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Saturday, October 25, 2025

Basketball - Give Yourself the Chance to Be Successful

Executives, coaches, and fans fall in love with platitudes. “We need to play harder" or “We’re not putting ourselves in position to win.”

They’re not wrong - but they’re incomplete.

Young players and sometimes veterans, need specifics. What does “playing harder” actually look like? Where does effort translate into points, stops, or wins? Sports are results-oriented. 

Effort Doesn't Cure Everything

Effort matters, but it doesn’t erase bad decisions, poor shot selection, or a lack of toughness. Effort alone can’t “stamp out bad basketball.”

Analytics sharpen the conversation. When you strip a game to its measurable parts, Dean Oliver’s Four Factors predict success better than clichés.

  1. Shooting: Effective Field Goal Percentage (eFG%)

  2. Turnovers: Turnover Rate

  3. Rebounding: Offensive and Defensive Rebounding Percentages

  4. Free Throws: Getting to the line and converting

Those four areas explain the majority of what separates winning from losing basketball.

Where Effort Moves the Needle

Effort doesn’t directly fix shot selection or passing decisions, but it has an unmistakable impact on three of the eight key subcategories that live within the Four Factors:

  1. Defensive Rebounding: Limit opponents to one shot. The benchmark should be a defensive rebounding percentage of 75% or higher.

  2. Offensive Rebounding: Create extra possessions, extra points, and momentum-changing plays.

  3. Forced Turnovers: Active hands, communication, anticipation - the best defenses make opponents uncomfortable.

These are effort-driven. You know them when you see them. They can’t be faked.

The Cost of Low Effort

When a team’s energy dips, the symptoms show up in the box score:

  • More second-chance points allowed.

  • Fewer offensive rebounds and extra-shot opportunities.

  • Fewer turnovers forced, effectively surrendering more possessions.

  • More easy baskets allowed — transition layups, back cuts, second chances.

Effort gaps turn close games into losses.

Coaching Interventions

Coaches can’t legislate effort, but they can cultivate it.

  1. Prioritize toughness. Rebounding and defense flow from a mindset as much as a system.

  2. Solve the chicken-or-egg problem. Recruit rebounders - or coach up rebounding technique. Emphasize block outs or “hit and get,” make contact first, then pursue the ball.

  3. Play the performers. Minutes reward production. Effort and execution earn the floor.

  4. Train for the demands. Strength, quickness, and conditioning create the physical base that sustains effort. Fatigue is the enemy of energy.

The Bottom Line

Effort isn’t a slogan — it’s an input. When directed toward the right outputs — rebounding, forcing turnovers, and defending with pride — it becomes a force multiplier.

Hard work won’t fix bad basketball, but smart, focused effort elevates a team’s ceiling.

Lagniappe. We do players no favors by letting things slide. 

Lagniappe 2. One of "The Four Agreements" is 'Don't Take Anything Personally'. What others say defines them not us. 








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