Slappin’ Glass sits down this week with the Associate Head Coach of UCLA MBB, Darren Savino! Coach Savino has been at Mick Cronin’s side for over 15 years helping build some of the best defenses in the country year after year, and shares his thoughts on those core principles and philosophies. The trio also discuss teaching methods in practice and PNR screening angles during the always fun “Start, Sub, or Sit?!”
Transcript
Darren Savino 00:00
We have a big dog bone, because our thought is the hungry dog gets the bone. So at the end of the game, we win the game, of course, whereas the most deflections gets to sign the bone with their name and how many deflections they had at the end of the season. The guy with the most dog bone signatures, we put it in a trophy case, you know, or a black thing, and we present the dog bone. The effort to get deflections overrides any other stat you could come up with in our moments. You could talk about field goal percentage, your points allowed, those are all important as well. But the deflection board, the hungry dog gets the bone, is the most important statistical barometer of our defense and how hard we’re playing.
Dan 02:13
And now, please enjoy our conversation with Coach Darren Savino. Coach got a chance to have you at our coaches clinic a few weeks back and chatting all sorts of things, defense, which we’re going to get into today. And the thing that we wanted to start with is your principles on the defensive side at UCLA.
Darren Savino 02:37
So I’ve been with Mick Cronin now for my 17th year as his assistant, and I get asked questions all the time about Mick’s defense and what we do and how he does it. And there’s some unique things that maybe we can do that are different. But ultimately, the things that I may say today are things that we all know already. I think the key is, and what I found all this time with Mick is just being consistent and never going away from your values, your core values on defense. And I find it amazing. There are days where the energy that you have to bring, Mick is able to do that as the head coach every single day. And to me, that’s the thing that stands out the most. And that’s why year in, year out, his teams are usually one of the best defensive teams, if not top 10 or top 20 defensive teams in the country, no matter who’s on the team with personnel changing, obviously now the way college basketball is and his consistency in his effort to make sure that the team understands that this is the way we’re going to do it. And we’re going to be consistent with it. We’re never going to allow our team and our players not to play the way that they’re supposed to play. And we all have philosophies and we all have strategies, but can we be consistent enough to make sure that every single day, no matter what we’re doing, that we never go away from that. We never allow in some of the things that we’re going to talk about. One thing would be never allow just a straight line drive to the basket for a layup uncontested. We never allow that. Now it may happen, but it’s going to be stopped and coached. And so our guys understand that’s not allowed. Another one would be is, you know, and you’re a great three point shooter, somebody drives, we don’t leave you and give you a wide open through. We don’t give the best shooters on the other team, wide open, stand still threes. Our players will know that if it happens, we stop it and correct it. And it’s something that our guys have to know. And then the last thing you never foul unnecessarily. You don’t put the other team on the free throw line and give them easy points as aggressive as we’re going to be on defense with our hands, our bodies, our pressure. We also teach and constantly coach, fouling and not fouling. How do you avoid putting yourself in a situation where you foul? So again, no layups, no open threes from the other team’s best shooters and no free throws. Those are our three basic core principles on defense. There’s so much stuff around that that goes into that with the teaching. I think that being consistent with that, if defensively, if that’s your philosophy, you have to coach that every single day, try to put your team in situations where you can drill that. It’s really paid off for us in 17 years. We’ve been one of the best defensive teams in the country with that philosophy in mind.
Dan 05:36
Coach if someone came to a UCLA practice, I know we talked about this, what would they see when you are first teaching how to guard the ball on a straight line drive? What are things that you are doing with footwork, handwork, drill work? Whatever it is to guard the basketball?
Darren Savino 05:57
Yeah, it’s a great question. I mean, it’s one of the most important things in your defense The better on the ball defenders that you have that have the right technique the athleticism the want unless you have to help right the less you give up, you know open threes You can control the offense first thing is applying pressure But also at the same time applying smart pressure who you are and who the guy is with the ball determines how much pressure you apply if I’m not the fastest guy in the team or I’m seven foot I obviously have to back up a little bit give space contain if I’m one of our quicker guys and the guy with the ball is a little slower or he’s a forward We can apply more pressure So obviously scouting has a lot to do with it But we teach that in our practices and we put our guys in situations where our seven foot three guys got to guard our point guard You know our point guard has got to guard someone like him but also someone that’s bigger so we can teach that aspect of how much pressure that you apply and How much do you have to back off and again depends on who you are and who you’re guarding every day? We’re doing some kind of one-on-one guarding the ball drill again You want to be good at it? You want to stress it? You got to do it every day now for us? We teach hands in front because we’re a big deflection team then we’ll get to that we’ll bring that up But so we’re a big deflection team So our hands are out in front not out to the side like an airplane like a bird Hands out in front. That’s obviously for deflections and pressure, but also for balance Our head is back our head is up our chest is up Never want to have your head leaning forward that’s forward lose balance lose athleticism So chest back head up hands in front and then we teach our guys that are back in our butt needs to be in line with the rim now We are no middle team But you also don’t want to open up so much when you give the guy a direct line drive to the basket from the wing We would teach on the wing or the corners that are again chest is in front our butts even with the rim And anytime that our back and our butt is not in line with the rim We stop it and coach it because you’re given the driver a direct line to the rim So everything we can do to teach our guys to stay in front make them shoot a contested to hopefully that way There’s no scramble. We have a better opportunity to get the rebound. There’s no fouls. There’s no layups There’s no help because we’re beat for the kick out three and so everything in our defense that I talked about before no way It’s no threes. No free throws. It all starts with our guarding the ball and being in front.
Pat 08:37
Coach, looking at it a little bit deeper, I mean, obviously the biggest component is, like you said, the one-on-one defense, but how are you then with the other four guys, your help schemes, I mean, I think with deflections, your gap integrity, also kind of living this, you know, no straight line drives, no layups.
Darren Savino 08:53
So obviously, in the perfect world, we have five guys out there that are just like Dwayne Wade like they can stay in front of the ball. Nobody has to help. Right? That’s not realistic. So obviously, our off the ball defense is important. Now we do something a little bit different, Pat, than a lot of teams would do off the ball. So like if I’m guarding the wing, and the balls in the slot or the top one pass away, most coaches in men, men defense teach no hand, hand in the passing lane, inside hand the passing lane, here in chest with their man in a closed stance. We’re in an open stance off the ball, all of our guys are in an open stance. So I’m seeing my man seeing the ball kind of like you would in the zone on the wing. That’s our stance. But we’re up in the line of the pass. So that guy can’t just throw it directly. And we’re deflecting with our, I guess it would be my inside hand. Right? So if I’m facing the basket facing the court, and I’m on the right wing, it’s my left hand deflection, not my right hand. And if my teammate gets beat, because I’m in that open stance, I could see it a little bit easier. And I’m positioned to go attack the ball with two hands. If somebody’s beat is close enough, we would call it a tight gap. We allow our guys to go and just strip with two hands, always with two hands, we teach it with two hands, we drill it, but also at the same time, being in the passing lane of the guy that I’m guarding. Because if it’s somebody that sees it coming, right? He doesn’t have his head down, he sees the help. He’s going to do what? He’s going to pick it up and fire it to the shooter. We have to be in line. So that shooter, it can’t just go directly to him. It’s either they got to go over my head and a slower pass, or he’s got to get out of line to pop out to catch it because the way I’m attacking the ball. So right on that initial attack, we’re in line and we’re training our guys to give really good help. Now it depends again, you got to be smart who I’m guarding. If I’m guarding the best shooter on the other team, if I go, I better get the ball. If I give up that kick out three, you’re coming out of the game. You got to know that you’re guarding the other team’s best shooter. So those guys are more in fake health, more fake at it and back so they can be there on the catch or take away that pass. But that’s where our help is in an open stance, ready to deflect the ball, whether it be a two-hand strip or deflect any passing. Obviously, if it’s our big guys switched on to a guard, because sometimes that may happen, we would call our defensive box would get much tighter to give more support to that guy. And again, we put our guys in situations and practice that we do that a lot that our center will be guarding the point guard or yelling box, box, and everybody gets in tighter knowing that there’s a mismatch. Our philosophy, Pat, is the mismatch doesn’t beat us. It’s the open man. That’s important. The mismatch, he may make a hard shot, but the mismatch doesn’t beat us, the open man does.
Pat 11:53
With the help defense being in the pass line when it’s not a shooter or just, you know, it’s a normal skilled player. How are you teaching the help defenders? Like maybe when to read the drive, I guess, when to really go try to get that seal or versus maybe it is just, Hey, it’s a stunt and back.
Darren Savino 12:09
The guy puts his head down. When someone attacks, you know, on the ball defender, whether it be a closeout or a change direction move, and that guy puts his head down, and you’re watching, he is not looking, you go. You can go and go strip him. Now, obviously, a guy who does a good job, he’s got his head up. He’s looking at you. Like, how many guys are going to put their head down, see the help come up, and fire a pass? There’s not many guys that can do that. They put their head down, you go. If it’s a forward, and we have this in our scouting, and I talk about it all the time, we’ll play some good players that are 6’9″, 6’8″, that play perimeter, that can shoot the ball, but also put it on the deck. But once they put it on the deck, they don’t have the skill like a 6’2 guard, where they can drive, see, kick. They put their head down, it’s over. They’re driving to the back. So, we just tell our guys, if he beats our guy, go. He’s not going to pass it. And so, scouting comes into play, but it’s really, it’s what is head down or head up.
Pat 13:07
Are all drives equal in terms of if you see a slot drive baseline and helping off the corner? Do you guys still go? Is there any distinction at all or it doesn’t matter?
Darren Savino 13:16
It’s a cardinal sin. You can’t leave the ball side shooter You know the team usually puts their better shooters in that spot They don’t put the guys that can’t shoot so if obviously the guy can’t shoot you’re allowed to go because we’re not gonna guard But 98% of the time the best shooters are in the corners So we get fake helping back and if you go and you don’t get the ball and they kick it you’re coming out Our guys know that that’s like cardinal sin for us You’d never leave the ball side corner the helps got to come from underneath if there’s gonna be some help and we work on that Defensively where he’s coming down the lane line where you know You try to do the best you can if you’re beat just to stay in the play with our wall ups and our hands back And then we get the block and the help from underneath the basket coming from the weak side
Pat 13:59
Drill wise, what are you guys doing to teach the help to read the drive?
Darren Savino 14:04
Yeah, that’s a good question. It would be boring to players, I guess, because you’re gonna start with like one-on-one, two-on-two. We’ll do it with managers. We’ll flip the ball to a manager in the high slot. Another manager will be in an offense. The other slot, up top, kind of. That’s an example of it.
But we have two of our guys guarding them. So we’ll start it with a flip out to a close out. And we’re guarding the ball. He hasn’t taken off on the dribble. So we’re getting our hands, our stance, mirroring the ball. And then the manager is going to try to hard dribble to the middle. The guy that’s guarding the other manager has got to be in line in that open stance. And he’s got to be ready to… And that manager can move a little bit, right? He can move to try to But we got to be in line. So we’re working on that pass to the other slot that we’re trying to deflect the ball or make that guy move out of line. That right there is more of a, we’re not going to steal the dribble yet. That’s more of trying to be in line off the ball and working on that stance and that deflection. Then there will be drills where we’ll do the same thing and the guy will attack and we’ll tell the manager to completely just hard drive it middle. Don’t even look at your other manager. Put your head down and go. And that’s where our other guy can see that and work on that part of it where he is attacking the ball. So we’ll do both where he’s dribbling with his head up. And the guy knows, I better not leave and go attack the dribble because he’s going to pass it to the shooter. So we got to get back in the passing lane. But he puts his head down and goes. And so those drills that we try to create those situations, we have great managers that played in high school so they can help simulate a little bit. That’s one example. We’ll also do it from the slot to the corner where beat, manager attacks, and we’ll have a guy in the corner guarding the corner shooter. And just working on it, again, it’s boring, but just working on bluffing back. Don’t overcommit because you know you got to shoot the bluffing back passing lane. And that’s just the only way you can do it live. But we start off practice probably 30, 40 minutes of all these different defensive drill scenarios that we’ve hopefully built habits. So then when you play live, well, wait a minute, we just did that. We just drilled that. Somebody gets beat, his head’s up, you leave early, you’re too deep in the gap. He fires it to a shooter, bang three. Well, we drilled that. And as the season goes on, you’re playing more live stuff, you’re doing more scouting. But early preseason, I mean, 30, 40 minutes of all those type of drills to force habits.
Dan 16:31
One of the other principles you talked about earlier was never foul unnecessarily. With your defense, I always think of the word toughness and how you teach that line of being tough without fouling. Couple of things you’ve mentioned, I would imagine you repping a lot of handwork and footwork because you’ve talked about hands out in front, two hands for steals, things like that. But how you drill, talk about being tough, but also just not having the other team live at the free throw line.
Darren Savino 17:00
It definitely starts with recruiting. If you can find, and I talk about this a lot, we try to find obviously tough, competitive, athletic-minded guys, right? Guys that want to win, that compete, tough, that want to be coached, that want to get better. But at the same time, sometimes we forget basketball IQ. That has to really be just as important as your toughness and athleticism. Because you can have all that toughness and athleticism, but make dumb plays, not smart basketball plays, and it ruins it. It ruins how good of an athlete you are. So we never foul low around the basket, even if we’re obviously stressing deflections and strips and two-hand strips. If we’re guarding someone who’s attacking the paint or the basket, we don’t want to foul low, especially when he’s going to score. We want to stay high wall up. And our protection, our shot blocking comes from the weak side. We never try to block. If you’re the primary defender around the basket, we’re not trying to block the shot. We’re trying to wall up. Again, our help and our shot blocking is going to come from the middle, from the weak side. And that way we make guys take hard shots. And practice, it’s kind of the end thing, is to practice defensively around the paint. And if you’re not doing it, you should be doing it, teaching your guys how to wall up without fouling, hands back, chest on the offensive player, and trying to force a hard shot. We’re not trying to block shots as the primary defender. We referee practice in every drill, our staff, and that way our guys get used to not fouling, honed fouls that would be called in the game. I think that’s one of the secrets to that, is to have a team understand what’s a foul, what’s not a foul. By refereeing every drill, doesn’t have to be five on five. It could be two on two, one on one, and teach and coach and referee what’s a foul, what’s not a foul. And as time goes on, you become really good at it as a team. And there’s some guys that are a little bit more aggressive than others, but playing defense, we don’t try to steal the ball every time. And again, depends on who you’re guarding to. If you’re guarding one of the best players in the team, you’re not going to steal the ball from him that much. You’re just trying to make him take a hard shot and make a mistake.
Pat 20:19
Following up on, you don’t want the primary defender to block the shot that you’ll rotate over hopefully the center behind. The technique behind when that center try to reading that drive to come contest and then how you want the second help, that crackback defender, he’s not contesting and you’re just giving up offensive boards. I guess the technique or the second rotation behind trying to block shots with your center.
Darren Savino 20:41
Great question, Pat, if we’re doing a good job with the driver, where we’re staying walled up, and we got him outside the lane, where now he’s going to be falling away from the basket, we don’t go to block that because that’s dumb. Because if you don’t get it, which you’re probably not going to get it, you’re giving up an offensive rebound. If his shoulders are at the basket, and our guys beat, we have to go, we have no choice. We got to go block that shot, right? But if we do a good job, we stay walled up, and he’s falling away, we show it on film, we talk about it, we’ll stop it if they do it, you cannot try to go block that shot. Let him fall away, let him shoot a hard shot. If we’re doing a good wall up and he’s now off balance, flipping the ball up, throwing it out of bounds, don’t go block it. Again, we’ll drill that with a manager, driving it hard in those scenarios where he may be still at the basket, where he’s shooting it, we go rotate, we have another guy just at the elbow or the wing, he’s got to crack down onto the big to block him out. Because that’s going to happen a lot in the game. So yeah, we definitely drill, try to get inside position on the big, offensive big if our guy leaves to go block that shot.
Dan 21:48
Coach with closeouts, you talked about no standstill threes. Is there a difference so between an uncontested versus contested standstill three? Are you flying by shooters or are you breaking down and just contesting the standstill three? I’m sure it’s a little bit player dependent, but I guess how you can test and close out to a three and then how that affects the rest of your rotations, defense, all that stuff behind it.
Darren Savino 22:13
Yeah, another great question. I know in the NBA, Dan, some teams will work on that corner three on the closeout. They’ll run by the guy, you know, they’ll close and just run sideways and buy at least make them reload. But we don’t do that. We stay in the play. If it’s a great shooter, obviously, you don’t want to be too much in help. But if you get caught in the help, and you have to scramble to that guy, you got to do everything you can without fouling him without running by him. They get so close where you can’t shoot the ball. You’ve got to make him dribble it. If you take them off the line, you take them and you make them go baseline. A lot of times when we close to the wing or corner, players have a tendency to go low and they allow the middle drive. It’s something that we work on a lot where we close to the shooter. The teaching point is hit your toes on his toes. That way he can’t shoot. If your toes are on his toes, which obviously that’s not going to happen, but the thought of getting as close as you can without fouling him, he’s not going to shoot. He’s going to have to put it on the deck and we want to force the baseline.
Dan 23:09
And I guess then expanding out your closed out coverage and gaps and all that one step more out would be your ball screen coverages. And I know at least historically, a lot of guys have hedged ball screens really well. You’ve talked about it before. How you keep the hedge from turning into where you’re in complete scramble and you’re allowing some of these standstill threes and how you’re keeping it to where the guys are tight compacted and also impact the ball.
Darren Savino 23:35
So I think one of our strengths on defense, we try to create and practice drills that we call scramble drills. Okay. So I’m sure every team does it to some capacity, but something that we do a lot for preseason stuff, we’ll spend 20, 30 minutes of practice time where it’s four on three and it’s five on four or three on two, you know, it’s always a disadvantage for the defense where we got to practice scrambling. Now I know getting off the pick and roll topic, but like you said, if you get caught in the blitz, they hit the pocket, they can spray it. Now we’re in the complete scramble. So we practice those scramble situations every day. So it becomes natural to us to be in the scramble. You don’t want to be in a scramble on defense, right? You want to keep everybody in front. Everybody’s got a man, but let’s face it, you’re going to be put in scrambles pretty much almost every other possession. So if you don’t practice it every day, how’s your team going to become good at it? What happens? We talk out of it. We see one guy goes there. I go to the other spot. I’m telling guys where to go. And these are the kind of habits that we get from drilling scramble drills. And we also finish it with a shot and a block out, which is another part of the scramble. That’s a problem because you don’t have a block out assignment in the scramble. It’s tough. So these are the habits that the scramble drills, like if I was, you know, the head coach of my team, I would do that drill, some kind of scramble drill every day because defense, you’re going to be in the scramble. I know NBA teams do it a lot. They practice their rotations and I think high school, some colleges, maybe they don’t do it as much. Like it’s vital to having a good defense.
Pat 25:12
But then the scramble drills, will you talk about lane closeouts or are you still always closing out to the ball? You know, maybe if there’s a two on one closing out, you know, taking away the extra pass or maybe you’ll give up some middle drives, but you’ll protect, let’s say the extra pass to the corner, or are you still, no, we close out on the ball and trust that the next guy will get that rotation.
Darren Savino 25:33
Pat, are you sure you’re not at our practices with some of these questions because that is a tremendous question for a drill that we would do. It’s four and three contests. You start in the lane, three guys, four perimeter coach into the basket, throws it to any perimeter, the defense now is four and three. Nobody can dribble, right? You’re scrambling around. One guy’s got the ball. One guy’s got to pass and the other guy might have two guys. You’ve reversed the ball top to top. The guy that has two guys now, as he approaches the ball in the high slot, he knows the guy in the corner is open. I think this is the question you’re asking.
Yeah. To give time to that bottom guy to get there because of the long run he has, he has to approach that guy where he’s there, but he’s in the passing lane to the corner with his outside hand. He’s got to slow that pass down. He might not deflect it, but at least if he jumps in that passing lane, maybe the pass is a higher pass because of more time to rotate. And yes, you may give up the middle drive if it was live, if we were allowed to dribble, but we practice that and coach that a lot and it’s important. You got to know that the guy, the one more pass is open. You’ve got to try to take away that pass a little bit.
Dan 26:42
How do you all the staff assess the health of your defense? So, done with the game, done with the practice, what’s the process like for you all to feel like whatever it is that you’re doing is in the right direction or you’re defending well, regardless of win-loss, the score, all that, how do you assess it and try to make it better?
Well, I would say, film work is important. Before we could get to the film, it’s our deflection totals. Our players know 40 deflections equals victory. If we can somehow get to 40 deflections, we’re going to win 98% of our games. Now, this year we start, we get 40 deflections every game. No one’s going to beat us. Very rarely will lose. Our guys know that. It’s on the board to start the game. We talk about it. At halftime, we come in. The guys know where we’re at with deflections. Each guy’s got next to their name how many deflections they have. At the end of the game, we come in a locker room. It’s up there. Guys are arguing with the guy that takes a deflection, says, I had seven, not five. You cheated me. It becomes a thing. We have a big dog bone because our thought is the hungry dog gets the bone. At the end of the game, we win the game, of course, whereas the most deflections gets to sign the bone with their name and how many deflections they have. At the end of the season, the guy with the most dog bone signatures, we put it in a trophy case, the plaque thing, and we present the dog bone. The effort to get deflections overrides any other stat you could come up with in our minds. You could talk about field goal percentage, your points allowed. Those are all important as well. But the deflection board, the hungry dog gets the bone, is the most important statistical barometer of our defense and how hard we’re playing. Now, obviously, film, giving up corner threes, or we’re making mistakes, the whole things that we’re teaching, our scrambling wasn’t good. We’re fouling low. All the defensive mistakes that our film will tell us that we would correct. But ultimately, it’s the deflection board is where we know that our defense is where it’s supposed to be.
Pat 28:47
Just following up on the deflection stat, I mean, obviously with 40 being the ideal and the best chance to win, is there like a Mendoza line, you know, if we’re at 33, we’re always in the game. If it’s at 25, we’re really strong. I guess like, where is maybe the norm for, yes, we always want to try to achieve 40, but if we were at 33, like we’re in this game, we’re competing and we’re doing a good job.
Darren Savino 29:08
And again, I think you’re on a staff somehow. Mick has talked about that, like, I would say 33, 35 is pretty good effort. And again, if you’re playing against the best teams in your schedule, if you can somehow get 33 to 35 deflections against the best teams, again, a deflection is a blocked shot. It’s a piece of the ball where there would be two hands, one hand, a piece of the ball of the dribble, off a pass, a loose ball on the floor, we dive on, we get a deflection. Those are effort. And to be able to do that against a really good team and get over 33, 35, that you’re putting in some pretty good effort. I mean, 40 would be unbelievable. 40 were definitely going to win. But if you can get over 33, that’s a good number.
Dan 29:52
We want to transition now to a segment on the show that we call start, sub or sit, we’re going to give you three options around a topic, ask you to start one, sub one and sit one. And then we will discuss your answers from there. So this first question has to do with on the offensive side of the ball. These are three different options around the offensive side of the ball that require the most TLC throughout the course of the season to keep your offense healthy. It’s your start would be the one that you think requires the most. So option one is the timing and spacing of your offense. Option two is the bigs and their screening. So always spending time on how your bigs screen, the angle, slip, stick, all that stuff or option three has to do with your guards and their use of screens, setting up pick and roll screens, setting up off ball screens. So the timing and spacing of your offense, option one, the big screening, option two, the guards screening option three for TLC on offense.
Darren Savino 30:57
I would start with timing and spacing. We’re doing that now. We’re not setting many screens now. I would think, Dan, Pat, you guys study a lot of offensive systems. And some people run a lot of screens, staggers, backscreens. That’s kind of old school. I would think there’s more pick and roll spacing concepts. So we’re trying to teach our guys how to move without the ball, correct spacing, when to get off the ball, when to drive, when to attack. That’s the hardest, in my opinion, that’s the hardest thing to teach young players. Because nowadays, guys dribbles the ball 50 times, everybody’s standing around, getting guys to move to the right spots, getting guys off the ball in ball movement, right? Changing sides of the floor. We’re doing that every day in our breakdown drills and practice, vital for not having a team that’s got sticky hands.
Get off the ball, move spacing, that’s priority. I usually work with our big guys. I’ll take that second. I always think that when it comes to screening, whether it be pick and roll or pin downs, whatever screening action that bigs are involved in, I blame them when it doesn’t work. Like, yeah, the guard should wait, right? The guard should set his man up. He should do all those things. But you tell him, like you go into screening, you’re going to the pick and roll. You’re going to the pin down. Tell him what to do. Tell him to set his man up. Because if you don’t, and he doesn’t, if he doesn’t use the screen, I’m blaming you. If he goes too early and he leaves and you’re not organizing set and you set in the legal screening, again, it’s going to hurt you. So like the big guys, in my opinion, have to be taught how to command and be in control of that action.
Two man game stuff. You’re in charge. You got the ball in a two man game. You’re starting whether it be a pass or a handoff. Tell the guard what to do. Tell him to take his time, set him up, whatever. The guard, obviously, you want to use a screen. Fran Fischel has got this YouTube video out if you ever have time to watch it. How to use a pick and roll. The options, the three, forget what he calls them. There’s like three steps to it. Obviously the first thing is setting your man up. Whether you’re using a pick and roll, you’re coming off a screen or a pin down or a double. That’s your man up first. Then use the screen. But then you got to be talented enough to get him into the screen. And then from there, you better be able to read and react to the defense. Do I have a shot? Is the defense telling me that I need to make the pass? Who am I passing to? You know, kind of going into a little bit different things there, but screening action for the guards. They’re going to know how to set their man up. And then obviously once they use the screen, what’s next? Who’s open? Am I open? Am I teammates open? Having vision.
Dan 33:40
Having vision. I want to go to your sub, which was the big screening, and you mentioned you’re in charge of a lot of that. With a guard like you had a few years ago, Tiger Campbell, that’s crafty, can play in the pick and roll, can snake, can do all this stuff. I guess with a player like that, what are the teaching points for the bigs on how to help a guard that’s like that to create an over or re-screen or slip out? When you’re playing with a dynamic guard, how you communicate to the bigs if they’re doing a good job or not helping that action.
Darren Savino 34:10
You got to communicate. Obviously, a re-screen would be if Tiger gets off the first screen, say it’s a pick and roll, and they do a pretty good job of getting over the screen or say we missed the screen or say the guy went under, that’s automatic re-screen. I mean, we automatically turn around and re-screen for him to get him back off, which is usually the hardest screen to defend is the re-screen and the pick and roll. We will have sometimes we’ll put some stuff in where the first screen is kind of like a decoy. You come off, a lot of teams do that. It’s pretty good action. You get a little bit of a show. You don’t really use it. Then you turn around really quickly, snap back, and then the big is not positioned to blitz or whatever his coverage is. So those are the type of things we would do with Tiger.
But our guys know that when he’s got the ball, if you can just get his man screened a little bit, we’re going to create some good offense. So I talked with our guys, you can’t miss the screen. It can’t be illegal. You can’t be moving. That was one of the things with one of our big guys last year that, you know, it was hard for him and he had some illegal screens. The most frustrating foul that you can have is a turnover, right? It’s a personal foul. It’s a team foul. Very frustrating. But coaching that, teaching that, making sure that you get a piece of Tiger’s man, that way he can get down the lane and create offense.
Pat 35:27
Coach, with the illegal screening aspect, what are you telling your bigs in terms of where to stop, how to stop when setting the screen?
Darren Savino 35:35
Yeah, another hard thing to coach, but it’s important. So what I would say is obviously go back to what I said before is you’re in charge of pick and roll. You’re in charge of the two-man game. So as you’re approaching, you better tell the guard whether it be set your man up, hold it, wait, get organized. That way he’s not blasting off the screen and you’re not set. And if that does happen, don’t scream. Get out of the way because you’re going to set him to leave the screen. Now, easier said than done, but you got to coach it. You got to tell him. Then show video. There’s a chance here where you’re going to get a foul. Don’t scream. If they actually do foul, because the guy was moving already and you were moving, show that clip to him and make sure that he understands. Don’t scream. Just miss the screen and then re-screen. That to me is really important. And it’s not an easy thing to coach. I just think that if you show film and you’re constantly teaching, your guys will get better at it. But the communication for a big guy is so important. Now, angle of screen too. If I’m going to screen, we’d like to teach our guys to kind of tilt our screen a little bit where we can get the ball going towards the basket. Let’s say if it’s a high slot pick or a wing, we don’t want our screeners back to the sideline. We want to kind of tilt it more where it’s towards the rim, putting more pressure on the defense. That to me is important. We don’t want the ball going sideways. We want the ball going towards the paint. Whether it’s middle pick, side pick, get our angle more where we’re getting the ball towards the basket. So it’s the elbow and the paint.
Pat 37:03
Coach, following up on your start with timing and spacing and you said something interesting, and I think it’s pretty prevalent with a lot of young guys is teaching them when to get off the ball and how you’re working with your incoming freshmen, your new guys, when is time to get off the ball? When is there nothing here? When to move it, when to space?
Darren Savino 37:20
I know some coaches will use like a mental clock in one or two seconds. Sometimes I’ve heard people talk about that. I think on the catch, you got to pre-determine what you’re going to do as that ball is in the air to you. You should be reading the defense, whether it’s a pass, skip, whatever, as that ball is hitting me, what am I doing? Am I stepping into the shot? Am I catching and going downhill, blowing by the closeout? Or am I catching and quick one more? Or am I catching and firing it to someone to the basket that’s underneath the rim, that’s open? These are the things that you have to know before the ball touches your hands. And then once you determine, once you catch it, we don’t allow you now to, all right, the shot’s not open, the blow by’s not open, the one more, the cutter, no one’s open. Now I’m going to take the ball and dribble it three or four times and go nowhere and call for a pick and roll. That’s where the play stops, we blow the whistle. You got to get off the ball. If you can’t do any of the things that we just said, your job now is, if you’re going to use your dribble, is to get it to the next guy. It is to have a big guy flash so we can hit him or we can run our flow. We can move and we can hand off two man game, or we can get it to the next guy who has to lift out and get open, that we can now start and move the ball a little bit. He can cut through, we can screen away. We come over, we get, you know, that guy can’t do anything. We got to constantly keep moving the ball. So just think in mind, before that ball hits your hands, you have to know what you’re going to do before that ball touches your fingers. And if none of that is available, let’s get the mindset of, right, we got to get the ball to someone else that we can keep playing and moving. Because if you stand there with the ball, call for a pick and roll, the good teams, you’re not going to get anything.
Pat 40:16
All right, Coach, even a move-in, we call this accountability in practice. You’ve alluded to it throughout when we were talking about your defensive habits and how you’ll correct them. But with this question, so a mistake, a habit, mistakes happen and just how you as a coaching staff think about holding that player or that team and the drill accountable, option one, would it be just the immediately repeat it, blow it dead, tell them to do it again. Option three would be to let the drill segment run out and then correct. Or option three, is it just to stop and sub them out, get them on the sideline to see, to think about it and just keep progressing with the next drill, the next unit.
Darren Savino 40:59
Great question. Repeat it. Yes. 100%. I think the punishment of jumping to the last one that you mentioned, stop it, sub them out, get someone else in. That would be, if it’s a repeat offender and we keep making the same mistakes, I don’t know, I’m not sure which is the first one, but let’s go to that and stop and sub out and I’ll change it a little bit. That would be the first thing. If it’s something that is repeated and that’s been coached over and over and over again, we’re going to run and it ain’t going to be Johnny running little Johnny. It’s going to be the whole team. And that way it’s not only little Johnny getting that message, but it’s the whole team. Like we’ve talked about this mistake five different times today. And at some point we have to be mature enough to like, you know, mistakes do happen. We all know that as coaches, they happen a lot in basketball, but a repetitive mistake that’s been coached many times that keeps happening. It’s a lack of focus. So a little running will get our focus in play there. Now repeat would probably be second. We’re not going to let the play run, which is the other one that you mentioned. We’re going to stop in the preseason. It gets monotonous. Sometimes it hurts the flow of the practice. I know some coaches like to be able to let the guys go up and down a few times, then stop it. There are some elite coaches that can remember all the mistakes in like two or three trips, right? You know, those kinds of coaches that you remember when you did this? I didn’t like that. I don’t think the kids can remember all that stuff. If it’s an egregious mistake that you want to stop and make sure the kids understand why we don’t want to do that, why we want to do this, I think you’ve got to stop the drill. No matter what’s going on, correct it, coach it and maybe freeze the clock and freeze the play where it is. And once you stop, all right, I’m going to give the ball back to little Johnny. We’re in this situation right here. Everybody stay where you’re at. I’m going to blow the whistle and we’re going to continue to play. That way you don’t have to start the whole drill over again. I think that’s really effective. So that would be my second one. What was our third one again?
Pat 42:57
and let the
Darren Savino 42:58
run it over again. Yeah, very rarely we’re going to do that. And it does happen, of course. We have a drill, we’re going to change ends on the miss or the steal, and you kind of let it go. It’s going to be one trip, then you’re going to stop, then you’re going to coach it. But letting them play through the mistakes, especially in the preseason, we have to start coaching that stuff right away. And they got to know it’s important. Now, if it’s something that you can kind of get away with and just bring it up after the whistle’s blown, but it’s something that you really want to make sure that’s important. You want to stress, you got to stop in coaching. you
Pat 43:28
Coach, to follow up on the sub, when you do freeze it in that moment with correcting that player, I guess the balance between like asking questions versus maybe just telling them, is it just quickly hitting on it? You know, you gotta be higher in the gap. All right, let’s run it back. Get higher. Here we go. Or is it posing them a question so they get the recognition piece, but also, you know, not stopping the drill too long as well. I guess like that balance between how you think about correcting mistakes in practice.
Darren Savino 43:56
I think it’s both at like, I think as coaches, sometimes we talk a lot and we just assume or expect they know, even if you’re coaching them, like you could be up there and you could be Pat Riley and whatever you’re saying is, you know, the gospel, right? It doesn’t matter if the player doesn’t really understand what you’re saying. And so I think getting them to talk to me is more important than anything. Yeah, I’m going to stop it, coach it, tell me what you’re thinking. That way, you know, like he has no idea or he does know he just messed up or whatever happened. But if you don’t get communication with your players and have them talk, you’re never really going to know what they know and don’t know. So I think as a coach, it’s so important. But you’re right, you can’t have a 20 minute dialogue there in the middle of the drill. You got to keep it moving. I think asking them and getting them to talk is really important.
Dan 44:45
when you stop and sub a player out, potentially, you don’t have to repeat a fender, what happens with that player when they’re subbed out? Does someone go talk to them or did you just let them watch on their own and then put them right back in? I guess what’s potentially a process there? Good question, Dan.
Darren Savino 45:01
In our practice, you really have to do something really egregious to get subbed out of the drill. Normally, when guys make mistakes, we kind of keep them in there until they get it right, put pressure on them. You know, defense, they can’t make a stop. You stay on the court, you’re not getting off the court until you get a stop. We’re not subbing you out, right? Get better. But if you do something where the coach has to take you off, usually you go to the treadmill first and then you get the coach, the assistant coach will grab them after and make sure he understands what he was doing wrong, right? Again, going back to what Pat was saying with the communication, we were talking about communication, making sure that the player understands so you can hear what he’s saying. So the running on the treadmill will start first and then the coaching will happen after once he gets off. Our strength coach has to be ready in practice. He can’t be daydreaming. He’s got to have that treadmill fired up.
Pat 45:51
Coach with kind of all the defensive habits we hit on earlier and you’re in this preseason mode right now and you start to get to the live stuff and how you as a staff think about helping your players kind of recognizing what’s unfolding like that should have been a stunt that should have been his head was down or, you know, what we talked about the center rotating over, are you thinking offensively, we’re just going to run our stuff, but then maybe the defense gets too comfortable because they know what’s coming and it’s always you’re not really scouting teams yet, but just putting in drawing upsets, drawing a place to try to stress test your defense and how you think about really testing your defense and testing for recognition from your offense?
Darren Savino 46:37
For us, early in the season, we don’t have a lot of sets in right now. We’re not, you know, one or two, maybe that we’ve covered and go through. So we’re playing a lot of what we call flow movement. The motion that most teams run to me, that’s the hardest thing to guard because you don’t know what’s coming. You don’t know if it’s a handoff, it’s a pick and roll. If it’s a, if our big is up top and we got both sides of the floor going with pin downs and fades to me defensively, that’s the hardest thing to guard is when teams flow and they, you don’t know what’s coming, when it’s coming, who’s cutting back door, you know, that type of stuff. Once we get through that part of our defense and guarding that kind of action, we will run segments of actions that we would see throughout the season, whether it be, you know, the Iverson cuts over the top to the wing, big runs to a side pick, so you’re working on different pick and roll actions where your help guy, your tag guy is not always in the same spot and that way it’s fresher. You’re also getting ahead and scouting. You’re going to see a lot of the same stuff. I mean, there’s not, you know, some creative offenses, whereas things they do that you don’t see as much, but the basics that you might see UCLA cut to a side pick, go double away, things like that, shuffle, back screen, double. Get a lot of those stuff in, in the preseason, train your team to run it. Even though we might not run it, that way you can practice against those kinds of actions.
Pat 47:58
What role does Shell play within your guys’ building of your defense?
Darren Savino 48:03
Every day, some sort of, you know, we have different shell options that we would do. The basics are the no dribble, you know, sprint to help close out on the ball. Always will start with that sprinting to help if you’re not in the right spots and you’re not overdoing it in the shell, your game slipping is just going to be really bad.
Getting when the ball skip, getting guys to sprint, you know, everyone sprint low towards the ball and be in position. That teaches our stance, that teaches, you know, the health print.
Dan 48:34
Coach, you’re off the start, sub, or sit hot seat. Thanks for going through those, playing that game with us, that was a lot of fun. 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?
Darren Savino 48:48
There’s so many different things, obviously, just your relationships with your players and staying in contact with them once they’re done with eligibility and they move on to the professional ranks or the real world. I would say for myself, for my development as a coach, as a person, and I wish I would have done this a lot earlier when I was younger, is to read, try to read every day. It doesn’t have to be coaching. It could be anything that could make you better, whether it be leadership, politics, whatever something that you enjoy, that you think you can get value from. I try to do that, probably when I was younger, it’d be more just basketball-related or sports-related, which I still read those kind of books, of course, but I think going into different genres, you can learn so much from other people. That can help you in your daily job as a coach. I can’t stress that enough. Again, I wish I would have been more into reading within my 20s and it really didn’t happen until after, you know, I get in the late 30s, mid 30s, and I enjoy it. I love it. I learn. I really see some of the things that I do read. It does help me in my profession, dealing with young people, becoming a better coach, becoming more organized, get my thinking to a place where it could help me become better in every way. And at the end of the day, it makes me confident, more happy, and you’re going to be more productive as you have that kind of mindset.
Dan 50:18
All right, Pat, you and coach Savino had a good back and forth. Well, an unspoken bond. Yeah, you might be on the UCLA staff by the time this comes out. Two defensive minds, you know, just going at it.
Dan 50:29
Yeah, but Coach Savino got the chance, personally get to know him over the last month, was kind enough, he came and spoke at our SG. Coach’s retreat out here in Southern California and was phenomenal at that. And then having him come back for more on the podcast and going into all their stuff was, as everyone just heard, great today. UCLA has been so good defensively and you got a small peek inside into why today. And so really great conversation.
Pat 50:57
Yeah, I appreciate him being so honest and forthright with what they’re trying to do, the habits they’re trying to build, what they want to take away and why.
So it was really fun to just kind of, like you said, get under the hood of the UCLA defense with him and Coach Cronin are trying to do there.
Dan 51:12
Absolutely, as always we’ll go through our top three takeaways and I believe the honor is yours this time to kick it off so I’ll go kick it to you on that first takeaway.
Pat 51:22
At the very top, he talked about big thing with just being consistent and the energy every day. But with the actual tactics strategy of UCLA’s defense or what Coach Cronin and their staff were trying to do, I really enjoyed the part when we got into no straight line drives, no layups, their gap integrity, how they teach, their open stance, and being in the passing line. And he mentioned some of their good drills that they build with the managers, build habits. But specifically, I like the part about the whole reading the drives, the head down, head up, and what that signifies for whether to stunt or whether to come and their whole bleeding into the strategy of no fouling, trying to come with two hands. I think that’s less likely to get a foul call. Really enjoyed hearing his thoughts because that’s something I’m big on. I’ve been thinking a lot with just being high in those passing lines, high in the gaps, taking away space, eating up that space, and then how you stunt or help accordingly based off of, of course, player scout, but then the drive of the opponent and their head down and chances are they’re not going to pass head up there and they see it, you know, be more conservative.
Dan 52:29
Sure, I love these real defensive deep dives. We’ve had a number of them on the podcast in different ways, but last year we had Cincinnati head coach Wes Miller on and talked thoroughly about their defense. Three years ago now, we have now St. Louis head coach, Josh Schertz, who at the time was still at the Division II level, Lincoln Memorial, and we did a defensive palooza with Coach Schertz. I thought that what stood out with Coach Savino today, you mentioned it a little bit, but the details behind everything. So anything from where they have their hand placement when guarding the ball, hands out front. And he mentioned not having them high and wide because for them for balance and for deflections, steals with two hands rather than just one, committing to it and going and getting it, how they wall up or how they zone up underneath when guarding around the rim. He mentioned that a little bit. So I think what was nice is you got the big principles, but then he did a great job of going into some of the details of what is making those big principles actually work. The decisions on the drive, like you just mentioned, how you go for a steal, how you actually guard the ball. He really gave you some good nuggets for anybody to take away. No matter what your scheme is defensively, I think all these things stick with whatever you want to do from that side of the ball.
Pat 53:50
Just to follow up on both our points, just the importance of reading drives. We’ve had peel switch conversations. We’ve had multiple help conversations. And we got into today with, you know, their rule that the primary defender never blocks a shot. So then we talked about when does the big rotate over and no, him reading, is it the shoulders past the defender to the rim? I think about coach Liam Flynn a couple of years ago when we had him on, he talked about, what was it? Wide drives versus line drives. Yeah. That’s like the crux of a lot of stuff, whether it’s your gap help, your backside help coming to block a shot is having a good understanding of what actually is beat and what is worth rotating over to to try to block a shot or what is maybe let’s make them make a tough shot and just live with it. That was also kind of ringing true as we were going through this first bucket of conversation.
Dan 54:38
Yeah. And I think those decisions, the wide drive line drive, reading the drives, all those things that a defender has to make, I think what helps those things be read better is the principle, the shot spectrum that you’re talking with your team about giving up. Because I think going back, he was saying, if you’re guarding a great shooter in the corner, like the Cardinals said, don’t give up a catch and shoot three in the corner. So your stunt is made better or your dig at the ball is made better because you know ultimately what the principles are. And so I think that’s where that principle has come into play. Lastly, the 40 deflections per game was an interesting side conversation that we went down about what is valuable to them from sort of like an internal stat standpoint. And you asked a great follow up on, okay, if you can’t get 40 stats, is there a line where you’re at least in the game? And you know, they talked about somewhere in the 30s probably being a good spot. And I just thought that was a good nugget for how an elite defense tries to track how they’re on point with what they’re doing.
Pat 55:38
I think we always enjoy when coaches share what they stat within their program, like program stats and what they hold valuable. And like you alluded to with the bone, what was it? The big bone or the dog bone, dog bone. Yeah, giving out the dog bone and just starting it from also an individual standpoint. It just rings true to what I alluded at the top of just the consistency of like, and the core values of this is important. They’re obviously going to work on it. They’re going to build the habit, but then they’re going to stat it and show it for everyone. Who was it? Was it don’t stat it, then it’s really maybe not important or something along those lines.
Dan 56:13
A quote that’s out there from a lot of coaches, but let’s go ahead and give it to Coach Topper, give him the credit.
Pat 56:18
Yeah, an original.
Pat 56:20
Feel like that. I think he might have trademarked it. Yeah. Yeah, be careful. Yeah. All right Dan transition now I’ll throw it to you for the second takeaway of our conversation.
Dan 56:29
I’m going to go to your start sub sit. And it was a great conversation around accountability and practice. And there was a little bit of carry over between the two. You got a little bit of sense of how they might coach and practice in the main bucket. But I just really enjoyed the whole conversation about how you stop and correct versus not stop and correct, and hold players accountable. And you and I were both talking about this beforehand, both in different parts of our seasons. What’s the best way to hold players accountable when there’s repeat mistakes, or you’re trying to just drive home a philosophy or how you want to play or an intent, all the stuff that we’re trying to do as coaches and how do you do that. And so I took away that for them, my big thing was they’re going to stop and teach. They’re not going to let things go. And I think that led to you and I have an interesting conversation afterwards too on just different styles of doing it, different parts of the season. And coach Savino mentioned depends on the time of the season, but especially early on, as you’re trying to build the habits and the fundamentals, they’re just not going to let things slide. And it’s another reason their defense is so elite is because, you know, these things are made so important. And so I think it’s an interesting conversation for coaches, who you are, how you structure practice and what you think about how you handle these mistakes. Basically, my takeaway is that is very unique to you as a coach and your program and what you hold valuable as to how you handle this situation. And I loved hearing his thoughts on how they do it.
Pat 58:00
Yeah, I completely agree. I think this is the art of coaching these moments. You talked about knowing who you are personally, or your coaching methodology. Because the biggest component probably is the effort and consistency to not let it slide. Every day, you got to bring it in, especially if it’s something that your core values, you can’t let it slide. So how do you correct it in a way that within your personality, so guys just don’t see through it like, okay, coach is making a show and lose the point of what you’re trying to make, you know, they stop listening to what you’re saying and just kind of like, I think it goes back to our conversation with Dr. Klein. They’re actually listening to the words you’re saying rather than just coaches just losing his mind again, but completely missing the point that this is a habit, we need to have to win or that we hold important. There’s, of course, so many ways to do a question asking waiting till after coaching on the fly. Like you said, just finding what fits your personality so you can do it every day.
Dan 58:55
Yeah mentioned that’s why Cronin and the defenses are so good because he does bring it every day. There are no off days He’s constantly in there doing it Pat I’ll kick it back to you as we keep going in our top three the last takeaway
Pat 59:08
Yeah, my last takeaway comes from your start subset. And I’m just always fascinated with just how you teach bigs to screen and preparing screens or well, tilting the screen. I really like but I thought it was really important in the communication piece, putting the onus on the bigs to really be demanding or have a vocal presence when getting in any sort of screening action dictating to their guards what they need. I don’t know, for me, just kind of a fresh perspective, you know, you get kind of caught in the weeds of the technique, the angles, the footwork, the breakdown. And you forget kind of the large part is just teach those guys to talk to each other and put the onus on the big man who’s most likely having the better advantage viewpoint as he’s running into any sort of screen kind of saying it all. I liked his thoughts just on the communication aspect of screening. It’s interesting.
Dan 59:56
You’re seeing the offensive foul, you mentioned how much it bugs him if a big gets an offensive foul and that it’s their fault and how you try to correct that. I mean, where you’re at over in Europe, I don’t think there are offensive fouls on screens. Definitely not as much as college. Yeah. I mean, college, I’m pretty sure referees get a bonus for every offensive moving screen foul they call it. Yeah. The joy of their lives to call it. You got to be more careful, I guess, at the college level on those screens. So, like, as he mentioned, I took that away too. And then, you know, he started the timing and spacing. And I think that he had some good points about early in the season, they’re just constantly teaching to get to those spacing spots and play through these ball screen reads and things like that. And younger players, how important that is early, but then often, yeah.
Pat 01:00:42
And that like stick versus slip, one to stick, one to slip. Yeah. Always an interesting conversation and just hearing coaches, how they teach it, talk about it, try to help the screener.
Dan 01:00:52
Yep. Move in quickly. Any misses from your end, not by coach Savino, of course, but anything we could have spent more time on or wish we would have went deeper on.
Pat 01:01:02
We hit on a little bit with the hedge defense when talking about no catch and shoot threes. Maybe I would like to have digged a little bit deeper into that, especially with how they think about maybe defending short roll catches again, within the framework of not giving up catch and shoot threes out of that when the short roll catches can be so dangerous for a defense. So I think that was one of my misses just kind of picking at their hedge.
Dan 01:01:23
Yeah. He does talk about hedging ball screens in the SG clinic. I’ll say that. Good plug. Yeah, elite plug there. But I’ll quickly give you mine and the accountability and practice start subset, maybe just going a little deeper on the balance of punishment versus rewards in coaching. And he joked a little bit or mentioned a little bit about the treadmill being there as a way to drive home a point. But then he also talked about the dog bone, the reward at the end of the season. And, you know, there’s obviously things that they reward and just what’s rewarded, what’s punished, things like that. So I think he would have some interesting insights just on that. And we hovered over that a little bit too. And we got some insight, but I could have gone deeper on that. Well, once again, we thank coach Savino for coming on, sharing so many great points with us today. We wish him and UCLA the best of luck this season. Thank you everybody for listening. Have a great week coaching. See you next time.