Brian Katz on Winning Players, Competitive Open Gyms, and the Road More Traveled

Transcript

Brian Katz: 0:00

The easiest day to lead is game time. That’s the easiest day. Everybody’s amped up, everybody wants to win. Of course, everyone wants to win. The hardest time to lead is practice. It’s brutal, it’s long, it’s the day-to-day grind, it’s the pressure of having to win, it’s the pressure of getting yourself motivated to play and your teammates motivated. To me, those are your leaders, because game day everybody can pound their chest and yell at a guy. I don’t necessarily know that that’s leading. And I’ll tell you one thing If you haven’t been the leader day to day, in practice, through the grind, your teammates not going to respond come game time, when you get on down.

Dan Krikorian: 0:46

Hi, I’m Dan Krikorian and welcome to Slappin’ Glass exploring basketball’s best ideas, strategies and coaches from around the world. Today, we’re excited to welcome former Division I, juco and high school head coach Brian Katz. The California Community College Hall of Famer and 2015 Mid-Major Coach of the Year at Sacramento State has a fantastic new book out called the Road More Traveled on coaching wisdom from over 40 years in the business, and we dive into many of them, including the difference between winners and talented players. And we dive into many of them, including the difference between winners and talented players. Competitive open gyms and we talk shot selection conversations and building a program from good to great during the always fun start, sub or sit. For much more on this conversation, as well as the book, make sure to sign up for our Sunday morning newsletter or purchase it directly at coachbryancatscom. And now please enjoy our conversation with coach Brian Katz. Coach, thanks so much for making the time for us. We can’t wait to dive in.

Brian Katz: 2:03

I can’t wait to slap some glass man.

Dan Krikorian: 2:07

Love it. Coach, we’re here today because we’re going to talk about a lot of stuff. You’ve written a fantastic book called the Road More Traveled which takes into account a bunch of stories from your 45-year coaching career, which spans high school, junior college and Division I head coaching levels. A ton of great stuff in there, and we’re going to kind of pull apart some of our favorite parts of the book and different themes and whatnot, and so the first thing we wanted to do is dive in on. One of the themes in the book that really interested us was winning players, and you’ve got some great stories in there about the difference between winners and talented players and all that goes into it, and so your thoughts on the difference between winning players and talented players so much of this, obviously, is subjective Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Brian Katz: 2:53

However, I want to also differentiate where we even start. I think there’s a misnomer out there that if a young man is on a winning team, he’s a winner. So I don’t necessarily believe that, and if a guy’s on a losing team he’s a loser. I believe this, that certainly over a period of time it all sorts itself out. But first of all, like for me in evaluation, three things. One is the guy good enough? You got to start with that, okay Once. Is he good enough? Then? Is he obsessed with the game? He can’t be dedicated, it’s not good enough, got to be obsessed. And then three does he have deep inner confidence? Okay, winning players have that Talented players. When you stop there at that, when you just say he’s talented, it doesn’t translate to winning. And to me, at the end of the day, what’s the game all about? It’s all about winning.

Brian Katz: 3:45

So you’re trying to get winning players I don’t even like to say good players. I want to say to me I try to really quickly categorize him he’s talented or he’s a winning player. Now, inherently, a winning player is talented. We understand that. Here’s the best way I can explain it In my world this is what I believe is that if you’re only talking about his talent, that’s all he brings, then he’s not a winning player because your talent’s not good enough. You’ve got to have all the intangibles, the other things that fit in, that compose a winning player, and so, ultimately, player evaluation. People say recruiting is the most important thing. I believe player evaluation is the most important thing, because if you don’t get that right, you might be recruiting the wrong guy.

Patrick Carney: 4:28

As we move into then the details and nitty gritty of player evaluation. You also mentioned the difference between dedicated versus an obsessed player. What is the difference in your eye and how you would go about finding out if he’s dedicated or if he’s really obsessed with the game?

Brian Katz: 4:43

Dedicated is, to me, the very minimal entry point. You go to work every day, you show up on time, you’re there, you’re dedicated. That’s not good enough. Obsessed means it’s basically all you think about. It’s the first thing you think about in the morning. Last thing you think about at night is basketball. You got your day planned out with how you’re going to work out. Get a hundred shots up before school when you’re going to work out. Get a hundred shots up before school when you’re going to get your lift in all of the above.

Brian Katz: 5:05

Now you ask how do you figure out who’s obsessed? This is the things I would do on any level. And again, I want to relate this to everybody I don’t know who’s listening. Is it a high school, au coaches, jc, division one? All the above Here’d be my thing.

Brian Katz: 5:17

Number one whenever I talk to the young man, what’s he want to talk about? And number two I would call them at every hour of the day or night. I want to call him late at night and you’ll know where the young man is. You can hear the noise in the background and he’ll tell you 10 o’clock at night on a Friday. Hey, coach, how you doing. Where are you at? Oh, I’m at a party.

Brian Katz: 5:35

Okay, my point is you constantly, constantly, you want to figure out what is he doing with his free time, what is he talking about, and from that you figure out if he’s obsessed rather than dedicated. The other part too, I think, is if he’s obsessed with the game, he’s probably a guy that doesn’t have a lot to talk about. Otherwise Meaning I’m not going to say he won’t talk about this or that. He’s constantly kind of coming back to how he’s going to compete, what’s going on with the team, him working out all of the above. But I really believe that he’s got to be obsessed. If he’s dedicated at the college level, I think at high school you might be able to get away with it. College level, you can’t rely on talent alone. You got to be obsessed with the game.

Patrick Carney: 6:21

I know we’re talking about winning versus talented players. So is it realistic to get a roster full of obsessed players? Or is it? You know you want your top guys to be obsessed, but hey, this is a rule guy like minimum, he’s got to be dedicated. Maybe he’s not obsessed, but he can still help us and he’s worth recruiting.

Brian Katz: 6:37

It’s a great question, a great statement. You’re never going to get a roster of completely all obsessed players. I mean when I say never, you want to try to accumulate as many as you can. I think of the best team we had at Sac State when we won 21 games, came with a basket and won the conference title. We probably had obsessed with the game. I think we had I’ll say five, no, maybe seven, and so those guys can carry the group and all of that rubs off on the group and it takes the guy who’s dedicated a little further this direction toward being obsessed. And so you want as many as you can, and I think to your points, well taken. No, I never had a team with 12 obsessed guys.

Dan Krikorian: 7:17

We’re talking about players right now and winning players, dedicated players, talented players. In your 45 years coaching, I know you came across this as well when it comes to the coaching profession and coaches that were dedicated or obsessed or sticking with it winning coaches as well and if there’s anything different when it comes to what your views are on winning coaches obsessed coaches in the profession.

Brian Katz: 7:43

No, it’s not different. Dedicated is not nearly enough. Look, it’s a sick profession. We’re all sick. It’s a 24-7. Even when I tell my wife I always say when I come home, or a five kid, she’d say, brian, you got to act like you’re paying attention a little better. You’re present, but you’re not your mind. It always goes back to that. It’s always going back to that. You’re always trying to figure out your team because it’s a constant grind on your mind. So being dedicated is not good enough because, again, the coaches are so good, they’re obsessed, they’re so good that you’re not going to be able to compete with them. If you’re just dedicated and you’re constantly looking for a way to make your team better and make yourself better, you know if it’s in a video. Is it go watch a practice? Is it study something constantly? So I agree on that level, dedicated is not good enough.

Dan Krikorian: 8:34

You’ve coached with and against a lot of really great coaches. Is there anything else that you wrote about? Think about, when it comes to the people that you competed against for so long, what they maybe did day in, day out as a coach as well.

Brian Katz: 8:47

Just had a couple of things pop in my mind. Number one they’re incredible learners. They’re constantly trying to learn and they can learn from anyone. I remember when I was at Santa Clara Carol Williams is the head coach. He’s in the WCC Hall of Fame and Santa Clara Hall of Fame he would reference you know, I was at my son’s junior high game. You should see this out of bounds by this guy.

Brian Katz: 9:08

Rand Can learn from anyone and I really think that’s a big deal and incredibly competitive and just incredibly tough-minded. Nothing would dissuade them Yet incredibly humble, but incredibly dissuade them. Yet incredibly humble, but incredibly tough-minded and driven and obsessed with the game. I think arrogance has a blind spot and I think when you’re arrogant, you’re about ready to get hit from behind.

Brian Katz: 9:34

The guys that I’ve seen and coached against, I’ll give you a good one the guy when I was at Weber State, randy Ray. He’s the all-time winningest coach in the history of the Big Sky in all the things we talked about. But’s the all-time winningest coach in the history of the Big Sky and all the things we talked about, but absolutely the most humble guy you could ever imagine, but incredibly competitive. I mean, when you played against him, man, you felt their presence. You felt his presence. You felt it. But I’ll tell you this If you beat them which they beat us more than we beat them he would always stop and make a point and talk to you specifically about what a great job you did and it wasn’t a bunch of BS.

Patrick Carney: 10:10

Moving back to this conversation of a winning player versus a talented player, you know, in our prep and through your book, you also mentioned inner confidence versus cockiness and I’m assuming it’s probably a very thin line. But again going back to the evaluation, how you look to suss this out before you get them in the door.

Brian Katz: 10:30

Well, I’d like to see every guy play. You got to see him play well, of course, but I’d like to see him in every circumstance. I’d like to see him not play well, I’d like to see him really struggle. And then what I want to see is when they get punched in the mouth, they’re not playing well. The team’s up, what are they like? Are they the guy that just again? I’ll come back to Dylan Garrity or Chris Walker in the book. They were two of the best point guards I ever coached With them. It would be like, okay, you could just see them regroup and then just press forward.

Brian Katz: 11:00

So deep inner confidence. What does that really mean? It means under any situation. When you get, you’re under the gun and things aren’t going your way. Your body language doesn’t change, your attitude doesn’t change, your effort doesn’t change, your energy level doesn’t change. None of it changes. I always say the highest compliment I can pay anybody is call them a quiet competitor, meaning you go in the gym. You can’t tell if they’re up 20 or down 20. You can’t tell any difference. To me, that’s deep inner confidence, and I’ll ramble about deep inner confidence a little bit. It’s things like this.

Brian Katz: 11:32

I talked about this in the book with Phil Ritchie. He gets 38 points in the first game of a tournament. By the way, he’s going to the JC Hall of Fame this Wednesday. It’s unbelievable honor. 80% of the guys are NBA players. He was a 15-year pro overseas, played for me at Delta College. Okay, he gets 38 the first night. The second night of a tournament, he gets two fouls in the first four minutes. Take him out. We go on a run, don’t put him back in. Start him second half. We go on a run, don’t put him back in. He plays eight minutes. He scores four points. I look down the end of the bench he is absolutely waving the towel, so excited for his teammates. He’s literally running down and getting water from the water cooler and sprinting back and during the timeouts down on his hands and knees giving his teammates water. So I tapped my assistant on the shoulder. I said Rich, by the way, he’s still a coach at Delta College, rich Ress. I said Rich, what night do you think was more fun for Phillip? Last night when he had 38, or tonight? He goes tonight Deep inner confidence.

Brian Katz: 12:30

He understands my day’s coming, my day’s pretty much every day. I know who I am. I know I’m a really good player. These guys, getting to play is great for them. Guys, getting to play is always great for morale. And you think about this in this age of stat driven stuff and social media, where if a guy like his status who’s player of the year in a state, end up playing at Oregon State, and all that, what happened? You only scored four points. Oh God, you know zero. The young man has to have the ability to go. I don’t care about that. My day’s every day. This is their day. Today. I want to celebrate this. These guys are my friends and my brothers, my teammates, and this is good for our team and it’s not a phony thing. Hey, listen, he’s going out on Wednesday to be inducted in this junior college hall of fame. There’ll be 15, 20 teammates there. One’s coming in from Pennsylvania, all across the country, winning player deep inner confidence.

Dan Krikorian: 13:22

I know we’ve talked about this a little bit and you speak about it in the book too is about ways on the court now to distinguish these winning players from, say, maybe not as winning players. I know you talk about one-on-one competition, things like be competitive on the court. Your eyes tell you one thing when you see them play, but then also maybe keeping track of these things as well.

Brian Katz: 13:41

Well, what we did and I did this in high school and in junior college, and again, look, here’s the thing. I want to be real clear on this I got more questions and answers, and anything we’re talking about today is something that worked for me, and I’d call this whole conversation food for thought for everybody. So I don’t want to act like I got all the answers because I don’t, but here’s what we did in thought was really helpful. So let’s just start with junior college. Every day with the guys would come in, we’d put them on a team, but it was a different team. Every day we’d rotate the teams. You’re never on the same team twice.

Brian Katz: 14:08

Now you play open gym, play the six, one on six, defense calls the fouls, all of that. Keep records, keep track. At the end of the day, there’s always a tournament. You see them one through. Whatever, how many teams, you have a tournament. There’s always a champion every day Then. So let’s say, Dan, today your team was six and one, so on the board, six and one.

Brian Katz: 14:27

Well, we keep changing the teams. So over time, you’re going to get on a good team, have a younger team, an older team. So over time, you keep posting the records. You get a large sample size. Well, I’m going to tell you this this is what I found to believe the guys when you get the large sample size, they have the five best guys with the winning record. They’re going to end up being your five best players, Tony, right now. And our guys would walk by the board and they’d go oh, I’m 58 and 17 and oh, you’re 25 and 25. And then we’d also denote how many championships you won. Now, this is open gym and it starts in the spring, goes all the way to the start of practice in the fall. That kind of thing will really really guys will separate themselves the winning play because, again now you know, there’s always the thing of well, he’s always on the best team, no, no, no, we rotate the teams every day, Never on the same team twice.

Dan Krikorian: 15:16

One-on-one as well. Was there ways that you would play one-on-one or smaller games rather than always five-on-five too?

Brian Katz: 15:28

Yeah, we kept track of any and everything. I like the one-on-one thing, you know, with some restriction a little bit. I like player evaluation, real simple. We play. This is early on, so I’ll ramble One-on-one from the top of the key behind the three-point line, one-on-one from the foul line, one-on-one from low post. And here’s the reason why you want to figure out.

Brian Katz: 15:46

I had a team true story. I didn’t figure out until three games left in the season that our best post-up guy was our point guard. I mean, that’s just stupid, that’s just dumb coaching. Now, that’s what kind of motivated me to do this. You might find out your best low post player is your point guard. You might find out your best one-on-one guy at 15 feet is your five man. Well, whoever it is, players have different skills and abilities and if you just well, you’re a big, you’re down here. Tell you this transition and rebounding.

Brian Katz: 16:09

On the last team I coached, at Delta, my point guard always penetrated kid named LeVar Neufeld six to 200 went on to play at Pacific. He was a great penetrator and a great offensive rebounder. Now my four man was a really good shooter and not a very good athlete. So I’d say, why am I having my four-man sprint into rebound, take him a half hour to get there and then have to run back where LeVar is a great athlete. He’s already in and down and around there, let him rebound.

Brian Katz: 16:35

So I switched their roles. I’d say, okay, benny, you are a get-back guy even though you’re the four-man. Levar, you’re a go-to-the-boards guy. Even though you’re the four man, levar, you’re a go-to-the-boards guy even though you’re a one man. So those are things that as I got older, I never took for granted. I went let’s be open minded and really evaluate our guys and I’ll tell you this when you talk about their offensive abilities and their skills one-on-one from the low post, one-on-one from the elbow, one-on-one from above the three-point line and make it competitive, you’ll find out what your guy’s strengths and weaknesses are.

Patrick Carney: 17:05

On this evaluation now with them on the court in the gym. How would you also evaluate who your leaders were?

Brian Katz: 17:13

I think it takes quite a while and you’re not going to figure it out overnight. If you have a new player coming in the gym, he hadn’t been around the guys much, probably you’re not going to see a lot of that, although you might. I think the key over time is, first of all, everybody has to be a leader in their own way every day. Number one, so it’s by role modeling, an example, by doing things properly. Okay, is the kid engaged? All the above. Does he communicate? Does he have big energy? All of that. Can you feel his presence? Again, a lot of this is subjective, of course it is, but do you feel his presence offensively and defensively? Okay, so now, over a period of time, you will figure out just by watching them.

Brian Katz: 17:53

This is what I always like to do. Let’s say we had seven or eight teams lined up open gym. Right off the bat I say, okay, pat, you got a team Dan, you got a team LeVar, you got a team Dan, you got a team LeVar. You got a team Amor, you got a team. Okay, then you go to your team. I would watch immediately when they went to their teams and said okay, I’ll give you a minute to huddle up. Who runs the huddle? Who says what? Who runs the huddle and what are they saying? More importantly, I don’t need this got got, got conversation, blah, but what are they saying? This is what Chris Walker would do. I’ve seen this a hundred times. So you’re playing open gym. He’d look at the team and go okay, phil Richie, 6’8″, best low post player on the other team Go okay. Now look when the ball goes in the low post. I’m going to guard Sean. He’s not a very good shooter. I’m going to double down every time on Phil. All right, just make sure you guys double down. I’m going to double down those kinds of conversations. Those are your leaders and again, it may not happen overnight, but if you watch close. That’s why I like to let them huddle up in between games too. Boom, you’ve just lost a couple in a row. I want to see what they do. Here’s the acid test. I really believe this.

Brian Katz: 18:59

You know, when the ball goes in the basket for the team that’s lost their first three or four games, do they go like that and go to different ends? One goes to get a drink of water, they just spread out and start complaining. Or do they immediately come together and start talking. And is there a guy that’s going to lead that Winning? Players are constantly trying to figure out how to win the game. So it starts with your open gym. Are guys conversing about how to win the game If they’re just playing?

Brian Katz: 19:26

I never like just playing an open gym, it’s irrelevant, it doesn’t have anything to do with winning. But again, play six, win on six. Oh, every possession matters. You turn it over, you’re in trouble, all the above. Now guys have to start talking and then you see who’s kind of disinterested and more pouting about how they’re playing. Or I’m 0-5, coach, put me on a lousy team. Or Sam Kirby and Chris Walker. I write about their tantrum as point guard. Sam, quiet, calm, very solid. That’s how he did it. Great leader Chris, a little more alpha, a little louder, a little more aggressive, but their conversation was only about how to win, nothing else.

Dan Krikorian: 20:08

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Patrick Carney: 21:15

You know you talked about kind of your process and the value of the open gyms and seeing who runs the huddle, but you did mention in our prep the dangers or when a coach makes someone the captain, why you wouldn’t do that, I guess, or why you wouldn’t recommend just making someone the captain without really this proper evaluation or understanding of who your team is versus, like you just think this guy is the captain or you want him to be the captain.

Brian Katz: 21:37

The reason I know about that is because I made that mistake about 15, 20 years ago. I’m never going to do that again. When you have a reluctant leader, you know you got to be eager to do it. You can’t be willing. So I had a kid, great kid and a really good player, but it just wasn’t. And so you’re constantly kind of forced on and then you just feel like you’re trying to kind of square peg into a round hole and then what happens is you don’t really get any leadership because you’re not getting what you want.

Brian Katz: 22:05

So my conclusion over the years was if a guy wasn’t eager and this is based on me watching him and his teammates and with interaction from teammates and input from teammates, you know, sometimes I’d have them vote. Sometimes I just talked to a few veteran guys. But bottom line was, if I didn’t have an eager leader or two, I’d tell them you know what? No captains. This year I’m your leader, because no captain is better than a guy who’s not going to lead. The answer is real simple You’re either helping or you’re hurting. There’s no middle ground. You’re leading or you’re not. No middle ground, you’re part of the problem, you’re part of the solution. So I just got frustrated with myself.

Brian Katz: 22:50

I said kid’s a good kid, he’s a 4.0 student, he’s all this, he’s all that. He can give you the right answer yes or no, sir. But he doesn’t want to do that. And you even ask him hey, what do you think about me being captain? Okay, well, yeah, I think I can do that, as opposed to the guy that you want is. You don’t even ask him about being captain. You figured out overstudying him. He wants to be captain. It’s not like he wants to be. He knows he is. Come on, man. Yeah, we want to win, let’s get going here.

Patrick Carney: 23:11

On those seasons where you say there is no captain.

Brian Katz: 23:14

How does your role change that season as a coach, compared to when you have good leadership, player leadership here’s the way, it would be different, okay, so let’s go to the time when you have really good captains, okay, and then I’ll go back to it. You’re constantly meeting once a week with your guys and I still think you need to meet, even when you don’t have great leadership. You got to meet with key guys randomly throughout there. So what I would say is a couple of things. One, your captains that are good leaders. You meet and say two guys once a week, year round, okay, you don’t have that. Then you’re meeting with random guys throughout the year because you got to kind of keep them all. You’re the leader, you got to keep them all kind of on the same page and the whole deal and you want them to be message senders.

Brian Katz: 23:54

I would say during those years and we didn’t have a captain I spent more time in pre-practice with kind of a message, a theme. I was a lot more focused and directed on what we wanted. That day, you know, you can say, well, we’re going to work more on our defense team. Eh, not so much that as hey, today, here’s what I need from you guys. Okay, I want you to really focus on when things don’t go well, I want you to make sure you go the other direction and have more energy. You have more energy when things don’t go well today. That is going to be our emphasis, things like that. So you have to kind of script it a little more for them and you hope that over time your goal would be by about two thirds of the way through the season. It’s all kind of gotten to them and then indirectly you’re getting some leadership from them. But you don’t want to throw it on somebody. You didn’t want to do it because it’ll all be bad. I’m just telling you.

Patrick Carney: 24:48

I think there’s peacetime leaders and wartime leaders, for lack of a better word. But you know, every season has its adversity. I mean it goes to understanding who your leaders are and how they lead, but also understanding what your experience has been with maybe guys who are good when things are going well, then they’re good leaders, but when things are going bad, maybe they’re not necessarily that wartime leader who’s going to do what’s necessary to galvanize the team and keep the team in line and trying to get out of, let’s say, the slump that you’re in or when season isn’t going as expected.

Brian Katz: 25:15

Well, if things are going their way and they don’t have a great attitude, in my mind they’re not leaders. I really believe this that the easiest day to lead is game time. That’s the easiest day. Everybody’s amped up, everybody wants to win. Of course, everyone wants to win. The hardest time to lead is practice. It’s brutal, it’s long, it’s the day-to-day grind. It’s the pressure of having to win, it’s the pressure of getting yourself motivated to play and your teammates motivated. To me, those are your leaders. Because game day everybody can pound their chest and yell at a guy. I don’t necessarily know that that’s leading. And I’ll tell you one thing If you haven’t been the leader day to day, in practice, through the grind, your teammates not going to respond. Come game time, when you get on them, they’re just not going to.

Patrick Carney: 26:04

And with the tough practices, the long practices, when there were seasons, whether you knew who your leaders were, how you thought about, maybe practice planning with the intent of I want to stress these guys I want to see who my winners are, who’s going to come out leading my team and how you maybe thought about some practices, or what you did to maybe make it hard and test the guys and stress them and to discover some of these things that we’re talking about.

Brian Katz: 26:25

I had a player. He called this part of the season the first six weeks, World War III, and here’s what I would do. I intentionally wanted to make it as hard as I could make it for the first six weeks. I mean my emphasis. Of course you’re teaching, but I wanted it to be hard, long. I wanted tough conditioning. I wanted all the above. I didn’t care, I wanted six weeks of that.

Brian Katz: 26:48

I wasn’t going to worry if guys didn’t like it or this, that and the other, because at the end of the day, to your point, you’re going to find out who your leaders are and who your posers are, who the guys are trying to fake their way through it, who really are not invested and who you cannot count on and who you can count. So I want to make it so tough on them that they seriously think about quitting. But don’t so now. When they’ve now realized, oh, I fought through that, I can’t quit, I think you got something. Now I really do. You got to have a period where it’s very difficult, whatever that means for you. It’s very difficult and you can figure out quickly who’s going to give in and who’s not giving in.

Brian Katz: 27:29

Now let’s come back to winning players or talented players. We’ve all been there. Well, I know he didn’t really, he kind of came through, but he’s really talented and we need him. You answered your own question. And look, I had a team Maybe the reason I learned this the best when I was the last in college, my second year. We were really talented. We won 21 games but, trust me, we underachieved. And you know why? Because I had a couple of talented players that were not winning players and I put all my eggs in their basket, so we underachieved. Now you could say well, coach, you won 21 games. At the end of the day, you know in your heart of hearts, and so does your team know. You know if you overachieved or you’re underachieved. We all know that. Okay, outsiders may not, although some outsiders can see it. So bottom line on it is that’s why I think player evaluation is huge at any level, even junior high, high school. If you put all your eggs and I did that I counted on these two guys that were extremely talented.

Dan Krikorian: 28:28

They weren’t bad guys, but they weren’t winning players we want to transition now to a segment on the show that we call start, sub or sit. For those maybe listening for the first time, 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 on the bench, and then we’ll discuss from there that’s a lot of asses.

Brian Katz: 28:48

I may be stuttering here. I’ll try. I’ll do the best I can it’s okay, it’s our segment.

Dan Krikorian: 28:53

we stutter all the time on it still, so don’t worry about it. So, coach, this first one actually is going to kind of build on the winning theme that we were just talking about. This is called good to great and it’s taking a good team and helping them become a great team. The background on this for us is, you know, your first seven seasons at Sacramento State, you guys incrementally got better and better in conference, until you just mentioned earlier that I believe that 2015 season, where you were a game away from winning it all, and we wanted to talk about three different aspects of winning that a good team can turn into a great team.

Dan Krikorian: 29:28

So option one is a great team understands how to win close games. That’s the hard part to teach. The second option is a great team understands how to win close games. That’s the hard part to teach. The second option is a great team understands how to win multiple games in a row. Understands how to really string together wins. And then the third option is a great team understands how to bounce back from losses, not let one loss turn into two or three in a row Start, sub or sit. Good to great those three options.

Brian Katz: 29:55

Wow, those are pretty good options. I’ll tell you what I would. Start number three Bouncing back. Okay, I think number three is huge. Winning close games has got to be my sub.

Dan Krikorian: 30:05

Okay, and then sit would be the winning multiple row. Well, I’d like to go back to your start, which was the bouncing back, and as you were building those years at Sacramento State and you’re getting to the point where your team was able to bounce back we were talking about winning players in the first part of the conversation, but maybe some characteristics of those teams or those practices that allowed you to not turn one loss into two or three in a row.

Brian Katz: 30:32

Again. Come back to your leaders. Early on our leaders weren’t as good as they were later when they became good again. Your captains are your message senders. You’re giving them messages, they’re parroting that through the group, the whole deal. But I think this is really a big key to bouncing back from losses. I think it comes from the coach a lot. You can’t get too high or too low. You know you win. This is classic in the Big Sky Conference Classic. You’d go and you’d beat Weber State on the road All right. Now, if that’s going to be a big party because you beat Weber State and they’re great and the whole deal, you’re probably losing on Saturday night at Idaho State. The key to being able to bounce back is the coach not getting too high or too low about any win or any loss.

Brian Katz: 31:17

I’ll give you this one. We had a 22-point lead with seven points to go early on in one of my teams at Sac State and we lost to Idaho State with seven minutes to go. We were up 22. Now what I’m proud of is we won the next game and the reason was we went in and I said this is just me again. For me, I always made a commitment and I tell them early in the season I’m not talking anymore two minutes after the game Win or lose, it’s going to be hey, good job.

Brian Katz: 31:41

Hey. Tomorrow, one o’clock, study hall, bus leaves at three, great Hydrate, whatever. Hey, we’ll see you guys. Good job, loss. Listen, forget about this one until tomorrow. Tomorrow we’ll wake up, we’ll deal with it. We’ll work on the three things because it’s always three things, it always seems to be. We’ll address those tomorrow. Well, the reason is you’re not too high, you’re not too low. So when we lost to Idaho State after a lead by 22, with seven minutes to go the next day, now you’ve looked at the film, you’re calmed down, you’re not upset. Everybody’s still innerly mad because you lost, but now you can go. Okay, now listen, here’s the bottom line. Let’s go through and look at these clips. What kind of shot was that? What kind of shot was that? Okay, bing bang, bonk, let’s get back. So I’m going to go back to this. I think the key is not getting too high or getting too low.

Dan Krikorian: 32:30

In my opinion and I think it emanates from the coach- you just mentioned that it’s always three things, and I just would love to go a little deeper on that why, you know, in your career you thought it was usually three things that were needing to be corrected or talked about the next day.

Brian Katz: 32:45

I can’t explain it. It just always seems to be three things. Let’s just take that game. You could go one. Let’s look at the film. Look at all that false bravado and all that goofy celebrating like we’ve already won the game. He’s shown that that was one Meaning. We thought the game was over Two. Now let’s look at our shot selection here. Is this a shot John, you would take? No, you guys are drunk with yourselves. You think to the bench Now that they’ve got it inside 10, look how insecure we look. So what was it, guys? We got cocky, and when cockiness is challenged, it turns to insecurity. I don’t care, there’s very few absolutes in the game of basketball, that’s one. So you guys were cocky, okay. Then we got challenged, you got insecure, and then it affected our shot selection because everybody went First. It was oh, we won, I’m going for my own. Then, when it got tough and we got insecure, then everybody was afraid to shoot. It’s three things. I don’t care, it’s always three things.

Patrick Carney: 33:50

My follow-up has to do with when you’re on a winning streak. During that period, what are you, as a coach and a staff, talking about in terms of, yes, let’s celebrate our guys they’re doing a great job but also we don’t want to get complacent. You think about the fine line between celebrating them but keeping them on edge. So you’re obviously continuing to get better and improve. We’re never playing a perfect game where there is nothing. You said there’s always three things.

Brian Katz: 34:19

So just how you thought about the team in the middle of a winning streak. So it’s complete opposites. Always, I always believe this when you’re winning, you can coach them harder, can constantly keep them on edge. Because they’re winning, they feel good about themselves. Now, when you’re losing, you are the ultimate teacher. You are calm and you’re very direct, but you’re calm. And you’re very direct, but you’re calm and you’re not riding them per se, because they’re already getting beat up, they’re already insecure, they’re already frustrated. Now, when you’re winning, it needs to be the opposite. I’d always say three things. This will always our goal get better every day, win the next game, have more fun than 18 the country. I tell them number three is not going to happen if one and two don’t happen, but it was always get better every day, win the next game. I wasn’t afraid to coach my team harder. I’d coach them harder, I’d be more aggressive and I’d challenge them more. When we’re losing, every bit is constructive, but calm and very positive, because they’re already down on themselves, need to see a way out.

Patrick Carney: 35:17

The seasons that you have good leaders and you’re holding those weekly meetings in the middle of a winning streak. What is maybe the conversation you’re having with your leaders? What are you conveying with them?

Brian Katz: 35:24

First thing I always want to talk about what was going on during the week. Say so, it’s Monday, we got at NAU Thursday. You know we’re going to leave Wednesday and then we’re at Northern Colorado Saturday. Okay, so let’s talk about that for a minute, about the travel, this, that and the other thing. And then, of course, I’d always ask them questions what are some thoughts?

Brian Katz: 35:40

Dylan, Mike, you guys have traveled NAU Coach, you know we got to really hit the guys hard on the hydrating thing because the altitude is 7,200 feet all the above. So those kinds of things are always first. Then you constantly say all right, now, look, guys, you know the deal, Come on one, five in a row. But you know where I’m going with this.

Brian Katz: 35:57

What’s the state of the team? Are we getting cocky or are we in a good spot where we’re still working and we’re still aggressive and we’re still finding ways to get better every day? Are we getting a little fat and happy, that kind of thing? So you constantly are kind of talking to them about that kind of a thing and say now, look, your job to make sure those guys are reminded that this can turn in one second. It’s your job to remind them that our games are won or lost in practice with our preparation, and we’ve got to have a great one every day this week and the whole deal. You’re constantly kind of reminding them and then ask them what’s the state of the team, what do you think about where we are right now and what do you think we might need to do about that?

Patrick Carney: 36:39

With cockiness, I mean I’m sure you see it before these meetings, but what do you see? Or what does your team show you? Where you’re not like we’re cocky, we’re not hungry, like we need to be in like a practice setting, what are they doing?

Brian Katz: 36:51

Not practicing hard, not practicing with a purpose, not focused. The vibe you can tell just by the feel of practice if it’s businesslike and driven by winning, or it’s more like driven by oh hey, look at us, look how great we are, you know. Look, I had a team at Delta won 25 in a row and let me tell you right now that team was the same team every day, made no difference. They were completely businesslike and completely focused. It’s because leaders Chris Walker, sam Kirby, again, you know, when you see the attention to detail slip, it could even be running a line, drill A guy. He doesn’t touch the line. You’re going to go. Well, come on, coach, you’re being picky.

Patrick Carney: 37:34

No no, you know your culture.

Brian Katz: 37:35

You know what you expect or like in your shooting process. If it’s hey, like we would have a shooting process, our guys go out. The first thing would be rollout shooting. They do it on their own. Second thing would be hit the floor shooting. If you notice, guys got out a little bit later in pre-practice and maybe skipped one of those because they were a little bit not early for pre-practice. Right off the bat, that tells me we’re behind the eight ball right now and then probably at some point now your message senders would call for a huddle and say something to the group Come on, man, what are you guys doing? You know you’re supposed to be here 20 minutes early at every practice. How come?

Brian Katz: 38:11

you got here 15 minutes early and then you skipped rollout shooting. Come on, we’re headed in the wrong direction.

Dan Krikorian: 38:20

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Patrick Carney: 38:59

All right, coach, our last start subset for you has to do with the value of shooting with your players before, after practice, on an individual basis. And what would be the greatest value you derive from shooting with your players Was option one, in providing them with that shooter, that player with confidence. Option two, in teaching them shot selection. Or option three, in teaching them role definition.

Brian Katz: 39:25

Start confidence, absolutely 100%. It’s power suggestion, it’s subliminal message, bear with me. When I was at Sac State, we took over, we had to go at five in the morning. Jim wasn’t available all day long. So if I text you and say, hey, meet me tomorrow at 440, we’re going to shoot for 20 minutes beforehand, you go, coach is going to be there 20 minutes for the head coach and he’s going to work with me right off the bat. And I think this is really a big deal, especially if you’re struggling. It basically says hey, man, I believe in you, it’s fine. And you don’t even have to say see, you’re not saying you don’t have to give them the big hey, I believe in you.

Brian Katz: 40:02

It’s your action, it’s passing, it’s hustling, you’re hustling after the ball, you’re rifling the ball. You know on time, on target. You’re excited, you’re boom. Then you play a kind of a competitive game. We always play that. One beat Michael Jordan. We used to call it play to 11, you know the game. And then when the kid hits it, you’re excited and get all excited. You high five him, boom. You’re sweating, you’re moving and he looks around, he goes. He’s working harder than I am Now. No, no, no, no. I mean, you guys can work about all you want, but when I tell a guy I’m meeting him and I typically have a guy before and oftentimes a guy after and it doesn’t even matter you know if things are going well or not going well, but I can tell you for sure.

Brian Katz: 40:46

If it’s not going well, I’m eating you and we’re working on it, because what better validation that you know I believe in you.

Patrick Carney: 40:53

If I had to make you choose in between also using this before or after shooting to teach shot selection or role definition, which would have the greater value when you do these little sessions with the players?

Brian Katz: 41:04

Shot selection because, again, it’s our suggestion. Subliminal, dumb example. I got Shaquille O’Neal. We’re not out there shooting threes. He’s kind of going oh okay, well, we’re working on him setting the on ball rolling hard. We’re working on him reverse post pinning his guy. Oh okay, these are the oh okay and your language okay, now let’s work on things you’re going to do in the game. Goes right to the young man, because that’s kind of splitting hairs If you think about it. That’s a little bit of role definition too, but I would say it’s shot selection.

Patrick Carney: 41:33

What other ways? Because, I mean, I think it’s a conversation that we’re always talking with coaches, besides this shooting windows, we’re talking about what other ways. Did you, on an individual basis, talk about shot selection and help your players understand what’s a good shot, bad shot for them?

Brian Katz: 41:47

First things first. We’d always start in July, right, and we’d never say a word to them about shot selection until about October 1, because I don’t want anybody to say, well, you wouldn’t let me shoot, no, no, no, we charted every shot. We charted every scrimmage. We let you shoot whatever you wanted to shoot. Now you got your data, you start going through and you’re showing them their percentage on shots. You bring them in, you show them film of shots. Yeah, you’re open, but Dylan’s more open. Who’s a better shooter by percentage? Let’s look at oh, dylan’s a better three-point shooter by percentage. Well then, you have to pass that up and go good to great. You know that kind of thing. I didn’t want to coach him early on it, but then, once we drew the line, I was going to coach him really hard on it and I really wanted them to know exactly what a good shot was, what it was. Now here’s the other part, and again, I hate to keep referencing the book, but for example, in the book, I also think you have to empower your players to work on that. As an example, we did this with Dylan Garrity. We had Dylan Garrity day. I was so frustrated that he wouldn’t shoot open shots. Now here’s the thing. You shoot a hundred threes around the horn, all right. Five spots, 20 shots, whatever you make, take off 40. That’s what the guy’s going to shoot in the game. So if he makes 90, he’s probably going to shoot 50% of the game. He’s an elite shooter. If he makes 70, he’s probably going to shoot 30%. I’m just telling you Okay. So now here’s Dylan Garrity. He’s making 85 to 88. All right, now here we go into our shot selection thing. I’ll never forget this.

Brian Katz: 43:14

We had a scrimmage on a Saturday and we went through and he passed up every shot known to man because he’d rather pass than shoot. So brought him in on Monday and I said, okay, real simple, I’m going to freeze this segment every time when Dylan has the ball. And I’m going to ask the guys now Dylan, pay attention, okay, freeze it how many think Dylan should have shot that? You see that, dylan, every guy in the room thinks you should have shot that. Next one, next one. We had one whole day of that and yet let me throw this out I do believe this, your best players, that you’re going to give more freedom to.

Brian Katz: 43:49

I would correct them on shot selection in a quote. I don’t want to say negative way, like that was a bad shot, way, that was with them in the office, not in front of the team, because I want them to have some freedom to feel good about it. And no, that’s a general statement. But also I’d say things like you know, again in the book Kevin Bland, by the way, played at UC Irvine player here in the state. He wouldn’t shoot the ball. I would tell him in front of the group all right now, look, kevin, you have to shoot two bad shots today. Did you guys hear that? You guys hear that you have to shoot two bad shots? Well, you wasn’t going to shoot two bad shots. He didn’t want to. You know whatever.

Brian Katz: 44:25

But I think sometimes your team can help you. Now you can go the other way. It depends on the relationship of the teammates and the veteran-ness of your group, so to speak. But you can sometimes go right in front of the group and go okay, freeze, isaiah, what do you think? Is that a good shot or not? Probably not. Okay, what do you guys think? And you know what guys are. They’re going to be a little hesitant to say to Isaiah or to say to Patrick, that’s a bad shot.

Brian Katz: 44:48

But I would say to you, when you already known this, we’ve already gone through this you shot a contested shot and Dan was open in the corner. A lot better, go, okay, freeze it, pat. What do you think about that? Probably, maybe, you go. I think it’s a good shot. Okay, how about the rest of you guys? What do you guys think? Well, coach Dan’s open in the corner. Okay, you guys think maybe he should have passed that up? Gone, good, great, okay, all right, pat, you kind of get the point. You know that kind of a thing. So, again, like I always say, let the film and the stats speak for themselves. And then you just go from there. And my line always on shot selection is always you know cause.

Brian Katz: 45:25

Look, what’s the main problem? Is it typically trying to get the guy to shoot more? No, it’s the guy who’s shooting too many bad shots. My thing’s real simple Always put it, don’t let it be personal. Hey, this shooting too many bad shots. My thing’s real simple Always put it, don’t let it be personal. Hey, this isn’t personal, pat, I just cannot allow you to shoot shots, low percentage shots. They’re going to keep your team from winning. I can’t penalize your teammates for that. Hey, I’m just doing my job. It’s your team, it’s your guy’s team, it’s not my team. I’m just here, I’m just steering the ship. But, pat, I can’t allow you to shoot shots like that and penalize your teammate.

Dan Krikorian: 45:56

Going back to shooting with your players and let’s say during the season how much you would or would not try to tweak or adjust a player’s shot, as opposed to an off season when you’re shooting with your better players and how much you would work with them on, like, say, technique or those parts of the shot.

Brian Katz: 46:13

Zero change structurally during the season.

Brian Katz: 46:16

Zero. Here’s what I would say. We coach every guy from the waist down every day, year round. Our process was we’d say park your car, which means probably for most people, shot ready. Park your car One, two, jump up, reach up, finish. Okay, boom, that’s our process. Park your car One, two, left right, jump up, reach up, finish. If you’re right-handed, of course, okay. So you’re coaching that every day. That’s from the waist down. Hey, dan, tap your hands on the floor. You got to get lower, lower Waist down. Okay, that’s every day you’re around.

Brian Katz: 46:45

But any structural change which really means from the waist up maybe it’s guy’s elbows here or the balls rolling around his palm or his thumbs involved we’re not attacking that till the off season because the pressure to succeed is too great. The young man’s going to get worse before he’s going to get better. Anytime, you make a change anytime, and so to me, if you’re going to make a change, you got to start about two weeks after the season’s over. You bring him in, you show his numbers, you show on film what you’re trying to work with, and then you work from let’s call it April, all the way to October, november, on that. One thing, only one, only one. Mike McKinney. You know, I had him. It was one a year. The first year it was you’ll never believe this he would scissor kick. He would lean back, which his legs would cross, he’d scissor kick. So he’s always off balance. Okay, got that down. Keep your feet under your butt. Okay, feet under your butt no scissor kick. Then we worked on his thumb. We put a coin right here. So every time you shoot, if your thumb gets involved, the coin falls out. We had a segment in that pre-practice, you know, because really good shooters shoot the ball one handed, so we’d have one hand shooting comes off these two fingers. You know, you guys know all this stuff. Okay, now we had about a five minute segment when he would shoot with the coin right here. So now, if you’re doing that, coin’s going to fall out. Here’s the other part too, and I believe this is really huge Baseball, they only got one hitting coach, only one guy talking to him.

Brian Katz: 48:18

Basketball, they only got one shooting coach. My guys know no one is going to talk to them about changing their shot except me. You do not talk to them about anything from the waist up. You talk to them about things from the waist down, meaning walk your car one, two, jump up, reach up, finish. That’s it. Now my staff would say to me coach, you know a little note, I think I’ve been watching Cody. The ball is not really on the pads of his fingers, it’s kind of in his palm. I think that’s why the ball rolls off. I think off season that’s something just to note you could really get on. So I want their observations from my assistants, but I don’t want them talking to him about it, because you guys know, when a guy’s struggling shooting, his dad says you’re not reaching up high enough. You know his cousin says oh, your elbow’s out a little bit. Hey, you need to take three breaths before you shoot this. Pretty soon, the kid, how could you ever make a shot like that?

Dan Krikorian: 49:12

Absolutely, coach. You’re off the start, sub or sit hot seat. Thanks for playing that game with us. Really enjoyed your answers there, coach. We’ve got one final question to close the show, but before we do, really appreciate you coming on today and sharing all your knowledge, your stories, your time Appreciate you coming on today and sharing all your knowledge, your stories, your time. This was really fun, so thank you very much.

Brian Katz: 49:30

Oh, I appreciate it. This is a blast. You kidding me. Anytime you get to talk basketball coaches, oh it’s fantastic. I could do this all day, every day. You’re doing me a favor, Are you kidding me?

Dan Krikorian: 49:41

We appreciate that. Our final question that we ask all the guests on the show is what’s the best investment that you’ve made in your career as a coach?

Brian Katz: 49:50

First things first. Let me just say this I really mean this. I really appreciate your guys’ questions. They’re very, very, very good. I really do. You’ve clearly thought them out and they’re kind of right to the meat of things, thank you. But anyway, best investment I think I’m going to call it one and one a one is find someone, or maybe a group of coaches or somebody that you know can really coach and really study them.

Brian Katz: 50:17

Here’s how I got to Santa Clara university. I worked under Carol Williams and Dick Davey. They didn’t recruit me, I recruited them. I worked their camp. I had two players, they recruited all the above and I remember hearing Carol Williams speak at a clinic and I had been already at their camps and seen it was a teaching driven camp and the whole thing. And I went I’m gonna work for that guy. So I just made my mind up. It’s this simple. I picked up the phone in the spring of 1987, picked up the phone, called Santa Clara’s office and I knew Dick and Carol. Dick picked up the phone. I said hey, dick, brian, katz, what do you think the odds of me coming to Santa Clara as a graduate assistant are? Oh well, I have talked to Carol.

Brian Katz: 50:55

And this is the second part, I think, and, by the way, I went there and really learned the game. They can really teach the game. I really learned the game from them. But here’s the other part too. Then the other second part is I think you have to have the ability to take some risks and make the tough move and bet on yourself. So as an example here, I was as a high school coach in Sacramento. I had tenure. I was 29 years old, we had the number one team in the city. The year before we had Richard Manning back, who ended up being an NBA player, went to Syracuse. We had our whole top eight back and yet I gave everything up a house, all of that, the tenure, the salary to go down to Santa Clara and work for nothing. When I say nothing, they pay for my tuition. But it was like hey, pay for your tuition. How you live, what you do, you’re going to have to figure that out Well. So I wanted to learn from them because I scouted them out. Then I bet on myself. Now, that’s not a real popular decision. If most people were given that choice, I’m not sure they would do that.

Brian Katz: 51:58

Then you know, from there, long story short, went up to Lassen College in Susanville, california, population 7,000. It’s in the middle of nowhere now. I mean, it’s Northeastern California, that kind of thing. And then, ultimately, let’s come back when I left Delta. And then you go to Sac State, which at the time was arguably the worst job in the country, if not pretty close.

Brian Katz: 52:17

But you’re betting on yourself. How can you bet on yourself and take risks? The only way you can is if you have attached yourself to some great mentors and really studied and gotten obsessed with the craft of coaching, because you know at some point in time you’re going to have to be able to adapt and adjust in every situation and coach a variety of ways at a variety of levels. But I think they fit hand in hand. One really study who you think can really coach and then, look, I was a cowboy there. Come on now. I mean I was this guy and I didn’t. I didn’t do anything there other than set the gym up to this, but I’m studying, I’m studying, I’m studying, I’m studying and I recruited them.

Dan Krikorian: 52:58

So one find that and then don’t be afraid to bet on yourself always a pleasure for us to talk to someone and roll them with questions. Someone like himself, who is coaching for 45 years and tons of success at multiple levels, and us just get to sit here and lob questions is always a pleasure. And he hit out of the park today with great stories, great insight, great wisdom, all down the line. Yeah, I mean, I was telling you before. He hopped on and is always a pleasure, and he hit out of the park today with great stories, great insight, great wisdom, all down the line.

Patrick Carney: 53:31

Yeah, I mean I was telling you before he hopped on and exactly what you said. Just the experience they have and what they’ve experienced and players and situations. It’s invaluable. So it’s always a pleasure when we get a chance to pick their mind and, you know, hit on topics more so on, yeah, just leadership like the real world, coaching kind of problems or situations. I go back it’s always a pleasure when we have one of the Van Gundys on, but like guys like that that just have experience for days and getting to learn from them, I think we always have the same reaction when we end the pod, like just what a career and just I don’t think there’s anything we could ask them that they wouldn’t have had experience on or be surprised by or dealt with at some point.

Dan Krikorian: 54:14

Yeah, probably multiple times.

Patrick Carney: 54:16

Yeah, exactly, yeah, yeah, like it’s old news.

Dan Krikorian: 54:18

And I think what’s fun for us too is obviously this podcast. We love at times getting you know tactical and technical and really diving into those things and then, like today, even though not ton, let’s say tactically, x and o, y is all over the place. So much wisdom and stuff to take away. That’s under and I think that’s the fun part about the podcast and, as you know, coaching in general it’s not. You know, the schemes and x’s and o’s are fantastic, but it’s all that stuff underneath it that one makes it enjoyable and heartbreaking, as he mentioned, and tough, but also is where I think the real leadership, the real coaching comes into play is just knowing how to deal with these types of situations and leaders, and he had some great examples about winners versus talent and stuff we’ll get into in a second. So yeah, as you can tell you and I are excited to dive into this wrap up session.

Patrick Carney: 55:08

So yeah, as you can tell, you and I are excited to dive into this wrap-up session. Yeah, definitely, I mean getting into it. It was fun. I mean the topic we settled on in the first bucket of differentiating between like or splitting hairs, between what’s a winning player versus a talented player, again going back to his experience, and you know, then we started to get into what it means to be dedicated versus obsessed and how he tries to find an obsessed player versus a dedicated player. It was fun just splitting the hairs, but this makes the difference between what we get back to winning and losing and like how to find these players.

Patrick Carney: 55:39

And I think he mentioned something when he said that just because the stereotype that it’s a winning team, he must be a winning player or it’s a losing team, he has to be a losing player. You know it’s a stereotype team he must be a winning player or it’s a losing team, he has to be a losing player. You know it’s hysteria stuff, so maybe it’s not always true. But then what does he look for? Again, drawing on his experience then, what has he seen in the players on a losing team that are still winners, and how he recruits to that finds, that finds like these diamonds in the rough, especially, you know we hit on when you’re at Sacramento State or we’re not all at a power conference. You know it’s like you gotta then find ways to seek these players out, and knowing these small details make a huge difference yeah, and I think it’s something as this podcast is coming out.

Dan Krikorian: 56:16

I know everybody at the college level that I coach at and you’re in recruiting and you’re the transfer portal and you’re trying to add to your team and you’re trying like heck to figure out how do I get winners. And you know we got into some stuff on the court that they did within their own program the one-on-one, the keeping track of winners and losers in open gym, which is great, and that’s obviously once they get into your program. And then I did like the little distinction between dedicated and obsessed and that often, you know, is that subtle difference. Just quick backstory on this.

Dan Krikorian: 56:51

We wanted to get into this bucket with him because in his book the road more traveled, he does have a couple chapters and the book’s actually really cool how it’s laid out where it’s chapters are about these different players that he coached and like kind of the lessons he learned from those players and the one he had about these two particular guys, chris walker and sam kirby, that just how great of leaders they were and how they were winners and all these scenarios that they went through on those teams that those guys led, how they were able to get through it and I think we wanted to just dive into that even more, because then he added some nice insights about how he had earlier teams that were more talented but underachieved because his top guys weren’t leaders, and I think it’s subtle but it’s not right.

Dan Krikorian: 57:38

Everybody listening to this right now totally understands what he’s talking about. Where you have players in your program that have that distinction, and boy, it’s a lot more enjoyable to coach the guys that have both the talent, yeah, and winning. But he mentioned too, you’re not going to get a team full of guys that are winners and obsessed, like you asked them.

Patrick Carney: 57:57

Within the leadership conversation too, when we kind of transitioned the conversation there. I really liked how he coached when there was no captain or no leader or there was weak leadership, let’s say, or lack of leadership, and I think it’s a question we have been after or had asked in the past before. But I really like kind of the clear examples he gave or the role he assumed in bringing more kind of like themes of the day or some more anecdotal stuff before practice to try to slowly filter in or siphon in a message that he needed where maybe midway through the season he got the guys going in the right direction, preaching habits they want within their program that, yeah, isn’t going to be provided amongst the players. I thought that was really, again drawing on his experience, cool to hear and enjoyed his thoughts on that.

Dan Krikorian: 58:42

Yeah, and I think during that part too, we discussed a little bit about when you try to make someone a leader who’s not, and then you get no leadership and it’s just almost better to not have that person’s ride.

Dan Krikorian: 58:54

They might be a great player or someone that loves to maybe lead by example, but trying to force them into stuff can be difficult. It reminded me of a great quote I’m going to go in the Wayback Machine here to Brady Bergeson, regis University head coach D2 Regis. We had a great conversation with him about leadership and kind of the way he tries to build it up. But one of the things I remember he said in that conversation was that the leader is not just who you say it is or who you want it to be. It’s who the eyes look to under pressure. That’s who your leader is and I think you mentioned I’m remembering back of key timeouts or crunch time situations in practice or in games and your leader is whoever everybody’s looking at on the court or wanting to talk to and kind of going to Coach Kat’s point of the true leaders kind of emerge through this process that he mentioned they kind of do in the early season and all that. So really, really great stuff throughout throughout.

Patrick Carney: 59:50

Yeah, I think it was fun. I don’t think we really ever had a conversation yet on the open gym runs in the off season and his thoughts on it, how he uses it. I mean, of course, to get the leaders out and define the winners versus the talented guys. So was interesting a conversation we haven’t had and I enjoyed hearing his thoughts on just how he uses it and structured it again. He said we’re just always thinking about this as coaches and all crazy.

Dan Krikorian: 1:00:15

So yeah, sickness he mentioned yeah, the sickness the sickness that just never stops.

Patrick Carney: 1:00:20

We never turn it off and as if there’s open gym. If the guys are going to be in a gym, we’re going to do something about it. Yeah.

Dan Krikorian: 1:00:26

Yeah, exactly Exactly, and to your point.

Dan Krikorian: 1:00:28

We haven’t had a conversation maybe we should really about the whole lifestyle intricacies of open gyms and open runs, because that’s its own sub world unto itself.

Dan Krikorian: 1:00:40

We haven’t gotten into too much.

Dan Krikorian: 1:00:42

Hey, let’s go to start sub sit, and two fun ones, for sure, and let’s just continue with the first one that I asked, which you and I went back and forth on going from a good team to a great team, and we wanted to ask that question because, looking at his history as a coach, he obviously coached some great, great teams at the JC level, but then he also did a really good job his first seven years at Sac State building that program, from winning, I think, one or two games when he took over in their conference in the big sky until eventually, that seventh year in they were a bucket or two away, like he mentioned, from winning the conference and just what it is.

Dan Krikorian: 1:01:17

That’s hard to do, and so I’ll start with what his start was. I love the conversation about bouncing back resilience, not letting one loss turn into three in a row and things like that, and it just kind of added to our main bucket, which was how important your leaders are within that and I’ll kick it back to you. But he had some gold about how to coach after losses versus after wins and his philosophy on that.

Patrick Carney: 1:01:45

No, yeah, I’ll just build off of it because that was my big takeaway. I love the thoughts he shared on how he was having conversations with his leaders when we got into during win streaks and then we got in from there, like he went through basically what he talked about and then how he tried to suss out the team and where they’re at, and he mentioned like are they still hungry? You know versus, are they cocky? And then still hungry, you know versus, are they cocky? And then going into like what is it cockiness and practice look like and what are the signs that he notices the words all right, these are red flags. We got to get rid of these behaviors.

Dan Krikorian: 1:02:16

And he mentioned the start if guys are rolling in late or skipping their pre-practice, immediately get in on them I also just to double back on the point of it reminded me, so I’m going to name drop a couple things real fast. This is what we do in this section, but yeah, about a month or so ago we had nick pasqua on from converse university and he also talked about his learnings, about how you can coach your team harder after wins and you need to be more of a teacher. I think, like coach cats mentioned, in the loss, they need confidence, you need to know that they’re not miles away, they’re potentially just inches away from the win. And then also Peter Lonergan we had on, I believe, last year, talked about the power of three and coaching in threes, and Coach Kat talks about how it seemed to always be three things after a game to improve on. So the power of three circled back in that conversation as well, I believe. Was that Coach?

Patrick Carney: 1:03:08

van guen told us in our conversation you can’t beat up a bad team. Yes, yeah, and what sticks with me in a losing streak or a losing season? You can’t beat up a bad team because, as coach cat said, they’re already getting beat up in the game. So yeah, exactly, they’re pretty aware.

Dan Krikorian: 1:03:23

yeah, absolutely, let’s flip over to the second star subset, the value of shooting with your player. This is something else that he mentioned in the book that he loved to do, and then, obviously, he mentioned on the show that he loved to shoot with his best players and took a lot of pride in doing that, even if it was 440 in the morning. What were your first takeaways there?

Patrick Carney: 1:03:43

I’m going to jump to, kind of the end, which I really enjoyed when we we got into. You asked the question on just shooting and correcting shooting. Yeah, you know what it looks like during the season versus in the off season. I loved his thoughts on year around. It’s waist down, so in the middle of the season he’s only correcting from the waist down, and I believe this conversation we had with the guys at the pro lane too, on just like starting there, I think you can get get better buy-in. You’re not going to mess with the player’s psyche or mental confidence, rather if immediately you start correcting from the waist up in the middle of the season. And then the other thing, though, that I liked is when he said, though, he only wants one voice. What other sport did he reference? Do you have the batting coach?

Dan Krikorian: 1:04:22

Yeah, the batting coach.

Patrick Carney: 1:04:24

He was going to be the shooting coach, or you have a shooting coach and his voice is the only one that’s actually conveying, let’s say, any observations or any technical adjustments to the player, and not trying to cloud his mind, but I liked the conversation on just correcting a shot.

Dan Krikorian: 1:04:38

Yeah, and I’ll just add to that, because I think that’s where I was going to talk to is there was a really good conversation about shot selection, how difficult it is at every level for every person, and really the value of when you’re shooting with your player. You’re sort of giving them confidence, which was his start, but then subtly working in the shot selection conversation just because you’re reiterating the types of shots that you want, and so he also had another really nice nugget about. He said this is a general statement, but if you’re going to talk shot selection with your one or two best players, that you maybe need to take some tough shots, that you do that privately, yeah he gave great examples of question asking.

Patrick Carney: 1:05:19

Of course, the guys, maybe you want to shoot more, but then what ultimately is why we always have this conversation is the guys you want to shoot less or taking the bad shots have this conversation as the guys you want to shoot less or taking the bad shots? Yeah, but how he approached that, and whether it was privately or within the team. But he gave just great examples of just how posing questions to kind of get the answer you need, whether it’s to the player, or if he’s still not getting it, then how do you kind of move shift to the team.

Dan Krikorian: 1:05:42

So the team’s teaching the player that that’s a bad shot, versus the coach just straight saying that’s a bad shot yeah, this is a conversation we have often we will have probably throughout the next year of just shot selection and the tools that coaches use. From the film, the analytics, those are the parts that you can see and you can maybe look at as a player. But then there’s the emotional part of the shot selection conversation and taking confidence versus giving confidence. So it’s not as easy as it maybe sounds when you’re sitting in a room full of other people who aren’t coaches and say you know, bad shot or whatever, why do you let that guy shoot that shot? And it’s so much deeper sometimes than just the actual thing. But hey, as we circle to close here any misses or areas you would have liked to have gone deeper, how we have more time we never really got on it, but again just through our prep and through the book.

Patrick Carney: 1:06:39

You know, he did talk about the importance of internal motivation and I’m always curious of the role that a coach has with motivation and when can you use it? When can you externally motivate a player? How long lasting are the it? When can you externally motivate a player? How long lasting are the results? When can you keep going to it versus when this point the player has to be internally motivated.

Dan Krikorian: 1:06:57

Yeah, and I’m guessing just from the conversation that the internal motivation would have been probably what the winners exude In the winners conversation in the first bucket. Yeah, absolutely For me, mike Nabors University of Arkansas women’s head coach, has had a great newsletter for years and all that. But from him I heard about this green light shooting drills that we’ve definitely done ourselves, which are a series of drills that you do with your team, kind of pre-season to like. He mentioned getting data from his team in the summer and the spring, before he even talked about shot selection, kind of circling back there. And we use some of those green light shooting drills for guys to get their green light shooting license, so certain numbers that you need to hit in order to get those. And I wouldn’t mind maybe going a little bit deeper on his process of taking the data, talking about the shot selection, like he mentioned, maybe in October, and circling in on that a little bit, because that’s another valuable tool in the shot selection conversation where you’re not just telling a player, like he mentioned, right away, hey, don’t shoot these shots, and then it creates some friction because the player thinks, coach, never let me at a chance, you have to earn it and those sets of drills are a good way to have more data for coaches and then kind of broach that conversation in a way. That’s well, it’s still not easy, but there’s at least data to back it up.

Dan Krikorian: 1:08:13

Yeah Well, hey, pat, if there’s nothing else, once again, as we wrap this up, we really thank Coach Katz for coming on, sharing all his wisdom, the road more traveled. I think we’ll link to it in our newsletter. People want to purchase the book. He was nice enough to send us a copy, which we’ve been going through, obviously and a lot of fun, a lot of great stories in there, especially for coaches out here on the West Coast. Probably a lot of names that they will know. So, if nothing else, we’ll start wrapping this thing up.

Patrick Carney: 1:08:36

Sounds good.

Dan Krikorian: 1:08:37

Thanks everybody for listening. We’ll see you next time.