The 3 Shots That Win 70% of Points in Pickleball
Not every shot in pickleball carries equal weight. In fact, roughly 70% of the points you’ll play come down to just three specific shots. These aren’t flashy trick shots or desperate defensive scrambles. They’re fundamental patterns that show up in nearly every competitive rally, and mastering them separates players who consistently win from those who struggle to break through to the next level.
Understanding which shots actually decide matches changes how you practice, how you strategize, and ultimately how you compete. When you know where points are truly won and lost, you can focus your energy on the skills that deliver the biggest returns. The counterattack stops your opponent’s momentum. The deceptive speedup ends rallies on your terms. The strategic third shot gets you to the kitchen where you can control the point. These three shots form the backbone of winning pickleball, and developing them transforms your game from reactive to proactive.
The Counterattack: Your First Line of Defense
When aggressive players start attacking you with speed and pace, simply blocking the ball back with a soft touch won’t cut it. You’ll find yourself pushed further and further back, eventually forced into a mistake or giving up an easy put-away. The counterattack is your answer to this pressure. It’s the shot that says “I’m not going anywhere” and immediately shifts momentum back in your favor.
The counterattack isn’t about overpowering your opponent with raw strength. It’s about speed, precision, and control. The difference between an effective counterattack and a weak one often comes down to technique rather than athletic ability. The first key is keeping your motion compact and concise. When a ball is coming at you with pace, you simply don’t have time for a big wind-up or elaborate swing. A large backswing slows down your reaction time and reduces your accuracy because you’re introducing more moving parts into the equation.
Instead, use a firm wrist and grip to absorb your opponent’s power rather than trying to generate your own. Think of your paddle as a wall that redirects energy rather than a hammer that creates it. This approach is counterintuitive for many players who instinctively want to swing harder when facing hard shots, but it’s far more effective. Position your paddle at net height in your ready stance so you don’t have far to travel when the attack comes. This ready position creates a shorter path to the ball and gives you precious milliseconds that make the difference between a clean counter and a desperate stab.
One advanced technique that can give you a significant edge is called “paddle shading.” This involves reading your opponent’s position and angles to predict where they can realistically hit the ball, then positioning your paddle accordingly. If your opponent is hitting from a wide angle near the sideline, the geometry of the court often prevents them from going cross-court without the ball sailing long or wide. Knowing this, you can shade your paddle toward the middle of the court and assume they’ll attack down the line. This pre-positioning cuts their reaction time in half because you’re already moving in the right direction before they make contact.
Where you aim your counterattack matters just as much as how you hit it. The goal isn’t to win a hands battle at the net by hitting harder and harder until someone misses. That’s a low-percentage strategy that favors the player with better reflexes or a more powerful paddle. Instead, the goal is to take control of the point immediately by placing the ball where your opponent can’t do anything dangerous with it.
If you have a higher ball to work with, aim for your opponent’s feet. A ball at their feet forces them to hit up, which either results in a mistake or produces a weak pop-up you can finish on the next shot. If the ball is lower and you can’t get it down to their feet, aim for their belly button or straight down the middle between both opponents. This prevents them from attacking on the next shot and keeps you in the rally long enough to look for a better opportunity.
One common mistake is aiming for your opponent’s backhand when they’re already positioned there and expecting it. If they’ve shifted their weight and angled their body to protect that side, you’re playing right into their hands. Anticipation works both ways, and good players will sit on predictable patterns. Mix up your targets and keep them guessing about where your counter is headed.
Speedups: The Art of Deception
Most dinking rallies end one of two ways: someone makes an unforced error, or someone executes a successful speedup. The problem is that obvious speedups are easy to counter. If your opponent sees you loading up with a big backswing or shifting your weight aggressively, they’ll be ready for the attack. Your speedup becomes nothing more than bait for a good counterattack that puts you on the defensive.
The secret to a winning speedup is deception. You want your speedup to look identical to your regular dink right up until the moment of contact. Don’t telegraph your intention with a big backswing or an obvious change in body position. Instead, prepare as if you’re hitting a normal dink with the same stance, the same paddle position, and the same approach. Then, at the last possible second, flick your wrist to generate power and surprise your opponent.
This wrist flick is the key to the entire shot. It allows you to create pace without changing your setup, which means your opponent won’t see it coming until the ball is already flying toward them. The technique is especially valuable on the backhand side, where many players struggle to generate power without risking injury. Traditional backhand speedups that rely on arm strength can lead to tennis elbow and other repetitive stress injuries. The wrist flick approach is safer and more sustainable while being just as effective.
Using a paddle with lower swing weight makes this technique easier and safer. A lighter paddle head allows for quicker wrist action and reduces the strain on your forearm. You can generate the same pace with less effort, which means you can execute deceptive speedups repeatedly throughout a match without wearing yourself out or risking injury.
Knowing when to attack is just as important as knowing how. High balls are the obvious choice for speedups because they give you a better angle and more margin for error. But better players rarely give you those easy opportunities. They keep their dinks low and consistent, forcing you to create your own openings. This is where most intermediate players get stuck. They wait for the perfect ball that never comes, then finally attempt a speedup from a poor position and get countered.
Instead, look for subtle opportunities that better players create for themselves. Volley dinks, where you intercept the ball out of the air before it bounces, take away 10-15% of your opponent’s reaction time just by virtue of being closer to the net when you make contact. This small advantage is often enough to make a mediocre speedup successful. When your opponent is out of position, moving backward, or caught between shots, that’s your window. These moments of vulnerability are brief, so you need to recognize them quickly and capitalize immediately.
Anything slightly higher than a normal dink is fair game if you have the technique to disguise it. You don’t need a sitting duck of a ball if you can execute the deceptive wrist flick effectively. The two most consistently successful targets are down the middle and at your opponent’s right shoulder. Down the middle creates confusion about who should take the ball and limits the angles available for a counter. The right shoulder jams most players and makes it difficult to get their paddle in position for a clean counter.
Avoid their backhand side if they’re already positioned there. Just like with the counterattack, hitting into a prepared defensive position is low-percentage pickleball. Speedups fail most often when they’re predictable or aimed at a player who’s ready and waiting for them.
The Third Shot: It’s Not Just About the Hit
The third shot is often called the most important shot in pickleball, and for good reason. It’s the gatekeeper that determines whether you can advance to the kitchen or remain stuck at the baseline. If you can’t hit a good third shot, you can’t get to the net, and if you can’t get to the net, you’re fighting an uphill battle on every point. But here’s what most players miss: the third shot isn’t just about the quality of the shot itself. It’s about what you do immediately after you hit it.
The key is using “feel” to decide where to move next. Don’t wait to see where your ball lands or watch your opponent’s reaction. By then, it’s too late. Move based on how the contact felt coming off your paddle. This internal feedback is faster and more reliable than visual confirmation, and it gives you a critical head start on your next position.
If you make clean contact on a drop shot and feel that satisfying sensation of the ball compressing against your paddle face with the right amount of spin and arc, start moving toward the kitchen immediately. You need that head start to reach the non-volley zone line in time to be in position for your next shot. Hesitating to admire your work or waiting for confirmation costs you valuable steps and often leaves you stranded in no man’s land when the ball comes back.
If the contact feels medium or okay but not perfect, move to the transition zone instead. This is the area roughly halfway between the baseline and the kitchen line. Moving here gives you more time and space to react to whatever comes back. Maybe your drop was a little high, or maybe it didn’t have quite enough spin. Either way, you’re not confident enough to commit all the way to the kitchen, but you still want to move forward and apply pressure.
If you hit it poorly or too high and you know it immediately from the feel, stay back. Give yourself space to react to the attack that’s almost certainly coming. There’s no shame in recognizing a bad shot and adjusting your position accordingly. It’s far better to be in the right place to defend than to be caught moving forward into a ball that’s being driven at your feet.
When you drive the third shot instead of dropping it, the positioning dynamics change. A drive is hit with pace and power, usually at your opponent’s feet or body, with the intention of forcing a pop-up or weak return. The problem is that you rarely have time to reach the kitchen after hitting a drive. The ball gets there too quickly, and you can’t cover that much ground before it comes back.
Instead, the correct approach is to hit your drive hard and low, then move forward just a few steps into the transition zone and prepare for what comes next. If your opponent pops the ball up because they couldn’t handle the pace, keep moving forward aggressively and attack the high ball. This is exactly what you were hoping for. If they hit a good low volley back at your feet, stay in the transition zone and reset the ball into the kitchen on your fifth shot, then continue your advance.
Here’s where modern pickleball has evolved beyond the traditional wisdom. With today’s more powerful paddles and the emphasis on aggressive play, some advanced players are attacking from the transition zone rather than constantly resetting. If your opponent gives you anything slightly high while you’re moving forward through the transition zone, don’t automatically default to a drop shot. Consider surprising them with an aggressive attack. This keeps them guessing and prevents them from crowding the net with confidence.
The third shot sets the tone for the entire point. A good one puts you in position to take control. A bad one puts you on defense immediately. But even more important than the shot itself is the movement pattern that follows it. Common mistakes on the third shot often have less to do with technique and more to do with positioning and decision-making after contact.
Understanding These Shots for Beginners
If you’re relatively new to pickleball or still learning the strategic elements of the game, these three shots might seem abstract or overly technical at first. Let’s break down what each shot really means in practical terms and why they matter so much to your development as a player.
Think of the counterattack as your defensive backbone. When someone hits the ball hard at you, this is your response that says “I can handle your best shot.” You’re not trying to hit it harder than they did. You’re redirecting their power right back at them in a way that neutralizes their advantage. It’s like catching a fast baseball and immediately throwing it back rather than trying to hit a home run.
The speedup is your offensive weapon during dinking rallies. Dinking is that soft back-and-forth exchange at the net where both teams are trying to create an opening. The speedup is when you recognize that opening and take your shot. It’s the moment you transition from patiently probing for weaknesses to actively trying to end the point. The reason deception matters so much is that good players will counter any obvious attack, so you need the element of surprise on your side.
The third shot is your bridge from defense to offense. In pickleball, the serving team starts at a disadvantage because they begin at the baseline while their opponents are already at the net. The third shot is how you overcome that disadvantage and get yourself to the net where you can compete on equal terms. Whether you choose to drop it softly into the kitchen or drive it with pace, you’re trying to accomplish the same goal: create an opportunity to move forward safely.
These three shots account for 70% of points because they represent the fundamental situations you face in every game. You’ll need to counter attacks multiple times per match. You’ll need to recognize when to speed up during dinking exchanges. And you’ll need to execute effective third shots on every point where you’re serving. Master these situations, and you’re mastering the core of the game.
Putting It All Together
These three shots form the foundation of winning pickleball at every level. The counterattack cancels your opponent’s attacks and prevents them from dictating play with pure aggression. The deceptive speedup ends rallies in your favor by catching opponents off guard when they’re expecting another dink. The strategic third shot gets you into the kitchen where you belong, transforming you from a baseline player fighting uphill into a net player who can control points.
The beauty of focusing on these three shots is that they’re not exotic techniques that require years of practice to develop. They’re fundamental patterns that you can start implementing immediately. Every player, regardless of skill level, deals with these situations in every match they play. The difference between winning and losing often comes down to how well you execute in these critical moments.
During your next practice session, dedicate specific time to each of these shots. Work on counterattacks by having a partner attack you repeatedly while you focus on compact swings and precise placement. Practice deceptive speedups by drilling the wrist flick motion and working on disguising your intention. Develop your third shot feel by hitting drops and drives, then immediately moving based on contact quality rather than waiting to see results.
The players who improve fastest are those who practice with intention and focus on high-leverage skills. These three shots are as high-leverage as it gets. They appear constantly, they decide the majority of points, and improving them creates a cascade of positive results throughout your entire game. Your opponents won’t know what hit them when you start countering their attacks effectively, speeding up at unexpected moments, and getting to the kitchen consistently off your serve.
Competitive pickleball is ultimately about controlling the situations that matter most. These three shots are those situations. Every player you face, from recreational to professional, succeeds or fails based largely on how they handle counterattacks, speedups, and third shots. By making these the cornerstones of your practice and development, you’re investing your time exactly where it will pay the biggest dividends. The scoreboard will reflect that investment.
