The purpose of this study was to investigate how basketball athletes cope with stresses. Subjects were 422 male and 406 female basketball players whom had competed in the 2001 university basketball annual tournament. The mean age of the subjects were 20.41 (±3.02). This study was assessed by using a modification of Lazarus's and Folkman's Ways of Coping Checklist. Factor analysis and analysis of variance (ANOVA) were used for data analysis. The results were as follow: (1). There are significant differences in the self-control, meditation, stability zones, detachment, transformation mood, active coping, displacement attention, self cognition and relaxation-mood. Male athletes tend to score higher in theses areas than female athletes, but female athletes had better self-cognition than male athletes. (2) Different ages in cope with stress had significant difference in the relaxation-mood and displacement attention, and athletes 20 years and older cope much better than athletes who were 19 years and younger. (3) Year of experience of the athletes in cope with stress had significant difference in mood change. Athletes with three years of experiences and older had better mood change than athletes with two years of experiences. (4) The best strategies for basketball athletes to cope with stress were to fully utilize the effective ways and the initial eigenvalues is 12.9 percent.