Slappin’ Glass sits down this week with the Finnish NT Head Coach, along with Head Coach of Japan’s Yokohama B-Corsairs, Lassi Tuovi! In this highly detailed conversation the trio explore Coach Tuovi’s thoughts on modern offensive thoughts, playing smaller lineups, and discuss how to defend good ball movement and mentally refreshing as a coach during the always fun “Start, Sub, or Sit?!”
Transcript
Lassi Tuovi 00:00
Some of the players they need to know exactly what you expect. They need to know that if I do this thing continuously, but coach expects what he told me in the practice, what we’ve been working on, I’m good and it will increase their confidence, it will increase their presence and they will also be maybe at the end better to improvise. But then there’s the players who need their space, who need their spotlight, be also capable to solve things by themselves and without giving them this freedom you will not reach their maximum potential.
Dan 02:03
And now please enjoy our conversation with Coach Lassi Tuovi. Coach, thank you very much for making the time for us. We’re in three different countries doing this podcast and we can’t wait to get started with you. Thanks for coming on the show today.
Lassi Tuovi 02:26
Thanks for having me. I’m super excited. I’m a big fan of your job and usually I like to more listen and speak. I think that’s very good advice for the young coaches so hopefully I can give some more tips or good stories for the other ones who are now listening this time.
Dan 02:42
We know you will and we’re excited to dive in with something that I know we’ve talked a little bit about off air and that’s your thoughts on modern basketball around five ball handlers, five shooters, and something that you’ve done work with, you know, with the Finnish national team and just having five players on the court that can all shoot it, dribble it. And I guess the good, the bad, the considerations that a coach might have when trying to play this style and where you kind of see this style going in the future of the game in general.
Lassi Tuovi 03:13
Well, I think that’s one of the topics everybody are discovering and studying because we want to be one step ahead of each other’s coaching wise. I’m very lucky with National Team where I have the generation where we have a mobile big man capable to handle the basketball and it gives you a lot of tools, maybe also to think basketball a little bit different way and not maybe the most orthodox way like it used to be played before. And as you said, having a five ball handers on the floor, I think first thing what it gives to you is that anybody can push the ball and gives you the opportunity to break the pressure and bring the basketball up very fast with anybody on the floor. One of the things that especially after defensive rebound with the National Team have been trying to play or build kind of a structure where we try to turn it into the transitional offense as fast as possible. And of course, depending on opponent and their pressure on defensive, on an offensive class, we will try to give the rebounder opportunity to push and break the first pressure and maybe then kick the ball ahead and pass it in front. But players who are capable to handle the ball and be their man one over one should have the opportunity immediately to push the ball moving forward. And that’s also gives you a different kind of angles and maybe even actions for your transition offense. Second thing is that in the basketball, we know that we have roles and this thing takes a lot of time in our experience that all the player, first of all, accept it and second of all, are capable to do it in a stress situation during the basketball games. So if you’re a fireman is bringing the ball up, handling the basketball, your point card will need to accept and build feeling the other spots. And it’s not only talking about the guy on the ball. Very important is to the other four players, what they understand and how they are feeling the other spots.
Pat 05:12
We stick on with your big man, getting the rebound, pushing the transition and the other four players filling the spots. I think kind of a natural concern or a stick ing point for coaches when they think about really this positionless five out is, you know, what to do with, okay, my fives brought it up.
He’s in the slot. Maybe you have a point guard or a wing at the top with no lane, you know, designated numbered breaks. How you just think about continuing to flow offense now with different spacings and one, the traditional, you know, big in the middle corners filled with wings or maybe now, like I said, you have a big bringing it up on the wing and a guard at the top, I guess what you start to consider with your team then to flow into offense, if a kick ahead or one-on-one isn’t there.
Lassi Tuovi 05:58
No, as we like to say, spacing is everything and the players in front are actually for us super important. In Europe, we want to run baseline to baseline, 28 meters is the thing for us. And then in case you don’t have a big man who’s running the touchdowns and the front trim actions, somebody else got to do it. Let’s say that playing with the big man who’s also capable to beat his man one-on-one before any kind of a transition action, he needs to have a space. And running wide, running deep, is it then in the baseline or into the corners? It’s super important because we would like to have a maximum space for this big man to be able to go coast to coast. And that’s something that normally, for example, we tends to stop on the wings or something, but we would like to use all the space on the front court. And that’s why it’s the key thing that we’re using the maximum space of the offense before even thinking about what the ball hunter will then do as the next action.
Dan 07:01
Because maybe before we get more detailed on some of these things, your thoughts on what is the biggest advantage you feel like playing this style gives your offense? I know the shooting is all great, but is it the spacing? Is it the pace? Is it the flow of play? Like, I guess what is it when you think about playing this style that you think is most beneficial for the offense?
Lassi Tuovi 07:23
Preserve pace is one of the things. And we can always turn it also opposite way that still at this point in basketball, I feel that most of the big amount of super uncomfortable to guard these actions.
Like style we played with team Finland 15 years ago, we were well known as super aggressive trapping on defense and doing stuff that other teams were not doing, taking risks, doing something different. And that’s the identity, which also means that we put their big man in the situation they are not so used to do. And especially in tournaments, when we go Eurobasket World Cup or Olympic qualifiers, there’s not too much time to add up and adjust. And when you put their big man in the stress in the situation and they’re not used to do, you get an advantage. I think that’s super important to know. And it doesn’t matter always like who’s from our side, the ball handler, but we need to understand who’s guarding. We need to see the match and that’s the first way to attack, not say mismatch, but the player who’s not in their natural sport or his natural routine. And that gives you the first thing very early offense, increasing the pace at the same time.
Dan 08:36
And what are actions that you like to teach early to have your bigs connect to drag screens, DHOs, you know, all the things you can do early that is uncomfortable for the defense, but beneficial that you’d like to teach kind of early in this stuff.
Lassi Tuovi 08:54
The first one is pretty simple and I go back to the very classical way of playing basketball. I think we should not try to make it too complicated.
The first one for us is a give and go. It’s the thing that when you’re capable to beat your own man, not even getting by, but if you can push the pace, hit the ball ahead and then beat your man by cutting, it’s something that this big man handling is giving to you and these kind of a give and go touchdowns are the first things whoever is handling the ball, but especially with the big man. On the other hand, before going any DHOs or tracks, we don’t run really a track screen with the national team. We rather put the pressure on the baseline and try to get some low post touches. But when you have a big man on the ball very early, all these inverted actions are very effective to start the offense and I think that’s something that we have been capable to do last year and we would like to do even more if you think about our big man starting from, of course, Laurin Markkanen and handling the ball. Why would you run a UCLA cut to guard for a big man instead of the classical way because it’s something that is super complicated to guard, especially if it comes with the early offense.
Pat 10:10
I’d like to follow up on something you said that was interesting that you like to put pressure on the baseline. And I mean, obviously we talked about for sure running to the corners and filling wide, but then like you mentioned, I guess using the posts, using UCLA screens, I guess, why are you then still thinking, let’s still try to pressure the baseline when you start to maybe get into these secondary actions off the fast break.
Lassi Tuovi 10:34
I think, especially if it comes with the movement, the stationary post that becomes under transition, simple rule that cut to the basket and something good will happen. But put a pressure and maybe invite some unnecessary help or weak side to shift to the post. Or a painted area will give you quick skip pass or try and kick with the early three-point shots. So we need to make still the defense collapse. First, we want to run wide, but then we want to make them after that collapse so that we can find our shooters. Tends to shoot a lot of threes since a long time. And this post catch is for us to make defense react and collapse. Then if we get the ball on the baseline, we have multiple options. And at the end, we would like to also bring this very quickly out and run the next action. But the stress, the defense, after running wide, that they need to collapse is probably the right answer.
Pat 11:30
When you are playing five out playing a little bit smaller ball handling and shooting your emphasis on the ball movement, the cutting and maybe more so than the dribble.
Lassi Tuovi 11:40
I’m not a big fan of dribbling, I’m a super big fan of cutting and it’s also a pretty simple thing that when you run five out there’s a lot of space in the paint and you should find a way to cut or curl the screens to try to find an easy basket but naturally also cutting is not only to receive the ball, cutting is a lot to make a sacrifice for the next one is it the other one in the same action by curling the screens or cutting back door but also for the ball handlers to have a bigger caps to try and that’s also one meaning of a distressing defense for us that when you go to the basket it will open a bigger space for the key action with the ball handler and first of all I think when we don’t post up so much we should still you know try to find easy baskets from the paint and since we don’t like to dribbling we’re looking more to cut and also collective way, collective basketball as well-known in Finland is playing and hopefully Yokohama is playing this season too, everybody feels important and this is super important for me that if you stand in the corner if you don’t touch the basketball many offenses in a row probably you will not make your next shot but if you are involved and you feel important part of the offense just by movement without even touching the ball you might feel more into the game and that’s why we also would like to activate a lot of those players to move without the ball.
Pat 13:05
Sticking on cutting. The question we ask a lot on the podcast is how you just think about teaching cutting. Are guys just instinctual? Is it rules-based? Are you working, like you said, on certain pin-down actions and you want always someone on the rim, someone coming back to the ball? How do you think about going about just teaching cutting and helping your players understand when to cut, where to cut?
Lassi Tuovi 13:27
I think we have pretty simple rules, talking about the tribes or let’s say short roll rotations. For me, it’s important that the basic rules are very clear for everybody and they kind of follow them. There’s not special situation or exception. Sometimes the cut is not even smart to do, but it’s better that they know that this is the way we do because most of the time defense is predictable and rotating the same way. Let’s say that if the baseline tribe happens, the cut from the top 45 should be made. And if you want to do it in the right time, especially high level in European basketball, you got to do it early. You cannot wait to see and then go, kind of a need to be one step ahead. When the defense is moving into the split or shifting into the help, you got to go. If you go too late, the next rotation will be there. And that’s why I would like that those things comes from the backbone. They’re really doing it in the plan of a second. And maybe sometimes it’s not even the best thing to do, but it’s better that they know exactly what to do. And that’s why we try to keep it very simple before making a reach or next adjustment.
Dan 14:47
You said on a baseline drive, you’d have like a 45 cut. How about over the top drives or middle drives? Is there simple rules there too? Or is that something personnel based? Or how would you differentiate different types of drives with cutting?
Lassi Tuovi 15:03
Yeah, of course, let’s say that we have reads according to defense also like how much they’re going to collapse and where they’re going to stand. The defense gives you the right cut, the defense gives you the right angle to cut. Is it going to be direct cut? Is it going to be kind of a banana cut or is it going to be a screen? Still, we have three tribes basically the same way as we do with the big man short roll. So we practice a lot of things that if the baseline tribe happens, it’s basically the same that we play an empty side pick where the big man is short rolling to the baseline. If he puts the ball on the floor is for us, it’s a baseline tribe as it is. And then the 45 or top man needs to read to cut. And then as said, you know, defense has a right to do good choice and be on the right spot. And for me, it’s very important to understand that if you start to cut and you see player in front of you change it in the screen and cut to the basket will be kind of a screen in the last defender when we open to skip pass for the weak side. This kind of a two or one basically killing the safety or attacking the last man on the weak side are for me the thing that is best way to create off ball movement and ball flow. And as said, there’s not right one way to do it since the defense is giving you the right option.
Dan 16:26
And I love treating drive like a short roll of that coach working on these things when implementing them, preferred ways to do this five on five, three on three, you know, five on Oh, all the different ways that you can introduce these things. But what’s a preference for you, especially I guess earlier in the season.
Lassi Tuovi 16:46
I still believe that you need to start it with three on zero, four on zero, where you really, you know, work on the timing, that everything happens with the right rhythm. Because I said, you know, if you are half second late, this 2024 basketball is super athletic, wingspans, everything on defensive end are making your life so difficult that if you are half second late, if you’re thinking to go and then you go, normally there’s somebody to contest or even block your shot, but basically you should be moving when the action is happening. But a big fan also to use type of a delay drills, where you work on the on-ball defender or big man to be delayed on short rolls. When we really get into the action and we have short four on three or let’s say three on two into the action, and then you need to make a right three, find one, two passes and a good shot. And this is also a drill that when you do it, let’s say everyday things, the defense need to accept that this kind of a drill, you know, the offense makes the right choice and they get a good shot. We go back in the routines that if you want to practice these things, defense can compete, they should gamble, they should even make not the obvious reads, they should fake and leave maybe the cutter open and anticipate to go for the skip pass. But they got to accept that in this drill, it’s competing against the offense who has pure advantage. And if we get a good shot, we make a right to pass this and get a good three point shot from the corner or the cutter makes a layup, we can give a credit for the offense.
Dan 18:27
Pat 19:33
With all this good ball movement, all this cutting, and you mentioned in the modern game, there’s so much length and athleticism, but when teams have the ability to kind of switch a lot of this stuff and keep everything in front, what then kind of becomes your considerations then playing this style and how you continue to break down the defense and put pressure on the rim and, you know, open up the shots that you want when teams are capable of switching.
Lassi Tuovi 19:59
I think one of the key things is that we haven’t had a lot of players who we want to directly throw the ball and work on a one-on-one mismatch or size cap on the low plot, neither on the perimeter. So we would like to play the next action and what the switching defense usually gives to you is that the other three players are also watching or let’s say alerted for the switch. So at the end, you should find from the outside, from the weak side, some kind of a sleep defense or open stance defense which you can destroy by cutting or screening the last defender still. If they play pure two-on-two and stick with the shooters on the weak side, of course, you need to find a solution through the size caps or speed caps. But most of the time, switching defense is a passive defense. So there’s a lot of things to find out. We would like to keep the flow on. We would like to keep the engine on and not only focus on the switch and these two players’ duties, but to find some solutions from the other three players on the weak side.
Pat 21:04
Coach, you mentioned when there’s a switch, there’s a defender on the weak side with an open stance and you encourage them to turn it into a cut. Can you just follow up on what you mean by an open stance?
Lassi Tuovi 21:14
Usually, like in this case, I think that if you have a size cap, if you, there is a switch which gives you advantage on the low post, somebody got to help, they’re going to build some kind of a help. Is it coming from the top or is it coming from the baseline? Which means that some player is splitting some players or at least preparing the split. And that’s usually, for me, the modern basketball is a player on the 45 on the weak side who’s ready to rotate or ready to take the first pass or something. And this is the player that you should really try to bully and make his life as uncomfortable as possible because he’s standing there and coaches told him during the week that wherever the basketball will go, you will take the first pass. But what if the offense is moving or what if somebody is screening him to get the last one open? So I think we should focus in the action to punish because if we don’t punish and if we don’t try to attack through the key action, they will never help. But once you do it, we should take care of that. The last one who has the main job, then to take care of an extra job to help somebody else is having a hard time on the weak side. So open stance is going to be the really thing that is about the stance, but it’s the player who’s basically splitting the last one, who’s response to have two roles or two players. And this one, we want to pay attention.
Pat 22:39
When the player with the speed advantage, so they switch and you mentioned there can be a size advantage or a speed advantage, when you have a speed advantage, how are you thinking about attacking that advantage?
Lassi Tuovi 22:51
It depends on your player on the ball. It depends what kind of a player, what is his strength to do.
We build usually few of the actions. I think the most common in the European basketball lately has been this ghost screen type of a fly by where you make the big man on the ball, guard the next action, which actually might not happen. So you create another stress and another miscommunication, which might open you to players on the ball or unnecessary switch to give a downhill try for the ball handler. So not big fan of starting to play one-on-one, but I would still like to involve another player for this action. Also, DHO’s to make him guard multiple actions in a row and invite another ball handler if we have somebody close to the ball handler who’s probably, or let’s say strong driver with the right or left hand and has having a good spot, we should involve him with the DHO, but not so that stationary, we start to attack this speed gap. We would like to bring more chaos into the basketball and then make their miscommunicator do a wrong choice.
Pat 24:01
With the DHO is it the player with the speed advantage dribbling into a DHO with another player or passing it and kind of following that pass into a DHO get action or both.
Lassi Tuovi 24:13
It depends also like what kind of a player you have on the ball. As I said, I’m a big fan of this kind of a Rocky passes that you go into the DHR, but at the end you pitch it behind and open a downhill instead of a handball, where you go east to west and get a lateral movement, but you go downhill, but then you pitch it behind and go down again. So this is one of the ways. But as you said, you can combine these, the goal screens and make a small pass and make a fly by with the first ball handler. But I said, the key thing is that when they switch and if we don’t find an advantage inside, we should keep the flow on and involve again the next player in. That’s the core of the philosophy.
Pat 24:56
On the communication, let’s say, I know it’s player specific, but if you do have a team, a player capable of either ghosting or playing this DHO, is it kind of a scout thing that you’ll dictate to the team or how are you having your team organized to get this done to let’s get the DHO or I’m going to dribble at you for this rugby pitch, the communication and who should it be coming from.
Lassi Tuovi 25:20
I think the highest level of basketball in Europe, you need to know the weak points. You need to really be sure that, of course, let’s be honest, especially in a Europe basket, when we play many games with not too much time to prepare, you need to use your strengths. You need to also involve your players who you want to put into the action. But as well, we should be very well known who are the ones that are not capable to handle this kind of actions. And it’s not only thinking that they will make the mistake, but it’s also to stress the players who are not comfortable to play this defense, to show them that you’re going to be a lot in this action today, you’re going to be targeted. I think that’s something that we underestimate, we scout a lot, but in the highest level, if you follow basketball nowadays, you know, they know exactly who’s not capable for this lateral movement and who’s uncomfortable to go into these ghost actions or, or real screen and make another switch. So you should really take a look at it, put on the floor from the other team.
Pat 26:26
With either of these actions, what are you communicating about the spacing? Sticking on just these two guys, where should the actions be initiating? Where should they be taking place?
So like you said, either it’s off the ghost, he’s going downhill or off this pitch. The guy’s receiving it downhill and not necessarily just taking you out to the sideline.
Lassi Tuovi 26:45
For example, ghost screen, I think it’s obvious that where the ghost screen is going to end up, you need to have a room for him. We go back to the cutting and making a movement from that spot already, so there’s enough space for those two to operate, make this ghost screen with pop or something. But once again, we go back to the main philosophy that this is the action where we can add back the switch as well as on the low post. And our three other players should be alerted that maybe we also would like to attack against those three players, who are probably again in the open stance.
It can be type of a flare screen below the free throw line, the screen, the shooter and the corner, or it can be just a simple quick pass because most likely we go back to the open stance. And many of the times when you run these actions, the other two players are watching the ball. When they’re watching the ball, you might find a quick pass into the wing and get a better closeout than actually the ghost screen. This is how it is in the ball screen offense, that when they take a look at the ball, you should have that outside. I would still say that we practice as much as we practice the key action and the spacing for that, we should find the right spacing and advantage to attack outside of it.
Dan 28:06
Great stuff there. Thanks for all your thoughts.
We want to transition now to a segment on the show we call start, sub, or sit. We’ll give you three options around a topic. Ask you to start one, sub one, sit one, and then we’ll discuss from there. So coach, you ready to dive in? All right. Sounds good. We know that in your past you’ve done some acting, you’ve been on a stage as an actor, and we’re going to ask you about the transferable skills from acting to coaching, the things that you believe as an actor are transferable to the coaching world. So start, sub, or sit. The first option is improvisation skills, being able to improvise on a stage. Option two is your presence and authority, being able to be out in front of people, speak, talk, have a presence. And option three is storytelling, creating a narrative, but being able to bring that to your team throughout the course of a season. So start, sub, sit, transferable skills to coaching, improv, presence and authority, or storytelling.
Lassi Tuovi 29:15
Good ones, everything is in the everyday business from my coaching and of course it also depends on the situation and the team or the moment of the team. As I know that everybody cannot start, I would still say that, you know, talk to tell is kind of a script. So I think every story, you should at least write a script what you want to do. For the script, you need to write casting, you need to put the people on their right roles, so they need to have a story which they follow. So I think knowing the script of the team is a story to tell but I would say that this is super important for all of us as coaches. It doesn’t have to be really a story, it needs to be the script to follow and what we’re going to do and how we are and what we try to do is very important and especially in a club coaching where you change the players, where you don’t always even know who they are. You should be very clear what you want from them and what is their duties and what is the other people expecting from them and this comes from my history that understanding that, you know, casting is everything is super important that everybody understands their role. I would say that that’s at least the first thing I would start before putting it out.
Dan 30:36
With the improvisaion and the presence, is there anything there that you felt was super impactful?
Lassi Tuovi 30:45
I think we do our job with artists, we need to understand also in our team and in our job there is people with the bigger role, with the bigger expectations, especially with the bigger capacity to do things. Improvising, giving the room for certain players to improvise and be themselves is super important. So I would say that some of the players, they need to know exactly what you expect, they need to know that if I do this thing continuously, but coach expects what he told me in the practice, what we’ve been working on, I’m good and it will increase their confidence, it will increase their presence and they will also be maybe at the end better to improvise. But then there is the players who need their space, who need their spotlight to be also capable to solve things by themselves and without giving them this freedom, you will not reach their maximum potential. So I would say that improvising, especially giving this thing to your main players who deserve it and who need it, it’s a key thing in a long season and with any team. So this tells probably about me, but I leave the thing in presence and talking and to out because I’m type of a guy that I’d like to speak about myself or how I do things, these two other things are more important for the team. So this is my maybe a little bit political answer.
Pat 32:19
Fair enough. Coach, I’d like to follow up with players that you know, like you said, if we look at it through the lens of acting, you’ve wrote the script, you’ve cast your players and you know a couple of guys are going to need the spotlight. But when you’re early in the season and like in the moments they are now pre-season, just how quickly are you to maybe give them their space or is it something that maybe they need to earn or you don’t want to put it too far in front of these moments of building your base, your foundation, your team identity.
Lassi Tuovi 32:51
Right now it’s a good time to talk because I just arrived to Yokohama a month ago and you have players we have never coached. I have won and the rest of the team is totally new. So I think building the confidence, building the structure, there are certain things which are the same for everybody. Certain rules, certain things we’re going to do, everybody got to follow. And that’s important off-court, on-court that everybody feels that we treat everybody the same way with the certain things.
But basketball and any of the sports is not fair because that’s why we have the roles, that’s why we have the players who will have the ball in their hands more, who are also capable to do more things. So early stages I would say that you know you need to make the basic rules and let’s say we go back to the previous talk. I think one of the favorite talk about cutting is always to say that you know are you going to cut from the corner if the defense is stunting on the drive or are you cutting from the 45. And then we have a coaches who uses both, we have a coaches who prefers another one because it’s simple to have one way rather than reading two ways. And then we always come into the same topic. More players will ask that what about if we have a better shooter than the other. And I think to the certain point it’s even more effective that the player cuts whoever it is and creates the right flow. When we get into the point that we know each other so well that me I know that that is going to be so much better shooter that maybe instead of a coach last telling that corner will cut and I will drift to the corner maybe I should take a look at him and show him that I’m gonna go and you will be wide open. But before we get into this point we need to work together and working together needs rules so we gotta follow the basic ones before making adjustments and riffs.
Dan 34:51
I wanted to pull out for a second because kind of within all this, the acting, transferable skills, the narrative, all that, I also heard you speak on some interesting other coaching points. And that was about how you prefer to work, go to coffee shops, walk, be out with people rather than kind of pulling yourself away in an office or in a hotel room, but that your preference for coach is to kind of get out and do that. And I love you could speak some more on that because I think that was a really some good points you were making about sort of the art of coaching and not getting burnt out in certain parts of the season.
Lassi Tuovi 35:28
Working with the Finnish national team since 2010, and I’ve been so lucky that this is my 10th season abroad with the club team as assistant for now as a head coach. And basically when your calendar is full, almost 12 months a year, let’s say 11 months a year, you don’t really have a day off with Bologna last year, we played 83 games and then you put the national team calendar into it. So basically you are every day in the gym, either gym, travel or play a game. For me, you need to find your way to recover. And when you don’t have a time to recover and take a weekend off or go to the holiday with your family or girlfriend, I think you need to find the moments in a day that you recover. And very early, actually when I moved to Istanbul 2015, I recognized that for me it works, that I go outside, I see people, I’m sitting somewhere that I basically don’t do anything, I look at the people, look at how they live, why they are doing like this, what is the culture in the middle of a Istanbul. And when you start to recover, same time you start to process, you start to have ideas. At the end this became me to also way to work more effectively. I’m a person that during the afternoon I would like to go to gym, I would like to take a nap or do something totally different, but then in the evening I feel that if I get into the right spot, I’m brainstorming. And then it’s the moment to plan the next game plan or take your laptop out from your backpack and start to watch the next opponent or maybe just make a call for your coaching friend and brainstorming with him. But we need to know what is the right way to do for you. And for me, this has been super important that I recognize that this is the way I’m effective and I’m also recovering because when I go back home from this cafe or restaurant or sports bar where I watch some other sports, I feel more fresh than a few hours before. And coaching life, I’m new here and everybody says that young coaches, we are fresh and we can work 24 seven, but it’s super important that you recover, especially when you don’t have these days to do it. So you need to find it inside your calendar.
Pat 38:57
All right, coach, our last start subs sit for you. We’re gonna turn to the defensive end and we’d like to kind of flip the conversation on many of the topics we talked about earlier with ball movement, cutting, spacing.
So our start subs sit here has to do with, we call it hard to take away on the defensive end, three things that are hard to take away on the defensive end that you think about a lot. Is it one, ball movement, hard to take away ball movement? Two, cutting? Or three, just spacing, teams that are gonna put you in good spacing? So those three things, what is the hardest to take away defensively?
Lassi Tuovi 39:34
Another good question. I think if I could answer a ball moment with good cutting with right spacing, that would be the masterpiece to do. Cutting is interesting because cutting is something that you can prepare. I was thinking this before and actually when we’re now working on it, you can also scout it if you know your opponent. I think some teams are having the structure that they cut automatically but also certain players are super good doing basic cuts. So that’s extremely important to scout and on the highest level they also do it very well.
So whatever you do, if you turn your head a little bit too much or if you are a little bit too high positioning yourself, the cut is there. But I would say that we used to play active defense. The hardest thing for us, why we play active defense, why we tend to hedge out with the big man is to stop the ball flow. To make the ball stay on one side, to make the ball handle dribble the ball. So when you play this kind of an active defense on the ball, you should try to deny the ball flow. So that’s for me the hardest thing to defend and that’s the thing that we try to avoid as much as possible.
Pat 40:58
I believe you said you used to play active defense. Have you had kind of a change of philosophy in terms of how you want to play defense now and what you’re trying to take away?
Lassi Tuovi 41:08
We want to be active, we want to be challenging. We want to be acting, not reacting, especially on the ball screen situation, which is the most common action in modern basketball. And you will face so many times in the ball game, but at this point, I think you cannot have one single ball screen coverage because teams are doing so well preparation and they are ready to destroy your defense. And so even though you do high this level, 40 minutes, it’s very complicated to do one defensive way. So we would like to be active, but you should have a hybrid system. It doesn’t have to be for me, a different ball screen coverage, but for example, changing the angle. Let’s say that you face tons of angle pick a role in the game and they start to find short for all the ball movement outside of the action with early passes. You should try to change the angle. Is it then by going under or channelizing the screen, icing it to the baseline? But you need to change their habits in the action during the game. So that’s why I would not say that we get more passive, but you need to have another coverage to mix them up if they do a good job, which they obviously good teams, they have right to do.
Pat 42:28
When we go to cutting and you brought a real good point with facing a team that has a good cutter, when preparing for that team or that player, how much if it is of concentrating on taking away his cutting and to the fact that maybe it changes kind of your weak side help? Or is it more so we’re going to continue to do what we do or how we tag, how we rotate, but just having an awareness of where he is and that he might cut.
Lassi Tuovi 42:55
Of course, you need to play against me against you, you need to play against your player and be ready to take away the cut, but also I feel that you can prepare your team against the opponent because there are teams who base their offense for cutting. You know that if they’re going to play the track screen and we’re going to overstunt, they’re going to make this lash cut. I would say that if you card Toko Shengelia wherever he plays and if you go too much shift to the ball, unnecessary help, you’re already dead. In this situation, you need to prepare your players to have a shorter help, maybe even more flat so that you know he will all the time see his man and the ball and then we will play against the players, especially some of the shooters who are not so familiar or maybe the team concept is not built on that and they will no matter what stay behind the arc and you can stunt more. Of course, when you play 83 games or when you play in Japan 60 games, every game you cannot change your routines but the player should know that when I guard this player maybe I cannot stunt so much or maybe my positioning needs to be a little bit more into the basket line so that I’m ready if he goes. This way you can prepare. I’m a big fan of cutting so I know that when the cutter does the right move, it’s tough because you know basketball with the highest level of players, you need to help. You cannot leave them one-on-one and you get a built to help from somewhere. Is it from the big man or from the next player and if the offense makes the right read, you will end up a closeout. Talking about cutting, one thing we underestimate for me is that the best way to deny cutting is of course the ball pressure and the basketball is about angles and not only talking about putting high ball pressure on the basketball but making the catches a little bit higher, making the DHO’s one step further from the basketball changes the angle and maybe because of that small effort, the backdoor pass is from the different angle and the defender is capable to get a deflection. Talking about cuts, you should also think all the time that what you have on the ball.
Pat 45:09
If we kind of tie it all together when looking at a ball screen coverage, if you know, you know, you mentioned trying to ball pressure, pushing the screens out and you’re facing an opponent that cuts well, and so your guys are going to be less in the stunts and the gaps, will you change the ball screen coverage or think about how you want to defend the ball screen coverage that is less reliant on stunts and gap pressure?
Lassi Tuovi 45:33
I think that’s something, for example, ball screens where the opponent team is looking for a short roll continuously, you should not allow it. That’s something that, you know, we go back to the topic of not having a different ball screen coverages, but having the opportunity to change their look, their angle and take away this way they execute short roll and then maybe the baseline cutter or weak side movement. So I would say that you start again on the ball, changing the thing before thinking about how we guard the guard, where we get the separation and where we are delayed and everything starts with the own ball defense and we solve this problem which gives them the advantage.
Dan 46:15
Coach, my last question has to do with ball movement and teams that are really willing to make the extra pass out of the pick and roll or create a penetrating drive and how your closeouts, you know, we see a lot of teams closing out to a lane rather than a body sometimes. So they take away the maybe slot pass to the corner or vice versa. If you’re playing a team that’s just really good at moving the ball, how it may or may not change or just how you think about closeouts into lanes versus bodies in general to kind of stop some of that ball movement.
Lassi Tuovi 46:48
To go back in the time when I was working in Strasbourg and I had a privilege to work with one of the smartest coach for me in the world, Coach Vincent Collet. And this was something that I think it was an endless catch. We play like daily about the weak side helps. And we’ve been talking about short draw of big men having the ball, let’s say on the freethrow line. And for me, our team should always help and make the offense pass the ball more and trust for our rotation defense, but you should never make an unnecessary help. And that’s the same thing that if the big man is having the ball above the free draw line, standing still facing up to the basket, do we need to have a player in the painted area on the smile, the charge area? Or are we preparing that in case he puts the basketball on the floor, we can make it there and make some other players stunned. And I know that there’s many ways to play basketball and this is not for sure the right way, but for us, you should clearly know that is this my help or am I helping unnecessary, not only because of the cuts, but because of the, you know, having a too long close up for the next pass. That’s clearly something that when you are active, you need to know your duties because there will be those delays. And for me, it’s super important that, you know, you don’t help because you feel that there’s a danger. You help when there’s a real danger. It’s the same way that if the big man is rolling to the rim, then we got to meet him in the body and early there, but then maybe the other players should already prepare for the rotation. So unnecessary help is also why we are able to punish by cutting the defense so well. So if the defense is going too much, you should find the catch to cover.
Dan 48:40
Coach, you’re off the start or sub or sit hot seat. Thanks for playing that game with us. You crushed it. That was a lot of fun.
Lassi Tuovi 48:46
Actually, I didn’t, because I don’t know which one I choose for a set-out, spacing or cutting, but I guess the spacing is one of the most important things in basketball. Well, we talk now so much about the ball movement and cutting, so I stick with my answer and shame on me putting spacing out, but I hope that at least my team has a good spacing this year.
Dan 49:09
Absolutely. Coach, our last question that we ask all the guests is, what’s the best investment that you’ve made in your career as a coach?
Lassi Tuovi 49:17
I think as a coach, there’s many things. I’ll be listening to the podcast and of course I knew that this might come up. And we always say that, you know, watching other coaches practices is super important. I fully agree. Unfortunately, I’ve been so busy or at least thinking that I’m so busy with my own life that I don’t have the time to watch enough. I would say that all the talks also coaches from another sports is very important because there’s so much common things to share and picked up. I just had a conversation with the volleyball coach who used to coach in Japan, finish coach, and now coaching in Korea. And in the short dinner, you already touched so many common things, even though we talk about different sports that I think I learned a lot during the short dinner. But that’s not my answer. That was just the thing I was thinking.
Like I think my best investment has been few times in my career that when I had the feeling that I should, I call it a chum. 2014 coaching my hometown, and I had some interest from Phoenix basketball clubs, and for some reason I felt that maybe I should take a look at if there’s something else, coach abroad. At the end, nothing happened. I was six months without any job. But then one day the phone call came from a coach deadman and 24 hours later I landed in Istanbul and same thing has actually happened few times after that. So I think like I’m a dreamer, I’m a traveler, I like to see what is behind the next corner. Maybe it’s not always so easy lifestyle for the people around me. But I think that every time my investment that I have been not scared to be without a job or be in the empty area looking that something good will happen has been a good investment because you need to follow your gut feeling. And I hope that those young coaches who are listening to this and they are thinking about it, they can give them a push that, you know, if you feel it, even though you don’t know what’s going to happen.
Dan 51:31
Coach Tuovi is someone that I wouldn’t mind having a cup of coffee with and just talking the game for a long time, one of those cafes that he likes to frequent. Just a great basketball mind, thinker of the game.
Pat 51:44
A quick backstory, you know, we both enjoyed watching his teams in Stroudsburg. I think this was probably three or four years ago, when we started to try to pursue him and get him on the pod. And just timing wise, it never worked out, you know, then he was named the Finnish national team. And it’s like he said, his summers got super busy. So been a long play. Yeah, two or three years in the making, like you said, it was completely worth it.
Dan 52:06
Yep, let’s dive into our top three points or takeaways and I will kick it to you for takeaway number one.
Pat 52:13
My first takeaway, I’ll start with our first bucket and just modern offense around five ball handlers. And this is something I’m glad we really started with again, considering watching the finish national team and just the way they play is really designed around just ball handling and shooting. And my first big takeaways where with playing with these five ball handlers, it’s the ability to put your opponent’s other big and unusual situations was one, whether it be, I mean, he mentioned the give and go. And I think before on air, I said, I really want to steal some clips. Just saying, yeah, forcing the five men to come out to the perimeter and then a quick give and go and just getting easy scores. And then the other one was the emphasis on pressuring the baseline. So we talked about running wide, filling corners, you know, the conversation then flowed into cutting, but again, with kind of five ball handlers, more shooting, maybe it’s not the traditional sense and pick and roll, but still cutting UCLA screens, still finding post-ups, but really looking to attack the baseline first, the compromise, the integrity of the defense before you can, let’s say, kind of get into a good drive, kick game penetration, creating kind of the opportunities when the initial kick ahead, you know, just the drive and kick isn’t exactly there, breaking your guy down one-on-one.
Dan 53:31
At some point in the middle to you kind of want a little run of your own about the hos and i was pretty jealous.
Pat 53:37
We keep throwing it on you, but it’s either you or me. We’re getting to a DHO conversation at some point. You’ve got the sickness too now. Yeah, it’s in you.
Well, yeah, when he talked about those rugby pitches, and I love the name rugby pitches, but something we looked at too with, we broke down against attacking the switch, kind of those pitching screens. I couldn’t help myself at that point.
Dan 53:55
Yeah, I’ll follow up on two points. One was the benefit of the modern five out ball handlers, like you just said, where you’re putting the big and tough situations.
I think that, you know, talking to a lot of coaches, that is the thing where when you’ve got fours and fives that run hard and get into quick dribble handoffs or rugby pitches or drag screens or dream up what you want to do, it’s incredibly hard for opposing defenses to guard that correctly for 24 or 30 seconds, whatever your shot clock is. Some places don’t have shot clocks, which I don’t understand.
Pat 54:28
A lot of DHOs in that game.
Dan 54:30
Yeah, I mean, I think a big takeaway and just I love the way his teams flow so quickly through connectors of the offense, the bigs and how fast it is and how open it feels. And so really liked hearing his thoughts on that. And then at some point we kind of flipped into a cutting conversation as well about how, when to cut, just thoughts on cutting. And I think that just always very interesting. And I loved his quote about the drive is like a short roll. So visually that made a lot of sense to me and telling guys where to cut from based off of cave. This was a short roll. If they’re big caught at here, where would we probably try to cut from? Whether it’s a corner cut and drift or 45. That was a useful nugget for me just visually kind of feeling and seeing that. And so I thought that was another good point in there.
Pat 55:22
Yeah. My last point on this, the quote, he said bullying the split player when we got into attacking the switch and when you have the size advantage or the speed advantage, naturally, the defense is going to maybe try to drop into some sort of help and really putting the emphasis. I mean, he said continuing to keep the engine flowing and looking to really attack that, he called that split defender, that defender who said maybe the 45 most time, that’s kind of responsible for two and within your switch offense, really putting an emphasis on like, we got to attack this player. And he said, maybe the primary action doesn’t create such a great closeout, but if you can bully that split player, you can get an even better closeout off of the primary action.
Dan 56:05
The end two were we talked some switching concepts was really good. I’ll give you a quick miss from my end I just didn’t follow up because conversation moved and whatnot But I would have loved to ask him more about it was kind of what he answered But he said about screening the last offender against switching was big And just would have loved to have heard a little bit more him discuss that which is kind of like a cousin to what we’re talking about right now, which is the split defender and bullying that person attacking but I just think yeah, some of his concepts against the switch on that second side He talked about the open stands and being able to attack certain ways. I think was really good.
Pat 56:44
Yeah. All right, Dan. And keeping it moving, in this recap, what was your takeaway?
Dan 56:49
So takeaway number two, we’re going to go to the stage on this one. Artist to artist. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, so I really enjoyed, first of all, asking this question. I think that someone that’s done something different outside of basketball and what they bring to it, you know, in his case, acting, I just think is really interesting. And I think that the storytelling in which what he started was really fun to hear him talk about and kind of getting into the cast and, you know, basically how important the players, the personnel are, but then the roles and, you know, what they’re doing was great. And then I’ll just also say I really enjoyed his further thoughts on how to work and create small windows of downtime for you as a coach within a busy season. We talked about going to coffee shops or whatnot, and that’s when he felt you could take a break in the middle of the day and restimulate thought. And I personally loved hearing that. I know for me, sometimes my favorite thing to do is get out of the office or get out of the hotel room and go walk and work somewhere else.
Pat 57:55
Yeah, kind of these outside of the box ones remind me too of our start subset with coach Dylan Murphy. Yeah Well, is it exactly he studied the classics? Yeah, so kind of tying the classics into coaching I really enjoyed then today tying acting into coaching one thing I took away from that conversation He had a quote, you know We do our jobs with artists referring to obviously the players being artists and that some need rules to really succeed and some need space and freedom and the improvisation and I liked his thoughts when I followed up on just how he goes about preseason and implementing the rules their structure while also figuring out the guys that need improvisation and how he Starts to implement that and balance that when it got into a really good conversation back to cutting With the inevitable like, you know, do we cut the 45 every time or do we cut the corner slide the 45? But then you’re faced with the challenge of well What if the better shooters in the 45 or a small guard who can’t finish at the rim? But as your guys start to improvise and they can realize like no you cut all drift or vice versa But giving them first that structure and then be able to build off of that when they start to You know figure out how to work with each other and build that synergy
Dan 59:11
You mentioned you got to know the rules or the reads first before the improvisation starts to take place. So like that would be a later in the year type of thing. I did actually take an improv class once as an elective for my master’s program. And honestly, it talks about you have to know the rules of improv before you actually try to improv. What the rules are.
Pat 59:31
It reminds me of our piano class we took together at the first test when you kind of had your own original already and this kind of the teacher had to tell you like, we’re going to stick to the basics here first.
Dan 59:41
Just stick to my ma, I gave me a nickel, Dan. Yeah.
Pat 59:44
You’re ready to swing.
Dan 59:45
sprint before you can walk. That’s right. Let’s stop improvising here and let’s get back on track to our last point.
Pat 59:52
I’ll take that back to you. My last point is within the start-subsits on Tuft to Takeaway, defensively, ball movement, cutting, spacing, and specifically when we got, it kind of all bleeds together as probably so much of this question is, and it depends. But when your follow-up on ball movement, I really like the point he made on that. A lot of it is, I mean, first, his philosophy is he wanted forced passes and that trusts the rotation, but the key emphasis on just not over-helping and understanding your help responsibilities in terms of defending the ball movement. And I think that’s what a lot of teams go through early in the preseason as you break down film, try to build your base defenses. And it goes back to like the gray area of defense. And he mentioned, we kept kind of hitting on the short roll as an example. Like, is he looking at the rim? Is he a threat? You know, then if so, yeah, then we need to pull in. What did he say? Help when there is a danger, not when you feel a danger. And if you can kind of make that distinction, that goes a long way in helping how you rotate and how you can contain ball movement. Or if you’re constantly over-helping, then yeah, I mean, you’re gonna be just constantly getting punished with ball movement. And I think it goes back to where your initial question was like the lane close out versus just closing out on the ball. If you’re in these constant situations where you’re over-helping, it’s like, yeah, maybe you need that lane close out because you’re creating like two long close outs, I believe he said. Or if they put you in a spot where you have to help and you’re making the correct help read, maybe it’s just like one long close out. And if you can get there and force that extra pass, your second rotation can get there and hopefully neutralize any advantage. So I really like that distinguish he made when looking at ball movement, kind of understanding how you’re helping and making those help reads.
Dan 01:01:39
I think you and I, when we were discussing this question, these are three sort of on their face, like basic things, what’s tough, spacing, cutting, or ball movement. But as we all know, certain teams do probably one of these three things really well. I mean, if they’re doing a couple of things really well, you’re in trouble. We were talking about just what do you think about from a defensive standpoint, if you’re going to face a team that just really cuts well, does that bother you more as a defense or think about more as a team, suppose a team that’s just like really this great and spacing as opposed to a team that just is going to move the ball and how you differentiate those things. And I think he threw in there towards the top that it used to have or like to have more active defense that’s going to force teams to kind of have to move it out. You’re sort of testing to see how good a team can actually move the ball. And I thought that was interesting too, thinking about, when you’re thinking about your opponent, if you have a couple of pick and roll coverages based off of your knowledge of how well they cut or space or move the ball can maybe give you an indication of how aggressive or not aggressive you can be on the ball screen coverage where teams that are likely not good at moving the ball, maybe you can be more aggressive because they’re going to be hesitant or not as good at moving it out of a hedge or whatever it is. And I just thought interesting stuff in there too, just thinking about how your aggressiveness on the ball maybe relates to what a team does well offensively.
Pat 01:03:01
Two quick follow-up points building off of what you said. I did like within this conversation and talking about scout specific cutters, guys that cut really well and just how you prepare for them, what maybe changes. And he talked about maybe your stunt help, your ability to be in the gap is less. And then he talked about kind of multiple pick and roll coverages versus maybe one and changing the angle or the level within that one coverage. That’s like one of my misses. I think it’s a conversation I’ve been trying to get out as we prep for different coaches and start subsets this debate, multiple pick and roll coverages versus one pros cons. I liked his thoughts too on even if you have one, you still obviously have adjustments within that too. Like he said, take away, well, if the short rule is killing you maybe change your angle, do something different and you don’t necessarily need multiple coverages. But like anything, there’s benefits to everything. And I think that’s a conversation I’ve been thinking about for a while now. And another one of those misses for me, maybe just to scratch that itch.
Dan 01:04:00
Well, I gave a couple misses. You just kind of talked about one. Was there anything else as we close here that were points of interest that we just kind of ran out of time for?
Pat 01:04:07
Another miss and we talked about it off air with him when we were just kind of thanking him and talking a little bit more about cutting. And he mentioned a really good drill that I think he both said, I wish we kind of got this conversation recorded, but he mentioned when teaching cutting that he’ll do the no dribble games, but have coaches as outlets, either one coach or two coach at the 45. Really liked that drill.
I mean, I guess I wish it’s something we got on air and maybe kind of drilled down. I know you asked about the teaching and in practice and we moved off of it a little bit too quickly because I think that was a really good drill that he talked about that kind of saves players from, like we said, maybe when you do no coaches out there and it’s no dribbles, maybe you’ll get like one rim cut, but then every other cut becomes just kind of like outlet passes running the ball just to keep it moving. Or if you have those coaches outlets, you can really emphasize cut quality. And like he said, see who is instinctually good cutters as well. Absolutely.