RonSenBasketball: Basketball Originality

Don Meyer had a marvelous website where he shared a wealth of basketball philosophy and knowledge…and took questions. He coached in the public domain. 

John Wooden has his Pyramid of Success. I used to print it out, laminate and distribute to players. One mother shared how her daughter looked at it and brought it to school every day in her gym bag…becoming a three-sport captain in high school. Later she graduated from Annapolis and served as a Naval officer. 

Dean Smith was a mathematics major. He developed his “Passing Game” offense and his ‘delay offense’, the Four Corners, famously associated with Phil Ford for us old timers. He was into ‘analytics’ before it became mainstream, emphasizing points per possession. He sometimes ran practices with “shot quality scoring” – assigning different points for layups, open and covered shots, and turnovers. 

Nolan Richardson’s Razorbacks established a brand, playing “40 Minutes of Hell” and my kind of basketball. Coaches create legacy when they are able to translate their personality into their team’s play. Identity relates the ability of individuals to blend their talents into collective excellence. 

Age conveys few advantages. One is the perspective of time, and the understanding of the values of faith and patience, flanking the peak of Wooden’s “pyramid.” How do you leverage persistence into performance? Sometimes teams win because they have the will to play “harder for longer.” Bill Walsh said that, “Champions behave like champions before they are champions.” Does our team do that?