Officials

How do you interact with officials?  Are you the one complaining about every call?  Is your philosophy to say nothing at all? 

The goal is to give your team the best chance to win and with officials being human and an unknown variable to every basketball game you need to have a plan when it comes to interacting with them and understand every official is different.  The size of the crowd can also play a role in what you can say to officials.  Its easier to yell your point across if no one else in the gym can hear you due to crowd noise.  Personally I do very little complaining especially if I don't have a prior relationship with the official and its early in the game.  I might ask an official what the player did wrong or add from my angle it looked like we were vertical and they initiated contact, but mostly I try for our early interactions to be positive and often in a joking manner.

I've found one the best places to foster good relationships is during summer camp games.  We always go to team camp where our officials association is having their training and I make a point to never complain about any summer call and spend as much time developing a positive relationship.  I don't know if it helps us or not, but as a coach who always wants to be in control of the environment having a plan makes me feel better. 

Roethlisberger Supports Leftwich

Ben Roethlishberger pictured above is celebrating his teammate, Byron Leftwich, run for an opening drive touchdown.  Its great to see Big Ben leading the sideline charge for his backup.  It would be easy to sulk given his injury that was preventing him from playing in division rivalry game, but Ben stayed engaged and did everything he could from the sideline to help his teammates gets the job done. 

Hold Your Post Game Comments

After a game emotions are running high with players and coaches, especially after a loss.  Its not easy, but I try to say as little as possible after a game and especially after a loss.  I do understand the importance of immediate feedback, but I've decided the benefits of that feedback don't outweigh the cons. I'm more likely to say something I regret immediately following a loss and players are less likely to take my instructions in a manner that allows them to improve.  If we did something that could be fixed by a coach's comments then say it during halftime or a timeout. After the game its too late and we're better off waiting until the next day.

Waiting until the next day allows the emotions to diffuse with both players and coaches and it allows the coaches to review the game film and approach players the next day from a logical standpoint instead of an emotional one.  A prime example of the benefits from waiting came from our first game this week.  No one wants to lose the first game of the season.  Everyone is amped up and ready for this to be their year.  Well we were getting dominated on the glass and ended up allowing 17 offensive rebounds.  During halftime and timeouts I was furious with our lack of toughness and how we were getting outworked and we were too soft to play against such a physical opponent.  My rants didn't help us win the game and after watching the film it was obvious we weren't scared of contact, we lost detail with box outs.  It was more of a technique issue than an effort or willingness to compete on the glass issue.  Blowing up one more time after the game was over might have made me feel better, but it wouldn't help our team rebound any better the next game.  Hopefully watching the film and 2 hours of box out and rebounding drills the next day will help our team the next game.

Are you a prisoner to your own emotional comments after the game or can you hold them until the next day?

Defensive Keys

My philosophy on scouting has changed over the years.  My first scouting report was overloaded with useless information that players would never remember or be able to execute during the game.  We have since simplified the information we share with our players in a hope they will be able to use the information we do give them in the game, but in our scouting report we have always had 3 defensive keys that would change depending on the opponents strengths. This year our defensive keys will be the same for every opponent:

1.) No transition buckets
2.) No Lay ups
3.) No catch and shoot 3pt

We feel that if we can take these things away it will put us in a good position to win.  Also having the same 3 keys every game allows this to become a part of our DNA and doesn't change what we emphasize or value from one game to the next.

What defensive keys would you like to be a part of your team's DNA?

1 on 1 Placement

This is a fairly simple drill that always seems to be early on the practice plan when we have our best energetic practices.  It may be coincidence, but its quickly becoming my go to drill when we have a letdown energy wise with the previous practice.  Here is the drill:


1 on 1 Placement
                2 lines out of bounds at lane line.  Defense starts with the ball and runs out to place the ball anywhere he wants inside the arc.  Defender tries to stand over the ball and "box out" the offense from picking the ball for as long as possible (If a player can't hold for at least 3 seconds start it over).  Once the offense is able to pick up the ball play live 1 on 1 with the offense getting 2 dribbles.  Can also play it out until someone scores.


It seems to get our competitive juices going better than our other 1 on 1 drills and inserts a lot of energy into the practice.  Before this year I thought our Auburn 1 on 1 drill (we got from Lebo while he was at Auburn) was the best energy kickstarter....

Auburn 1 on 1
                2 Cones or chairs are set up just shy of half court on one side of the floor.  2 players start on the baseline with the player on the outside holding a basketball (may need to make this players chair different distance).  On command the players race to half court with the offensive player dribbling the basketball.  Once they get around the cone, the two players are playing 1 on 1, but must stay on one side of the court.  Divide players into teams and give each player a chance to play defense and offense once to add a team element. 

My favorite part of this drill was it had a team component to it so the players on the baseline were engaged and cheering on their teammate. 

What are your go to drills to insert energy into your practice?

 

Strength Zone

I was going over some John Maxwell notes last night while enjoying the Lakers - Portland NBA game.  John Maxwell is big on staying in your strength zone and continuing to invest in the development of your strengths and its a philosophy that makes sense to me.  Growing up I always heard you've got to work on your weaknesses and turn them into strengths, but now I'm not sold that is the best advice to follow after a certain age.  For example lets say my 3pt shooting skill on a scale of 1-10 is a 7 and my one dribble pull up is a 3.  I would rather put my efforts into taking my 3pt game to a skill level 9 than put in the time it would require to take my pull up game to a 5.  Improving to a skill level 5 doesn't make my pull up jumper a good shot for our team, but taking my 3pt catch and shoot level to a 9 gives our team an elite producer in that phase of the game. 

The media seems to be on Mike Brown for installing a Princeton offense with one of the best pick and roll point guards to ever play the game, but sometimes the media can blow things out of perspective so I went to check out synergy (awesome place for any stat you can think of) and discovered the Lakers offensive possessions have ended with a pick and roll 10% of the time (would have been last in the league last year).  Now I'm not a part of the Lakers program or pretend to know better than Mike Brown what is good for the Lakers, but the situation has made me re-evaluate our offense to make sure I'm putting our players in their strength zone and giving them the best opportunity to be successful.

Does your offense keep players in their strength zone or are you trying to make players fit into your system?

Practice Habits

There are 2 people who can't have a bad practice...head coach and the best player.  By bad practice I'm not talking about missing shots, but rather energy, effort and communication.  Like it or not your best player is a leader on the team.  If he/she doesn't bring it with their energy one day then you are destined to have a bad practice as others follow the best players lead and all the energy is sucked out of your team. Also as a head coach you are the leader of the program that everyone takes their cues from and ultimately responsible for everything that happens.  Players will be as detailed as you insist or as loose as you allow.

Head coach and best player must be on the same page and set the tone every day at practice to foster a productive and energetic environment.