We're We Good Coaches?

Kristi and I were at the NCAA basketball elite eight game last week, watching Butler advance to the Final Four. Kristi was preoccupied by the fact that the Bulter coach looked so young. Not knowing much about him, she assumed he was 'our age', meaning early 30's.

This lead her to ask if I thought our friend Chad was a good coach. This was an obvious comparison, as Chad is also in his early 30's and trying to make it in the world of high school and college coaching. He's hit some rough patches along the way, and is currently in rural Kentucky running the high school varsity team.

The reason she asked me, and the reason I might have some insight to answer was that while he was here in SLC for a few years he and I coached what was essentially a junior varsity recreation team.

My first response to her question was that I didn't know. This is the crux of this whole story. Chad was a disciplinarian, and he had played DIII college ball. I didn't have the experience, but also had a disciplinarian attitude. The problem was that that attitude didn't fly with these kids. We treated them as if they'd just made the varsity squad after rigorous tryouts. The reality was that these kids liked basketball, but there were reasons (skill or attitude) that they didn't make the high school team. We were glorified babysitters.

We tried to break those kids down, drilling them in the finer points of fundamental basketball, thinking they'd soak it all up and allow us to build them back up into solid players.

The answer to the question is now obvious: our approach would probably work at higher levels, but give what we had it was the absolute wrong approach, and we all suffered for it. We as coached got frustrated, I think the kids only really enjoyed the actual games and dreaded practices, and we hardly ever won, if at all.

Chad is proving that it works though, having rebuilt a Wisconsin varsity program before doing the same at his current position. But looking back at it, a much softer hand was required.

Coaching Isn't What It Seems

Quote from an article in today's Salt Lake Tribune, about the highly successful soccer coach at Waterford:

"It's not that he knows more soccer than everyone else, although his soccer knowledge is vast. It's not just in his ability to manage and motivate people, although he's very good at that. He has a clear vision of what we're going after, and he gets everyone on the same page and he teaches them their role".

Pretty clear that paramount to success (in any field i'd argue) is organization. Over what you'd otherwise think is important, in this example the coaching skills of knowledge or managing/motivation.

It goes on:

"For all the on-the-field success that he's enjoyed, however, Capener says he looks back on three primary things: No. 1, he's tried to instill a love of the game in his players because of how much he's loved the game. No. 2, he's tried to instill in his kids the idea that the sum is greater than its parts. No. 3, he's loved the associations he's had with his assistant coaches — Hercules, Tim Dolbin and Scott Stewart — and with his players and with his opponents.

"According to Capener, some of his proudest moments as a coach have come in years when his teams haven't won state titles. But when everything comes together, it's been especially sweet".

If that isn't coaching 101, I don't know what is.

Bob Bradley

"Movement as a team to attack and defend. The ability as a team to move the ball quickly, play the ball forward and create advantages," he said are what he emphasizes. "In international soccer, the reaction when the ball turns over is really very, very important, so we need to make sure everybody understands as a team how we do those things."

-- Bob Bradley

Now I'm not necessarily a BB fan, we'll see how he does in the upcoming World Cup, but this quote breaks things down pretty well I think.

Coaching Overrated

University of Utah's new defensive coordinator Kalani Sitake:

I think coaching is overrated. My job as coordinator is to organize everything. The coaches on this staff have done a great job recruiting great players. We've got some speed on the defense and that has nothing to do with my coaching. My job is to make sure we've got our guys in good position to be successful and utilize their talents.

The Art Of Managing

Arsene Wenger, Arsenal Manager, on Guus Hiddink shortly after his promotion to manage Chelsea for the remainder of the 2009 season:

He has a strong knowledge of the game and strong personality. He has big experience and he always gets his teams to play the kind of football he wants to play. This is the real art of a good manager.

I found this quote interesting because its quite lofty praise from one coach to another, with both party's operating at probably the highest level of football in the world. But it was also the specific praise of getting a team to 'play your way' as an indicator of a good manager that I found quite informative.

Ownership and Investment

I just finished watching the Utah-Wyoming basketball game, and there was a featurette on Ute head coach Jim Boylen and his 3 assistants, and a behind the scenes look at one of their practices.

The thing that he said that stuck out to me most is how he delegated responsibilities to his assistant coaches. Now delegating responsibility in and of itself is no great revelation. It was more the attitude that coach Boylen set with those responsibilities, saying that the more he gave them, the more 'ownership' they had in the program.

Now I have to say, I love that shit man. Former Utah football head coach Urban Meyer used to say the same kind of stuff, calling for 'investment' in the program from his staff and players. I even hear it coming out of mouth of BYU football coach Bronco Mendenhall, although I think he just stole it from Meyer after he left for Florida.

But you look at the track record of the coaches mentioned: Boylen has (as of this minute) the Utes atop the MWC with a 7-2 record, 16-7 overall with an RPI of 12th in the country; Meyer won 2 consecutive conference championships at Utah, busted the BCS, and has continued on at Florida with 2 national championships in the last 5 years; Mendenhall won 2 consecutive MWC conference championships and turned around a floundering BYU program. It's hard to argue with the results, so maybe we should listen to the common tune these guys are singing.

I think if you have a staff that feels ownership in what you are trying to accomplish, and you have players that buy in to the system and are invested, you'll have a team that is at the very least competitive every single time they step between the lines.

If I Could Do It Again

A few years back I had the fortunate opportunity to coach 9-10 grade boys basketball for my local catholic church in their local catholic league for two seasons. I also had the pleasure of coaching each year with a pair of my closest basketball buddies.

At the time, I was a newlywed living the dink lifestyle. It was quite the commitment to run practice for 2 hours twice a week, and then have games on Saturdays, especially when I had no vested interested in coaching these kids other than a love for the game.

I really did enjoy it, but looking back I don't think I enjoyed it enough. I would kill to have that kind of time on my hands now to devote to coaching those kids, and I would definitely change the my attitude in how I approached the endeavor all together.

Unfortunately, my teams weren't that good, which over the years has been a craw in my side. If I could give it another go, I have some definitive changes I'd make and new ideas I'd try to increase mine and the kids enjoyment of the experience, and hopefully make us a better team.

Ideas to follow. Most will be in the context of 'fixing' these seasons of 9-10 grade catholic school ball, but can also be seen as my overall philosophy that I've developed over the years to basketball specifically, and coaching in general.