CREATING STRUCTURE IN MOTION

As I blogged about yesterday, I'm excited to be speaking at a Motion Clinic hosted by Joe Foley & Robert Dallimore at the University of Arkansas Little Rock this weekend.  You can click here for more information. 

Here just a few things I will be talking about in regards to Motion Offense and creating some structure.  Many coaches are afraid to utilize motion because they believe they lose control and structure.  But when properly taught, that is not the case.  One of my three topics will be on Motion Structure and here is a brief outline of what I will talk about.  Of course, if you are at the clinic, you can see me utilize the UALR players to show these principles as well as receive some of the many passouts I will giving to the coaches in attendance -- hope to see you there:

STRUCTURE COMES FROM TEACHING
2 MOST IMPORTANT THINGS WE TEACH PLAYERS: TO TALK AND TO THINK
Coach Don Meyer: "Be skill coach, not drill coach."
◄Great motion teams have great individual skill players
◄Each player does something extremely well

STRUCTURE COMES FROM EMPHASIS
◄Not always what you teach but what you emphasize

STRUCTURE COMES FROM PRACTICE
You get what you tolerate

THINGS YOU MUST DEMAND
Proper cutting
◄“Cut to Create Help”
Proper screening
◄“Screen to Create Help”
◄Communicate: Visually & Verbally
     -“Don’t talk your game, yell your game”
◄Set up cut before screening
◄Sprint to Screen — “head hunt”
◄Shoulder to Chest Plate
◄Proper Angle
Ball Handling
◄Strong with the ball
◄Drill: 4/0 Sweeps (add shallow cut)
Dribble Usage
Passing

SPACING
Daily demand/daily maintenance

RESTRICTIONS
Practice what you want & Need
◄2/1 Screening w/No Ball
◄2/2 Screening w/No Ball

Cutting = Take Away The Dribble

4/4 or 5/5 No Dribble

◄Not just keep away
◄Shot Clock or Pass Restriction

4/4 or 5/5 Screen the Passer

◄Create movement
◄Difficult Screen to Defend

4/4 or 5/5 2 Reversals

◄Make sure they are thinking reversal

5/5 Specific

◄Only Seimone can score
◄Can only score off of a Back Screen
◄Only score off of a Complimentary Screen
◄Only off of a cut from a Tillie screen

BK: “Great thing a coach can have is an imagination”

—Never take away lay-up!

BEST DEVELOPMENT GAME

Motion Game
Keep score for what you want
Score for screens (any or specific)
Score for paint touches

STATS

Measure what you need
Kids are stat conscience
Places importance on specific roles
◄Turnover chart
◄Post Feed Chart
◄Screening Chart (Wendlyn Jones)

ENTRIES

Reasons for entries
◄Pressure defense with set-up
◄Create touch for go-to player
◄Attack poor defender
◄Create mismatch

GAME CALLS

Coach K
◄Fist = paint touch
◄5 Fingers = five passes
◄Call a concept, not a play

Restriction

◄Seimone 2 touches/Syl 1 touch

Script Offense

◄Via Scouting

 

ARE YOU TEACHABLE?

I'm so excited to read John Maxwell's newest book "Sometimes You Win, Sometimes You Learn." Here is a little something from the book and you can bet this will be a passout to our team:

Jazz trumpeter and bandleader Louis Armstrong once said, “There are some people that if they don’t know, you can’t teach them.” Some people want to be right, even when they aren’t. And as a result, life is difficult for them. They never find the pathway of learning nor do they learn the lessons life offers to those with a teachable spirit.

Teachability is a choice. We choose whether we are open or closed to new ideas, new experiences, others’ ideas, people’s feedback, and willingness to change. In my new book, Sometimes You Win, Sometimes You Learn, I focus on how to turn loss into a learning experience. And I believe that teachability is the pathway to making that happen.

Traits of a Teachable Person

If you desire to find the pathway from failure to success, you need to cultivate the following five traits:

1. Teachable People Have an Attitude Conducive to Learning
People with a teachable spirit approach each day as an opportunity for another learning experience. Their hearts are open. Their minds are alert for something new. Their attitudes are expectant. They know that success has less to do with possessing natural talent and more to do with choosing to learn.

2. Teachable People Possess a Beginner Mind-set
When people are actually beginners, they find it easy to have a beginner’s mind-set. But maintaining that teachability becomes more difficult as you learn more and achieve some success. I try to maintain a beginner’s mind-set by keeping the following three things in mind:
     1. Everyone has something to teach me.
     2. Every day I have something to learn.
     3. Every time I learn something, I benefit.

3. Teachable People Take Long, Hard Looks in the Mirror
Becoming and remaining teachable requires people to honestly and openly evaluate themselves on a continual basis. Any time you face a challenge, loss, or problem, one of the first things you need to ask yourself is, “Am I the cause?” If the answer is yes, then you need to be ready to make changes. Recognizing your own part in your failings, seeking solutions (no matter how painful), and working hard to put them into place leads to the ability to change, grow, and move forward in life.

4. Teachable People Encourage Others to Speak into Their Lives
Teachable people surround themselves with people who know them well and who will lovingly, yet honestly, speak into their life. However, that can be a challenge—for many reasons. First, you must be willing to develop strong enough relationships with people that you can credibly ask them to speak into your life. Second, they must be courageous and honest enough to speak freely to you. And third, you must be willing to accept their feedback and criticism without defending yourself. Otherwise, you’ll only receive it once!

5. Teachable People Learn Something New Every Day
The secret to any person’s success can be found in his or her daily agenda. People grow and improve, not by huge leaps and bounds, but by small, incremental changes. Teachable people try to leverage this truth by learning something new every day. A single day is enough to make us a little larger or a little smaller. Several single days strung together will make us a lot larger or a lot smaller. If we do that every day, day upon day, there is great power for change.

Futuristic author and speaker John Naisbitt said, “No one subject or set of subjects will serve you for a foreseeable future, let alone the rest of your life.” In other words, even if you do know something well, it won’t do everything for you. Living to your potential requires you to keep learning and expanding yourself. For that, you must have a teachable spirit. If you don’t, you will come to the end of your potential long before you come to the end of your life.

JOIN ME AT THE UALR MOTION CLINIC THIS WEEKEND

I'm taking some time this morning, with it being our practice day off, to organize my thoughts and notes from the Motion Offense Clinic this weekend at the University of Arkansas Little Rock.  I really love motion offense and how it's taught and I have great respect for UALR and the great job they do of teaching.  Some of my concepts I will be speaking on will be:

1. Alignments -- execution and usage
2. How to create Structure within Motion Offense
3. Zone Motion

A few decades ago, as an assistant coach on Dale Brown's staff, we would always have high school and college coaches visiting with us at practice.  One of those that was constantly there to grow as a coach is Robert Dallimore, now an assistant at UALR.  I knew Robert was already a good coach because he was directing one of the state's top high school program's at the time -- yet there he was being a continual learner.

Knowing Robert allowed us to often discuss basketball when we ran into each other on the road and he eventually introduced me to Joe Foley, the head coach at UALR -- and an outstanding motion coach.  Now I had another coach to talk basketball with during the summer.

When they first approached me with the idea of doing a two-man motion clinic I didn't hesitate.  First I love talking motion, but more importantly I will be able to go listen to Joe and watch he and Robert teach their team.

I would hope that if you are near the UALR campus this weekend that you'll stop by.  I always tell coaches, even if you don't run motion, there will be teaching methods involved in motion that will improve you set plays or continuity.  The concepts are amazingly unique to good offensive play and adaptable beyond true motion. Oh, and the clinic is FREE!

For more information on the clinic, click here.

DOC TEACHING "TRUST" AS AN IMPORTANT FACTOR FOR TEAM DEFENSE

The following in excerpt from an article written by Eric Patten for NBA.com.  You can read the entire article here.

Doc Rivers has insisted all week that the Clippers were not a poor defensive team last season. They led the NBA in steals, held opponents to 94.6 points per game and forced a league-high 15.4 turnovers. But the team’s struggles against the 3-point shot (37.3 percent from opponents, 26^th in the league) and trouble in transition defense were both areas that Rivers and his staff have emphasized since the onset of camp Tuesday.

He has been pleased so far.

“They’ve been great,” Rivers said. “It’s funny. Alvin Gentry, who is more of our offensive coach, said, ‘Geez, I’m having a tough time scoring right now.’ And I said, ‘And that’s good.’ If at some point this year, if we can get to the point where it’s easier to score against our opponent than it is in practice, then we know our defense has arrived.”

Until then, it will remain a work in progress, which means establishing a sense of trust amongst teammates on that end of the floor.

“The biggest thing with the defense is we have to trust that next guy’s going to be there to help, being at that rotation,” Griffin said. ”You can’t help somebody else if you don’t trust that somebody else your back. You can’t help them fully.”

Phrases like “help the helper” only work when everyone is engaged and Rivers has employed more than just defensive terminology to help get that message across. He had the team traveling in vans by position group all week with Griffin, Chris Paul and DeAndre Jordan selected to hold the keys. They have eaten almost every meal together. They have bought in.

“The more trust you have in your teammates, the more trust you have in yourself, when you show up on your good nights they’re going to use you and on your bad nights they’re going to pick you up,” Rivers said. “They want to be better. They want to do the right stuff. They want to listen, so they’re allowing me to coach them. That makes it a lot easier for me, but if they didn’t want to it would be very hard.”

DON MEYER: THINGS WE HAVE TO LEARN EVERY YEAR

This is one of my absolute favorite pieces written by Coach Meyer.  It's not the first time I've posted it but the first time I've posted it in its entirety:

You Can Pick Captains But You Cannot Pick Leaders (The Foxhole Test)

When we think our team is ready each year, we have our players take the foxhole test. They draw a circle to represent their foxhole. They write their name at the front of the foxhole. They draw a line at their rear, their left, and their right. On each of those lines they write the names of teammates they would want in their foxhole if they were fighting a life and death battle. The position to their rear is worth three points and is awarded to their most trusted, courageous, and tough teammate. The position to their left is worth two points and is awarded to the second most trusted, etc. teammate, and the position to their right is awarded to the third teammate they would pick and is given a value of one point. This test cuts through all the friendships, cliques, and is the truest measure of what players really think of their teammates. It might be a good idea for each coach on the staff to do this with his/her coaching staff, administrators, teach associates, and of course your team. There are many people who you would love to have around on the golf course or in a duck blind but deep down you know that defeat is assured if they are in your foxhole.

Your Team Is Never As Tough As They Can Be And You Can Never Assume They Are Tough Enough

When looking in the dictionary you see descriptions for toughness such as: hard to break but not necessarily hard to bend, difficult to get the better of, apt to be aggressive, able to resist, etc. When we think of toughness we immediately think of mental toughness and then physical toughness. LET ME SAY AT THE OUTSET THAT A TEAM WILL NEVER BE TOUGH WHEN THEY ARE COACHED BY A STAFF OF COACHES WHO ARE NOT. The hardest thing we have to do each day as coaches is saddle up and face the day with the attitude we want our players and team to adopt. WE CANNOT SELL THEM SOMETHING THAT WE DO NOT OWN. My most difficult task as coach is to be tougher on myself and more demanding than I was the day before. THIS IS ESPECIALLY IMPORTANT WHEN YOUR PROGRAM IS WINNING GAMES. For every 100 who can handle failure, there is but one who can handle success. Winning can weaken the resolve of those who worship winning and do not plan, practice, play and coach to a higher standard. THE BEHAVIOR OF YOU R PLAYERS IN THEIR ACCEPTANCE OF FATIGUE, BAD CALLS, TURNOVERS, MISSED SHOTS, BEING OPEN AND NOT GETTING THE BALL, HARRASSMENT FROM THE OPPOSING FANS, TRASH TALK FROM OPPONENTS, AND THEIR TEAMMATES' FAILURES AND SUCCESSES will tell you all you need to know about how well you are teaching the life long lessons of toughness.

Players And Coaches, Everyone In Your Program Must Be Willing To Change When It Is For Their Improvement And The Betterment Of The Team

This is the thing that always concerns us in our recruiting of players. We are not for every

player. The solid programs will have attrition because there is a standard, a level of excellence, a desire for learning and improvement on and off the court that is demanding and is therefore character building in nature rather than a look the other way. That is probably why we have not had many transfers in our program from four year schools or junior colleges in our 30 years of head coaching. The few that we have had were outstanding kids and developed into great team players. As a coach you are constantly studying to find a new and better way to teach the game and YOU USUALLY FIND THAT THE OLD SCHOOL WAYS ARE STILL THE BEST. The TEST OF TIME is the master teacher and is cruel but the fairest of all teachers. You will never have a team if the best athlete on your team is not someone willing to be molded and taught to play the game and conduct them self in the proper manner. If your leader is of suspect character, the fabric of your team will be torn apart when the first negative winds attack from outside the program. If your best athlete is a great leader, no amount of negativity will rip the team apart.

Thinking As A Team, Becoming A Team, And Always Remaining A Team Is the Single Best Thing That You Can Teach Your Players For The Present Time And For Their Life After They Leave The Program

When you play a game, travel on the road games, register for classes waiting in long lines, eat in a restaurant, befriend or ignore a young child after a game, respect or taunt an opponent, deal with winning and losing, you are making a statement about what the core values are in your program. Coaches, players, and teams are teaching lessons in every encounter along life's way. We hope it can be said of our program that EVEN WHEN THEY LOSE THEY WIN. The way you accept the hand life has dealt you vividly tells everyone else what your true character is. The great boxer Sugar Ray Robinson said, "You can tell the most about a man when he is getting whipped". That is oh so true in a basketball game and life. YOU DO NOT HAVE TO WIN A CHAMPIONSHIP TO BE A CHAMPION. As a coach, you are responsible for the actions of your players and team. You are not a coach if you look the other way and ignore bad behavior. It must be dealt with or you are harming your players for a lifeti me. Philippians 2:1-8 gives a description of what a team attitude should be like for coaches and players.

Transition Defense, Intensity On Defense, Rebounding On Both Ends Of The Floor, And Turnovers Are Key Factors You Can Help Your Team Become Aware Of In Practices And Games
 
Transition Defense---Try to develop a philosophy of transition defense that fits your style of play on both ends of the floor. It might vary some each year depending on your personnel. Stick with it in every shooting drill, all break down drills, 5/0 work, and 5/5 scrimmage. This will be a key to not giving the game away.

Intensity on Defense---Too many ways to defend a particular offensive move means no way to defend it because players think too much. It has to be instinctive quickness. If a player lacks quickness, then this is even more vital. As Jerry Tarkanian said, "The more they think, the slower their feet get". Keep it simple on defense and lean to the aggressive way of doing things and your team will make more plays defensively.

Rebounding on Both Ends of The Floor---You must chart effort in order to see if players really value possession of the ball and realize that rebounding is most often the way you gain possession of the ball. Turnovers---We got a great idea from Porter Moser, the head coach at the University of Arkansas-Little Rock. He puts so many basketballs in the ball rack and removes one for each turnover. When all the balls are out of the rack it means that there will be morning running. We have modified it some because our coaching staff does not like to run in the early mornings. Porter is a very young coach. We put two balls in the rack and when we have turned the ball over three times the offending team will run or do whatever consequence we think is best. We like it, it is simple. It drives home a point. BALLS IN THE RACK makes our players realize that everything they do in practice will effect what they do in a game.

 

 

COACH DON MEYER: 4 TYPES OF PLAYERS

Unconscious & Incompetent: These types of players "don’t know that they don’t know." They aren’t even aware that they don’t have a feel for the game. These players aren’t going to contribute on a winning team.

 

Conscious & Incompetent: These players now realize that "they know they don’t have it." These players still don’t have a feel for the game and are lacking in the skill department but they realize where their weaknesses are and can now begin to improve 􀃆 Awareness is the beginning of correction.

Conscious & Competent: At this level of development, the player is able to perform various skills (competent), but he / she must think about everything that he is doing before performing the skill; i.e. catch the ball, go into triple threat, direct drive, etc. 􀃆 You know, but you don’t flow. Very robotic.

Unconscious & Competent: The most difficult level to reach, this player can perform the skills without having to think about them. For this type of player, the game naturally "flows."

Be sure to check out www.CoachMeyer.com

LAWRENCE FRANK: PICK & ROLL CONCEPTS

Starting point on a pick and roll is key.

Set-up is the next step, trying to get four-on-three situations.

Random pick and roll – unexpected, not called, quick.
 

The screener should do a half-roll.

• Roll until you are a point between the elbow and the NBA half-circle under the rim.

Punish the help and use their rotations against them.

 

People in the NBA are not called selfish, they are called thirsty.

 

Tell the players to not get caught up in the plays, but understand the concepts.

 

Four men will show in the NBA, fives play soft.

 

All defensive commands: E.L.O:

• Early.
• Loud.
• Often.

Location of the screen is a big factor. You can mix things up by moving the screen down.

 

Horn action- counter defense going under screen.

 

Twist action- make it a two on one screening action.

 

Freeze action0 dribble at your teammate and dump the ball off to him as you screen their man.

 

To see the best way to execute the pick and roll, watch Chris Paul. He has redefined the pick and roll aspect of basketball.

 

On a double screen with the two bigs as the screeners, depending on personnel you want your four-man to pop out and your five-man to roll straight to the rim. The five should post up on the NBA half circle under the rim because you can’t front him there defensively.

WIN AND LOSE WITH YOUR BEST

I'm a big believe in there is a specific way to coach special players.  Chuck Daly got that and mastered not just his NBA teams but the Dream Team as well.  Here is a great look into his thought process in this regard from the book "Chuck Daly Coaching" by my friend Brendan Suhr:

“Coaching is like flying an airplane. There’s going to be a lot of turbulence. Your job is to land the plane safely...Some nights, you got to lose with your star player. You don’t always win with him. You got to lose with him. So if Isiah had lost the game for us tonight, that’s okay because he has won me a lot of games. So I’m going to stay loyal to him even if he’s having a rough night.”

 

AGGIE DEFENSIVE NON-NEGOTIABLES

We held a team meeting to discuss where we finished up defensively last year and where we wanted to go this season. We spoke both in terms of concepts as well as utilizing statistics to measure.  We spoke about "why" we did or didn't do things well last year and mapped out "how" we will improve this year.  To start with, we selected our non-negotiables.  There will be areas that we simply won't tolerate.  And by not tolerating, we are talking about in drills, scrimmages and games.  I think as a team, you should have some non-negotiables in all areas of your program.  I believe strongly in the mantra that you get what you tolerate.  Here are the non-negotiables that we have set forth for this season:

NO PAINT TOUCHES
Starts with transition defense
Proper positioning by ball defender and helping teammates
Excellent post and flash defense

HAND ON THE BALL

Every held ball...every dribble...every pass...every shot
We are looking for deflections

DO NOT FOUL A SHOOTER

Aggressively challenge and contest every shot WITHOUT fouling
Don't bail out a bad shot or bad play

CONTEST EVERY SHOT

This is a team concept and team objective
Aggressively challenge and contest every shot

BLOCKOUT & REBOUND

Blockout every player near or moving to the glass
ALL 5 on the defensive board on EVERY shot -- attack the glass mode

COMMUNICATION

Echo Yells...ELO (Early, Loud, Often)
Constructive -- help teach your teammates
Supportive -- help motivate your teammates
Whether you are in the game, drill or not

 

 

WORKING ON TEAM CHEMISTRY

Each week, as a member of Sue Gunter's staff, we'd start with a Monday morning staff meeting.  We would go over the typical subjects such as calendar items, practice, travel and recruiting.  But Coach Gunter always wanted to talk about chemistry issues.  It was a phase of our program.  She wanted to make sure that we knew it was important and that we considered it in all areas of our program.  Chemistry in terms of players connecting is important.  But that connection is just as important in the timing on the court as it is with the relationships off the court.  Are you talking about and working towards improving your team chemistry?

Here is a great article by Brian Crawford of NBCChicago.com that speaks to the importance of it on the NBA level and how the Bull's Tom Thibodeau is keeping an eye on it:

No matter if a team has been together for years or joining forces for the very first time, chemistry will always need to be developed. That’s Tom Thibodeau’s focus through the first week of training camp as Chicago prepares to take on the Indiana Pacers in their first preseason contest on Saturday night.

With Derrick Rose back, the team needs to once again become acclimated to having him around and he, in turn, must acclimate himself to once again being on the court with his teammates. But Thibs says it’s bigger than the acclimation of D. Rose.

“It’s not just him. That whole unit has to get used to playing together,” Thibodeau told the Chicago Tribune after Sunday’s second full day of practice at the Berto Center. “It’s not only his timing but it’s everybody’s timing and spacing and execution. That’s on both ends."

Rose has said he feels like a basketball player again and even though his injury never kept him away from the team, being around and being “around” are two very different things. His presence on the floor again is an adjustment for everyone, but Thibodeau says the fact the core – including Rose – has been together for a while makes the re-acclimation process a bit smoother.

“He’s been around, and obviously the core of the team has played with him before so that’s to me a big plus. But you have to re-establish your chemistry,” Thibodeau reiterated. “We start from a zero base from last year and build from there, but the fact that these guys have been together for a while has been a plus. It allows you to move along much quicker. Because we’ve been through it, and we’ve added a few things here and there, but the foundation, they have a pretty good feeling of what to expect.”