"Survive and advance" in Malone. The network drops you into a remote location with a team of a dozen players matched with 15 others for size, athleticism, and skill. You have a dormitory, dining facility, an athletic complex with a basketball court and fitness training. There's a single elimination tournament in two months.
In Alone it's shelter, fire, food. Rinse, repeat. In Malone you set the priorities.
You get a well-paid assistant and six coaching items. You can't bring performance enhancing medication. Each player gets identical items. Each book counts as one item.
Restated, what combination of coaching and training produces sustainable competitive advantage? Build skill, build TEAM, build resilience, and help build character and leadership.
What's your practice schedule?
- Develop a "Plan for the Day" including published schedule
- How much skill building?
- What percentage is shooting?
- How much scrimmaging?
- How many sessions a day?
- How much time off?
- How do we measure progress?
- How do we use classroom time to implement a program?
- How do you set up roommate groups?
- How does player leadership emerge?
- What is our feedback to measure progress?
- How much do we practice 'situational basketball'?
Assistant Coach. Do you want an established coach, fitness guru, basketball trainer, jack of all trades?
Work to develop technical, tactical, physical, and psychological skill. I'd choose an elite skill trainer. Pick a Don Kelbick and get two-for-one as an experienced college coach. And I think we'd get along. Why not pick an elite college coach? Are they an elite developer or elite recruiter? Certainly coaches like Jay Wright and Geno Auriemma are both. Plus, I'd have to find someone who thinks I'm not a nutcase...a big ask.
For the woodsman, "the axe is the tool of tools" and a fire rod is the second most critical tool. As coaches, our brain comes first.
Items: think about the MUST, NEED, and WANT categories. I'm not taking a five-dollar whistle as a MUST in this context.
1. Notebook (three-ring binder). The notebook comes with our program philosophy, drill book, quotes, and playbook. Writing carries an edge over typing and I want players to take notes. Top players maintain their notebook as learners.
2. Tablet. Players want and need access to family, the outside world, and the Internet. Plus we have our favorite basketball learning and teaching sites.
3. Music system. I'd want something to interface with the sound system in the gymnasium. Music inspires, energizes, and provides "crowd noise" so players learn to communicate over the noise.
4. Video system. Video is the 'truth machine'. Yes, players watch video on their tablets, but I want everyone to access the information together, ideally on a video board. Follow Anson Dorrance and show positive clips (mostly) and Doc Rivers' policy of no more than thirteen clips in a session. "This is who we are and how we do it..." identity and performance.
5. Video channel subscription. "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy." It's not the perfect team-building platform, but this isn't Parris Island Marine training center. Positive lives never emerge from negative experiences. After an evening meal, I'd want a team study session and an evening movie/show as a group. Films entertain, show struggle, evolution, and character... such as Hoosiers or Shackleton.
6. Cellphone. I go back and forth. The negatives are the ultimate distraction. Players will play Candy Crush, be on the phones with their friends when we want them studying, and lose focus. But understand 'cultural literacy' as young people see phones as freedom and lifelines.
I won't argue that a fifteen year-old needs a jumprope over a cellphone. As great as many basketball and leadership books are, I can't say that any one exceeds technology value. Maybe the players would want "Beats" headphones. You can't always get what you want.
"Gimmicky" won't be our calling card. Coach taught that you win with fundamentals not trickery. The Haka isn't gimmicky for the All-Blacks, it's integral to their identity and culture. The Haka would be inauthentic for us.
Everyone defines what matters for them. For me, it has never been all about basketball or winning, but about character and seeking excellence. Winning becomes the byproduct of process transforming talent. What's right for you? Go for it.
Lagniappe. Don Kelbick...
Lagniappe 2. Another Ido Singer BOB.
Iona BLOB - 4-Low Lift Rip STS pic.twitter.com/TZUkzumqRY
— πΈππ ππππππ (@IdoBasketball) August 12, 2022
Lagniappe 3. Don't get hung up on age. Coach John Wooden won his first championship at age 55.