Stan Van Gundy on Philosophy vs. Style, Efficient Shots, and Segmenting a Season

Transcript

Stan Van Gundy 00:00

to me is the difference between philosophy and style. My philosophy is always that the game at both ends is played from the inside out, but it’s totally different in terms of style.

When we had no big guys away, we were playing inside out, was for Dwayne Wade to break guys down on the dribble. When you have Shaq, you’re gonna play inside out by throwing the ball to the post. With Dwight Howard, it was gonna be playing inside out in a pick and roll game and having Dwight roll to the rim, and now your defense has to make decisions. So your philosophy, your core principles may not change, but your style in my mind’s gotta be flexible and centered on the people that you have. 

Dan 01:27

And now, please enjoy our conversation with coach, Stan Van Gundy.

One of the teams and coaching experiences I wanted to ask you about is your first year taking over the Miami Heat and your 12 years as an assistant before that. You take over a team that won 25 games a year before you guys win 42 that first year and go to the second round of the playoffs and thinking back on that experience as a coach of taking over a team for the first time as an NBA head coach now and any learnings or takeaways from that time. 

Stan Van Gundy 02:52

Yeah, that was probably the most enjoyable head coaching experience I had in the NBA. And it started horrendously. So I was an assistant all through training camp in the preseason, we played our entire exhibition season. And then Pat Riley surprisingly decided to step away at the end of the regular season. And so, you know, we had done all this stuff. And I think it was three or four days before the first game that I take over and we lose our first seven games. The seventh one was to my brother in Houston. And it wasn’t like we were losing a lot of close games. I mean, we were getting our butts kicked pretty consistently every night. So from there, you know, you have to figure out where are we going to go?

Now, the lucky thing is in the NBA compared to high school or college season is seven games is not that long. I mean, you know, we’re just short of 10% of the season. So we were own seven, seven’s the length of a playoff series. So we decided motivationally that we would look at the season in seven game chunks, and we’re just going to try to get better. And we actually drew a staircase on the board. And every seven games was the next step. So step one was we were own seven. And I forget what our point differential was, but it was double figures minus whatever. So hopefully, you can take a step up from there. But so we went step by step. And then we were five and 15, which, you know, we are five and eight. And then we were still 25 and 36 coming down to the last quarter of the season, but we’ve gotten progressively better. And we’ve won some of those seven game series. And then we won 17 of our last 21 games. So down the stretch of the season, we were outstanding. We actually won a playoff series in the first round, we beat Charlotte or New Orleans at the time in seven games, and then lost a pretty competitive six game series to Indiana.

So it was Wade’s rookie year, Haslam’s rookie year, we were really, really small. Brian Grant was our center. Keith Atkins, one of my assistants called us the itty bitty committee, you know, we were pretty small, but good. And we just continued to get better and better as the year went on. And what that year really, I think taught me is you had to stay focused on improvement. We were bad through seven games. And I think you can’t run away from that fact. I mean, we were bad, we’re not going to go from Owen seven getting beat by double figures to be in one of the best teams in the league over the next two weeks, we’re just not going to get there, we’ve got to get there step by step. And part of that is, you know, improvement by the players basic things. And part of it is as a coach, we got to find more answers and what works for these players, you know, and you’ve just got to stay focused on that. And that’s where we tried to go with that. And it was very gratifying at the end, to just build that up and find ways to keep guys focused.

And I remember at one point, actually, we had Ray for Alston on our team, and he came in and he’d seen something, somebody in one of the New York papers had written that we had a chance to break the 76ers record for fewest wins in a year, you know, which was in time, you know, and we ended up 42 and 40. And in the second round of the playoffs, so it was a fun year. But also, the second lesson that I learned, and I don’t know, learned it, because I think I knew it ahead of time, but it really drove it home that it was true, even in the NBA is you’ve got to focus on your strengths as a team, and they may not be typical, like we couldn’t be a typical team that year, we didn’t have an NBA caliber center, I mean, our center was six foot nine. And to get our best players on the floor, we took Dwayne Wade, who had never been a full time point guard in his life, he wasn’t a full time point guard at Marquette in college. But we had Eddie Jones at two and everything. So we made Dwayne Wade into a point guard, you know, to get our best players on the floor. And so I think, from a coaching standpoint, you can’t just line guys up in a box and say, Okay, well, we need a center, we need a power forward and boom, boom, boom, it’s not going to work, you got to find a way to get your best players on the floor, and you got to find a way to get those players in the spots where they have the best chance to be successful. That’s your job as a coach. And it’s not always easy, but that’s your job is to find it. And it took us some time, but it ended up working out at least fairly well. 

Dan 08:09

You mentioned that this was one of your if not your most enjoyable head coaching experiences and if or how much expectations played into that were a team that wasn’t expected to win but then you did versus other teams you had that were more maybe say contenders. Was that at all part of why it was so enjoyable? 

Stan Van Gundy 08:28

Oh, yeah, I’ve been through it the other way, right? And so when you can coach a good team, a team that does well, that didn’t have those expectations, come on, it’s so much fun because what happens over the year and it’s easier psychologically on the players because everything that goes well, you get praised for it. If you lose a couple, nobody, you know, is on you about it.

But our season, even though we didn’t start with real high expectations, I mean, we were getting our ass kicked. And so the question was, wasn’t even a question. People made the statement that I was way over my head. And even though it was 25 wins, it’s Pat Riley you’re following who’s won multiple titles and he’s a genius and you’re following him and they’re saying, Oh my God, look at this poor dude. And every time out was at the wrong time and everything else. And this guy’s over his head and he’s not long for this job and the whole thing and the players are getting it that they’re not good enough in the whole thing. And so while the expectations weren’t high, it wasn’t easy early in the year for three quarters of the year, it wasn’t easy. And then the last quarter of that season and even into the playoffs were fun because we were good and we’ve all been through it. It’s only fun if you’re good.

I mean, I haven’t had a bad season that I would classify as fun to their credit. Some coaches do because they’re able to keep perspective and say, you know what? I didn’t have a very talented group of kids, but they got everything they could out of themselves. We got everything we could out of them. And I enjoyed the season and I admire that and respect that. And it’s a great perspective, but I’ve just never been able to play a losing season. 

Pat 10:17

You mentioned taking the season in seven games spurts, and then he also said, Ray for Austin kind of using that article as motivation, but what did you learn about motivation that season being the first time NBA head coach? And like you said, the length of a season. 

Stan Van Gundy 10:32

I think that the short stretches were really the key for me as well as the players, because, you know, when you start 0-7, you can go on a four game winning streak and you’re looking and you’re four and seven. I mean, it’s still no good. So if you’re going to look at things in this big picture of the whole season, it’s going to take you a long time to climb out of an 0-7 hole when you’re a young team trying to get better.

So like I said, after 61 games, we’re 25 and 36, but we’ve gotten a lot better. And the only way you can really appreciate that, Hey, we’re getting there, we’re getting better is to look at things in shorter segments and appreciate that, okay, look, we are making improvement. We’re not where we want to be, but forget about those early season things. We’re pretty good now. You know, we went from awful to just reasonably bad to mediocre to maybe a little above mediocre to where we’re actually decent to good to by the end of the year, really good. I mean, you know, we’re there. We’re competitive in a second round series against a really good team. Like we were good. And so if you’re not looking at that in shorter segments, then it’s going to be tough, like if you’re in a high school or college season, maybe it’s the next two weeks, like, all right, guys, we’ve been through this stretch. Let’s forget about that for a little bit. And over these next four games, let’s try to be better than we were. That’s what we’re shooting for. We may not be four and oh, but we were 0 and four getting beat by 12 a game in this stretch, if you can show them at the end of the next two weeks, say we were two and two and our point differentials even, well, hell, that’s a hell of an improvement. Now let’s take the next step. But if you don’t look at it in short segments, you’re still two and six over the last month and your point differential is still minus six. It doesn’t look good. So I think putting the blinders on and those short segments were something that I’ve tried to do since then, particularly when times are tough. But I also think it helps you when times are good, because when I had really good teams, the fact that you’re starting to decline a little bit can be obscured by that overall record. So when I had teams, I had three teams that won 59 games, went 59 and 23. But, you know, you could look at a five or six game stretch and say, we’re not playing very good basketball, but you look at the record and I’d say you lost a couple and so you’re 32 and 10, you’re 32 and 11. But yeah, but in the last five games were two and three and we’re getting out rebounded every night and all of these things you’ve got to and I think even more so in an 82 game season, you don’t want to be locked in on one game. Anybody can have a bad game or a great game, but you got to lock in, I think, on shorter segments to get an idea of truly where you are and either help you in your goals or getting better if you’re struggling or realize it when you’re starting to slide, even though you may still may be first in the standings. It’s the way that you gain a consistency in what you want. 

Pat 14:07

On this progression with the heat and going from 0 and 7 and then finishing strong, you also mentioned the importance, I mean with any team, the consistency of your habits. What were maybe habits specific to that year that you were really trying to drive home with the guys and that you guys were working on? 

Stan Van Gundy 14:22

You see, I don’t know if those have changed a lot from year to year. I always look at it as the first thing you’ve got to do in coaching is you got to decide, number one, what you think is really important to winning games. But I think the other thing is maybe more importantly is what can you best control as a coach? And I think when you’re 0 and 7, okay, you’ve probably, when you’re getting blown out, not doing too well in any area, you’re probably struggling all over the board and you can’t solve all of those problems.

So when you decide where are we going to go, well, are you going to improve your shooting over the next couple of weeks? Maybe we can work on it more in practice, but come on, you’re probably missing shots because you guys can’t shoot. And you might change that over a year or two, but you’re probably not changing it in the next couple of weeks. But you know what? We can get back on defense. And I think as a coach, if I ride that hard enough, if I’m pretty clear on what our rules are in terms of getting back, as opposed to go into the offensive glass and all of that, that’s an area we can get under control. I think maybe with some real concerted effort and again, clear coaching, we can cut our fouls. We don’t have to be sending people to the line 30 times a game to shoot the most efficient shot in basketball, the free throw, we can do those things. We can probably block out better. That’s something that every player out there can control and we can block out. And then there’s probably two, three, four turnovers again that we can cut down on some ones that are just basic fundamental, one hand pass, one hand catch, again, building habits with our footwork in practice, cut that travel out, doing a better job with our timing, run and pick and roll. So we’re not getting moving screens. You can’t take away everything, but there’s certain areas that you can probably correct more quickly as a coach than other areas. And those are the ones I think that you’ve got to focus on. You’ve got to narrow the team’s focus to a few areas. You can’t have them concentrate on 35 different things. And it’s got to be the things that will show the improvement, the quickest, because that also allows them to gain some confidence, not only in themselves, but in you as a coach that you’re finding some answers. And I think where we tend to go most of the time is to our schemes, you know, we’re going to run a different set. We’re going to run a different out of bounds play. We’re going to change things defensively. And that may be the answer, but I think a lot of times you got to look at some very, very, very basic things that if you’re not doing, you’ve got to get corrected quickly. 

Pat 17:32

You mentioned the importance of clear coaching, where and maybe in the past in your experience being around other coaches where they’re not clear or maybe they where it can go wrong, where they’re not clear with the things that they want to focus on. 

Stan Van Gundy 17:44

I’ll give you two examples there, and I think we all tend to do this. I know that I do, so it’s easy for me to say is we will identify the problem without being clear on a solution. And so the two areas I think about all the time, because I think they’re the two beat yourself categories are turnovers and fouls. I mean, I think it’s the quickest way to beat yourself in a game. And I think that coaches will rail on. We got to cut our turnovers. OK, yeah, is there anybody in favor of increasing their turnovers? You know, so that’s great. But how are we going to cut our turnovers? Because you don’t want guys playing scared. You know, if a guy is open on a backboard cut, I don’t want my guy not to throw the pass because he’s afraid to turn the ball over. I don’t want my guy to be afraid of fouling to the point that he won’t contest a shot at the rim. So how are you going to improve these areas? You’ve got to be clear on. And I think with turnovers, you’ve got to be clear on what you can tolerate and what you can’t. So I can’t think of a situation where we have to catch the ball with one hand. So I’m going to say I know I see it. At least once every night in the NBA, a guy drops a pass out of bounds or loses control. A lot of times you enter the ball to the post and a post guy is going to try to catch with one hand and then maybe bring his other hand to it. It gets deflected. We can cut that. I don’t think very many passes need to be made one handed. There’s a few pocket pass on a pick and rolls quick. I think you’ve got to make that without bringing the other hand to the ball. There may be a couple of others, but I think for the most part, we can pass with two hands. That definitely cuts turnovers. I think that and it goes to both guys. I think our timing on pick and rolls to still screen effectively but cut illegal screen calls. We can do a better job on that stuff. That’s something that we can be on. I think that and this is not as clear as those. But I think that one extra dribble into traffic where if you’ve gotten rid of the ball account earlier doesn’t turn into a turnover, I think there’s those areas where you’re talking to your team. Now, if the guy, you know, is being overplayed and he cuts back door and this is a place where I would myself tolerate a one handed pass. I’m a big guy. I’m dribbling at the guy for say a dribble handoff. He’s overplayed. He back doors. Boom, I make the pass. It’s a little past his outstretched hand. You made the right read. You did the right thing. You turn the ball over. I don’t want you afraid to make that play. I don’t. If you’re a great offensive rebounder and you’re not being reckless, but you’re going to the offensive board, you get into a call and over the back, I’ll tolerate that foul. I’ll tolerate a turnover like you got to be clear with guys just saying, guys, we’ve got to quit turning the ball over.

Well, yeah, but what does that mean? Same thing with the fouls. You want an aggressive defense. It’s easy not to foul. You just don’t get near anybody and you’ll cut your fouls and you’re not going to stop anybody, but what are the ones you can tolerate? 

Stan Van Gundy 21:12

I already said one. You go over the back. Okay. You try to take a charge and the ref makes a block call. I can tolerate that. You’re doing the right thing. You’re putting your body in front of the ball. Why the guy beats me by half a step on a drive and instead of working my ass off to get back in front, or even if I have to let in the help defender take him and veering back, I just whack down on the ball and send a guy to the line rather than making him make a tough runner. He’s now at the free throw line. I can cut that foul.

I think we need to be clear. Yeah, these are areas that we want to cut. I think with guys contesting shots at the rim, you know, and I think a lot of NBA teams do a great job on this now stay in vertical. I don’t need to slap down. That’s an area I can work on in practice. I can show in film and that we can harp on and work on to cut those fouls instead of just saying, Hey, cut your fouls. Well, what do you mean? You don’t want me to fight to get through screens. You don’t want me to try to get in front of the ball and cut guys off. No, you know, we want to do those things. So I do think in those areas, we have to be really, really clear in what we’re looking for to solve the problems that we’ve identified. Identifying the problems is step one and usually pretty easy. It’s solving the problems. It gets more difficult. you

Dan 24:00

Stan, talk a little bit about adjusting to your team earlier and learning from your team as the season goes. I’d like to ask you particularly about your Orlando Magic team, 2008, 2009. I think it was 2009, January, you guys set the, what was at the time, the NBA record for most threes made in a game. And you just had a team that shot a lot of threes, obviously around Dwight Howard roll into the rim and all that. And how much of, I know it’s sometimes been credited, the threes you guys shot led to a lot of what you see now of teams is shooting more threes and be more perimeter oriented and how much of that season, that team, that just kind of came naturally or how much you really thought about how much you wanted to be perimeter oriented, shoot a lot of threes type of thing as you guys went to the finals that year. 

Stan Van Gundy 24:43

Well, first of all, I think that whatever credit I’ve been given for that style is misplaced, we locked into the way we played literally locked into it. So I got the job in 2007 in Orlando. They were under 500. I think they’re 40 and 42, but had gone to the playoffs the year before been swept in the first round.

I come in and you know, Tony Battie, who was a good player, had been the starting power forward. And so Dwight Howard, Tony Battie, Jamir Nelson, we had Hedo Türkoğlu returning. We had signed Rashard Lewis and we were debating between, do we play Hedo Türkoğlu  at the two and Rashaad Lewis at the three, which was the position he had played in Seattle, or do we bring one of those guys off the bench, right? Tony Battee in September, before training camp goes down hurts his shoulder and he’s out for the year. So now, you know, because I’m a genius, no, because I had really no other viable choice, we said, okay, we got to turn either Rashard Lewis or Hito Turklew into a power forward and a mindful of the fact this back in a day where people were still playing power forwards today. I mean, that would be easy. I mean, Jason Tatum’s your power forward in Boston, you know, but back then there were power forward. So one of those has got to have to play, but it was our only viable option. And we started with Türkoğlu trying to guard the four, but that didn’t really work, Rashard was better guarding there. So that’s how we played. And so all of a sudden we had four three point shooters out there around Dwight. I didn’t like sit down and come up with this unique way to play at the time, even though everybody else was playing, everybody except Dan Tony was playing conventional power forward. It was clearly our best players. And again, we talked about this before the show. I think one of the things you’ve got to do in coaching is you’ve got to find a way to get your best players on the floor and find a way to get them in the spots that makes them most successful. For us, that was a pretty easy choice and the style of play just evolved from there.

And then yes, because Tony Battie got hurt, I ended up looking a lot smarter than I was. So, and you know, after a while you’re going, Hey, this works pretty well. Maybe we’ll stay with this. And so we went to the two games that first year and got a little bit better in the second year and then went to the finals. So things just started to evolve, but it all goes back to you got to get your best players on the floor. A lot of times it’ll be a duplicate of not only positions, but maybe of skill sets. There’ll be a duplicate of guys. Well, they’re your best players. So you’re going to have to build something that works for those guys. Now, I think in college, maybe a little easier than high school or the NBA, to be honest, maybe some teams, probably not many can recruit to a system. You’re going to run the same system year in and year out, not too many high schools, maybe some of the private ones who can recruit, but most guys at public high schools, like one year, you’re going to center your offense around a big guy. 

Stan Van Gundy 28:01

And the next year, all you’ve got is guards and you’re going to have to change. And to be quite honest, in the NBA was the same. I mean, my first team with the Miami Heat, Brian Grant was a very good mid range shooter. He was my starting center. He was six, eight and a half, six, nine. And the next year I got Shaq. I don’t think you can just sell us my system and, you know, we’re going to either have Brian Grant try to bully guys in the low post or Shaq try to shoot mid range jumpers. No, like you have to adjust.

And I think that that’s what coaching is all about. And then getting those guys into spots where they can be most successful. I do think you’re going to have certain principles as a coach that don’t change for you, like you really think the key defensively is protecting the paint. Likewise, on offense, I’ve always thought the game has to be played from the inside out. And that to me is the difference between philosophy and style. And I think people mix up the two. My philosophy is always that the game at both ends is played from the inside out. We’re going to attack inside and then play inside out on offense and on defense. We want to take away the paint first. OK, but it’s totally different in terms of style because when we had no big guys away, we were playing inside out was for Dwayne Wade to break guys down on the dribble and get in the paint and play inside out. And my center was actually shooting a lot of jump shots. When you have Shaq, you’re going to play inside out by throwing the ball to the post and making people take that away with Dwight Howard. It was going to be playing inside out in a pick and roll game and having Dwight roll to the rim. And now your defense has to make decisions. So your philosophy, your core principles may not change, but your style, in my mind, has got to be flexible and centered on the people that you have. 

Pat 30:08

Coach, with finding your style, you mentioned playing your best five guys with, whether it was in Miami with Dwyane Wade being the one or playing Richard Lewis and Türkoğlu, what does that look like in practice? All right. These are our best five guys. How do you find the style that fits them? 

Stan Van Gundy 30:24

You’re a little luckier in the NBA because things can go wrong early in the season. You’ve got time to recover, but it’s really, you’re just watching your team. And it’s usually not hard to identify your better players. And I’ve always felt this in building a team too. Like you’ve got to identify your top two or three players. And then who you’re looking for is the guys who helped them the most. Not necessarily your fourth, fifth, sixth best players. Like JJ Reddick was a perfect complimentary guy for us in Orlando. He exploded as a player later on in his career as he got to better coaches. But with me, he was a really good complimentary player because he could shoot the ball, which we needed space on the floor, and he was a low mistake guy. Didn’t make mistakes on the defensive end. He didn’t turn the ball over. I think sometimes when I watch some high school teams particularly, but even some college teams, you got guys out there that might legitimately be your fourth and fifth best players, but they’re not helping you because you rely on two or three guys to create shots on your team, no more than three. Sometimes one, if you don’t have a great team. Now those guys, you have to give them some freedom to make mistakes, going back to the turnover thing because you’re relying on them to make plays. But the other guys, they can’t make mistakes. So that guy who might legitimately be your fourth best player. So he might average eight as opposed to this guy might only average four, but he also turns the ball over because he tries to do too much. No, he’s not the guy that helps me the most. So I think the first thing is who are the guys we’re going to play around? Who are we going to play through? Who are our key guys? And then from there, who are the guys we put around them that help them play well, the most help us on the defensive end, the whole thing. So if you’re going to play with a Dwayne Wade or a Dwight Howard or really any great player, particularly who aren’t guys who shoot it real well or from range anyway, well, I got to put shooting around them. You might be a good player, but you know, I can’t have a guy out there who teams don’t have to guard. And so you might be a better player than this guy, but he’s going to play more because he helps Dwayne more. He helps Dwight more. For instance, our second team in Miami, when we got Shaq, we ended up losing game seven in the Eastern conference finals to Detroit, which still drives me crazy, but we won 59 games. Damon Jones was our starting point guard. We didn’t start the year that way, but into the year, I don’t know, maybe 10 or 12 games, we went that way. And it was Damon’s best year in the NBA. And it was the only time he was a full time starter. And look, Damon didn’t go by anybody on the dribble, but he could do two things really, really well, actually three things. He could organize the team. He didn’t turn the ball over and he was the best three point shooter in the league at that time. 

Stan Van Gundy 33:35

Well, you’re playing with Dwayne Wade and Shaquille O’Neal. You know, not bad. Don’t make mistakes. Keep us organized and make threes all the time.

In fact, I was telling this story the other day, every time he would make a three, he would run back up the floor holding up three fingers on each hands. And at Riley, who was my boss, obviously pulled me in and he said, get him to stop doing that. And I said, really, Pat, I was hoping he’d do it like seven times a game. Cause he only does it when he makes them, you know, so I thought that was great when he did it, but he was a fit for that team. Was he one of the best five players? He was for us. But if you were just judging overall talent, you’d say he’s a point guard in the NBA who doesn’t get in the paint and struggled to keep other guys from getting into the paint. He’s a backup. Well, not for us because those two guys needed him. So I think when you’re putting it all together, that’s how you’ve got to do it. You’ve got to first identify who do you want to play through? That’s usually pretty obvious. And then who helps him. 

Pat 34:45

Before we came on, you mentioned that any time in a coach’s career, there’s going to be moments where you’re outcoached in a game. As you look back on those moments, has there been some underlying themes or some moments where you walked out of that game and said, never again, that’s maybe impacted or changed your in-game philosophy or your philosophy in general? 

Stan Van Gundy 35:03

Not so much my philosophy in general, but in-game stuff, yeah. And I remember one, when Brad Stevens was coaching in Boston, Brad was one of the few guys that didn’t always substitute his guys in a pretty consistent pattern. So I was in Detroit and I had Avery Bradley, who we’d gotten in a trade. And I wanted Avery to guard Kyrie Irving and Avery was a great defender. So what Brad did, he took Kyrie out of the game early. And then by the time I took Avery out, Kyrie comes back. Now I don’t have the matchup that I want. And certainly this isn’t going to be every game, but I said, nope, no more. No more. When I have match-ups like that, where I definitely have to have one guy on one guy, and I told Avery before the next time we played, you’re going to match Kyrie’s minutes, your normal playing time rotation is going to be different, but you’re going to play Kyrie’s minutes.

My brother, when he was in New York, and this is going way back, he did it to us. I was an assistant in Miami. We had Clarence Weatherspoon coming off the bench and Clarence was a good player, undersized, but a really good player and get off the floor. Very good mid-range jump shooter, strong, tough guy, but he struggled with size a little bit. We played him in a playoff series and I mean, literally Jeff didn’t even have to turn around and say anything to his bench. Every time Clarence went to the scorers table, Marcus Canby came in the game every single time. He just, I mean, literally it was instantaneous, like, here goes Clarence, here goes Marcus Canby because Clarence struggled with that size. And so you think I would have learned from that, but I learned my own lesson with the Kyrie thing. And yeah, look, there’s great coaches at every level and you can learn lessons if you’re humble enough to use it, or you can go into the locker room after the game and complain because the next guy up couldn’t guard Kyrie when you could have controlled the matchup better than you did. And so part of it might be the guy’s fault. Fine. I mean, get on him, whatever mistakes he made, but part of it might be, you know what, it is couldn’t guard to do didn’t have a chance, but I had a guy who could and all I needed to do was alternate my pattern to do that. Yeah. You got to be humble enough to realize it was your mistake and correct it going forward. 

Dan 37:37

Stan, this has been awesome so far. We want to pivot now to a segment we call Start Sub or Sit. You played it a couple of years ago with this where we’ll give you a topic and then three different options on that topic. I ask you to start one, sub one, however you want to sub that one in and out and then sit one as well.

And so this first one has to do with tightening the bolts of your offense. So what Pat and I were talking about earlier and a little bit of what we were talking about right now is you’re just trying to tighten things up, whatever it is, an action, a flow, however you’re playing, and you just want to work on it in practice. And these are three different ways that you would say, hey, here’s how we’re going to tighten this up a little bit. So option one is through five on five, but saying having a constraint or wanting to play through that action in five on five. Option two is more small group work, three on three or four on four, two on two, something where it’s not five on five, but you want to break down that action. And then option three is maybe through more skill session, one on one, working with guys individually to tighten up certain things that may be screening, shooting, whatever it is. 

Stan Van Gundy 38:43

I’m going to go with your order. I’m going to start the five on five, sub the breakdown work and sit the skill sessions, listen in the NBA. Now for most teams, it’s the absolute opposite of what they’re going to do. I mean, and it is tough five on five work in an NBA season with as many games you play is tough, but to me, it’s really the only way you’re going to tighten things up.

So I think what we have to do in the NBA more now is you’re either going to just work five on Oh, or put coaches out there on defense to give them somebody to screen so that we can work on that kind of timing. You’re going to have to do more of that or some small group work though. I’d still favor the five man stuff because I think the guys off the ball are still really important in terms of spacing and all of that. I think it’s five man work regardless. 

Dan 39:38

So Stan, for me to follow up first on the Five-on-Five, and I guess let’s say this is a practice where you are going Five-on-Five hard and you want to tighten things up. I guess what that would look like normally for you as far as are you stopping at mid Five-on-Five to correct right there? Are you waiting until the play ends and then you go back and kind of repaint the picture? Are you just letting them play the whole time and maybe watching the film with them after? Like how would you prefer to teach through the Five-on-Five in a normal practice flow? 

Stan Van Gundy 40:06

That’s always a really, really tough question. I mean, I think in general, you don’t want practice stopping all the time. So I think one of the biggest skills you learn as a coach, head coach or assistant is you’ve got to be able to coach on the fly. I mean, you’ve got to be able to coach guys while the action is still going. So in other words, we’re running flex action and we haven’t been setting a guy up for a cut. Well, one of the coaches is right there on the baseline. He’s coaching a guy as we’re going and we start to play. Come on, set him up, set him up, get an angle, you know, the entire thing. I’m coaching them on the fly. Now, if I’ve done that three possessions in a row and it’s still bad execution. Now, maybe I’ve got to step in and say, whoa, whoa, listen, I’ve been telling you on every cut, did you not understand what I’m saying here? Like you got to set the guy up. You’ve got to be talking to your screener, you know, come on, hold the screen there, the whole thing. I think two of the greatest in-game practice things that coaches have to learn coming up is to be able to coach on the fly and to be able to see all 10 guys on the floor. And I think the second one is a really hard thing for young coaches. They don’t see all 10 guys and you’re coaching in practice. You know, I’m coaching the offense and the defense. I got to see 10 guys to be able to correct, but whatever it is that you’re really focused on, you got to coach that on the fly, because if you’re going to wait too long, guys might not even remember what happened or what they did. And at the same time, if you’re stopping it all the time, there’s no flow in the game or anything else. So it’s always a tough decision. But I think the first answer is coach on the fly. Stop it when you absolutely have to. 

Dan 42:04

Stan, if I could just quickly follow up too on something you just said about seeing all 10. How did you develop that throughout your coaching to see all 10 and hopefully correct and teach all 10? 

Stan Van Gundy 42:15

It’s an experience thing, number one. Nobody has it when they first start, nobody. But I think the first lesson in it is as much as you can watch all 10. I think that even as coaches, especially when you’re young, you tend to focus on the ball too much, you know, and you’re just locked in on the ball and you don’t even notice what’s going on here. So you sort of have to discipline yourself to have a broader perspective on what goes on.

Now, sometimes you can’t because I know what I would do in practice a lot is I would say to my assistants on particular drills, hey, I want you focused on blocking out on every shot. That’s it. If that’s your assignment, then that’s what you’re doing. But when possible, or you’re sitting on the bench in a game, try to watch the entire game and as you do it more and more, you’ll realize that you’re not missing what’s going on on the ball. You’re simply seeing more things and it just takes time like anything. It takes time to where I remember a lot of times asking guys, even assistants starting out in the NBA, maybe they’re talking about scouting report and they’re talking about an action. And I would ask, what are they doing? What’s their spacing over here on the weak side, you know, and it’s sort of like, I said, well, first of all, in the film, even if you have to run it back, all those things matter because for instance, a tiny thing, but you know, the way we used to defend high pick and rolls, particularly when our big guy had to pay more attention to the ball is the low man on the weak side was responsible for the roll man. And then if the ball got skipped, if the ball handler threw the ball to the weak side corner, we would X out on the weak side. Well, that’s great. If the spacing is such that you can do that, but a first time I remember it happening to us, and again, this goes back to you’re always learning as a coach and because the other guys always out coaching you or doing something you weren’t ready for is Monty Williams as his role, man went that guy who was on the weak side wing rotated all the way up to the midpoint at the top of the key. Well, you can’t X that out, or at least if you do, you’ve got to be really, really definitive on how you’re guarding that wing guy coming up. So if you’re not paying attention to all 10 guys, if you’re just, our rule is you’re taking the role and we’re going to X out and you’re not noticing that what they’re doing on the weak side. Well, you’re putting your guys into an impossible position where they’re looking at you like, what are you talking about? Excel, my guy’s top of the key got to see all 10 and it takes time to get into that, but you’ll learn it over time. 

Pat 45:09

Coach, when we were putting this question together, it was kind of rooted in practice planning. And I’d like to just ask how you built practice. I know in the NBA, there’s not much, but if you’re in a preseason or when you’re in college, just how you like to build up a practice if you had a 90 minute, two hour block of training. 

Stan Van Gundy 45:26

Yeah, it’s an interesting question. So what I always did now, I had people to talk it over with, you know, assistance and things, not everybody listening to your podcast has that they’re doing it on their own, but my process would be the same is I would first just get down everything I thought my team needed to do, you know, needed to work on, on that day, and then I would, you know, with the ad, the drills or five on fives, whatever it was that I thought would help us work on that, how long those drills would take.

And I would put them all down on paper. And then when we had a meeting, I’d have them all on the board. And it was generally four, four and a half hours worth of stuff that I thought we really needed to work on, but it was all up there. I didn’t worry at first about trying to narrow it down. Then we would talk about how long and how hard can we reasonably go today? Might say, well, you know, we probably got an hour and 15 minutes and maybe 30 minutes of it live. Okay. Well, so now we got to get it down to that. And now I would just start prioritizing. It’s simple. It’s not easy, but it’s simple prioritizing, you know, well, I’m probably not going to play a lot of zone tomorrow. Anyway, I’ll lock that 15 minutes right off right then. And then I would go down the list until we had what I thought we needed. And I always would believe wishing I could have done more, but I also had, I learned a lesson from an assistant. I had Bob buyer who’s now in Charlotte. I’ve worked with Bob one year in college, five years in Orlando, four years in Detroit, and Bob would always say to me when we’d get into these things, he’d say, look, you got two or three things that you can improve today. What are they going to be? Yeah. We’d always bring it back to that. We can do as many things as you want, but you got two or three things that you’re really going to be able to drive home. What are they? So I think that’s a good thing to do. And then the other thing I learned about practice planning along the way is I needed to get to the most important stuff early.

A lot of times what I would do earlier in my career is I would build up, you know, we’d have these warm up drills and shooting drills and some basic defensive drills, and I’d have down near the end, I’d build into my five on five. And this was going to be the meat of what we want it to do. But then you start noticing guys are tired or, you know, it’s a particularly practice is going too long, whatever it is. And you decide to cut it short. Well, shoot, the thing I thought was most important is what I ended up cutting out at the end of the day. So other than getting warmed up quickly, I tried to get to the meat of what I wanted to get done, my most important priority early. So number one, if that took longer, like we’re struggling with it and it’s fine. I’m doing the most important thing. And if I had to cut something at the end, like we got to that hour and a half and I didn’t get everything done. 

Stan Van Gundy 48:34

Well, at least I got the most important stuff done early. So those are the principles that helped me the most in practice, but it always started with putting everything down.

Another great one I got from Dick Bennett years ago, when I was talking to him about practice, he gave me two things that have stuck with me my whole career. I think Dick’s for my money, just an opinion, the best college coach that I have ever seen. And he ended up getting the Wisconsin job after I got fired. So he replaced me, you know, which was the single biggest elevation in a coaching move that was ever made going from B to Dick Bennett in one year. Incredible job by the University of Wisconsin. But anyway, Dick told me two things. Number one, when I asked him about practice planning, he said, watch your team, they’ll tell you what you need to work on. I mean, it’s so simple and so perfect. Watch your team. A lot of us have all these drills. These are the things that I think we need to do every day. And I’ve got these drills that I love. And Dick was like, Oh, watch your team. I mean, you know, you’re not blocking out. Well, you need to come in and work on blocking out. You know, I mean, watch your team. I thought was great. And then Dick told me he always wanted to be good at the things that happened a lot. And I just thought that was perfect. Dick didn’t put a ton of time in on side out of bound. He just didn’t think it was a big deal. He wanted to get, what are the things that are going to cover 75 to 80 possessions in the game? We’re going to be good at those. And then the rest of it, I remember he got asked at a clinic one time, because he played exclusively man to man. And they played that Pacline defense. Now he didn’t play that early in his career, but as he went on, he played the Pacline defense, you know, they were really good at it. And then they played pretty slow offensively, but they took care of the ball and the whole thing. And somebody asked him at a coaching clinic, a high school coach said, well, that’s all well and good, but what do you do when you get down 10 in a game? You know, you’re down 10, it’s late in the game. And he said, well, first of all, the way we play, we don’t get down 10 very often, which I thought was a great answer, you know, because they didn’t play real fast and they controlled the game. He said, yeah, if we’re down 10 late in the game, we’re going to try to press. But to be honest, we’re not very good at it. And I’m not going to spend a lot of time on it because it’s not something that happens a lot with us. And these are the things that I’ve chosen that we’re going to be good in every night.

And I think too often as coaches, which is admirable, we strive to be good at everything and it keeps us from being good at anything. I don’t care the best teams in our league, in the NBA, the best teams, best offensive teams, best, they’re still going to have things they’re not good at. I’m looking at the Boston Celtics best team in the league. 

Stan Van Gundy 51:41

Very good defensive team. They’re not going to force turnover. They’re just not. That’s not what they do.

They’re not going to force many turnovers at all on offense and a second best offense in the league. They don’t get to the free throw line. They don’t score many points in the paint. Could they address those things more? Maybe, maybe they are. But they get great quality shots. They take care of the ball. They’re a great shooting team. Their spacing is excellent. You’re just not going to be great at everything. But any good team has got to be great at some things. And you’ve got to choose what those are. And if you’re trying to do everything, it’s going to be hard. And so I thought Dick Bennett, look, he’s a great, great coach. And it was very simple and a lot of things he said and really understood what coaching was all about. The other great one he had, and this was before me, my brother had watched him practice when my brother was an assistant with the next seed was in town to scout the box, had gone up to a University of Wisconsin Green Bay practice. And he asked Coach Bennett after the game, he said, Coach, your team’s always one of the best teams in the country. And they were always in the top 10 taking care of the ball. How do you do it? And Jeff’s waiting, you know, for the drills and everything. And Coach Bennett said, Jeff, that’s simple. Don’t play the guys who turn it over. And, you know, it sounds like a joke, but I took from that. I expanded it into my NBA time. Like I had Dwayne Wade. He’s a rookie. He’s playing out of position as a point guard. And he literally had to create every shot for us. That was how our team was. Dwayne create every shot, even as a rookie. He’s going to turn the ball over. He was either first or second in the league that year in turnovers. But we were a low turnover team because the other guys, we didn’t put them in positions to do that. And so they didn’t turn it over much. I remember having that discussion with Hubie Brown, those guys. And I’ve fought that for the rest of my career. The guys you’re relying on on playmakers, you got to give them some rope and you’re not going to be unless they’re doing some really dumb stuff or not being fundamental. You got to give them some rope. But these guys who all they’ve got to do is make a jump shot when the ball comes. They can’t turn the ball over. And then you’ve got to ride hurt. That all started with Bennett.

Don’t play the guys who turn it over. I learned a lot from watching Coach Bennett’s teams and humbling myself to go meet with Dick Bennett after he took the job that they fired me from. Great coach, great person willing to share and everything else. Just a fabulous, fabulous guy and smart as hell. 

Pat 54:26

Last thing with practice planning, how much did you think about working on your strengths versus working on, like you said, what you need to get better at? 

Stan Van Gundy 54:34

Again, I think that first of all, you’ve got to have an identity as a team and you don’t want to ever Let that slip, you know pat riley would always say Keep the main thing the main thing So yeah, if you’re a defensive team and you’re going to struggle to score anyway, you can get carried away with Spending so much time on your offense that your defense slips and you still can’t score because you don’t have the players who are going to score So I think you’ve got to watch that and so I think number one You’ve got to make sure The things you have as a team that allow you to win your strengths stay strengths You know, and I think you’ve got to be on guard for any slippage whatsoever For those things when I used to talk to players about their own individual work I would always tell them to think of it in this way, particularly guys Who are trying to move up the ladder? I would say okay Why am I going to put you in the game? I’m standing there as a coach and i’m thinking we need Blank, when do I turn to you? What’s that answer? Oh shit, we’re not stopping anybody. I’m a defender. I turn to you or we need some shooting I turn to you or I need somebody to handle the ball against this press. I turn to you So number one, what’s your strength where when I need something you’re the guy i’ll turn to you better have that And then what’s the thing that where I say, oh shit, I can’t put him in the game Due to this take care of those two areas. Make sure that strength stays the strength And make sure that oh shit area gets good enough that it doesn’t keep me From putting you in the game.

So if you’re a great shooter, but you turn the ball over too much Well continue to get your shots up and be that great shooter And figure out how to cut your turnovers so that now i’m going hey, we need some shooting in the game I’m going to joe and I don’t have to worry about you Be in a turnover machine and it’s the same thing with the team. I think you focus on What’s our biggest strength and then what’s the area that? Consistently gets us beat if I can keep this the strength And make this better. So it’s not an area at least that people can just go at us on then I got a chance to win

Pat 57:42

Our next start sub sit is looking at the offensive side of the ball from a tactical standpoint. If you’re playing an opponent that is determined to take away your three-point shots in the pick and roll by dropping a big and staying at home and everyone, how you would think about still generating three-point shots out of the pick and roll.

So start subset, your first option, veer screening with the screener, rolling him into a screen. Second option is maybe then popping the screener, trying to play to some second-side actions. Or the third option we’re giving you is some two-man screening off the ball during the pick and roll, whether hammer screens, flare screens, exit screens, whatever kind of action maybe to loosen up the defense and still generate three-point shots around the pick and roll. 

Stan Van Gundy 58:33

Okay, I’m going to leave you with a caveat and then I’m going to go into your start subset. I’m just going to leave you one that first of all I wouldn’t focus on generating more threes but if I needed to create threes I would start the off-ball action because there’s not as much pressure now on my guard and I can create some off-ball screening action and get the three.

I would sub getting to some second side action and while I think flipping the screen and everything can create good action I don’t know that it’s necessarily going to generate more threes so I would sip that action. 

Pat 59:11

Just like to your caveat, why would you not be worried about or thinking about generating more threes? 

Stan Van Gundy 59:16

Yeah, so I’ve been going through this all year, and my brother and I talk about this all the time, you know, the analytics movement in basketball, I think has helped us in a lot of ways, it puts some numbers on some things that we’ve probably always seen with our eyeballs and everybody claims to pay attention to the analytics, everybody, at least in the NBA, everybody, you know, the analytics, this, the analytics, that, and we’ve had this three-point explosion, and everybody will say that’s driven by analytics, and a lot of teams focus on getting more threes, shooting more threes, a lot of teams focus on taking away the three. And what I know from the analytics is, the three is the third most effective shot in the game, at least in the NBA, I haven’t gone through the analytics in college, but I would guess they’re the same. The most effective shot in the game is free throw. If I get to the free throw line, let’s for two shots in the NBA. Now, we’re not dealing with one in ones like they are for a few shots in college. But in the NBA, we’re at about 78 and a half per game. So it’s 1.57 points per possession. If I shoot a layup, anything inside three feet, we’re at about 69% on average in the NBA, so it’s 1.38 points per possession. And if I shoot a three on average, it’s a little over 35%, 35.6, I think, so I’m about 1.10 or 1.11 points per possession. Why am I focusing on trying to get a shot that’s worth 1.11 points per possession instead of trying to get more layups, which is not only worth 1.38 points per possession, but attacking the rhythm is how I get to the free throw line, which gets me 1.57 points per possession. So look, I was one of the guys who started shooting a lot of threes early, but I’ve always focused on inside out. Why are we so focused on getting the third most efficient shot in the game and stopping the third most efficient shot in the game? The simple explanation is people will go, well, a three’s worth more than a two. Yeah, but only if it goes in. So it all comes down to percentages. And so that is the thing that right now perplexes me more than anything in the NBA game.

Milwaukee is an example. So under Mike Boudinholzer last year, they were the fourth best defense in the league. And they did focus last year a little bit more than Bud did in his first four years. For his first four years, Bud had one of the absolute top defenses in the league and gave up the most threes every single year for four years. Last year, they had the fourth best defense in the league, middle of the pack and giving up threes. They did concentrate on it a little more, but all of his focus was on get back, protect the paint, don’t foul, rebound the ball. And they were a great defense. Now this year, Milwaukee is one of the best at taking away the threes. I think they’re in the bottom 10 defensively because they give up fast break points. They give up stuff at the rim. 

Stan Van Gundy 01:02:48

They give up offensive rebounds. Part of it is because they’re guards can guard. So it’s perplexing to me the focus on the three. I’m not saying it’s not important.

My brother and I both talked. If I took another coaching job, one of the things I would focus on is how do we get more layups? Do we get them in transition? Do we get them on the dribble? Do we get them off more deep post-ups? Do we get them on off-ball action on back screens and things? How are we going to get more layups? That would be my focus, not how we’re going to generate more threes.

And I never focused on how many threes we were getting in a game because we were always, look, we’re going to attack the rim and how many threes we get are going to be dependent on how you guard it. If we force you to come in and help, boom, we always wanted shooters on the floor and boom, we’re going to kick it out and knock down threes. But we never went into a game saying, hey, we got to get up 35 threes tonight. I guess you can do that if you just want to jack them up. So my answer to your pick and roll question would be, well, look, if they’re going to stay home on the perimeter and now we’re truly playing two on two in the pick and roll, great. We’re going to get everything inside the pane and at the rim. I don’t care how many threes I get because I know the stuff at the rim is higher percentage stuff. And I also know it’s where I draw more foul. So that’s my perplexing NBA question for right now. I’m wondering why we’re prioritizing the third most efficient shot in the game. 

Pat 01:04:27

Coach, then if you want to then attack the rim when they’re going to stay at home, what are maybe you telling your big your guard or how are you looking to attack the rim? So is it just get rim shots like is what kind of are healthy rim shots for you when you’re going to want to attack this coverage? 

Stan Van Gundy 01:04:42

I think, look, you’re going to try to turn the corner as much as you can and put pressure on that big all the time, either going to make them put two guys on the ball or they’re going to switch and then you’re going to have a mismatch at both positions. There’s only so many things they can do.

You’re going to roll your big for the lob behind the defense. And then I think one thing everybody should watch and teach, and it’s not easy, is go back to the days of Marcin Gortat, particularly in Washington, and watch him over and over. Most teams call that screen the Gortat now, and he would actually roll and screen the big himself. And so the guard literally walked in for layups. Really hard for guys to get the grasp of, but it’s a great one. If guys go under screens, you’ve got a non-shooting guard, then you’ve got to teach them to flip the screen and get that guard down deep in the paint. That’s where I would focus. To me, the three comes where they can no longer guard your two with their two, and somebody has to pull in. Now, that’s where you have to shoot the three, but it wouldn’t be my priority. My priority would be, can we turn the corner and get to the rim? Can we throw the lob or even the pocket pass to the big and he can carry it to the rim and you see a lot of fouls on those plays with big trying to recover out of the drop and he fouls. I’d put pressure on that rim in every way possible on the pick and roll, make them bring a third defender in, and then your threes will open up. 

Dan 01:06:24

Stan, great stuff. You’re off the start, sub, or sit hot seat. Thanks for going through those couple with us and diving in to the numbers there. The final question here to close, Stan, is what characteristic or trait that you most admire in others in the field of coaching? 

Stan Van Gundy 01:06:41

I would say, and I admire this consistency, and I mean that in a lot of ways. One of the coaches, I might actually admire Jerry Sloan more than any coach in the NBA, and obviously he had a great record. He never won a championship, but to have that level of success year in and year out for 20 some years, I admire that kind of consistency, but also the consistency in guys whose teams, and they might have teams who are better than others in down years, but you know, going in that that team is going to be solid in important areas, this guy’s teams are not going to beat themselves. You’re going to have to come in and beat them.

And particularly these high school coach, even a college coach with the recruiting and the transfer portal, they’re a little down in talent right now, but we’re going to have to go in and beat them. And they’re not going to give away the game with dumb mistakes and things like that. Like this guy is going to be consistent. His teams are going to be consistent in what they do all the time. Players. I admire that in everybody, particularly in the league is talented as the NBA is capable of great nights and what separates people is your consistency and a coaching standpoint, I didn’t bring his name up before Jerry Sloan’s because I’m biased. I worked with Eric Spulstra for a lot of years, but how many years is this guy just have his teams overachieved compared to what people expected? And he’s had totally different types of teams. You know, he’s had to manage the expectations of the big three years. And then he had the year where they started 10 and 30 and turned it around. And we’re over 500. He’s the epitome of a guy who keeps searching for answers and finds a way. That’s the consistency in him, never an excuse. And even in his own mind, not an excuse. Eric’s never the type of guy that just man, we just don’t have enough. He is going to keep finding a way to get it done.

I just really admire consistency and coaches and players and teams. That’s what greatness is. That’s what’s hard to achieve. We’ll all have an answer here and there, you know, we’ll all find a game plan that works on a night here and there. But guys who do it here in and here out, game in and game out, that’s the great. 

Dan 01:09:21

Knowledge, passion, enthusiasm for the game, it’s always there. You can just hear it and Stan had one of the, still one of the most listened to first episodes we did a few years back and I’m guessing this one will be somewhere up there as well. This was tremendous. 

Pat 01:09:37

Yeah, we did not disappoint. Before the podcast, we were kicking ourselves for not hitting record earlier. 

Dan 01:09:42

Yeah, before we officially started, it was just 10 minutes of just straight gold. 

Pat 01:09:48

He gave us plenty of ammo for when we finally hit record. 

Dan 01:09:51

Yeah, absolutely. Before we kick off some of our big takeaways here, I think just background, what you and I were thinking about heading into this was anytime we get a chance to have someone like Stan on who’s just had an unbelievable career, multiple levels, and everybody knows who he is, he’s so knowledgeable, is picking out moments in time of learning’s takeaways, growth.

And we went through and asked people about different times in his career that might be interesting. And some of the ones that came up were his first year at Castleton State when he was a 24-year-old coach. We didn’t get to that too much, but layered in there a little bit. That Miami Heat first year was something you and I both circled for various reasons. That was one. And then also some of his years with the Orlando Magic we thought were interesting moments in time. 

Pat 01:10:39

You know with the Miami Heat team too, I think what kind of attracted us to start there is that it was a good bridge. I mean, it was his first NBA head coaching job. So, you know, referring back to what he said is this time at Castleton when he got his first head coaching job. Although we didn’t, like you said, hit on it too much, but going in, we thought, all right, that would be a good bridge. And then knowing too that that Miami Heat team ended up very successful or overachieving that year, but having success was also another good bridge to getting into, of course, his time with Orlando Magic when they were making the finals and Eastern Conference Finals. 

Dan 01:11:13

And I think circling back to what you mentioned about the Miami Heat team, that was interesting, his first head coaching experience. And I wrote down a couple of notes because, you know, he went from 25 wins, then the 42 made the playoffs and we kind of went through it on the podcast so I won’t regurgitate it. Always interesting those seasons where teams turn it around. I have kind of like a soft spot for wanting to talk about those because they’re so interesting to me.

So we had Dustin Kerns on from App State who’s been unbelievable at turning programs around quickly. Grant McCastland, Texas Tech turned programs around in one. I know we’ve had others on that have done the same thing, but those two I kind of wrote down quickly because they’re reminding me of these turnarounds and what goes into taking a team that was struggling and pulling it apart, putting it back together and having success. And I thought what was particularly interesting today with Stan is it wasn’t like it worked right away. And actually, I didn’t know that in our research, you’re looking at stuff, all the different things. I didn’t realize they were 0-7. So to go 0-7 and then still win 42 games, I mean, they really obviously picked it up on the back end of the year, which was great. And I just think his detail looking back on how to construct the lineups, how to play, and then breaking the season down into these chunks of seven game series and trying to win that next series, it’s just a way to keep them progressing. I just thought it was a really big and nice takeaway from me there in the beginning. 

Pat 01:12:44

Same  here what I like too about how he approached the season and like compartmentalizing it into these seven game stretches is just the ability to keep the motivation high for his players and for the team and I mean especially the NBA season it’s so long but every season and on right gets long at some point and he referenced you know in college taking it like in two week windows you know are we getting better we’re improving or I like to I said you can be applied if you’re a good team with expectations you know living on these two weeks we haven’t been good or we’re dipping you know and not being kind of blinded by your past success that maybe yeah we were two and four in this week but overall we’re still really good but being able to take a snapshot of that season to motivate the players for hey we’re improving we’re getting better look versus we’re dipping a little bit or we’re some slippage here and using that window as motivation as you move through a season

Dan 01:13:35

And moving to start-sub-sit, we kind of circled back and forth between our first bucket and start-sub-sit, so we might kind of dip back and forth here. But you and I obviously meeting beforehand trying to figure out, I think some of these questions were generated from our own two experiences.

Teams that are good defensively are limiting your attempt, you’re able to shoot threes, which was the second one. And then I think trying to tighten right now as we’re both recording this kind of mid-season, we’re trying to tighten the bolts a little bit offensively and defensively. And so that’s where those questions came from. So I’ll kick it to you on the first one, your takeaways on you tightening the bolts of offense and his answer there. 

Pat 01:14:11

I’m sure it’s probably the same as you, but it’s when he got into saying all 10. Of course, it comes with experience, but the importance of being able to see all 10 and kind of coach offense and defense. You mentioned you assign your assistant specific tasks or keep an eye on this, but as the head coach, being able to take in everything is definitely a skill because it is very challenging. There’s so much going on.

Trying not to correct everything, and that was the other interesting part of the conversation. I think what we always like to have these conversations with teaching and correcting, what to correct, what to let go, how you make corrections, how you have feedback, and outside of seeing all 10, which was my big takeaway, I, of course, appreciate his thoughts on just how he viewed coaching correction and checking for understanding. 

Dan 01:14:56

I’m with you, I will add to that conversation too, how, you know, playing five on five obviously was his preferred way to teach. And then I think he talked about when to stop and correct or how to coach on the fly, having assistants coach on the fly versus stopping it overall. And we always go back to the art of that and the feel of that. There’s not like a prescribed way to always do it. And I think it was within that too of the clear coaching and was that part two or also being out coached? Maybe you asked him that later. Yeah. 

Pat 01:15:32

Yeah the clear coaching was from our first bucket. He mentioned what healing habits and what you’re going to hold important, but you have to be clear. And he said identifying problems, but getting solutions, you got to be clearing your solutions of what’s important to you and how to go about it. 

Dan 01:15:45

Fot  sure. And I think part of that being clear and simple, he got into talking about Dick Bennett, legendary coach Dick Bennett and sort of the simplistic ways that he taught and taught him. And I thought that was a really nice segment to kind of honor one of the best coaches of all time, but then some of the key takeaways that he had is kind of a mentor.

And I think what shines through when you talk to Stan that I always appreciate, and this is Jeff to just their respect for the craft of coaching, the profession, it just really shines through. I think it’s just why they’re so beloved throughout the coaching community because, and Stan mentioned it on the podcast too, the other coach is doing a good job too, is trying to beat you. It’s not just you messing up. Sometimes you get out coached and we got into that a little bit too with the substitution with Brad Stevens stuff, which was interesting. But I just love the way that they respect the game and talk about that. It’s so hard. It’s an art. The other person’s really good most of the time too and trying to win. They’re lifelong learners. 

Pat 01:16:49

and they loved talking to coaches, learning from coaches. And when he got on Dick Bennett, it was also interesting within this tightening the bolts starts upset with how he just approached practice planning and what he’s learned from coaches like Dick Bennett and his kind of method or approach to kind of throwing everything on a board and whittling it down. And as well as understanding what are our strengths, keeping our strengths and how do we mitigate our weaknesses. 

Dan 01:17:16

Yeah, and last point too, he mentioned that I took away and thought was really good, was that get to the important stuff early in practice so that way if it goes long and you spend extra time on it, you at least hit that first. I thought that was a really good takeaway. 

Pat 01:17:28

Yeah, that’s a good catch for you. I think that was one of my big, big ones that I’m going to take with me, and it makes a lot of sense.

You do all this fluff and then you run out of time at the end of the stuff that really matters. You got that 11-man fast break. 

Dan 01:17:41

Yeah, exactly. Let’s flip it to the other one, which was loaded with analytic talk and three-point talk around I mean just a good conversation I’ll kick it back to you again because you were the one that really thinking about this

Pat 01:17:54

A great conversation. I don’t know if we really hit on any of the start-subsit scenarios, but I know you and me have been talking about this a lot with our teams and opponents playing different opponents, and everyone knows Ram free throws three points.

Not that everyone’s doing the same thing, but if your team that is dependent on we want to take threes and opponents are so determined to take those away, how do you still think about doing what you do well? If this is a strength of ours, how do we still get to it and the rate you want that’s healthy for your team? No surprise, maybe I should have been better prepared knowing both Jeff and Stan, they didn’t really care too much about generating more threes. The thing about threes, a really fun conversation nonetheless, and I’m glad we got into it and kind of his thought process and his value still on getting to the rim, generating fouls as still being the highest PPP, and that it’s okay if they’re going to take away the threes because they’re giving you the rim and hopefully the fouls and his approach to just taking what the defense gives you at that point. 

Dan 01:18:58

Hearing Stan and I know as he talked through it the goal is to win the game and from his point of view and talking through it analytically still getting to the line and still getting layups does put the most pressure on a defense and I think what was interesting within all this is that I asked him about that season with the magic which he is in some respects you know credited for starting to shoot more threes having four shooters on the floor and so I think he’s an interesting guy to have this conversation with because I think what he’s saying is you got to look at your team you got to look at what they do well and what the defense has given you and I think he would say and I think what I kind of took from this whole conversation was the value of still attacking inside out has not gone away. 

Pat 01:19:42

And, you know, he talked about it and we talked about, of course, you gotta let the other opposing coach is trying to win that game. So when they call the strategy of no help, let him play two on two, you know, you got to find a ways and this is what we got into like, okay, how can you kill that coverage or get them out or get them to start helping? Is it, do you have guards that can get or is there a gortat screening? But, you know, they’re doing it for a reason.

I think that’s where this again, going back to where is this conversation coming from? You know, what were we thinking about? It’s like, okay, well, they’re doing it for a reason. And so how do you take them out? How do you break that coverage or get them out of that coverage? And can we still generate quality three? So there isn’t such a three point disparity at the end where it’s okay. Yeah, we got a lot of twos or we took what the defense gave us, but maybe that was part of their game plan. 

Dan 01:20:28

All I know is having good players that make shots solves a lot of this. 

Pat 01:20:32

Yeah, the solution is always get better players. 

Dan 01:20:37

Yeah. So I thought that something I wish we could have went deeper on is his, the last question we asked, consistency of coaches, I just thought was a great answer. And maybe, you know, I just haven’t what he said was perfect. But I always think hearing more about consistency and respect for assistant coaches, he mentioned a couple in his talk at the end there about what he respected out of those coaches, I just thought, you know, another question follow up or two really would have been interesting, maybe deeper on if he’s seen their practices or games or, you know, what it was that they did maybe behind the scenes to, but I thought was a really, really good answer to finish the show. 

Pat 01:21:18

Yeah, I didn’t follow up at all with why he preferred two man screening flaring around the pick and roll as opposed to his sub was popping and getting the secondary action. So would have liked to have gone into that, but we were running long and Stan was given great answers. 

Dan 01:21:34

when we are solving the threes verse two for everybody. 

Pat 01:21:37

Yeah. 

Dan 01:21:40

Well, that was awesome. Appreciate everybody listening and we’ll do this again next time. 

Pat 01:21:49

Thank you so much for listening to this episode. Please make sure to visit SlappingGlass.com for more information on the free newsletter, Slapping Glass Plus, and much more. Have a great week coaching, and we’ll see you next time on Slapping Glass.