March Madness: Basketball games you can play with your family

by Brittany Anas · March 5, 2013

By Brittany Anas

Hey, hotshot: Do you get inspired by filling out your March Madness brackets and watching Cinderella upsets? For basketball fans, the most magical time of year is approaching as the NCAA tourney will take over our televisions, the always-enthusiastic Dick Vitale will shout his famous one-liners at us and we’ll wallpaper our living rooms with brackets.

Why not convert some of that enthusiasm into a basketball-themed work-out? You can take the Big Dance to your own driveway court or your local recreation center, getting your family and friends to play, too.

Here are a few of our favorite, driveway classic basketball games that will get your heart rate up and help you improve your own game:

Twenty-one: Nope, not blackjack, but there is a little bit of gambling and strategy involved as you need to land on exactly 21 points to win the game. This individualized game means it’s every man and woman for him or herself. Play with a minimum of three players.

• For the “tip off” one player shoots the ball, intentionally hitting the rim so that all players can fight for the rebound.
• For a super-competitive game, there are no fouls. For a family-friendly game, let players call their own fouls. If somebody calls a wussy foul, just go all “Bill Laimbeer” on them and dramatically deny the foul ever took place.
• Shots made on the court count as two points.
• After each made field goal, the player heads to the free throw line to shoot up to three free throws in a row. Free throw shooting ends when the ball is missed.
• The first player to make it to exactly 21 points wins the game. If a player goes over 21 points, his or her score is docked to 11 points. To avoid going over 21, players will flub a free throw — like Shaq, except it’s intentional.

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Around the world: This driveway classic is a fun way to hone your shooting skills from all areas of the court. Play with a minimum of two players.

• Use cones or chalk to mark spots on the court where you’ll be shooting from. For a short game, mark six spots. We suggest two, easy inside shots, a free throw and three perimeter shots. For a longer game, mark a dozen spots.
• Players line up for the first shot and shoot one at a time. If you make it, you move on clockwise to the next spot on the court. Shoot until you miss.
• At any point in the game, if a player misses their first shot, they can shout “chance” and take a second shot. If they miss that shot, they’re sent back to the beginning spot to start all over.
• The first person to make all shots from all of the denoted spots is the winner.

(Shop cones at Sports Authority or for outdoor chalk at Michael’s).

H-O-R-S-E: Trick shots or solid outside shooting can win this family-friendly game for you. Play with at least two players.

• Decide the sequence of players — i.e. who will shoot first, second, third, etc.
• Player one shoots the ball from anywhere on the court. If he or she makes the basket, player two must shoot from the same spot. If player two makes it, player three must shoot from that same spot, and so on. Once a shot is missed, it’s open range for the next player in line to shoot from anywhere on the court.
• A missed shot earns you a letter and the first person to accumulate five letters — spelling out H-O-R-S-E — is knocked out of the game.