Hook shot

In basketball, a hook shot is a play in which the offensive player, usually turned perpendicular to the basket, gently throws the ball with a sweeping motion of his arm in an upward arc with a follow-through which ends over his head. Unlike the jump shot, it is shot with only one hand; the other arm is often used to create space between the shooter and the defensive player. The shot is quite difficult to block, but few players have mastered the shot more than a few feet from the basket.

The hook shot was reportedly performed for the first time in official games in Eurobasket 1937 by Pranas Talzūnas, a member of the eventual champions, the Lithuania basketball team. Former Harlem Globetrotter Goose Tatum is often credited with inventing the hook shot; he would even shoot them without looking at the basket. The hook shot later became a staple of many players in the National Basketball Association, including notable stars such as George Mikan, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Magic Johnson, and Yao Ming.

In FIBA games, hook shots were a favored skill for centers before dunks became more popular, mostly because of the relative difficulty of blocking such shots.

NBA Hall of Famer George Mikan developed a devastating hook shot while playing for DePaul University in the mid-1940s. Mikan was able to score seemingly at will with either hand and was a large part of the success of DePaul and later the Minneapolis Lakers.

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