In Reply to: From what I seen in college ball over the last few years posted by traprh on March 31, 2025 at 10:53:29
it with two hands and putting his elbows out. Back when I coached (I'm not sure we could do this when I played) we taught the rebounder to move his arms around as a rigid piece consisting of the ball, his two hands holding the ball opposite each other on the ball, and his elbows straight out from the ball. First they banned that so a player could pivot and hold the ball in both hands with his elbows out protecting the ball without swinging his arms about independently, but moving his arms with his body as he pivots.
Then they banned the elbows out altogether. So now you see the rebounder holding the ball with two hands, the ball up against his body somewhere (the higher the batter), and he pivoting to keep opponents' hands off the ball. Mara is slowly learning to keep the ball at least shoulder high, but he isn't anywhere near consistent with that yet. Even keeping the ball high, it's still hard to keep opponents off the ball without being able to put your elbows out.
It is now easier for the opponent to grab the ball and tie up the rebounder. The opponent has a better chance of not being called for a foul if he uses both hands - which is what it looks like Cronin teaches since the Bruins mostly reach in with both hands. But even with that his players do get called sometimes for a reach in foul, but not as often as I would expect. There's some solid coaching going on there.