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06 Sep

Posted at 23:03h in Archive, Motivation by
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If you've been in coaching for very long you know that the recipe for a great team and a successful season (however you measure that) involves more ingredients than a great offensive system and good athletes. Team chemistry plays a huge role as well. We've all seen the Mighty Ducks, right? Great team chemistry + Emilio Estevez = Championship. Well, you may not have Emilio on your bench (not all dreams can come true), but you can build team chemistry. Here's one of the ways Randi Peterson from Coe College does it: We finish each pre-season with a scavenger hunt. This year, we created a giant puzzle. Every piece of the puzzle had a clue attached to it leading to the next piece. Once all the pieces were found, the girls assembled it and read it's message. It seems simple, but it is fun and hilarious and they have to do it together. And, for some reason, being silly bonds people to each other. It also makes good fodder for the highlight film too. But, that's not where we finish.

24 Aug

Posted at 21:52h in Archive, Tribe Spotlight by
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What can happen in a year? Well, if you're Uie Garcia and the South Windsor Girls, a lot. See, Coach Garcia has sold out on the Read & React Offense. He integrates it in just about everything he does in practice. He uses it against man-to-man, all types of zone defense, and as a press breaker. And, now, he's created an AAU organization dedicated to running the Read & React at every level. The Connecticut Attack are proof that it can be done on a large scale successfully. We were sent this article and thought you should know about it. For inspiration. For encouragement. And, well, because we like to brag on Read & React teams. Heading into his final year with the South Windsor Girls Travel Basketball Program, Ulysses Garcia decided to raise the bar through implementation of the Read & React Offense. The program dramatically evolved under his leadership; migrating from non-competitive teams at every grade level to teams that were consistently competing for league championships. Yet it was his final year that Garcia saw the greatest growth. Through implementing the Read & React Offense, his athletes began to really understand the game and develop a true 'Basketball IQ'. They moved well without the ball, and made smart decisions with it. Instead of running plays, they were reading defenders as well as ball movement.

10 Aug

Posted at 20:51h in Coaching the Read & React by
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I mentioned in the previous post, What the Read & React Looks Like, that the offense can easily take on the personality of your team: a lot of that personality revolves around the personnel you have each year. So, if you have a small, quick team, you can run 5 OUT. If you have a dominant post, you can run 4 OUT. If you have two post players, you can run 3 OUT. And, if you have all of those components, you can alternate seamlessly between those formations. In fact, once you get the Foundation of the offense in, your team can switch between formations every season, every game, every possession, or within a possession, all based on how you want to play and how your players best fit together. All of this can be done without the fundamental actions of the Read & React ever changing. Here's a video showing footage in every formation: 5 OUT, 4 OUT, and 3 OUT. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a7JA0x2O_cU

25 Jul

Posted at 05:14h in Coaching the Read & React by
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In the previous post, we discussed utilizing the inside-out game with the Read & React: how there is always an inside threat in the Read & React, whether the ball is thrown into the post or not. What we didn't mention, though, is the sure fire way to block that inside threat: lazy (or uninformed) post players. As a coach, you cannot allow your post player in a 4 OUT or post players in a 3 OUT to stand in the mid post for entire possessions. Whoever plays in the post, whether it's a designated post player or a cutter who has stopped in the lane, must be trained to use the weapons of the Read & React. Start with these four options:

12 Jul

Posted at 22:18h in Coaching the Read & React by
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This post was inspired by a thread in the Tribe Forum. Be sure to check out the forum and pick the brains of Read & React coaches from all over the world. I've always had an inside-out mentality when it comes to basketball. It makes sense, right? The defense is required first to protect the lane (hopefully forcing them to rotate and cheat to do so), which opens up the outside game because it's always easier to attack a recovering defender. But what if you don't have a strong inside presence? Basketball's traditional paradigm teaches us that to "go inside" means we need to have Post Players inside, hogging the lane, and scoring with drop-steps and hooks and dunks and high-low action, etc, as we run our offense through them. I can count on two fingers how many times I had a post player like that in my program. The good news is that you can get the same amount (if not more) inside-out action in 4 OUT or even 5 OUT. It sounds like a contradiction, but it isn't.
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