Hook shot

A hook shot, in basketball, is a play in which the offensive player, usually turned perpendicular to the basket, gently shoots 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. Once the ball is in shooting position, the hook shot is one of the most difficult shots to effectively defend. However, prior to that point, as the ball is being brought up into position, it is very susceptible to being stolen from behind.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, the NBA's all-time leading scorer, was well-known for his highly-effective sky hook, so named because of the height at which Abdul-Jabbar released the ball. Abdul-Jabbar was over seven feet tall, and he released the ball only when his hand was at the very top of his arm's arcing motion. Thus, once released, the sky hook was essentially impossible to block without goaltending. Some of the few players in history to ever successfully block one of Kareem's sky hooks were Wilt Chamberlain and Artis Gilmore.

Abdul-Jabbar's teammate Magic Johnson used a similar shooting technique during the 1987 NBA championship, which was termed the baby hook. It was also very difficult to defend.