How To Read A Book A Week

Can you imagine what you could learn in a year if you committed to reading 1 book a week?
For me, committing to reading just 1 book a week has become a futile goal.  I just haven’t been able to do it.  But, thanks to this article by Sam Davies, I have renewed purpose and a plan.
Cut the FatCutting out just one hour of television a day creates an extra 365 hours per year to accomplish whatever is most important to you. That’s over nine additional 40-hour workweeks – 2 months of additional time!

Advice College Basketball Coaches Would Give Their Younger Selves

Be who you are.  Coach because of the relationships.  Have balance.  Pace yourself.  Don't be irrationally emotional.  Have goals, but embrace your path, stay committed, and don't measure yourself against anyone else.  Get over yourself and empower others around you.  

USA Today Sports recently posted an article in which it asked some of the premier coaches in college basketball one simple question:

"Knowing what you know now, what is advice you would give your younger self about coaching and your career if you could?"  

As a relatively young coach, I took a lot of good gems from this article.  A couple of the lessons I was forced to learn early, a couple I was blessed to learn by having such a great staff, and some I am still working on now.  Read below as some of the greatest coaches, and leaders, in the world talk about some of the things they would have done differently if given the chance.

Mike Krzyzewski, Duke
Be Who You Are.

“Get to Duke earlier. (Laughs.) That would be the very first thing. No, I’d say be who you are. I think I was really lucky at 28 to take over a 7-44 program at Army, my alma mater, and to have to do everything — and my wife had to do everything, and our whole family got involved.

UConn: March To Madness Episode 1

Geno Auriemma and the UConn women’s basketball team is the subject of a 6 episode, weekly HBO special following their 2016-2017 season.  I have just watched the first episode, and it gave good insight into the mindset of the most successful coach in women’s college basketball history and what it takes to be a part of the game’s greatest program. 

It had interviews from girls who helped build the program and from girls currently in the program.  Every girl that spoke, from legend Rebecca Lobo to freshman Crystal Dangerfield, mentioned how mentally tough that you have to be to play for Coach Auriemma.  They mention that his number one goal seems to be to get them to reach their full potential in the 4 years that he is with them.  

Below I have some of the more memorable quotes from that first episode.

The coolest thing about this is how all of the players seem so happy to be a part of the whole ‘UConn’ thing.  They all seem genuinely happy to be a small part of the bigger picture.  Of course, the faces that are always shown so happy are Sue Bird, Diana Taurasi, Maya Moore, and now Breanna Stewart, and there are obvious reasons for their happiness, a main one being the level of success that they were all able to reach.  And, I am sure that there are the disgruntled, unhappy players as well that we just don’t see and hear about.  But, the fact that some of the best basketball players of all time are more than happy to be known for being a part of something more so than being known for their individual success tells me a lot about the program.

The Simple Way To Break A Bad Habit

I below are my notes and link for a really good Ted Talk by Judson Brewer on how to break bad habits.  In summary, most of us live on a rewards based learning process.  This can be dangerous when the behavior is not healthy, like eating sugary foods or smoking cigarettes as he described in his video.  When we are triggered, we should instead be 'curious,' which is a behavior that can bring us pleasure in a more productive way that most of our unhealthier behaviors.

Here is the video.  After the jump are my notes.

Fronting The Post

Our philosophy is to front the post.  I like fronting the post to keep it out and to limit your ability to get us in foul trouble, and it puts our post defenders in better position to help on dribble penetration because they aren't stuck behind the person that they are defending.  But, this drill can be great for your team no matter how you guard the post.

I first saw this drill below watching SMU men's practice when Larry Brown was still coaching them.  In this video, I really like how they finish each rep with a charge, a loose ball, or a steal.  This is something that we will implement about once a week.  

Feeding The Post To Start Practice

After you have determine an offensive style or system for your team, player development is the most important aspect to your teams success in my opinion.  How you play at the end of the season is a direct reflection to the emphasis that you put on each individual's skill development and growth.

I am always looking for ways to steal a couple of minutes a day of practice time in which we can teach and drill certain parts of the game, and one way of doing that is the drill below that teaches and emphasized post feeds.

I feel that ball penetration, whether through the dribble or the pass, is the most important part of  your offensive attack.  Aside from the fact that your shooting percentage goes up as you get closer to the basket, getting penetration breaks down the defense, creating open 3's or long closeouts.

In the drill below, you can create many opportunities for your team to practice post feeds, to practice footwork in the post, and to practice reads and passess out of the post.

My ideal get-a-way from this video would be to use this drill everyday for the first 3 minutes of practice, and for 1 or 2 minutes in our pre-game warm-ups.