Total Pageviews

Wednesday, March 19, 2025

Relationships and Basketball

Coaches change lives. I've been privileged to have a relationship with Coach Sonny Lane for almost 55 years. My wife and I celebrated our fortieth wedding anniversary with Coach and his wife, Paula. 

Coach shared so many valuable lessons with us:

"Sacrifice." Teams win with shared vision, shared sacrifice, and shared decision-making. 

"Take care of business. - family, school, basketball." There was never a doubt about priorities or commitment to them. 

"Take care of yourself. Everybody wears a coat, hat, and gloves" (in the cold Boston winter). If you're sick, you can't help us.

"The ball is gold." Long before the Four Factors, he emphasized shot selection and avoiding turnovers. Against a team that had won 17 straight into the sectional quarterfinals, our first possession had 22 passes before we took - and made - our shot. We shot 23 for 42 from the field and won 58-38. 

"Who are those guys?" Teach players to believe in themselves. You can only be as good as your self-belief. 


Boston Garden, March 1973

Lagniappe. The hardest position to teach and to play... 

Lagniappe 2. "During one of our conversations with Coach Izzo, he reminded us of the importance of trying to recruit kids who are already tough and then demanding that they be tough every single day in practice." - Eric Kapitulik in "The Program"

Lagniappe 3. Jay Wright's coaching started with ATTITUDE.  

Posted by at

Tuesday, March 18, 2025

Basketball Coaches Train Leaders*

*Adapted from my volleyball blog

Coaches train leaders. Find areas of agreement and controversy. 

1. "Leaders make leaders." Don't confuse loud voices with leadership. Examine character and decision making. Doris Kearns Goodwin wrote Leadership in Turbulent Times, sharing her study of the Roosevelts, Lincoln, and Lyndon Johnson. Lincoln famously distributed leadership, discussed in Goodwin's Team of Rivals. 

Navy Seal Jocko Willink authored Extreme Ownership. Leaders are accountable to the mission and to their teams. 

Leaders forge culture. In Legacy, James Kerr shares how the New Zealand All-Blacks rugby squad embraces team culture and Maori culture. "Sweep the sheds" has both literal and figurative self-management. Having a 'blue head' means to be cool under pressure. Players are taught to "leave the jersey in a better place." Teammates understand the Greek proverb that "old men plant trees in whose shade they will never sit." 

Team leaders transfer core values which appear as performance through standards which are behaviors. 

2. Consider the role of probability in decision making. Weather forecasters learned their forecasts improved when they reported them in probabilities. "There's an 80% chance of rain on Thursday" gives us useful and nuanced opinion. 

If you want to read further, consider reading Thinking in Bets. 

3. When making judgements, apply "mental models" and cognitive biases to think better. Share examples. You see a player have an exceptionally good or poor performance. Sample size limits our judgment as one day may not represent their 'weighted average'. 

Evaluating an issue or problem. Expand our "circle of competence." 


4. Leaders model excellence. They prioritize decision-making for the good of their team over what's good for them. They inform the value of truth - living the truth, telling the truth, and taking the truth. 

5. Study analogies and variety of disciplines. Consider keeping lists of stories and analogies as references. 


6. Leaders become better listeners. Nelson Mandela attended meetings where his father always spoke last. Having listened to the discussion, the senior Mandela made more insightful comments addressing others' concerns. 

"An army of asses led by a lion can defeat an army of lions led by an ass." 

Lagniappe. Strong abs help with balance and injury prevention.  

Lagniappe 2. What's our "basketball number" of poor shots, turnovers, and missed assignments?  

Lagniappe 3. Do you want moody or self-absorbed guys?  

Posted by at

Monday, March 17, 2025

Basketball - Applying Mental Models

Coaching is problem solving. Use mental models to help us relate our domain knowledge to other domains. This may trigger analogies or "out of the box thinking."

Here are ideas from Biology mental models: 

"Ideas from biology provide other key mental models. Evolution via natural selection explains much about competition and adaptation." At any moment, we live in a "defined state," physical and mental activity, sleep. The effectiveness of these activities defines our growth trajectory and sometimes our demise. Our actions determine our growth/evolution. 

Gary Keller, author of The ONE Thing advises highly motivated people to invest four hours a day on their "one thing." 

Microbiology teaches that tiny bacteria and viruses invisible to the naked eye can transform environments, economies and societies. Small changes create big ripples. We spend almost no time thinking about zoonotic disease - COVID, malaria, dengue fever. 

Attention or inattention to detail can cost us everything. Nassim Taleb discusses rare yet predictable events in "The Black Swan." Who could have guessed that the costliest accident in Las Vegas history was a tiger killing his handler? 

Failure to prepare or inability to execute during "winning time" impacts basketball history. Call a timeout where none exists. A free throw lane violation in the final seconds eliminated UNC in the ACC tournament this weekend. A Princeton backdoor cut beats defending champion UCLA in 1996. Predictable unpredictability...

DNA is the source code programming the growth and form of all biological organisms. Metabolism powers the chemical reactions sustaining life. What is the DNA of our basketball program? Does a learning culture, effort, unselfishness, and toughness define us? 

Homeostasis describes how organisms dynamically self-regulate to maintain ideal equilibrium within despite external changes. How much time do we devote to lesser known aspects of self-regulation? Have we prioritized the proven benefit of sleep and basketball performance? Is nutrition something we ever discuss (timing, consumption of protein, alcohol use?). Do we preach recovery by low level activity, foam rolling, hydration, thermal contrast - hot and cold - showers? 

Lagniappe. Ran this once and got a shot but not a hoop. Alpo not Valpo... 

Lagniappe 2. Coach Crean on in-game change options. 

Lagniappe 3. A few 5-out options. Teach young kids spacing even if they can't shoot from the perimeter.  


Posted by at

Sunday, March 16, 2025

Basketball Failure

We used to say, "every season ends in tears, tears of joy or disappointment." Successful coaches and players learn from failure. 

Basketball offers many ways to fail as organizations, coaches, or players. Failure is our companion, a prerequisite for success. Failure is a certainty; repeated failure questions our methods. 

Failure reflects 'structural' problems and/or 'decision/execution' issues. 

Structural:

  • Skill (talent/player and team development)
  • Strategy (game knowledge/experience)
  • Physicality (too little strength/quickness/conditioning)
  • Psychology (effort/resilience/mental toughness)
Decision/Execution: 
  • EFG% (shot selection/time-score-situation)
  • Turnovers - "Turnovers kill dreams; turnovers earn seats."
  • Rebounding (assignment/action/conversion to defense)
  • Fouling/basket attack ("Fouling negates hustle."


Graphic from Zak Boisvert

Personal beliefs/opinions

1) Coaching is a relationship business. Establishing trust, developing culture, and inspiring players are prerequisites to success. 

2) My job as a coach was to add sustainable value for a player's life. 

3) Learn how to develop players or get assistance. "Every day is player development day." 

4) A player has two priorities, to make others on the team better and to impact winning. 

5) Condition with a ball. Practice time is precious and we're coaching basketball not cross-country. 

6) Resilience includes the ability to play with intensity while playing under control. Intensity without emotional control can lead to chaos. 

7) I love practice. Practice creates opportunity for players to add value for themselves and for the team. 

8) Bad losses are part of the process. The worst relate to breakdowns in situational understanding leading to avoidable mistakes. 

9) Performance on the track is not the same as basketball conditioning. 

10) Practice situational basketball every practice to have a better chance to win close games (two possessions or less).

Lagniappe. Duke BOB, multiple scoring options. 

Lagniappe 2. Obvious...and yet...  

Lagniappe 3. Don Kelbick shooting. Coach Kelbick teaches, "think shot first" and emphasize what you're good at. 

 

Posted by at

Saturday, March 15, 2025

Study Elite Defense

"Stops make runs." Billy Donovan discusses The 95, the 95 percent of the time that you don't have the ball. That makes defense The 50. Until we amp up our defensive preparation, commitment, and execution, we won't be serious competitors. 

Commitment.

  • Five guys engage...playing tied on a string.  
  • Ball pressure and containment takes opponents out of their offense.
  • Strong defense gives you a chance when offense struggles. 
  • Adopt a core theme..."hard twos" or "one bad shot." 
  • Reward minutes to stoppers.
Technique. 
  • Play low. "Low man wins."
  • Play close. Proximity reduces shooting percentage. "Contestedness" is proven. 
  • Help. "Cover 1.5," yours and half of another. 
  • Challenge shots without fouling. 
  • Talk. Talk energizes and intimidates. 
Attitude. 
  • Attack. Passive defense loses. Find guys that win individual battles.
  • "Jordans" defend as though a stop gets everyone Air Jordans.
  • Take pride in both individual and team defense. 
What's the problem? Slogans don't defend. 

Lagniappe.
Lagniappe 2. Bring coaching substance to add value. 
View on Threads

Lagniappe 3. Old adages still matter. "Layups and free throws win games." What actions in your playbook are designed to get layups? If our team seldom goes to the rim, complaining about lack of fouls is a canard. 
Posted by at

Friday, March 14, 2025

Basketball - The Franklin Lunch

Make friends with the dead. What if we had lunch with Ben Franklin or DaVinci or Lincoln? How would it go? What would we ask and hear? What would we order?

“It’s a great honor to have lunch with you, Mr. Franklin.”

BF: “There are more old drunkards than there are old doctors.” 

“Good to see that age hasn’t dulled your sense of humor. I’d love to hear your perspective on coaching.”

BF: “One of my favorite topics - self-improvement. You know about the 13 virtues?” 

“Absolutely. Love number 13. You said you could never achieve humility because if you did, you would truly be proud of it”

BFL “Boil it down to this, ‘Well done is better than well said.’ Important parts of coaching are introspection and self-reflection.”

“What do you want?” 

BF: “You won’t trip me up on that, Doc. I’ll have a pint and the brisket.” 

“Tell me about relationships and coaching.” 

BF: “Coaching is collaboration. Find your own path and navigate the inevitable struggles.”

“How about a few pithy quotes?”

BF: - An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.

- without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.

- Honesty is the best policy.

- We must all hang together or assuredly we shall all hang separately 

- If you would not be forgotten as soon as you are dead and rotten, either write something worth reading or do something worth writing.

"Did you have any favorite sporting pastimes?"

BF: "I was pretty accomplished at kite flying."

Lagniappe. Simple action versus a couple of zones...  

Lagniappe 2. "Movement kills defense." 

Lagniappe 3. Find players committed to winning not stats. 

Posted by at

Thursday, March 13, 2025

Learn Better to Think, Analyze, and Decide Better. Tips and Strategies That Pay

"Learn every day." Today's piece informs tools to improve our study and production. 

Learn life lessons. Learn how to learn. Learn your sport. Each of us has a state of being which evolves. Embrace a learning culture across the arc of your life. 

Acquire resources to function more effectively at home, in school, and on the court. 

Boost emotional intelligence.

12 Sentences Emotionally Intelligent people use under pressure pic.twitter.com/wcoKvYecia

— Always Keep Learning (@AlwaysKeepL) March 9, 2025

Learn how to learn. 

Take the free Coursera course on learning when you have an extended break (e.g. summer). It's about 8-10 hours. You will learn better study habits. I wish I had access to this as a youngster. 

Write better.  

A couple of great resources for writers are Stephen King's book, "On Writing" and Anne Lamott's "Bird by Bird." You could start by searching for highlights from ChatGPT or Claude AI. 

Become a storyteller. People remember great stories. The Heath Brothers' Made to Stick is a great read about the magic of storytelling. 

And follow the advice of Director Werner Herzog, "Read. Read. Read. Read. Read." 

Think better. 

Use Mental Models. Get a valuable introduction to "Thinking Models" of Charlie Munger. Apply these principles to improve analysis and decision-making. 

Use every tool in your toolbox to better yourselves. 

The famous football coach Amos Alonzo Stagg was asked what he thought about his team. He replied, "Ask me in about twenty years and I'll be able to give you a better answer." Your coaches would say the same thing. 

Lagniappe. "“Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.” —George Bernard Shaw"

Lagniappe 2. Zoom action can help us. Zoom is "downscreen into DHO." 

Lagniappe 3. Ask better questions. Where do our points arise (transition-halfcourt offense-threes-sets-layups, midrange)? What is limiting us? How do our opponents score? It doesn't have to be "Nerdvana" high level analytics, just what is happening. 



 

Posted by at

Wednesday, March 12, 2025

Keeping the Basketball Wolves Away

Via Ben Volin of The Boston Globe:  

"In his memoir “The Score Takes Care of Itself,” Hall of Famer Bill Walsh described the frenetic life of a head football coach. 

“In the NFL, events occur – hit you – at supersonic speeds with volcanic force,” Walsh wrote. “There aren’t months or weeks to recover, not even days. Usually only hours or minutes. While you’re throwing a wolf out the back door, another is banging on your front door and two more are trying to crawl through the windows.”"

Coaches get input from many sources - administrators, assistants, doctors, players, families, fans. Coach Bob Knight shared, "if you listen to the fans in the stands, pretty soon you'll be sitting next to them."

Coaches hardly get a breath during season. It's a sprint not a marathon. Blink and it's over. 

It's juggling as coaches balance development and winning, the present and the future, senior experience and promising young players. It's even worse in college with NIL and the transfer portal. Danny Hurley shared that over half his team is considering or plans transferring. 

What are the wolves? Here are a few possibilities:
  • Overconfidence. Past results don't guarantee future results. Respect every opponent. 
  • Doubt. You can only be as good as you believe. As Bon Jovi sang, "you can't win until you're not afraid to lose." 
  • Outside recruiters. "We can make you better than your coach."
  • Distractions. The world offers an unlimited number of possibilities to teenagers. Focus on the process. 
No coach ever made everyone happy. It's impossible with limited minutes, role, and recognition. At best, the coach teaches and cares for every player, puts the team first, and communicates why decisions are made. Then (s)he fights off the wolves...daily.  

Lagniappe. Make your community proud with the competitiveness and character of the players and coaches. 

Lagniappe 2. Great video on warmup, athleticism, and strength and balance. Although it emphasizes volleyball, it applies for other sports. Seek balance. Don't ignore training and don't overdo it. 


Lagniappe 3. "More difficult to handle success..."

Lagniappe 4. Joe Haefner defense (Twitter not loading embed feature well today). 

 

Posted by at

Tuesday, March 11, 2025

Basketball - Actions to Get Layups

"Layups and free throws win games." That's an oversimplification but as David Baldacci writes in "The Hit," "Sometimes the simplest answers are the right ones."

Don't have a "Billy Preston Offense." 

Categorize by hard-to-defend actions. Fundamental basketball leverages simplicity. Perimeter passing to shoot threes works when you're hot and often in the NBA when you're skilled. When your high school team turns the ball over twenty times and shoots 20-25 percent on threes - that dog don't hunt. 

Isolation 

1) Favorite action, Horns Down, double downscreens sets up curls, flare lifts, or a drive for proficient point guards.

2) Reverse pivot from the elbow. You all know box drills. Get your big a one dribble layup with elbow entry from Horns or 1-4 high.  

Pick-and-Roll 

1) e.g. Elbow Get

If you have "bigs" who can put the ball on the floor, enjoy a mismatch against a big less accustomed to defending dribble drive. Rejecting the ball screen creates a great option. 

2) Duke Elbow series

Another horns action with options for handoff or dribble drive for the big. Of course, you could also interchange the 4 and the 1 and get a mismatch if the defense elects to switch. 

Cutting 

1) Tufts


This is a minor variation of a play run by the Tufts' women, former coached by Carla Berube (now at Princeton). There's a post feed and a back door cut. 

2) Blind Pig

Complex screening

"LAKER" a typical zipper entry into screen-the-screener play.  


 2) Iverson

3) Spain (extra trickery)

4) Rip 

Mismatches 

1) Pistons


"Pistons" capitalizes on the "switch everything" mentality many teams employ, especially late in the game and late in the shot clock. A small on big cross-screen is simple and underutilized at every level.  

Lagniappe. Defense gives us a chance to advance. 

Lagniappe 2. Be the tougher defender. Most young teams are not. 

Lagniappe 3. Simple strength workouts cross sport domains. 

Posted by at

Monday, March 10, 2025

Basketball- One Thing

“If you chase two rabbits you will not catch either one.” Russian Proverb 

Visualize the process not the results. Students asked to focus on process had better motivation and focus. And better process leads to better results. 

  • Optimize process. Great process gives us a chance for excellence.
  • Multitasking is a lie. A computer multitasks by rapidly switching between tasks. Humans can't do important work that way. Walk and chew gum? Yes. Study and watch television? No. We can only do one thing with full focus. Texting and driving kills, and estimated 16 percent of fatal accidents. 
  • Excel at time management. Do more by wasting less time. 
Focus on "The One Thing" as described in Gary Keller's book of the same title. 

Examine the big picture...all things possible for the success of a program. From the Pareto Principle we know that 80 percent of the results come from 20 percent of the input. Our job is to find that One Thing needed to succeed. 

Players? Players without coaching? Incomplete. 

Coaching? Even the most exceptional coaching needs players. 

Strategy? Without players and coaching, there is no strategy. 

Player development. Without all of the above, pointless. 

What encapsulates all of the above? Culture. Culture binds all of the above together. "Culture eats strategy for breakfast" and "fight for your culture every day." 

What elements foster culture? 
  • Positivity. "We can do this." 
  • Learning. Grow your game. 
  • Teamwork. "The whole is greater than the sum of the parts." 
  • Simplicity. "Fall in love with easy." 
  • Meritocracy. Performance matters. "This is not a union job." 
Director Ron Howard says, "the director is the keeper of the story." In sport, the coach is the keeper of the culture. 

Lagniappe. 

Lagniappe 2. I like to start this with the outside two shuffling side to side. 

Lagniappe 3. Be an energy giver not an energy vampire. 

Posted by at

Sunday, March 9, 2025

Basketball - Physicality, Develop Functional Strength

Train the 'four legs' of the basketball stool - skill, strategy, physicality, and psychology (resilience). 

Every great player is an exceptional athlete. "Average" players can improve with better athleticism. Yes, some athleticism is genetic but a lot is acquired.

Here's another dumbbell workout for the whole body. Functional strength ensues. 

  • Goblet squats
  • Underhand rows
  • Snatches
  • Split squats
  • Renegade rows
You can do these! Adjust the weight if you want a bigger challenge. 

View on Threads

 Lagniappe. Chris Oliver has great podcasts. 

Lagniappe 2. Horns sets from Gibson Pyper 

Lagniappe 3. Do you remember this game? I do. 

Posted by at

Saturday, March 8, 2025

Basketball - Going Deep in the Postseason?

The margin for error shrinks during every round in the postseason. Excellent teams don't beat themselves with poor decisions and mental mistakes.

Tell your players what you're going to say, say it, and repeat it.

1. "Mental mistakes will beat us." Everyone needs to be on the same page. Knowing your assignment, their strengths and weaknesses, and opponent strategy counts.

2. "Don't trust; verify." What's your assignment? If this happens, you do what? 

3. "There's no time for selfishness." The number one statistical factor in winning is effective field goal percentage. The quickest path to improvement is better shot selection. As Coach Auriemma would say, "if it were up to me, I'd let you shoot. Your teammates don't want you to." Forget about hero ball. 

4. "Turnovers kill dreams." If you don't value the ball then you have to sit.


5. "Every second counts." Don't take plays off. Every second of every possession matters. "Play harder for longer." 

6. "Know the time, score, and situation." About a third of games are decided by two or fewer possessions. That can distill down to "two-for-one" shots at the end of quarters. It can occur with a shot taken too soon at the end-of-quarter that turns into an opponent hoop. 

7. "There are no 50-50 balls." it has to be ours. Back to those two possession games...win more possessions via rebounds, saved balls, and loose ball retrievals. 

8. Free throw efficiency. Target better. Bill Bradley aimed for the center of the four bolts attaching the goal to the backboard. They're gone. But you can aim for the middle of the connecting plate underneath the goal. Sometimes it has writing such as "SPAULDING." It can make a difference. "Teams that can't shoot free throws last as long in the playoffs as dogs that chase cars." 

Bonus: forget about multitasking. In The One Thing, Gary Keller points out that multitasking is a myth. Even computers rapidly sequence between tasks. Distracted driving (texting) accounts for 16 percent of all driving fatalities and half a million injuries annually. Players need full focus on the task at hand. 

Lagniappe. Tatum separation for shots...  

Lagniappe 2. Taking away the FIRST pass is the goal of aggressive defense. 

Lagniappe 3. Do our players know that value comes from making others better?  

Posted by at

Friday, March 7, 2025

Basketball: Constantly Work on Your Skills and Brand

Improve your brand, how others perceive your program and you. Here are exemplars from valued brands.

Set your Standard of Performance high and work to live up to it every day. Be accountable to setting your standards high. Encourage that standard to everyone in the organization. Bill Walsh's The Score Takes Care of Itself belongs on your desk.

"Make it. Sell it. Build brand awareness." - Sara Blakely   CEO and owner of Spanx, Blakely turned an undergarment idea into a five billion dollar empire. On an 'Outward Bound' type retreat she had to jump, wearing a bungee cord, to a 'catcher' suspended by a crane. She made it successfully, unlike taller, more athletic types. She jumped to a spot 'three feet above' the catcher. Her advice, "aim high." 

"Do one thing every day for your craft and one for your business." - David Mamet, playwright, author, and director.  Improve your skills, athleticism, and brand. 

"The director's job is to advance the story." - Ron Howard, actor and director   Become your own life coach. Advance your narrative using the tools acquired from mentors, study, and experience. 

"Bring the best version of yourself to work every day." - Samuel L. Jackson  This echoes the fourth agreement in The Four Agreements. 

Your program and fans may value winning most, but our players care about how we treat them and the value we add. A regular dialogue helps unearth their needs and concerns. It's never perfect but the relationships developed can mean so much for both parties. 

Lagniappe. You can win a game with a key cut. Who doesn't remember Princeton beating UCLA? 

Lagniappe 2. Happiness won't always be the product. 

Lagniappe 3. From Boston Sports Journal, John Karalis

Tatum said. “I tell Baylor (Schierman) and Jordan (Walsh), all those guys, when you get out here, make a play. Both ends of the floor. If you're open, shoot the ball. If you have a closeout, attack it. Make the right read. Just don't be a robot. Be a basketball player. Do what got you here."
Posted by at

Thursday, March 6, 2025

Basketball - The "Junk Drawer"


Feedspot Top 100

Everyone has a "junk drawer." Tape, stamps, a ruler, elastic bands, local phonebooks, and other flotsam inhabit the universal storage space.

Packing tape and bread ties - we need them when we need them. 

That doesn't make either the drawer or its contents useless. Who and what reside in our metaphorical basketball "junk drawer?"

Consider a "bad team." Bad teams show occasional good plays and illustrate great video examples of bad play. Video study of bad play, ours and others', sheds light on 'what not to do'. A few examples:

  • Lack of communication
  • Flawed defensive stance and positioning - six feet under, upright, hands out (Snowman Defense), flat-footed
  • Weak or non-existent blockouts
  • Dribbling or passing into traffic ("win in space")
  • Bad footwork leading to violations and lack of separation
  • Failed conversion and transition defense
  • Crosscourt passes into enemy hands
  • Passes to ankles and hands of stone
No coach wants his team used as negative examples. This reminds me of Jim Bouton's sequel to Ball Four, "I'm Glad You Didn't Take It Personally."

There's a saying, "One bad play, bad play; two bad plays, bad player; three bad plays, bad coaching." That's a huge oversimplification - chicken soup from chicken feathers thinking.   

The junk draw contains fundamentals. Every tool can be wielded well or carelessly. "Cutting" lives in too many junk drawers. Urgent cutting is heaven sent and lazy cutting is the idle hands devil's work. 

"Everybody knows that." What coach doesn't lament the player looking at the bench saying, "I know, I know." If you know, then stop doing it. Junk drawer.

The junk drawer holds myriads of antiquated drills and seldom-used 'actions' that deserve better. We extinguished hamburger drills that don't instill toughness, only exposing players to injury. Once we brought "Tiger" out of the junk draw. 


It worked six decades ago and still does. 

It's cousin, LION, helped win us a game with the slip on the cross screen.
 

Some items don't belong in the junk drawer. Watch a high school game without pick-and-roll or complex screening (Iverson, Spain, screen-the-screener) and marvel at 'what you don't see'. 

What's in your junk drawer that belongs or what isn’t and should be? 

Lagniappe. Basketball is "a game of ____ " (mismatches) 

Lagniappe 2. "Casual failure" or causal failure? 

Lagniappe 3. Consistency is underrated. 

 

Posted by at
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)