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Last One Holding The Chalk...Usually Wins!(February 2009)Assortment of plays, drills and ideas to help your program improve.
In November we looked at Michigan State University and Tom Izzo. This month we continue our look at their big rival, the University of Michigan and John Beilein. Click the link below for our final installment of Beilein's "West Virginia Style" 2-guard offense, THE CHIN SET. Introducing...Hooptube.org - Views Before You Choose! COACHING
INFORMATION from REBOUND RULES: The Art of Success, by Rick Pitino (Harper
Collins Publishers, New York, 2008): * One thing you must do in the face of adversity is to be honest with yourself, and with the people you're trying to lead. Acknowledge the difficult spot you're in and commence digging out of it. Don't point fingers, don't recriminate, and don't make excuses. Stay positive and get to work (In discussing how his team came from a 68-37 deficit against LSU with 15 minutes to go and won the game.)....the goal was to get within 20 points as quickly as possible. To do that, we concentrated on three things: using our press to create turnovers, fouling the two shaky free throw shooters LSU had on the floor, and getting high-percent- age shots. * Here is the important common denominator in all these comebacks: They began with positive energy on the floor, on the bench, and in the team huddles. * The most important thing I did in the course of those comebacks was to build my players' self-esteem. Don't tear them down for the mistakes that got the team in those holes to begin with; build them up to the point where they felt capable of making the plays that would result in victory. * When people feel extraordinary, you get extraordinary results. When people feel ordinary, you get ordinary results. * There certainly is a time for constructive criticism and even an outright tail chewing, but it's generally not when you're trying to rally people to redouble their efforts and perform at a higher level. * After my job ended with the Celtics, I had to pull myself out of a crater by rediscovering what I call my PHD--my passion, my hunger, and my drive. * My perspective now is totally different (after losing a young son, and a beloved brother-in-law in 9-11). Basketball is my passion, but not my life. Helping my players, family members, and friends achieve happiness counts more than the final score of any game. * I believe if you chase money, you're not necessarily chasing success. Give yourself success, and money will chase after you as if it's your shadow. * The old expression says there's no "I" in "team," but a lot of coaches think there is--and they think that they're the "I". That's especially true in college basketball, where player turnover makes the coaches the stars of the show. * If there is one thing that makes coaching basketball as fun for me now in my mid-50s as it was in my mid-20s, it's passion. Passion for the game, passion for the competition, passion for helping young men grow up, passion for creating team success through the collaboration of individuals. * When we coach individual instruction workouts with our players in the mornings, I try to be as involved, as thorough and as demanding of the 10th guy on our team as I am of the star. * I've come to believe that it's imperative to follow team meetings with individual meetings--to make sure each person gets the message you want them to get. * Lack of humility is the greatest killer of potential with young people. It's unfortunate that most of us don't find humility until around 50 years of age. By then, most of us have hit enough potholes to know that we don't always have all the answers. * Too often, early success leads us to believe that we've arrived. Suddenly we stop trying to improve ourselves, and we stagnate. * I've developed a fairly keen eye for when players have let success get to their heads...... ....That's why our practices after we win can sometimes be harder than after we lose. During film sessions, we'll praise them for what they did well--but we'll also drill home the mistakes, then test their focus on the court. If they don't come out ready to work hard after a good game, we tighten the screws. That's trying to maintain hunger and humility. * To keep my schedule as organized as possible, I write it all down on a daily basis...I've learned better than to leave it up to memory. Passing thoughts and sudden ideas need to be written down, or else I'll forget. * When I arrive at the office, I always want to attack the most difficult problems first. It's the only way for me to approach it. If you let something slip until the afternoon, you're likely to let it slip until the next day--and the next day--and the next. *
A couple things I've learned about productive meetings. They are not a gathering
place for idle conversation; they're not a minute longer than they need to be;
and they must be followed by action. Everyone on my staff should walk out of the
meeting ready to act, not asking what just transpired. If they don't come away
with a clear vision of what to do next, it wasn't a productive meeting. |
