Basketball Rules: How to Play Basketball

The origin of Basketball with its invention in 1891, in Springfield, Massachusetts. It was made by a Canadian physical education instructor named James Naismith. It was actually created to be a less injury-prone sport than football. The original game had 13 rules & a peach basket hung at ten feet above the ground. Even though it happened in the United States, at least ten of the players who participated in the very first game ever were university students from Quebec.

The rules of basketball now are quite simple although if compared to the originals ones, they are way more complicated. Basketball is a team sport with 13 rules. The basic rules of basketball are the following: it starts with two teams of five players. Their goal is to try to score by shooting a ball through a hoop elevated 10 feet above the ground. The game is played on a rectangular floor named the court, and there is a hoop at each end. The court is then divided into two main sections by the mid-court line. If the offensive team puts the ball into play behind the mid-court line, it has a total of ten seconds to get the ball over the mid-court line. If it doesn’t do so, then the defense gets the ball. Once the offensive team gets the ball over the mid-court line, it can no longer have a player(s) with the ball in the area in back of the line. If it does, then the defense team gets the ball. The ball can only be moved down the court toward the basket by passing or dribbling.

The team with the ball is called the offense. and the team without the ball is called the defense. The offense team’s job is to try to steal the ball, contest shots, steal and deflect passes, and garner rebounds. When a team gets the ball in the hoop, they score two points and the ball goes to the other team. If a basket, or field goal, is made outside of the three-point arc, then that basket is worth three points. A free throw is only worth one point. Free throws are given to a team according to some formats involving the number of fouls committed in a half and/or the type of foul committed. Fouling a shooter always results in two or three free throws being given the shooter, depending on where he was when he shot. If he was beyond the three-point line, then he will get three shots.

Other types of fouls don’t result in free throws being given until a certain number have accumulated during a half. Once that number is reached, then the player who was fouled is given a “1-and-1” opportunity. If he makes his first free throw, he gets to try and get a second one. If he misses the first shot, then the ball is live on the rebound.

Each game is divided into sections. All levels have two halves. In college, each half are twenty minutes long. In high school and below, the halves are divided into eight (and sometimes six) minutes quarters. In the pros, quarters are twelve minutes long. There is a gap of several minutes between each halves. Gaps between quarters are pretty short. If the score is tied at the end of regulation, then overtime periods of various lengths are played until a team scores another point.

Each team is assigned a basket or goal to defend, meaning that the other basket is their scoring basket. At halftime, the teams switch goals. The game starts with one player from both team at center court. A referee will toss the ball up between the two players. The player that gets his hands on the ball will then tip it to a teammate. That is called a tip-off. In addition to stealing the ball from an opposing player, there are other ways for a team to get the ball but I won’t go into details.