Slappin’ Glass is joined this week by the Head Coach of the Utah Jazz, Will Hardy! The trio dive a variety of modern topics including freedom vs. structure in unlocking player potential, lineup considerations, late-game analytics, and talk transition flare screens and effective film breakdowns during the always fun “Start, Sub, or Sit?!”
Inside the Episode
“At the end of the game my first thought is about offense. Offense to me it is a life blood of the team, whether we like it or not. Most guys’ brains think about offense first, and if they feel comfortable and they feel good on the offensive end, they’re more likely to give better effort defensively. If the offense is clunky and it doesn’t quite make sense and we’re not getting any good shots, it’s hard to dig in and just get like five stops in a row. To win a game You’ve got to get a couple baskets to make everybody feel like we’re in the mix.” – Will Hardy
We sat down this week in what was one of our favorite conversations of the year with Utah Jazz Head Coach, Will Hardy! Coach Hardy is one of the great young Head Coaches in the NBA and we dove into a number of great topics including:
- Freedom vs. Structure in Unlocking Player Potential: Coach Hardy gives his thoughts on developing players within an offense, along with giving them “breathing room” to grow. Great thoughts throughout.
- Late-Game Analytics: We went down a fun rabbit hole about how Coach Hardy views analytics, and specifically in late-game.
- Transition Flare Screens: During “Start, Sub, or Sit?!” we explore Coach Hardy’s use of a Flare Screen in transition to ignite their offense. We discuss spacing, timing, and the overall philosophy in using that type of screen.
Chapters
0:00 Exploring Offense, Structure, and Player Potential
4:16 Coaching Strategies for Maximizing Player Potential
10:18 Analyzing Fit and Lineups
18:54 Balanced Lineups and End-of-Game Strategies
30:31 Transition Flare Screen
41:25 Coaching Strategies and Prioritizing Focus
45:59 Assessing Offensive and Defensive Performance
50:10 Wrap Up
Transcript
Will Hardy: 0:00
So at the end of the game my first thought is about offense. Offense to me it is a life blood of the team, whether we like it or not. Most guys’ brains think about offense first, and if they feel comfortable and they feel good on the offensive end, they’re more likely to give better effort defensively. If the offense is clunky and it doesn’t quite make sense and we’re not getting any good shots, it’s hard to dig in and just get like five stops in a row. To win a game You’ve got to get a couple baskets to make everybody feel like we’re in the mix.
Dan Krikorian: 0:39
Hi, I’m Dan Krikorian and I’m Patrick Carney, and welcome to Slapping Glass, exploring basketball’s best ideas, strategies and coaches from around the world. Today, we’re excited to welcome Utah Jazz head coach Will Hardy. Coach Hardy is here today to discuss freedom versus structure and unlocking player potential, collective lineup strengths and weaknesses, late game shot quality and analytics, and we talk individual scout film and transition player screen action during the always fun start, sub or sit. The season is here, but we know that many coaches are already looking ahead at international trips in 2024 and 25. Ourselves, along with a number of former podcast guests, cannot say enough great things about our experiences working with Josh Erickson and his team at Beyond Sports. From handling flights, hotels, game scheduling, excursions, service learning opportunities and more, josh and his team provide unmatched service and support throughout the entire trip. To learn more about why more than 650 programs have trusted Beyond Sports, visit beyondsportstorescom and tell them. Slopping Glass sent you. And now please enjoy our conversation with coach Will Hardy. Coach, we know you got a really busy schedule right now. We appreciate you taking some time for us.
We’d like to dive in with you on this, talking about freedom versus structure in an offense as it relates to helping a player unlock their potential and, as we all know, certain players require differences within an offense and just how you think about structure versus freedom, as it relates to each player individually, and then I guess we’ll also get into as a team on the whole, that concept is massive for us here in Utah our staff we want to teach the game and have our players understand concepts that we like to play with.
Will Hardy: 2:56
But the freedom comes because we spend most of our time trying to teach decision-making and reads based on what the defense does. As coaches, sometimes we have this grand plan of how it’s all going to work perfectly. Everything looks good on the board, everything looks good on a five on O walkthrough, but the game gets going and it’s fast and we have a short shot clock and the defenses are extremely athletic and can close gaps quickly, and so we want to try to give our guys an understanding of what’s next, based on how they’re being guarded. We don’t want to pigeonhole them where they’re thinking. They can only do one thing I we are very, very fortunate to coach the best players in the world, and they all got here playing the game their way. So, yes, there are parts of players you would like to improve or things that you would like to see them maybe do a little bit less of in a team construct, but I think we have to recognize that that’s hard to just strip something away or to learn something totally new right off the jump. I think there’s a process of getting a team to sort of come together and understand how they all fit, because 95% of these guys have been the best player in every game they’ve ever played in their whole life, until they’re in the NBA. So for us it’s about OK, let’s try to look at our group. What do they do well? What does each player do well? Let’s not spend a bunch of time complaining about oh well, he doesn’t do this or he doesn’t do that. It’s such a waste of time and I think the complaining coach really bothers me. It’d be like the poker player who’s like I only play aces. Well, good for you, bro. Like that’s not how this works. We’ve got to look at our group and go how do we play with this team to the best of our ability, and so then it’s about that’s how you set up the structure. You look at what you’ve got. You say, hey, these are their strengths as individuals, and then, when this group is on the court, this is sort of their collective strength. Maybe this is more of a space and pace group. Maybe this group is a little bit more like we’re going to attack the switch and try to play a little bit more physical because we’re a little bigger. Whatever it is, every team has different nuances, but you look at that, you set up the structure, you try to teach them or show them the things that you see potentially happening within the structure and then you got to let go a little bit, like you have to leave breathing room for them to be creative, for them to play with their instinct. Because Brett Brown, who I worked with in San Antonio, had a line that he used to say to me all the time when I was in the video room that has stuck with me forever, which is don’t make it a science project. You’ve got to let them have some creative license to do the things that they do well and to play with their instinct. Because, believe me, in one of our games there could be five things, 10 things, 15 things that happen, maybe because I told them to do that. There are also 100 things that happen that they did on their own, that I had nothing to do with. Anything that Jordan Clarkson does on the court I had nothing to do with. I promise he’s such an instinctual, creative player that’s how his brain works, that’s how he plays that I have to figure out for Jordan in particular what structures, what sets are good for him from a spacing standpoint or a read standpoint. And then I have to just let him be Jordan and I can’t micromanage every possession, I can’t coach every dribble, I can’t coach every shot. You’ve got to look at it in a little bit larger sample size. I know the analytics people will be happy that I just said that, but you have to give it a little bit of I use the term breathing room a lot. You’ve got to let them play some and then you can tinker and tweak as you go. But when we try to make the lanes too tight, the box is too small the guys get to play in. You lose that creativity and the instinct that these guys have, which is the best part about them. These are the best players in the world and I have to recognize that.
Patrick Carney: 6:50
What have you learned about being careful in what you communicate, the psychological impact you as a coach have, and even your behavior when you’re trying to let these guys just play after giving them concepts?
Will Hardy: 7:04
The feedback piece of coaching. Again, this is all just personal to me and my experience. It’s about when. When are you giving this feedback? In the middle of the game as a guy runs down by you on the court? That’s probably not the moment. Some things can be communicated at a dead ball. Some things you need a little bit more time and maybe that’s a timeout. Some things are I’ve got to wait till the emotion is way down and like that’s after the game. That’s the next day. You don’t want them to get tight. I said to our team last year if we create an environment where you guys are looking at the bench after every play, that’s a bad environment To look over and go. Did I do that right? Is that what you meant? We can’t have that. You guys have to play and it’s my job to maintain our staff’s job, to maintain the accountability at the right moments. Coach them hard at the timeout, coach them hard at halftime, coach them hard in between the quarters, coach them hard post game the next day at film practice walkthrough. But the emotions of the game are real. Everybody’s competitive. The players feel the scrutiny, the fans, twitter, social media, all those things. There is a lot of pressure and anxiety that goes with that. I don’t care how good you are. The stakes are high and a lot of people are watching you and you want to do well, and so I have to be careful about when I communicate those things to a player. Again, that’s not that I’m going to just let the game wash over me and just like, yeah, whatever happens happens. But maybe I call a guy over at a free throw and I talk to him privately about something that’s going on, instead of screaming across the court in front of 18,000 people what the hell are you doing? That may be unproductive. Some guys respond well to it. Some guys they can shut down. Every player is different. All the personality types are different, and so it’s a whole other conversation about getting to know your players, and it’s not one size fits all. You have to coach them all differently to try to maximize what they’re doing. But it’s tricky, it’s not perfect the balance of letting them be them but also holding them accountable to whatever standards we’ve set as a team. I found last year, being in that seat for the first time, that the timing of it is the most important thing. What do you say is important, but when you say it, how you say it, who you say it in front of some things are okay in front of the whole team. Some things have got to be a one-on-one conversation because there are very natural human emotions that come with the things you say and team dynamics and keeping everybody engaged and feeling like they’re a part of it and you have their best interest is hard. We’re trying to maintain trust throughout the entire season because I don’t care how good my ideas or any coach’s ideas are, if the players don’t trust you, they’re never going to go for it.
Dan Krikorian: 9:44
Just a couple of minutes ago, you talked about looking for the collective strength of certain groups and certain actions that they might play into. I love to just circle back to that because it was really interesting and I love to hear your thoughts on, as we’re talking about unlocking player potential and how a group can really bring out the best in certain players, and how much you think about who to put together on the floor and how you get to those decisions.
Will Hardy: 10:08
That’s the thing I think about probably the most when we’re talking about the bigger picture stuff with the team is who fits well with who? We’re about to go through it at training camp. There’s this obsession with who starts, who’s the starter? Yes, it’s impactful. As somebody that played basketball, I understand the importance of feeling like you’re a starter. It’s a different feeling. I get that, but for us it’s 82 games, but it’s also it’s 48 minutes and we have to try to maximize that 48 minutes to give ourselves the best chance to win, and we can’t have a lull because we just put a group on the court that doesn’t fit well together. I think one thing we did a pretty good job of last year as a staff the end of the game is a totally different thing. We’ll do whatever makes sense at the end. We don’t have the same finishing lineup every time. Some teams have a more consistent rhythm with that and that’s based on how their roster’s set up. It’s not because anybody’s doing anything right or wrong, it’s just the way that our roster’s constructed. We have to be more flexible in our thinking and so we have to explain it to the team. You may not be a starter, but that doesn’t mean that you’re not going to play 28 minutes and be in at the end tonight. It’s just that this first group matches well together. I think you fit great with this second group as we get into the next wave of the game. Then, as we go, we’re going to continue to sub and tinker with it. But there are certain players that fit very well together from a stylistic standpoint. It could be something as simple as the pace of the game. They both like to play up tempo. It could be something as simple as one of the reasons why Steph and Clay have been an amazing combo forever. For a lot of reasons. One of them is they’re both really good playing off the ball. They’re able to play this style where they throw the ball to Dremon and then they both move around, and they’re both comfortable playing that way. Certain players may not match as well with that style. It’s about figuring out how they fit. For us. You look at two man groups like hey, these two guards fit well together. But then you have to look at the whole. How does that impact the other three players? How does this five man group fit? Then you’re analyzing both sides of the court. When we talk about fit, our brains always go to offense. What style are we going to play on offense? That’s great, but then you got to go to the other end and you got to play defense For us. Walker is such a big force for us defensively, but he provides a different thing on offense. Matching those styles what’s best for the impact in terms of winning, versus what fits best stylistically, like to your eye or a flow of the game those are two different things, because I think you can play a quote-on-quote ugly style that’s still effective. As coaches, we have to be able to strip back. This is not a coach’s clinic. This is not a video that we’re posting on Twitter where it’s like, oh, look at how beautiful that action is. That looks amazing and it’s pleasant to watch. We’re trying to win. I don’t care if it’s, we’re going to come down, we’re going to launch atop of the key three and we have these four monsters that are going to go to the offense and glass. We’re going to win that way. I’m not saying that would work, but there’s a world where it could and that would be not fun to watch, necessarily, but I don’t care. I want us to win these conversations. This is the fun part of coaching is that it’s not two plus two is four. I think sometimes we’re able to, especially after a game. We look at stats, we look at analytics and we’re able to make these very quick black and white right and wrong comments about a game or a team or how they’re playing. But it’s so nuanced because the team, the players, it’s a living, breathing thing and you got to find ways to kind of keep that going for an entire game. The staff meetings, conversations with our assistants that’s all we talk about is how we’re going to maximize the 48 minutes. What are those adjustments? Along the way, you can hinder a player by pairing them with the wrong people. You can also really free people up and you can see things about them that maybe you didn’t think were there, if they’re playing with the right group of people. It’s always a work in progress, believe me, like right now, I have in my head some ideas about our first day of training camp that could be scrapped the second day of training camp. But you don’t know until they’re out there.
Patrick Carney: 14:12
When finding the right fit, or the right five guys that play well together. What is it that you see, and maybe this is is there like some stats that you look at that maybe back it up? Is it an eye test? How do you kind of get to the point where, like, all right, this five is fitting together. Initially, it’s an eye test.
Will Hardy: 14:28
You don’t have the sample size yet, you don’t have the stats that are going to be meaningful to back it up yet. There are times where we’ve talked about let’s take the offense, for example, let’s watch this group play offensively, but let’s cut the film when the ball leaves the shooter’s hands. It’s not about whether it went in or not. It’s about like are we okay with this? Because the results allow us to convince ourselves of good or bad things all the time. A shot that goes in again, coaches were emotional beings and so we’re like oh, that was great. Yeah, every shot that goes in is great. But if he missed, are we willing to like, die with that shot? But, as it goes, the stats tell you a lot in terms of the quality of shot you’re getting, which is the same thing as watching it without seeing the result. How high a quality shot are we getting? Are we developing the types of shots we want? Is the efficiency on offense? Is it in a good balance with the efficiency on defense? Like I was talking about earlier, this is a beautiful offensive group. We’re getting crushed defensively. We have to try to balance those things and I think that’s where analytics has such power to me when it’s coupled with watching, when it’s coupled with really digging in as a group and paying attention to what it looks like on the film. Because, analytics, I think it’s made a lot of people lazy. I think there aren’t as many people that really watch as used to, because you can now tell a story about a game without watching one clip. There’s so many advanced stats that you can just go and look at the advanced stats from a game and you can tell a story that’s hard to argue with, because, wow, they got crushed on the glass and, man, they just got clobbered in the paint. 58 points in the paleo, oh my God. And you can say these things and it’s like, yes, those numbers are true, but why? Why did we get clobbered on the glass? Did we get clobbered on the glass because we were small? Or did we get clobbered on the glass because they shot 55 threes, missed a ton of them and the ball bounced everywhere and it was 10 long rebounds that just in one game happened to bounce to these odd places, points in the paint. were they on the rim? Was it floaters? What’s really happening? And coupling it with the film helps you have like a strength of an argument. You know I’ve said a lot this summer. I don’t think I have assistant coaches. I really feel like I’ve employed like eight lawyers. They’re just constantly building cases that they’re trying to come in and basically put myself and our team on trial every day, which is great because it keeps me sharp and it keeps me honest with myself about what I actually think. And I had to be willing to say like, yeah, that idea that I had maybe wasn’t that good. And they end up coming up with most of our good ideas, but they’re doing it in a way that’s film backed up with stats or it’s. They saw a stat and it made them go investigate something on the film because they’re like man, that number seems crazy. Like what is going on there? Let me go do some research and find out why. Your initial question was like how do you analyze the groups and it’s everything. That’s when it’s real, but if it’s just the stats or if it’s just the film, it doesn’t always tell you the full truth, so we have to do a good job of the information that’s available to us to give our best guess, which is really what this is every time right. It’s a bet, it’s a guess, it’s. We only have 70% of the information. We don’t really know what the results going to be, and so you’re trying to predict what the most likely thing to happen will be.
Dan Krikorian: 17:52
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Patrick Carney: 18:54
You mentioned balanced lineups. You know, if you’re strong offensively, not going to crush defensively but during the course of the game or season with injuries or foul troubles or some coaches we don’t always have the luxury to kind of select our teams. How do you think about offense when you have like a defensive heavy lineup that you know is going to get stops but maybe they’re more defensive minded? And how do you think about offense in terms of maybe pace Again this flow versus structure conversation when it’s a defensive heavy lineup?
Will Hardy: 19:22
Number one. I don’t think that pace is always good. We’re not good at offense. Let’s get more possessions. I’m not sure that’s a good solution necessarily. So like a defensive minded lineup it’s for me. The first thing I started to think about is the tempo of this game. Naturally, for me, if our advantage is defense unless we’re creating turnovers that are leading to like leak out two on one, three on two situations let’s try to grind this little segment of the game out and try to take the air out of the gym, because we know on offense we might struggle, but offensively, again, even a defensive minded lineup, these guys all have something they do well as a team and as individuals, and so it’s about trying to pick. Okay, with this defensive minded lineup, the biggest strength we have is what and we may be doing it over and over and over again you may do less variety with a defensive minded lineup. You may try to simplify it and strip it down and if you were a baseball pitcher, I’m going to throw my fastball six times in a row because it’s my most reliable thing right now and sometimes we think let’s be creative, let’s get outside the box, let’s do five different things. But for me, with our group. It’s about let’s do something consistent with this group, that they know that they feel confident they can execute because the defensive minded lineups like somewhere in the back of their head they know that they may not be the most offensively potent group. Let’s get them in a comfort zone where they feel good about the reads they have to make the shots that they may develop, instead of trying to scatter them around and do five different things kind of searching. I think a team can feel you searching as a coach. We start bouncing all over the place. They’re kind of going like what are we doing? This is a lot of random things. I think if you give them the feeling of confidence and this is what we’re doing, this is why it’s going to work they’re going to have a better feeling on the offensive end. But the number one thing for me is the tempo of the game. I think HACE is something that’s over talked about. Let’s just get more possessions. I mean some teams should think that way. Some teams should try to take the air out of the gym. If I know that we’re not as good as your team, why would I want this game to be in theory, longer? No, we just saw it in FIBA the shorter game is more dangerous for the better team. The better team wants the game to be long because eventually our talent it’ll outweigh you, it’ll wear you down and beat you. So I think tempo is something that, as coaches, we’ve got to reimagine. Some Like just because stats talk about pace and possessions and all those things. 24 seconds is short, so it’s hard to totally take the air out of the gym. But I see a lot of at a lot of different levels. I see teams that are quote unquote, not as good, just trying to emphasize running and pace and go and go and go, and I’m not sure that’s the best solution.
Dan Krikorian: 22:13
Coach, my last question on this topic has to do with something you said earlier about differences between starters and maybe end of game lineups, and how you look at that and I’d like to actually go back to that too and what generally maybe you value in lineups end of game as far as their ability to switch all the stuff that you can do, and how you think about end of game stuff.
Will Hardy: 22:36
End of game. That’s when the chess match really kind of is on in terms of. There’s two ways to think about it. Neither one is right or wrong. You’re either going into it with the mindset of I’m going to make them adjust to us, or I’m looking at what they have and I’m trying to adjust. I’m a counterpuncher, I’m trying to adjust best to what they’re doing, what lineup they put out there at the end and sometimes it’s like a game of chicken between the two coaches. Who’s going to adjust? We’re both going to put these lineups out there. Are you going to go small because we went small, or am I going to go? No, we’ve got to match their size. We’ve got to play a little bit bigger. Number one is sort of figuring out, as a coach, how your brain works best. Are you a person that you want to kind of, you’re going to adjust to us and I’m willing to die this way, or are you somebody that’s more of a counterpuncher? The second piece of it is how do we, at the end of the game, best develop good shots? And that doesn’t mean it has to be a three, but game gets tight, close game. We’ve got to get attempts up and they’ve got to be good attempts, and so usually we practice end of game about as much as anything in terms of having our team try to understand what we’re going to go to, what we could go to. Sometimes it changes game to game based on who we’re playing. If there’s a matchup we want to expose or we know they’re going to have this center in the game at the end and this is what they do defensively. This is how we’re going to try to take advantage of it. So at the end of the game, my first thought is about offense, because there are some coaches that I have played for, worked for, that are probably like rolling their eyes as I say that what you know, defense wins, yeah, but offense to me it is a lifeblood of the team. Whether we like it or not, most guys’ brains think about offense first, and if they feel comfortable and they feel good on the offensive end, they’re more likely to give better effort defensively. If the offense is clunky and it doesn’t quite make sense and we’re not getting any good shots, it’s hard to dig in and just get like five stops in a row. To win a game you got to get a couple baskets to make everybody feel like we’re in the mix. So my brain generally goes to the offensive end first, at the end of the game how are we going to try to expose whatever lineup they have on the court? And then that leads to kind of a defensive flexibility. I’m a little more flexible in the game defensively. Are we going to switch, are we going to play drop, are we going to switch? And then we’re going to go double or hit. We played zone at the end of the game some this year because that’s just what fit that group best. So we sort of adapt our defense based on what offensive group we have. Again, that’s not right, but I also don’t think it’s wrong. It’s just that’s how my brain operates, it’s how our staff operates and that’s how our team. We’ve sort of got them in that mindset of we’re going to do different things based on who’s on the court, because it’s not going to be the same group on the court all the time.
Patrick Carney: 25:31
When you went zone in those final minutes you said that’s what fit that group best. What characteristics of that group made you think that a zone is the best for them?
Will Hardy: 25:39
For us. The zone gave us the best ability to keep our five man, walker, in the game and switch without him really being involved. It kept him low on the floor where we didn’t have to do a bunch of pre switch or fly switch whatever people call it to try to protect him if teams tried to pick on him at the end of the game, it let us at least dictate where our defensive players were on the court. We’re going to have our four quote unquote smallest guys closest to the ball, so we’re switching things. If they run ball screens and keeping Walker away from the play, there are flaws to his own. There are shots you’re going to give up, but there are shots you’re going to give up in man too, and we felt like we wanted Walker in the game at the end of those certain games that we went zone. At the end it gave us the best opportunity to keep him close to the basket, which is his best thing defensively.
Patrick Carney: 26:33
What was the difference between going zone or just saying, well, let’s just put Walker in a deep drop, like really deep, keep him at the rim I mean all like Rudy Gobert and kind of protect him that way?
Will Hardy: 26:42
The drop still gives up clean looks at the basket, although in the first three and a half quarters of the game the analytics would say those shots or shots we’re willing to live with. Yes, I agree, but with two minutes left in the game and it’s tied, a 45% pull up that we don’t want to shoot 100 up in the game, that’s the shot that could beat us. A basket is a basket in those last couple of minutes and so it’s like they’re not all created equal. If that makes sense, like the two point pull up at the first quarter versus the two point pull up with 35 seconds left in a tie game, is just not the same. So that’s where my brain went on. Just the drop is going to give up a good shot or a clean shot and more likely than not they’re going to have the ball in their best player’s hands and so switching, and then, you know, sometimes we would double team out of the zone, like we would hit out of the zone to try to get the ball out of their best player’s hands. Because I think if you just play drop at the end, your, you know, drop is the coverage that probably gives up more shots through the ball handler than anyone, and they’re going to have the ball in the hands of their best player at the end. I would love it if somebody else shot the ball.
Patrick Carney: 27:49
Flipping to the offensive side when we’re looking at shots. You mentioned the importance of getting good shots. Is a good shot in the first quarter? Change in the last minute of a game for you?
Will Hardy: 27:58
For me it does. Yeah, it’s like the end of the shot clock. Sometimes a basket is just what you need, especially as you get down to a minute left in a tie game. I think at that point we just need the ball to go in. And so, two versus three I get the analytics and I’ve studied a ton over the long haul, over a big block of possessions. This three point shot is better than this 44% pull up to totally get it. But with 30 seconds left I would like a shot that goes in 44% of the time over a shot that goes in 33% of the time because we don’t have time, we’re not going to get all three reps of that three point shot. For the math to kick in, I need the ball to go in, and so we see it in the end of games. We see it in the playoffs when the game slows down and the three gets taken away as the rounds go on. It’s tough because the math can tell you things that they make sense over thousands of possessions or even over 100 possessions. But in the last minute of the game we’re trying to win a three possession game. It’s tied. It’s a different feeling for you as a coach and as a team, because being down two with 30 seconds left it’s not where you want to be, even though that shot that went in is one that everybody’s like. Oh, we’ll live with that, but maybe not at the end, because ultimately we’re not evaluated on the whole of the stats At the end of the year. They aren’t going like, oh well, you know, the jazz had this offense and their defense was this and their plus minus was that and the efficiency was good, yeah, but how many wins did they have? So, like as a coach, sometimes the stats are frustrating because was that what I’m getting evaluated on? Are you saying that, like, 10,000 possessions is what I’m being evaluated on, or are you going to evaluate those 10,000 possessions 110 at a time? Right, and so that’s where sometimes it gets a little tricky on what’s best mathematically versus what’s best right now.
Dan Krikorian: 29:48
A quick thank you to our newest partner here at Slapping Glass, one of the best tech companies in the world of sports, huddle. As many of you know, huddle extends an array of useful products to coaches, from their auto tracking camera, huddle Focus, live streaming tool, huddle TV, wearable athlete performance tracker, wimoo and their newest offering, huddle in stat, an all in one data powerhouse platform that combines advanced tagging with a global film library. For more information on all that’s offered with Huddle in stat, visit Huddlecom slash Slapping Glass today. Thanks to Huddle for the support. And now back to our conversation. Coach, this has been awesome so far. We want to transition to a segment on the show that we call Start, sub or Sit, and so we’ll give you three options around a topic ask you to start one of them, sub one of them and sit one of them, and then we’ll have a quick discussion from there. So, coach, if you’re ready, we’ll dive into this first one. Yes, last year you guys did a number of things in transition, but one of the things we love watching you guys last year do is some of your transition flare screen action, and we wanted to talk about the toughest to teach when running a transition flare screen for your team to kind of get set and have it be an effective action to run. So Start, sub or Sit these three different things when it comes to the transition flare screen. Option one is the angle of the screen, the location, the angle at screen. Option two is the timing of when that screen takes place in transition. Option three is just the spacing around that transition flare screen.
Will Hardy: 31:23
Start the spacing. Spacing is the most important thing for sure in terms of the ability to not just create an advantage but take advantage of it. I’m subbing the timing and I’m sitting the angle Coach.
Dan Krikorian: 31:35
I want to follow up with the sub, the timing and in transition, where everybody’s sprinting to space, as you mentioned as your start, in different locations, just what that timing you’d like to be so that that action is effective.
Will Hardy: 31:49
A lot of the reason thinking whatever you want to call it behind this concept is 99% of teams are taught to load to the ball in transition, and so it’s not just the guy on the ball, it’s that secondary sort of nail defender, and we feel like the flare makes the nail defender have to make a choice. The guys run back, they sit there in a stance or yelling, load, load, load. You know I’m in the gap, I’m in the gap, and then all of a sudden they hear flare, flare, flare and it’s like, okay, now I have to make a choice. Am I supporting this guy who’s guarding Collins Sexton coming down at you know 80% speed in transition, or am I going to go over the flare? And if I go over the flare now, there’s potentially a driving gap for Colin. So we don’t want that screen to be too early. We want the screen to be number one at a time where, if the guy who goes off the flare is open, Colin can throw him the ball. There’s sometimes where we do stuff in general as coaches like that action looks great, but the guy with the ball is not even looking over there. So it doesn’t matter how good it is or how open he is, you can’t get in the ball. So we want to wait to a point where we set the flare, where the guy can get the ball, and to that, if that guy does chase hard over the top of that screen and the nail is clear, that Colin’s in a position to take advantage of that space before it gets closed back up. So it’s something that we have to work on. It’s not perfect, you know. The first key to everything is like everybody’s got to actually run, you got to get into the play. Usually those guys that are at the top that are coming off the flare, or the person setting the flare, are probably the people that were just involved rebounding and then have outletted the ball and then they’ve got to run to kind of catch up to the play to get in that spot. It’s been fun. It’s been fun to teach. The guys actually took to it pretty well last year. Some will continue to try to build on this year. But there’s definitely, for all the clips that people are like, oh, that looks great, there’s definitely some ones that look terrible, based on, usually, spacing or timing.
Dan Krikorian: 33:41
It’s a work in progress always philosophically setting a flare and transition for you rather than a single pin away. Like you see, a lot of teams run a single pan, or maybe a stagger. What was it? I guess the flare instead of a pin that drew you to that action more.
Will Hardy: 33:54
Well, we like to have our five men in the weak side wing, if we can. Five men defensively gravitate to the paint always, and so we now have cleared up a little bit of space by making the next closest person to the ball be a smaller ball handler, because his man is going to be shifted at the nail because that’s what he’s taught and X five is going to be in the paint because he’s a big and he can’t help himself. And so the flare, we thought, gave us an opportunity to, number one, take advantage of that small who shifted at the nail. But really the flare was a secondary piece of that spacing. We chose that spacing because the first option is the guy with the ball just dribble drive. And now usually we try to create a situation where you have two people going to help. You’ve got the weak side bottom defender going to help because, again, that’s what he’s been taught, and then you have the five man kind of diagonally going to help down towards the rim, because he’s a five man and he can’t help himself, he’s not thinking rotate to the corner. So that was the genesis of it from there. Okay, well, if we like the five and that spot, what are other things that we can do with them. And that’s where the flare happened. It didn’t start as hey, I love flares and transition. It started with we thought this spacing was going to give us a different type of advantage offensively early in the clock, and then it became from there what can we build offensively?
Patrick Carney: 35:15
around that, going back to the timing piece and kind of reading the point guard in terms of when that flare should happen or can happen. So again the point guards looking, was there maybe references or spots on the floor? You thought the point guards passed the hash or on the three point line, probably the passes too long, the flares no good here or any sort of like teaching points. Early on in the season you were working with your team and your point guard to make sure like one we can complete this pass If we get a good flare screen as our guard has just crossed half court because they’re moving with a little bit of tempo in these sort of transition situations as they’re crossing half court.
Will Hardy: 35:53
That’s when we want the flare to start to come in, because usually that’s a moment of one. I’m not being super pressured on the ball, so the chest pass across the top is much easier to throw, because if they start the action as I cross half court now I’m sort of getting down around the hash as it’s time to throw the ball, or that’s when the guys sees the nail clear and they shift gears and they start to go downhill. I don’t want the ball handler to come to a complete stop Now. We’ve lost the moment, we’ve lost the tempo, especially with our guard, colin Taylin, chris Dunn, jordan Clarkson, keyante. It was like those guys are so good at playing from 70% speed to 100 where they shift gears and they go. I don’t want to bring them to a stop and I feel like they’re going to have to stop if we wait too long. You know the ball is not across half court yet, or the ball is. We’ve like run to the flare, like we almost want them to happen at the same tempo. Whatever tempo, the ball handler is coming down the court. That’s the tempo I want the flare screen set at, so that we have an opportunity to actually see it and make the decision. It’s the timing of when, but it’s also like how hard the flare screener runs to it. It’s really never a dead sprint, it’s usually a 70%.
Patrick Carney: 37:07
They’re kind of like gliding into it to give the ball handler a chance to really see what’s happening with the spacing, with the five men saying you want to run to the wing, Does that take time to build that habit? I feel like big men they’re taught you know the rim, run the trail spot and then building that habit. And then also, how would you execute the flare if the big man was on the rim or out in front of the break?
Will Hardy: 37:28
It still takes time. We’re still working on getting the five men away from the ball. You know again, a lot of times they are outletting the ball, they are going to get more defensive rebounds from the other guys, so or they’re going to be around the basket fighting for a rebound even if they don’t get it, and so we’re just teaching them. Number one ball gets out, let it to the right side of the floor. You’re trying to run away from the ball and if there is a small running in that lane which usually there is, because that’s what they’ve been taught there’s somebody already ahead in the corner. There’s somebody that’s filling that wing and the five is sort of coming behind them. They’re sort of pushing that smaller player towards the middle of the court. So I’m a small. I start running. The wing guy in the corner ahead of me, five starts to fill behind me. I just start drifting towards the middle. Again, it’s not like a dead sprint on an angle. I just start kind of feeding myself in towards the middle of the court, and that’s something we still have to work on. We don’t want to take away any of our bigs opportunity to go get on the rim. This is what they’re taught if they are even with or behind the play. If you’re ahead of the play and you want to go put your head on the rim, duck in, get a layup, no problem, we’ll play out of our four outspacing then, because we teach five outspacing and then we also have if the five is ahead, we have four out what we’re doing there. We will set the flare even if the five is ahead of the play. Maybe one of the best ones we got all year was a home game against Oklahoma City. After all-star break, late in the fourth quarter, walker got ahead of the play and I think Taylan actually set a flare for Lowry and he hit a three to tie the game. That was again just a read of hey, I think Jordan had the ball. We want to try to create that space at the nail and Taylan made a good read and sort of saw that Lowry’s man was paying attention to the ball and he set the flare. It’s something that we’re going to continue to teach because we have to evolve as a team. Walker is a player that’s going to evolve and that we’re trying to help evolve. So there’s gonna be times that Walker is spaced in the corner. It’s not gonna be all the time. He’s not Brooke Lopez, not yet. He hasn’t gotten to that stage in his career. But there are gonna be times where we’re gonna have Walker. Hey, if you’re ahead of the play and you don’t get it, you’ve got to filter out to the corner. And so now we have smalls in those spots and so the flair will be played with two quote-unquote Parimate players. But you know that’s gonna be on us as a staff to continue to teach these concepts and tweak them as the team Changes. It’s the team changing from a roster standpoint trades, free agents draft, all those things but it’s also the team changing as the players improve or their games develop. We have a lot of young players, so as a staff we’re sort of trying to predict what’s next in terms of hey, this is something we want Walker to do more of in the future. So we have to put him in that spot a little bit more, not always, but we have to start to slow, drip it in. You can’t just all the sudden one day up now you shoot five, threes again. That’s gonna be an all-or-nothing proposition. We have to sort of find ways to drip that in, and with that comes new teaching for the team, which is fun. I would be bored to death if every year was the same and we were gonna come into camp and just sort of rinse and repeat what we just did. Like I said earlier, the fact that it’s not two plus two is for the fact the team is a living, breathing, changing thing is what excites me every day and sort of keeps us as a staff sharp, because there’s always new problems to solve.
Patrick Carney: 40:47
All right, coach, our last start subset for you has to do with individual Scouting reports showing your players the individual scouting film and what you found to be the most beneficial for the players to watch In terms of retention. What they’re actually gonna take away. Is it the strength of that player, is it the weaknesses of that player? Or or, option three, is it the situations you’re gonna put that player in and how they either defend or how?
Will Hardy: 41:13
Whatever the situation may be, I’m starting the strength, I’m subbing the situation and I’m sitting the weakness. I think the players respond and understand sort of. Again back to the baseball analogy, like what someone’s fastball is. You try To give them a picture of this is what this guy is going to. It gets down into clock. This is his most likely thing he’s gonna go to and we’re trying to take that away. The situational part is also just as important because there are certain players you’re gonna have to guard a ton of pick and rolls. There are certain players you have to guard a ton of off-ball screens. But we also look at the end of game stuff. When it really comes down to it, this is where they’re gonna put him, this is the spacing they’re looking to give him and this is what they’re trying to get out of that and this is how we’re gonna take it away. The weakness part he struggles going here or there. I think defensively the guys better respond to like what they’re trying to, not let someone do anything but this, because really that’s what we’re telling them. As a coach, I would love it if we could make everybody go to their weak hand and shoot up. You know, running skyhook. That would be great. But you know you got Kyrie in an ISO. Can we let him do anything but like a left-hand Hesitation, pull up three and again? Kyrie is a tough example because he’s maybe the most creative player You’ve ever seen with the ball. Like he’s insane. And if you check the stats he only averages like 45 points against us. Like I have no clue what I’m talking about, but it’s like anything but that, anything but their fastball, and we’ll figure it out because the percentages go down. That’s kind of how we coach the personnel stuff because, again, it’s four games a week. It’s not that they don’t know the players yes, they’re professionals but it’s hard to take in so much information day after day after day and really put it into Practice in the game. They’re all nodding their heads and like with it in the film sessions, in the walkthroughs, and they know what’s going on. But now it’s the middle of the third quarter. I’m tired, I’m frustrated. I’ve just got an elbow in the neck, my head, somewhere else, and so if I can just remember like anything but the hezzie pull-up, then we feel like we’ve made Incremental step towards giving ourselves a chance coach, in terms of clips or video length, like you said, when there’s so many games, come on, how do you simplify the actual video length?
Patrick Carney: 43:28
and how many clips of their strengths, of these situations Do you think about or want to show them?
Will Hardy: 43:32
We try to get to the point with the film, whether it’s individual or team. Our job is to prioritize the everything matters crowd. I Understand and fully respect. We don’t have time for that. The guys also can’t retain the 13 keys to win this game. Okay, the first two better be the ones you really care about, because no human being can retain all of that. And so, from an individual standpoint, they’re probably gonna see in front of the team, depending on how Involved each player is in the game. The best player may get six clips and then you’re filtering down to a couple for some of these other. You know the role players, guys that are aren’t playing as much or aren’t quite as Involved, but then they get sent an edit that they get to watch on their own time. It’s probably double. And again, I don’t expect them to know all 12 clips cold. It’s easier for them to digest that when they’re by themselves. Maybe I watch three clips and then I go get a glass of water and then in the film room with the team We’ve got to keep it tight because they don’t get a chance to go somewhere else or look over there for a minute Like they’ve got to be locked in, and so it’s on us to really try to strip the portion size down. The let’s just do more, let’s just drown them in clips, like I think that’s coaches Covering themselves. And believe me, I’ve done it, we’ve all done it. But middle of the second quarter you’ll see some guy make a shot and some assistant coach spike some papers and be like. I told him that this morning. Yeah, dude, that was clip 17 of your 40 clip. Edit the guy. He wasn’t paying attention anymore. You know, it’s like when we walk through nine of the other teams plays, raise your hand. If you know nine of our plays, you’re gonna know nine of their plays. Like I just don’t understand what we’re doing. That’s just me. I’m not saying there’s a right or wrong way, but I would rather hold them accountable, viemently accountable to two things, then be just kicking and screaming about ten things and they don’t even know what really matters to me anymore. Because there’s like yeah, there he is. He’s just kind of mad all the time about everything.
Dan Krikorian: 45:32
If I could, follow up about Yourself personally and we’re talking about players right now and their retention and what’s on the top of their minds during a game. But for you, what do you most care about as the head coach? I know you have your staff that’s gonna give you a lot of stuff. But for you personally, during a game, what is on top of your mind?
Will Hardy: 45:47
man. So I learned this year, number one, that when you’re the head coach, you’re there but you’re also somewhere else at the same time, if that makes sense. Yeah, I don’t hear the crowd, you’re just like almost blacked out, thinking about kind of everything. But I’m watching number one hour Low. Offensively, is this group vibing right now? Because then I’m able to hold them accountable. Defensively, because, again, I truly believe that their comfort offensively leads them into a different place defensively. So I’m looking like is there number one? Is this something we need to change what I’m calling or do we need to change the group? It could be one or the other and you have to make that assessment in the moment. This is not because this group’s bad, I’m just calling all the wrong stuff. Right now I got a change. The second thing that you’re trying to like stay a step ahead of. Again, it’s 48 minutes and you’re trying to maintain the momentum as much as you can. Where are they gonna go? What are they thinking about doing? What’s their adjustment like? That’s the stuff I study a lot is what’s their tendency in terms of their sub pattern or end of game. What do they do so that I have what I want to do ready. It’s a lot of the things that you guys have kind of already asked about. It’s who’s on the court together. Is this group flowing well? And if they’re not, you have to be able to separate. It’s not always just them, I think. As coaches it’s like, oh, this group stinks. Yeah, sub these guys out. It’s like I also have to have enough humility to go, or I’ve just the things I’ve asked them to do the last three possessions. That’s on me. And before I just start subbing people out and quote-on-quote blaming them, is it because I need to call something different first? And so that’s honestly the internal dialogue I’m having the whole game. Is it them or is it me and not them? Like it’s their fault? It’s me both ways? Have I put the wrong group on the court? Or am I calling the wrong things for this group because they don’t have like the Chemistry right now on the offensive end that keeps them engaged at a level that on defense, they’re gonna give max effort and I can hold them accountable to the things on that and that we care about?
Dan Krikorian: 47:43
Coach, you’re off the start subberset hot seat. Thanks for playing that game with us. That was a lot of fun. We got one final question for you before we end the show. But before we do, congrats on all the success and we wish you the best luck this season and thank you very much for coming on today and being so thorough.
Will Hardy: 47:58
Yeah, I appreciate it man, thank you.
Dan Krikorian: 48:00
Thank y’all for having me. 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?
Will Hardy: 48:08
There’s a lot of them. But I’ll go to something that’s more recent. I work with a Mental performance coach. He’s helped me a ton the last two years, just kind of understanding. I’m a very competitive, like we all are and can be like an emotional person, and Working with somebody in that space Directly. You know there’s different ways to do it. People do meditation and mindfulness and all these things and they’re all great. But for me it was having somebody that was working with me one-on-one To help me understand the things I can control, the things I can’t control how I process information, how I process my own emotions has been a game changer for me because I think it now bleeds into you know I’m now in a role where my emotional state matters and Right or wrong, the temperature of the head coach impacts the whole organization every day. If I come in and I’m kicking and screaming and Just off and it’s gonna be a little tight, I it just is, and that’s again not right or wrong. And if I come in and I’m happy, go lucky and whistling and cracking a bunch of jokes, it may be too loose, but working with a mental performance coach on those things has helped me stay a little more in a smaller band in terms of like, I still get pissed and I still get happy, but at work it’s in a tighter window and at home it helps me stay out of the giant swings where I could really, as a head coach, negatively impact our group. I needed to be able to talk through it with an individual. Not that I didn’t understand mindfulness and those things, but I have follow-up questions. I need to know this, and it’s different when it’s made personal to you. Hey, I was in this situation yesterday at work and this is how I reacted and they can kind of talk you through those things. That investment for me has been massive for sure. Wow, pat, that was pretty fun, yeah, to say the very least.
Dan Krikorian: 50:06
I think it’s safe to say one of our favorites of the year so far. Yeah, I would say.
Patrick Carney: 50:10
so I guess kind of getting into our first bucket, our first theme, which was freedom versus structure.
Dan Krikorian: 50:17
Like I said, we’ve had conversations in and around this before, but we added the caveat of when it comes to unlocking player potential and how, what you do as a coach, the kinds of stuff that you do you’re going to be able to do it in a way that’s not a problem what you do as a coach, the kinds of structure versus freedom decisions you put in your offense and defense. How that affects certain players individually. And then obviously we got into the group collective effort. So I’ll kick it back to you on any first takeaways there in that first section.
Patrick Carney: 50:45
My first takeaways here and you mentioned it’s obviously sitting with his staff looking at their players, what kind of concepts they want to try to develop or what concepts they want to go into the gym with, but then taking those concepts, I wrote down four big bullet points. For me, it was then teaching them the decisions and reads within that concepts, helping them understand. Then what’s next, which I think is a conversation we always have, like not getting stuck on this concept or I can flow into other things, and then what we hit on through is just the process of finding the pieces that fit for the five-man units that work well together, and I think the biggest thing is just the process of letting go, or then giving them breathing room, the freedom, part of it, to let them, like we always talk about, show you what works, show you how they do it and learn from your players.
Dan Krikorian: 51:27
Absolutely, and he mentioned too that coaching is just sometimes your best guess. It’s not a perfect science type of thing, and so I think that’s something he talked about a lot too is we’ve done all the homework, we’ve done all the legwork to put them in positions we think our best, but then you also just have to let them play the game and kind of show you, and so I took that away as well. I liked how you had the follow-up about learning when to correct or coach through certain things, and that was a good follow-up by you. And I think his answer was great about learning the right moments in which to press down on anything coaching-wise the timeouts, half-time things like that. And you mentioned yelling and screaming at a guy in front of 18,000. A lot of guys might not react well to that, and just I think you kind of got his approach to coaching through that as well.
Patrick Carney: 52:14
He said I wrote down accountability at the right moments, yes, and then getting in. I think from there we progressed a lot into just finding five-man units, finding like a collective that works together, and I really appreciate his thoughts on when we got him to talk about balance line-ups, but then also how he measures or settles upon five-man units that work. And I mentioned you before coming on. I just liked the approach of taking the film and cutting everything after the shot, so not knowing if it was a made or missed, but sitting there as a staff and saying are we willing to live with this shot? Like, will we die with this shot? Is this a good possession to measure and value five-man units?
Dan Krikorian: 52:49
That was great, I think. The lineup discussion and all that was really interesting. I enjoyed two things. I got to the end of game line-ups and how he thinks about that. You talked about sort of a defensive heavy lineup and I think the thing we both liked in those bits of the conversation were one is how he thinks about offense breeds life into the defense and especially late game, like can we get a bucket, can we score? I thought was a big takeaway. And then you heard, too, just a really realistic approach to analytics from someone that has access to every single piece of analytics in the world. But you heard his thoughts on late game defensive units, all that, what analytics really matter and how you use them. To. Like what he mentioned, you’re just trying to win the game. The shots are different at different times in the game, which we all know, but I liked hearing him walk through that and then, on top of that, walk through that’s what you’re evaluated on as a coach. They don’t ask you at the end of the season what your PPP was and you get a raise based off of its above one point. Whatever or not it’s, did you win? You get to the playoffs right, like that’s what you’re evaluated on, and so I think that was a really good part of that conversation too. To me, jumping back before the late game you alluded to it.
Patrick Carney: 54:00
We talked balanced lineups and we had a real good conversation with coach Ben Resner balancing lineups and it’s a question I posed with coach Hardy when asking about okay, well, now you’re stuck with an overly defensive lineup and from there we had a really good conversation about pace and the way to look at it. He said, obviously if it’s super defensive heavy, that you know he won’t slow it down. Less possession, simplifying I wrote down to like less variety, probably for that offense, just go to your fastball, he kept saying, and if you’re constantly searching the team can feel it Really. The ultimately was the pace conversation and he mentioned rethinking pace and I thought he gave a great example with the World Cup and Team USA. You know it was to their benefit to try to, you know, make the game longer, more possessions, because then talent can win out. So if you’re less talented, shorten the game and that way you know it’s to the detriment of more talented teams. If the game gets shorter, appreciate it’s not on pace and how he thinks about it Pace is so interesting.
Dan Krikorian: 54:55
You and I have talked about this off air, on air, with coaches, because whenever this episode is coming out, we don’t know exactly, but early in the season especially, it’s we’re going to play with pace, we’re going to get more possessions, that’s all great, but it’s really interesting seeing some teams are better at mid-level pace or slower pace. Ben McCollum, northwest Missouri State, we had on like they don’t really run right and they won national titles year after year. Division two, division three Randolph-Macon a couple of years ago was one of the slowest pace teams in division three. Basketball All the games in the NCAA tournament for college basketball end up ticking down possession-wise. It’s just really interesting. It was a great conversation. Yeah, for sure, let’s move to start sub or sit. And just the first one the flare screen. We did a deep dive breakdown month or so ago on his transition flare and we enjoyed diving into all the stuff that they did with it, the timing of it all that we’ll get into, but also how they flowed into other stuff. Really, really cool concept, and so that was kind of our fun part, to just get to ask him straight up about it, and he didn’t hold anything back.
Patrick Carney: 56:01
He was really open about this whole thing, I appreciate him sharing what I like the most when we got into the timing conversation and just the timing and working off of the point guard. So everyone’s on the same page. The point guard’s looking for the flare, he can deliver the pass and you know he mentioned kind of sliding into it that it’s not really a full-paced thing and I think he referenced the times 80%, 70%. So again, just kind of pulling back the curtain and getting his thoughts like why they went to it to attack that loaded up nail. So I mean he gave us everything.
Dan Krikorian: 56:29
It’s always fun when we’re finding on film or talking to coaches is actions that take advantage of technically good defense. So he mentioned the reason it works is because rightfully so, in transition your thoughts have kind of loaded the ball. He didn’t say 100%, but no one’s taught to just run and stick to their man and open up huge driving gaps in transition. And this flare just takes advantage of the fact that we know that guy’s going to do his job and load up and we’re going to try to hit that early and create that advantage early in the possession and then they’re going to put the five man the center in that wing spot because they know the five men can’t help themselves and they’re going to drop in the key.
Patrick Carney: 57:04
So you have the ball loaded up and you got no help. The five man is also loaded up in the key. I mean he said just the thought process, the development of this concept and what went into it and just how they made the pieces fit, based on again, like you said, the defensive tendencies or habits of their opponents.
Dan Krikorian: 57:21
Yeah, and he gave a little bit of the genesis or the creation of it and it wasn’t like he mentioned something. He just always loved transition flares growing up and as soon as he got that head job he was going to do it. It was born out of the spacing he mentioned. It takes time with the players to learn it because it’s a little different than just running the rim, like he mentioned. They can still rim run, but it’s a little different than middle of the floor stuff. Hey, come and maybe set a drag or throw it to him and get into delay action. It’s a maybe a different mindset, but I would imagine it’s tougher for opposing teams to play against because it’s just awkward as you’re getting back.
Patrick Carney: 57:55
You talk about the lane running and maybe that was a miss for me. I mean, I wanted to hear about how he just worked with the fives, but then on the other side the coin is getting a guard or a shooter into that top spot. He did talk about it the five man pushing or the guard in front of them into the trail position. But I think that’s also where the bigs have been taught the lane runner rim run. Sorry, the guards or the wings have been taught to run wide. So you know, looking at it on the other side of the coin as well, how he works with his guards to make sure they’re getting that trail spot filled. So there is someone there to screen if they get the five in the other foot.
Dan Krikorian: 58:31
For sure. Moving to the second one, something we talked about beforehand of, just it’s always interesting with how much film and stuff that they have at the NBA level. What do you filter to the players, what is useful for the teaching standpoint? So I’ll throw it back to you on that second start subset with Scoutfilm.
Patrick Carney: 58:48
I just kind of came with simplify what you want to tell your players. And he said, you know he would rather vehemently hold his team accountable to two things rather than. I think he said like literally, here’s 13 ways to win the game and just none of it’s going to get retained. He made the good joke of, you know, trying to have them remember nine opponent plays when they can’t remember nine of their plays. Yeah, we go back to it’s realistic. You have to be realistic of what your players can retain, what they’re going to retain, what they want to retain. I think that goes to like why he says throw them the strengths. That’s what they want to see, first and foremost, and then also decreasing your stress level as a coach. He said are you going to be a coach that’s just going nuts all the time, because if you try to stress out over 10, 12, 13 things and of course they’re not going to remember number seven or they’re going to forget, you know, clip number 16 out of 40. And you’re just going to be slamming your clipboard. But it’s unrealistic expectations.
Dan Krikorian: 59:43
But he mentioned, you’re able to hold them accountable to two of their top strengths. Or you were a player more recently than I, was at higher levels pro levels, and but you know, in the middle of the flow of the game it’s hard to. You want to be light on your feet, right. You want to be able to just play hard and play free defensively to what we’re talking about now and trying to remember was I supposed to go over this under this? Wait, how did I check this action, my top locking here? Sometimes I mean, it’s just a game of mistakes. It’s going to happen where you just don’t guard it correctly because of a lot of teams run good offense and it’s hard to get to those things. But, like he mentioned, if you can remember, don’t let him get to this shot, don’t let him get to this spot. Whatever they do, do your best to not allow this and we’ll figure out the rest. I thought it was just a real good takeaway too, and, like he mentioned, they’ve got three or four games a week. They’re on planes or flying around. Like they can hold them accountable to those things. It was really good. I also enjoyed hearing his thoughts on just his own personal thought process as a coach, which I find really interesting and I guess would be maybe not a miss per se, but just something I wish we had more time for, because his answer about what he thinks about during the game and how hard it is and how he kind of blacks out was really interesting. And I think that the psychology of in-game coaching is super interesting and just what is going on in your mind in the middle of all this and trying to keep it all in line. And I thought his answer was good to that about trying to look at the flow of his players and make decisions off of if it’s him from a personnel standpoint or him from a play call or structure standpoint was a good takeaway too.
Patrick Carney: 1:01:11
And what he was, kind of a softball thrown our way that we had to back off of.
Dan Krikorian: 1:01:15
Yeah, it was a high softball right at my eyes. I just had to play off and then. This isn’t not another miss for me, but if we had more time to ask more about his best investment question with his own performance coach and just more what goes into that, because I think that you and I were talking right before we hopped on. We just keep hearing more and more coaches who have been on the podcast. Meg Griffith talked about it recently. She works with a mental performance coach at Columbia Women’s Basketball and how much it’s helped just to work through things that head coaches, assistant coaches, need to work through throughout the season.
Patrick Carney: 1:01:46
And he made a good point. It’s not that he didn’t understand these things, but just he said it’s obviously tailored, very personal and I think getting more of the process behind it and the why’s have been the biggest benefit that he’s come across working with a mental performance coach.
Dan Krikorian: 1:02:00
Yeah, it was really well said, a great way to close it. So well, pat, if there’s nothing else, we will start wrapping this thing up. Sounds good. Thanks coach Hardy again for coming on and for sharing all his thoughts. We wish him the best of luck this season. Thank you everybody for listening. We’ll see you next time.