finger-roll

1 7.2

A basketball shot made near the basket by rolling the ball off the fingertips

noun

Jargon

: tiro de dedo

In the final moments of the match, she scored with a swift finger roll that surprised the defenders.

Examples

It's called the "finger roll".

Failure to Launch (2006)
Then we would toast to something big, something we could share in the loving of it, like Bill Russell's finger-roll lay-up or the pulled pork sandwich at Round Belly Ribs or the fact that I had grown two inches that year, even though he wouldn't have known that.

Fiction book (1995)
During the game, he executed a beautiful finger roll that curved high into the air before dropping into the basket.
The player practiced his finger roll shot repeatedly, trying to master the technique for a perfect arc.

Synonyms

lay-up

vsfinger-roll

Jargon

5 3.4

A close shot near the basket in basketball made with one hand, often off the backboard

uses a fingertip roll and higher arc rather than a close banked shot

How Skillful

hook shot

Specialized

3 3.6

finger-roll

Jargon

1 7.2

layup

Specialized

24 4.5

Surface Forms

finger-roll singular

finger-rolls plural

Morphology

finger-roll = finger + roll (transparent) = finger + roll

The compound 'finger-roll' literally describes rolling performed with the fingers, so a learner who knows 'finger' and 'roll' can infer the basic sense.

Etymology

Finger-roll comes from the two simple parts finger and roll, because the player 'rolls' the ball off the tips of their fingers. So a finger-roll is a soft basketball shot made by gently guiding the ball off the fingertips in a rolling motion toward the basket.