*Article*

#### **E** ff**ects of Upper-Limb, Lower-Limb, and Full-Body Compression Garments on Full Body Kinematics and Free-Throw Accuracy in Basketball Players**

#### **Duo Wai-Chi Wong 1,2, Wing-Kai Lam 3,4,5,\*, Tony Lin-Wei Chen 1, Qitao Tan 1, Yan Wang 1,2 and Ming Zhang 1,2,\***


**\*** Correspondence: gilbertlam@li-ning.com.cn (W.-K.L.); ming.zhang@polyu.edu.hk (M.Z.); Tel.: +86-010-80801108(W.-K.L.); +852-2766-4939(M.Z.)

Received: 1 April 2020; Accepted: 6 May 2020; Published: 19 May 2020

**Abstract:** Compression garments can enhance performance and promote recovery in athletes. Di fferent body coverage with compression garments may impose distinct e ffects on kinematic movement mechanics and thus basketball free-throw accuracy. The objective of this study was to examine basketball free-throw shooting accuracy, consistency and the range of motion of body joints while wearing upper-, lower- and full-body compression garments. Twenty male basketball players performed five blocks of 20 basketball free-throw shooting trials in each of the following five compression garmen<sup>t</sup> conditions: control-pre, top, bottom, full (top + bottom) and control-post. All conditions were randomized except pre- and post-control (the first and last conditions). Range of motion of was acquired by multiple inertial measurement units. Free-throw accuracy and the coe fficient of variation were also analyzed. Players wearing upper-body or full-body compression garments had significantly improved accuracy by 4.2% and 5.9%, respectively (*p* < 0.05), but this di fference was not observed with shooting consistency. Smaller range of motion of head flexion and trunk lateral bending (*p* < 0.05) was found in the upper- and full-body conditions compared to the control-pre condition. These findings sugges<sup>t</sup> that an improvement in shooting accuracy could be achieved by constraining the range of motion through the use of upper-body and full-body compression garments.

**Keywords:** range of motion; basketball shooting; proprioception
