Practice….We're Talking About Practice!

In the true spirit of Allen Iverson, I, too, will admit that as a player I absolutely HATED practice.  Bring on the games coach…I just want to play! But now, that I am older and a coach, I am like Iverson’s practice-adoring nemesis, Larry Brown.  I absolutely LOVE practice.  I love trying out new drills, I love working out new plays.  Practices can never be too long for me.

With my new love of practice, I’ve come to realize that a coach needs not only an overall coaching philosophy, and a team building philosophy, but a coach needs a philosophy about practice too.  So with a nod to Allen Iverson-Larry Brown’s sometime contentious relationship in regard to practice vs. play, here are some notes I found along the way that I believe will help to shape a philosophy for practice.

1. Need to ask yourself, “Why are we doing this drill?...How often will we do this drill?...Does this drill get its desired results?”
2. Every drill should have a name. I like to name my drills after the source I got it from (i.e. Gator Passing Drill from Billy Donovan & University of Florida, or Spider Fastbreak Drill from the University of Richmond).
3. Each drill should be multi-purposed.
4. Perform drills at the full-court, ¾ court and ½ court level.
5. Stress to players the importance of execution of drill to game situations.
6. Drills require imagination and concentration.
7. Players don’t like drills, so the coach must sell the value of drill work.
8. All drills must be competitive.
9. Drills should be timed (use score clock).
10. Build a portfolio of drills that specifically relate to your system of play and fundamental concepts.
11. Vary the use of drills (protect against boredom)
12. Stress enthusiasm…be very vocal…let them know you are watching.
13. Hold each player to your highest performance standard.
14. Each drill should relate to the coach’s system of play.
15. The biggest challenge for a player during drill work is to consistently concentrate on performance.
16. Every drill must be placed at the most advantageous time during the practice period.
17. New drills should be introduced early in practice period while the player’s concentration level is still high.
18. Combine as many fundamentals as possible into drills even though emphasis may be on one only.
19. Use small carefully organized groups of 3 to 5 players for teaching purposes.
20. Take notice that each player will not require the same amount of work (or attention) on each fundamental.
21. Be demanding!!!  Demand correct execution of basic skills.
22. Express your expectations of each drill at the start...set the tone…don’t compromise your standards.
23. Be sure to balance criticism with praise. (Ratio 2:1, Praise)
24. Explain how the drill relates to the offense, defense, etc.  Help each player understand the bigger picture.
25.  Coaches are teachers…drill work requires constant teaching. But again, I’ll add, don’t over-talk it!
26. Guard against ending practice with an activity that causes players to feel they are being punished.
27. Conclude each practice with a drill that players enjoy.  Whenever possible coaches and players should exit practice with a positive feeling. My little quirk is that all practices end on a made shot. (whether it’s to end a scrimmage or concludes a foul shooting drill).

Teaching a Drill:

Explain why drill is being performed. But I’ll add my own key point…don’t over-talk it!  Some coaches love to gab.

Demonstrate the drill slowly.

Ask for feedback.

Have players run the drill at half speed.

Make necessary corrections.

Allow players to perform drill at game speed.

Creating competition:

Compete against the clock.

Compete against an opponent

Compete against self.

Coach’s responsibilities during drill work

Teach

Motivate

Discipline (not punish…stressing correctness…concentration…more of a mental discipline than physical)

Drill Stations:

Allow for more variety while maintain emphasis on the same subject matter (i.e. offense, defense, rebounding).

Protects against monotony.

 Fewer players standing around.

 Gives assistant coaches the opportunity to teach.

And lastly always remember…when a coach steps into any practice, he must know:

What I am going to teach.

How I am going to teach.

Why I am going to teach.

Dwayne Casey & the Principles of Zone Defense

I want to share one of my notes from Coaching U Live 2014 - Las Vegas.  Though I'm an offensive minded coach I enjoyed listening to Dwayne Casey, Head Coach of the Toronto Raptors.  He spoke on zone defense - his match -up zone system.  I believe Dwayne Casey is a very underrated coach who is doing a terrific job with the Raptors.  He did wonders with undermanned Minnesota Timberwolves team and as an assistant in Dallas, Coach Casey is largely credited with creating the defensive identity for the Mavericks during their championship run in 2011.  Coach Casey is a coach you don't hear a lot about regarding his coaching philosophy and systems, so I wanted to share with you some keys to his zone defense as well as few pearls of wisdom - Coach Casey's Seven Principles.

Zone Principles (Match-Up Zone)

• Heels of your #1 & #2 on the 3-point line.
• ***Point to your match.***
• Don't allow baseline.
• 3/4 defense of the post.
• Zone is broken down into "rooms"
• Tag the cutter.
• Chart multiple stops.  For example…a team should want seven 3-stop sequences.

Dwayne Casey's Seven Principles
1.) Get them in a stance.
2.) Get them to see and anticipate.
3.) Get them to enjoy contact - hit first…flesh to flesh contact.
4.) Talk & communicate.
5.) Attention to detail.
6.) Act it up.  Be an actor - sell the foul…sell the pump fake.
7.) Finish, finish, finish - finish the play…finish the drill.

The Princeton Offense, Part 2: The Genius of Rick Adelman & the Democratic Offense

To piggyback on the previous entry on the Princeton Offense, I just wanted to take a moment to highlight Rick Adelman who employed a version of the Princeton offense in the NBA.  I enjoyed watching Rick Adelman's teams play.  I enjoyed the free flowing way they played offense.  In a nutshell, the principles of Rick Adelman's system is: all five players must be engaged, move the ball quickly, be aggressive in the read and react.  The Rick Adelman system also allows players to make decisions and be creative.

Rick Adelman

As shared in the ESPN.com article "The Book on Rick Adelman:"

Adelman isn’t looking for one specific shot in a possession. He imagines a range of positive outcomes and has created a framework for achieving one of those objectives, which we know generally as the corner offense.

The corner isn’t so much a system of play calls as it is a systematic way to promote ball and player movement through smart reads. Multiple players are involved in just about every possession, which keeps offenses humming and players happy.

At its most basic, a corner set will feature three players on the strong side -- at the wing, corner and a big man at the elbow who has the instincts and skills to facilitate offense on the fly, players such as Chris Webber, Vlade Divac or Brad Miller. Offensive players size up the defense, then choose an action that best exploits what the defense surrenders.

In short, read and react.

In my research of the Princeton Offense I found another article on Rick Adelman, this one by Jonathan Feigen, which I thought I'd share excerpts from.  If you're a motion offense guy like myself, some of the points raised will get you thinking about the beauty of a democratic offense that gets everyone involved.

It has been called the Princeton offense. But despite some similar backdoor cuts, it is often far different from the offense Pete Carril took from his 29 years at Princeton to Adelman's Kings staff and the Hall of Fame.

The term "motion offense" has been tossed around, and there is a lot of motion. But a college motion offense does not go against a 24-second clock that rules everything in the NBA. And Adelman uses far more "two-man game" with more post-ups than any college motion offense.

It is basically a movement-based, read-and-react NBA offense. When run well, Adelman will resist calling plays, instead letting his players determine where the ball goes based on what they see in the defense.

Wing players cut to the basket. Centers and power forwards often play outside and pass toward the basket. Every cut is followed by more movement to maintain spacing and create open shots if defenders overreact to the cuts.

"Basically, it's a series of three-man game and two-man game," said Rockets assistant coach Elston Turner, a six-year assistant with Adelman in Sacramento. "If the three-man game doesn't work, you flow into a two-man game. And at the right time, it's one-on-one.

"As a general rule, we allow our players some freedom to show their skills. We believe the spontaneous creativity, things that happen in the spur of the moment based on what the guy in front of you does is the hardest to guard because you can't prepare for that.

"It's exciting to watch and it's exciting for the guys to play in. If you have the ability to play, we allow you to do that."

Adelman said his best offensive players…will still be put in position to do what they do best. But players rave about the democracy and freedom in the offense so much, they might as well be running for office.

"It's a free style," guard Mike James said. "Coach wants us to figure it out for ourselves. He understands that in the game we're going to have to figure it out…One thing about the offense, it's constantly flowing. Everybody is touching the ball. You use your teammates to help you get open to get shots.   It's not like one person is creating, and everybody else is standing. It's constant movement all the time, and everyone is touching the ball.”

There's no understating the influence of Rick Adelman whose offensive schemes have influenced basketball coaches on all levels of competitive basketball.  His Corner Set offense can be found throughout the NBA. Coaches on any level can look to it and study it and see that it's a perfect balance of structure and freedom.  It's a system of basic rules, but is also a system in which players are free to operate within them as they see fit…a truly democratic system that any player would love to play in.

The Princeton Offense & The Art of Unselfishness

I am a fan of Pete Carril's Princeton Offense.  What I like about the Princeton Offense is its spacing, constant motion, flare screens and screens away from the ball, all elements that I try to incorporate into Team Hurricane's motion offense.  Of course, its hallmark is the back-door cut for lay-ups, as well as the hitting open 3-point shots.  

Pete Carril

"We pass, we cut, we shoot the ball well and we look for good shots.  The main thing is to get a good shot every time down the floor.  If that's old fashioned, then I'm guilty."

"I don't recruit players who are nasty to their parents.  I look for players who realize the world doesn't revolve around them."

It's a beautiful offense to watch with its precision and crisp passing. What I love most about the Princeton Offense is that is all about being unselfish:

The strength of the offense is about being unselfish and the fact that everyone touches the ball. You can tweak the offense as much as you want to tweak it, but it helps everyone succeed. It has a lot of movement and even if one player is scoring, the other four players play a huge role in helping that process.

(http://www.mensbasketballhoopscoop.com/store/basketball-offenses/nba-princeton-offense-playbook-learn-the-princeton-offense-from-the-nba/).

My motion offense is basically a 3 out 2 in, and I love the symmetry that this set affords me.  But the basic set for the Princeton offense can be 4-out with 1-in (either at the high post, or low post), a 2-3 high set, or a 1-2-2 (5-out) set. To run an effective Princeton Offense, a smart post player with good passing skills is key. It also requires players with a high basketball IQ and good perimeter skills... passing, dribbling, shooting, cutting, etc. While I embrace the concepts of the Princeton Offense, I do realize it may be difficult for youth teams to run when you have limited practice time.And like any good offensive system, there are certain concepts that you can incorporate into the offense that you run.  Look at the Terrific Twenty and see what applies to the offense you run.

The "Terrific Twenty" Rules for the Princeton-Style Offense 

(http://www.freebookez.org/pdf/27343507463/)

1) If you can pass, dribble, and shoot well, you will always dictate to the defense what they do. If you can't and are not fundamentally sound, they will dictate what you do.

2) You must always see and think on the court, in that order.

3) Don't ever become stationary(stop moving) for more than one second, even if you have the ball, unless you are in the post. Think continuous movement.

4) If overplayed by a defender, don't wait to burn him- go backdoor immediately.

5) If defense is playing you inside, go outside. If the defense is playing you outside, go inside.

6) Hard cuts to the middle will open up the perimeter - cut with conviction!!

7) Make sure you look at the ball when you cut -- be ready for a pass.

8) If you cut through and don't receive the ball, get outside to the perimeter as quickly as possible.

9) Do the opposite of whatever the defense does. :

10) The purpose of the dribble is to get a defender out of position, so dribble with a purpose and in one direction.

11) If you are dribbled at by a teammate, look to go backdoor if played tightly.

12) Be ready to roll back or to the basket on all screens -- go opposite of wherever the cutter goes. 

13) Keep good spacing (15-18 feet).

14) If you see there is weak-side help on defense, look to skip opposite and make them pay.

15) Don't go to the ball when closely guarded--go backdoor.

16) With few exceptions, cutters should go opposite of where they came from when going through.

17) Lay-ups and three pointers are what we want to get, in that order. 18) It doesn't matter who scores, as long as someone does.

19) Shots are missed because they are bad shots or the shooter doesn't think they can make them - take good shots!

20) Work hard to make things easy.

Here are some old clips of the way the Sacramento Kings ran the Princeton Offense.  At the time Sacramento ran this offense, Pete Carril was an assistant coach under Rick Adelman  I'm a big fan of the corner cut after a pass to the pinch post as a way to initiate a variety of actions.

Clip 1 - Back Door Cut, Multiple player movement

Clip 2 - Shuffle Cuts, Screen Away Actions, Hand Off

Here is the college level Princeton Offense being run, Post-Carril, but still incorporates the key elements of constant motion and a spread offense, screening, etc.

Clip 3 - College Level - Back Door Cut

Whether on the Pro Level or College Level, the unselfishness of the Princeton Offense can not be denied.  Some will say it's old school basketball, but being unselfish, wanting to see your fellow man succeed, and willingly play a part in another's success, is a life concept that NEVER goes out of style.

The Oregon Way - The Offensive Philosophy of Dana Altman

I happened across some old clinic notes and found one of interest from Dana Altman, current coach for University of Oregon.  At the time when I heard him speak, Coach Altman was at Creighton University. Though Creighton was rarely seen on national TV, the times I did see them play, I always came away impressed with the imagination he used in his high post offense.  Of particular interest were his UCLA cuts off the high post.  At this clinic Coach Altman shared his 10 Keys to Your Offensive Philosophy.

Coach Dana Altman

Ten Keys To Your Offensive Philosophy by Dana Altman

1.) Understand and be comfortable teaching your offense.

2.) Must be flexible.

3) Know where the shots are coming from.

4) Spacing

5) Ball reversal.

6) Ball has to be posted.

7) Check defenses ability to guard a particular phase - for example, how does the defense deal with posting guards.

8)  Does it go smoothly from transition to set.

9) Can you mold offense to fit the talent of your players.

10) Put you in a great rebounding position.

The third key sticks out because I'm learning to convey to my players the importance of being aware of where the shots are coming.  Sometimes in my haste to create a fluid motion offense, I'm so engrossed in imparting to my players how I want them to move, I don't stress the specifics of where the ideal shots are coming from.

To learn more about Coach Altman's principles I recommend his DVD, Dana Altman: The Complete Guide to the High Post Offense vs. Any Defense

In this best selling DVD, Coach Altman shows his base sets for the offense, along with its positioning, movements and cuts.  The DVD includes different set plays that teams can run out of this offense to utilize different strengths you may have or exploit potential weaknesses your opponent may have.  It also shows different ways of transitioning into offense from a fast break.  

A quick clip from Coach Altman's Complete Guide.

Here's a clip from another Dana Altman DVD: Using High Post Offense to Attack Zone Defenses. I like how he talks about the importance of screening angles.

Here is diagram of a motion set run Coach Altman's University of Oregon.  To see these and other great diagrams, check out  Fast Model Sports - Basketball Drills & Plays Library.

http://www.fastmodelsports.com/library/basketball/fastdraw/20902/play-Motion-Offense-Post-Option

Next up, I hope to get back to discussing Team Hurricane's motion offense and, in particular, our Princeton Series which incorporates elements of the Princeton Offense.  See you all soon!