.1 cm; body mass: 87.1 ± 13.1 kg) competing in the Euroleague Basketball Next Generation Tournament. Players' movements during the games were measured using a portable local positioning system (LPS) (WIMU PRO®, Realtrack Systems SL, Almería, Spain) and included relative distance (total distance / playing duration), relative distance in established speed zones, high-intensity running (18.1-24.0 km·h-1) and sprinting (> 24.1 km·h-1). player load, peak speed (km·h-1) and peak acceleration (m·s-2) number of total accelerations and total decelerations, high intensity accelerations (> 2 m·s-2) and decelerations (< -2 m·s-2). RESULTS: There was an overall decrease in distance covered, player load, number of high intensity accelerations and decelerations between the first and last quarter of the games in all playing positions. A classification tree analysis showed that the first quarter had much influence of distance covered (above 69.0 meters), distance covered <6.0 km·h-1 and accelerations (> 2 m·s-2), whereas the fourth quarter performance had much influence of distance covered (below 69.0) and distance covered 12.1-18.0 km·h-1. CONCLUSIONS: A significant reduction in physical demands occurs during basketball, especially between first and last quarter for players in all playing positions during basketball games of under 18 elite players.

Physical demands of elite basketball during an official U18 international tournament.

The aims of this study were (a) to compare players' physical demands between different playing positions in elite U18 basketball games and (b) to identify different clusters of performance. Data were collected from 94 male subjects (age: 17.4 ± 0.7 years), competing in a Euroleague Basketball Tournament. Guards covered a greater relative distance than centres and forwards (small to moderate effect). Forwards and guards had more peak accelerations, high accelerations and high decelerations than centres (moderate to large effects). A cluster analysis allowed to classify all cases into three different groups (Lower, Medium and Higher activity demands), containing 37.4%, 52.8% and 9.8% of the cases, respectively. The high accelerations, high decelerations, peak accelerations and total distance covered were the variables that most contributed to classify the players into the new groups. The percentage of cases distributed in the clusters according to playing position, game type (worst vs worst, mixed opposition, best vs best) and team were different. Centres have lower physical demands specially related with the number of accelerations and decelerations at high intensity and the peak acceleration when compared with guards. Each team has a different activity profile, that does not seem to influence the tournament outcome.