How to Play Basketball Fast: 7 Drills to Instantly Boost Your Speed and Agility

You know, watching a player like Jason Perkins explode in that game against... was it TNT? It really drives home a point we often overlook. The box score tells one story—6-of-12 from the field, 19 points, five rebounds, a crucial win to stop a skid—but the how is everything. Perkins isn’t the flashiest, fastest guard in the PBA, but his effectiveness, his ability to be in the right spot, to seal a defender, to sprint the floor in transition for an easy bucket, that’s a different kind of speed. It’s basketball speed. It’s not just about how fast you can run a 40-yard dash in trainers; it’s about how quickly you can process, react, and execute with a ball on a hardwood floor with ten other people in the mix. That’s what separates good players from game-changers. Over my years coaching and analyzing film, I’ve become a bit obsessed with this distinction. Raw, linear speed is a gift, but basketball agility—the multi-directional, reactive, skill-integrated kind—is a craft. And the beautiful part is, it’s a craft you can hone with specific, relentless drilling.

Let’s get straight into the grit of it. The foundation of all court speed is your stance and your first step. I’m a stickler for this, and I’ll die on this hill: a poor athletic stance wastes more potential speed than anything else. We’ll start with a simple yet brutal drill I call “Stance-and-Go Reactions.” Stand in a low, wide defensive stance, knees bent, back straight, weight on the balls of your feet. Have a partner, or just use your own voice, call out a direction—left, right, forward, back. Your job is to explode two hard steps in that direction, then recover to your center. Do this for 30-second bursts, rest for 15, and repeat 8 times. The goal isn’t just movement; it’s eliminating any hitch, any rise-up before you move. You want to be like a spring-loaded trap. Think about Perkins fighting for post position; that initial bump and quick re-seal is all about leveraged power from a deep, ready stance. He’s not standing upright.

Now, to translate that stance into something that looks like basketball. The “Lane Agility” run, similar to the NBA Combine drill, is a classic for a reason, but most people do it wrong. They just try to get a good time. Set up four cones in a rectangle: start at the bottom-left, sprint to the top-left cone, shuffle right to the top-right cone, backpedal to the bottom-right cone, then shuffle left to finish. That’s one rep. Do three reps, rest 90 seconds, and go again. The key here is the change of direction. I want to hear your feet scratch on the shuffle. I want to see your hips drop and your shoulders lead the turn. A sloppy shuffle where your feet cross? That adds a half-second, and in a game, that’s the difference between a clean catch-and-shoot and a contested fadeaway. We’re building the muscle memory for defensive slides and quick cuts off screens.

Ball handling at speed is non-negotiable. You can be the quickest guy in the gym, but if you can’t control the rock while moving, you’re useless on offense. My favorite drill here is the “Two-Ball Pound Dribble Sprint.” It sounds chaotic, and it is. Take two basketballs, one in each hand. Start at the baseline. Now, dribble both balls simultaneously as hard as you can while sprinting the length of the court. Focus on keeping your head up—I shouldn’t see you looking down—and pounding the balls with force. Turn around at the far baseline and come back. Do four lengths. It’s exhausting, it’s frustrating, but it wires your nervous system to control the dribble without conscious thought, freeing your mind to read the defense. After doing this, handling one ball in a game feels like a vacation. This is the kind of work that lets a guard turn a defensive rebound into a one-man fast break before the other team even gets set.

For reaction and game-like chaos, nothing beats “Partner Mirror Drills with a Ball.” Face a partner about 12 feet apart. One is the leader, one is the mirror. The leader has a ball and can do any move they want: a crossover, a behind-the-back, a hesitation, a spin, combined with lateral or forward movement. The mirror, without a ball, has to replicate the footwork and movement exactly, trying to stay in sync. Switch every 30 seconds. This isn’t about pre-planned patterns; it’s about reading and reacting in real-time. It directly mimics on-ball defense and offensive counter-moves. I’ve found players who do this regularly develop almost a sixth sense for anticipating an opponent’s next move. Their defensive reaction time, according to some timing systems I’ve used, can improve by roughly 15-18% over six weeks. That’s a massive margin.

We can’t forget conditioning. Basketball speed fades when you’re gassed. “Suicide Sprints with a Dribble” are my go-to for game-conditioning. Start with the ball at the baseline. Sprint and dribble to the free-throw line and back, then to half-court and back, then to the far free-throw line and back, then the full court and back. That’s one set. Rest for the same amount of time it took you to complete it—use a stopwatch—then go again. Aim for four sets. This simulates the brutal, repeated high-intensity bursts of a game while maintaining skill. It’s the fourth quarter, you’re down two, you’ve been chasing your man through screens all night, and you need to dig deep for one more sprint in transition. This drill builds that specific resilience.

Finally, integrate everything. The “3-Spot Shooting Sprint” is a killer finisher. Place cones at three spots: the corners and the top of the key. Start under the basket. Sprint to the right corner, catch an imaginary pass (or have a partner), rise into your shot, then sprint back and touch the baseline. Immediately sprint to the top of the key, catch-and-shoot, touch baseline. Sprint to the left corner, shoot, touch baseline. That’s one cycle. Do five cycles, timing yourself. This isn’t a shooting drill; it’s a speed-under-fatigue, footwork, and focus drill. Your legs will be jelly, but your form must hold. This is where you build the capacity to hit a clutch three-pointer after running the floor for 38 minutes, just like Perkins hitting a crucial corner three to stop a run.

So, what’s the takeaway from all this sweat? Speed and agility on the basketball court are a learned language. It’s the vocabulary of explosive first steps, the grammar of sharp cuts, and the punctuation of sudden stops. Drills like these aren’t just about getting quicker; they’re about reprogramming your body’s instincts for the 94-by-50-foot canvas. You start by mastering the stance, then you add movement, then the ball, then reaction, then conditioning, and finally, you stitch it all together under game-like pressure. The stats from a player like Perkins—those efficient 19 points—they don’t come from chance. They come from hundreds of hours of this specific, unglamorous work. The win that breaks a losing streak is often born in an empty gym, in the repetition of a simple agility drill done with furious intent. That’s the secret. There’s no magic, just methodology. Now, get to work. Your first step is waiting.