What a script is and is not
A script is not a practice plan in the 'warm up, then some team, then conditioning' sense. It is a clock with plays on it. 5:40 to 5:55 is inside run against the Over front, and the plays are 31 Blast, 32 Blast, 38 Toss, 39 Toss, each three times from the left hash and three from the right. When the horn goes at 5:55, inside run is over whether it was good or not. That discipline is what makes a two-hour practice feel like three.
Start from the install, not the calendar
Monday's game plan decides what the week has to teach: the six new plays, the two fronts you will see, the coverage you need to beat on third down. Every period on the script should trace back to one of those. If a period cannot say which part of the game plan it serves, it is conditioning wearing a disguise.
This is also why the script is easier to write from a tagged play library than from memory. Filter to 'third and medium vs Cover 3' and the plays for Wednesday's third-down period are sitting there; write them in and you have not forgotten the one you installed last week and never repped.
The shape of a practice
Most high school practices settle into the same skeleton, and the skeleton is the point -- players and coaches should know what is coming. A two-hour script at five to fifteen minutes a period:
- Walk-through (10-15 min): the new plays at half speed, before anyone is tired. Best learning window of the day.
- Warm-up and stretch (10 min), then a water break you script so it actually happens.
- Individual (15-20 min): position groups on technique. Linemen on their combos for this week's front, receivers on the release the corner will give them.
- Group (15 min): inside run, pass skel, or seven-on-seven. Offense against the scout look you drew from film.
- Team (20-30 min): the game plan against the scout defense, situational -- first and ten, then third downs, then red zone. The plays are named and the down and distance is called out.
- Special teams (10 min): one unit a day. Scripted or it gets skipped.
- Conditioning or a two-minute drill (5-10 min): if it is a two-minute drill, it counts as team.
Name the plays
The period that says 'team offense' is a period with no plan. The one that says '31 Blast x3 L, 32 Blast x3 R, 38 Toss x2, play-action off it x2' is a period a position coach can prepare for and a scout-team coach can align to. Write the plays, the hash, and the number of reps. It looks like overkill on paper and it is the single biggest difference between a staff that installs eight plays a week and one that installs four.
Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday
- Tuesday: install. New plays in walk-through and group, base plays in team. Heaviest day.
- Wednesday: situations. Third down, red zone, backed up, two-minute. The call sheet's boxes become the team periods.
- Thursday: polish and special teams. Short, sharp, the openers scripted in order, then send them home. Print the call sheet and wristbands after.
Print it for everyone
Every coach gets the script, on paper, before practice -- the scout-team coach most of all, because he needs to know which front to show in which period. A script only the coordinator has seen is a script the rest of the staff is guessing at. If your players carry a phone, the installed plays for the week should be on it by Monday night so Tuesday is reps, not a lecture.
The mistakes that cost the most
- Periods that run long. One period going eight minutes over means the last two get cut, and the last two are usually special teams and the two-minute drill -- the ones that decide close games. The horn is the horn.
- No rep counts. 'Run inside zone' becomes eleven reps of the same play to the same side. Write the count and the hash and you get six looks instead of one.
- A scout team with no card. If the scout defense does not know which front to show, the offense is practicing against nothing in particular. The script tells them.
- Water that is not on the script. It gets skipped in September heat exactly when it matters.
- Rewriting from scratch every week. Keep the skeleton and change the plays; a script that looks the same every Tuesday is a script the players run without being told.