A Comparison of the Effectiveness of Two Free Throw Shooting Methods

Book excerpt: The purpose of this study was to compare the effectiveness of two free throw shooting methods, the Ed Palubinskas Method (PM) and the Free Shoot Method (FSM), and their ability to improve free throw shooting accuracy. The experimental group, using the PM, and the control group, using the FSM, shot the same amount of free throws over a 13 week period. Subjects were 33 male intermediate basketball students at Brigham Young University. Subjects in both groups shot 26 free throws twice a week. Subjects were tested once every other week by shooting and recording the amount made out of nine attempts. There was no significant improvement for trials for both groups over the 13 weeks (F=1.583, p=.154). There was also no significant difference between groups (F=.445, p=.510) nor any interaction between groups (F=.642, p=.696). There was no significant difference in free throw shooting accuracy between the PM and FSM for the selected groups.