The One-Legged Three. A shot that made pause the game.

Yesterday I was watching Joventut Badalona vs Valencia Basket, and one shot made me pause.

A three-pointer by Guillaume Vives off one leg.

Huh? I went back to check if I had seen it right.

Not because of the result, but because of the moment. It wasn’t the end of the quarter. It wasn’t late in the shot clock. It wasn’t rushed. It was a deliberate shot.

That detail stuck with me.

So I went into the data. And Vives is not just another shooter. At this point of the season, he’s leading the ACB League in three-point percentage.

Going over film of all of his attempts, a clear pattern appears. Roughly one out of every four threes is taken off one foot! And he makes 60% of them!

That actually makes a lot of sense.

For players without exceptional physical tools — players who don’t rely on vertical lift to shoot over the defense — this type of shot creates space and rhythm. It’s efficient. It’s repeatable.

Vives isn’t the first to do it. A similar technique was already visible years ago in the game of Juan Carlos Navarro, which I explain in my video breakdown:

It brings us to the real coaching question:

Should this be a technique we teach more often?

And if so, why isn’t it already part of our standard shooting toolbox, especially for guards who don’t generate a lot of elevation on their shot? And especially in female basketball, like Marine Johannes is showing?

Once again, the ACB proves to be a trendsetter in the global game.

That’s also why I’m currently working on a report with my own analytical view on the first half of this current ACB season.

More on that very soon, stay tuned!