The Army “29 Lacrosse Drill”, Coach Alberici
This is a great lacrosse drill from a great lacrosse coach. Coach Alberici is one of the most popular lacrosse coaches on our site and always delivers awesome lacrosse drills, or new twists on drill you might already have in your practice plans.

This is a far better version of a drill I have run in the past, only in this case, we can coach up many more lacrosse fundamentals. It is a 3V2 lacrosse drill with options beginning with a 2V2 Pass and Pick, and Pop. I want to begin with a disclaimer. You may think that the first version of this drill is attack players, and the second version is for middies. That is your option. But in this day of ‘Inverts’ and motion, I strongly encourage your offensive and defensive middies to play in both versions of the lacrosse drill as well as your attack players.

Version One… 29 Drill Behind

We begin with three lines of offensive players, only two lines will be involved initially as the lacrosse drill begins. First we have an offensive player stationed about ten yards off the cage, a yard or two in front of GLE. Next we have an offensive player deep at ‘X’.

Each of these offensive player lines has a corresponding line of defenders. And they are there initially to let the drill unfold, not to play aggressively on the first pass.

We have a third line of offensive players, stationed way off to the side by the far hash mark on a football field, or simply place a cone 15-20 yards outside, also above GLE. This spacing is important.

The first offensive player on the wing passes the ball to the offensive player at X. He fakes a jab step or a move forward, then sprints back to set a hard pick behind for the ball carrier at X. The ball carrier at X carries past the pick and then rolls back to the outside and passes to the wing player who set the pick, now back at X. And we play for a second or two then… then at this point, the third offensive player from the outside hash joins the drill and we go 2V2, Pass – Pick – ‘Pop’ to a 3V2 and play it out.

Where this drill is a little different in coaching fundamentals is on the pick. The third offensive player is not involved initially [private]so that we can focus on the fundamentals of the pick both offensively and defensively. Many coaches vary in where they want the pick set, some directly behind, some 45 degrees and so on…

Also coaches may vary on how they want to play the pick situation behind. Maybe you are OK with a ‘Switch’ here, or for most coaches, communication and a ‘play through’ or drop to allow space for the defender to stay on the ball carrier to preserve the match-up. I love this! Practicing picks offensively and defensively can be monotonous and boring, this is a great variation, with the end result a 3V2, which the players love.

So the drill is actually a two-part drill… we want to focus hard and coach on the pick aspect, once we have done this…then… the two defenders must drop back to the pipes and both play at GLE and/or in front. And we have fun playing out an extremely quick 3V2 to a look at the cage.

Version Two, 29 Drill Up Top

I have also run this many times, but nearly as well as they run it at Army. This version begins above the Restraining Line. Again, we begin with two offensive players initially and a third line in waiting… And we have two lines of defenders… Keep reading because there is a cool coaching opportunity here…

The difference here is that in his version, Coach Alberici stations the third line higher, above the 20-yard line if you have the markings, and the third offensive player is forced to stay ‘high’ and cannot go below the 20-yard line.

We begin with the same pass and pick, roll back to the ‘picker’ play a second or two then we add the third offensive player.

Now… why is this so cool? Because Coach Alberici often treats the format or scenario as an opportunity to not only work on ‘pick’ play, but to work the drill to simulate zone offense and zone defense. By keeping the middies higher, offensively and they work to find the seems, or carry and pass back, or most importantly to put a coaching focus on how you might want to work these aspects of increasing zone looks both offensively and defensively. I told you it was cool eh?

Please take a few minutes to listen to Coach Alberici explain all this in his own words far better than I for all Free Members, click here to listen to the Preview Sample on the podcast page, check it out!!

Please mail me your thoughts, mike@laxcoachmike.com, or hopefully place your comments below for all to share…

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