BASKETBALL THOUGHTS

July 23, 2011

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_____________________________________________________________________________ ARTICLES:

Evidence That Little Touches Do Mean So Much

By Benedict Carey Found at NYTimes.com Psychologists have long studied the grunts and winks of nonverbal communication, the vocal tones and facial expressions that carry emotion. A warm tone of voice, a hostile stare both have the same meaning in Terre Haute or Timbuktu, and are among dozens of signals that form a universal human vocabulary. But in recent years some researchers have begun to focus on a different, often more subtle kind of wordless communication: physical contact. Momentary touches, they say whether an exuberant high five, a warm hand on the shoulder, or a creepy touch to the arm can communicate an even wider range of emotion than gestures or expressions, and sometimes do so more quickly and accurately than words. It is the first language we learn, said Dacher Keltner, a professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, and the author of Born to Be Good: The Science of a Meaningful Life (Norton, 2009), and remains, he said, our richest means of emotional expression throughout life. The evidence that such messages can lead to clear, almost immediate changes in how people think and behave is accumulating fast. Students who received a supportive touch on the back or arm from a teacher were nearly twice as likely to volunteer in class as those who did not, studies have found. A sympathetic touch from a doctor leaves people with the impression that the visit lasted twice as long, compared with estimates from people who were untouched. Research by Tiffany Field of the Touch Research Institute in Miami has found that a massage from a loved one can not only ease pain but also soothe depression and strengthen a relationship. In a series of experiments led by Matthew Hertenstein, a psychologist at DePauw University in Indiana, volunteers tried to communicate a list of emotions by touching a blindfolded stranger. The participants were able to communicate eight distinct emotions, from gratitude to disgust to love, some with about 70 percent accuracy. (847) 609-4595 Bbailey3@depaul.edu Brandon.bailey.24@gmail.com Twitter: @CoachBBailey

Brandon Bailey Graduate Assistant Director of Basketball Operations DePaul Mens Basketball

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July 23, 2011

We used to think that touch only served to intensify communicated emotions, Dr. Hertenstein said. Now it turns out to be a much more differentiated signaling system than we had imagined. To see whether a rich vocabulary of supportive touch is in fact related to performance, scientists at Berkeley recently analyzed interactions in one of the most physically expressive arenas on earth: professional basketball. Michael W. Kraus led a research team that coded every bump, hug and high five in a single game played by each team in the National Basketball Association early last season. In a paper due out this year in the journal Emotion, Mr. Kraus and his co-authors, Cassy Huang and Dr. Keltner, report that with a few exceptions, good teams tended to be touchier than bad ones. The most touch-bonded teams were the Boston Celtics and the Los Angeles Lakers, currently two of the leagues top teams; at the bottom were the mediocre Sacramento Kings and Charlotte Bobcats. The same was true, more or less, for players. The touchiest player was Kevin Garnett, the Celtics star big man, followed by star forwards Chris Bosh of the Toronto Raptors and Carlos Boozer of the Utah Jazz. Within 600 milliseconds of shooting a free throw, Garnett has reached out and touched four guys, Dr. Keltner said. To correct for the possibility that the better teams touch more often simply because they are winning, the researchers rated performance based not on points or victories but on a sophisticated measure of how efficiently players and teams managed the ball their ratio of assists to giveaways, for example. And even after the high expectations surrounding the more talented teams were taken into account, the correlation persisted. Players who made contact with teammates most consistently and longest tended to rate highest on measures of performance, and the teams with those players seemed to get the most out of their talent. The study fell short of showing that touch caused the better performance, Dr. Kraus acknowledged. We still have to test this in a controlled lab environment, he said. If a high five or an equivalent can in fact enhance performance, on the field or in the office, that may be because it reduces stress. A warm touch seems to set off the release of oxytocin, a hormone that helps create a sensation of trust, and to reduce levels of the stress hormone cortisol. In the brain, prefrontal areas, which help regulate emotion, can relax, freeing them for another of their primary purposes: problem solving. In effect, the body interprets a supportive touch as Ill share the load. We think that humans build relationships precisely for this reason, to distribute problem solving across brains, said James A. Coan, a a psychologist at the University of Virginia. We are wired to literally share the processing load, and this is the signal were getting when we receive support through (847) 609-4595 Bbailey3@depaul.edu Brandon.bailey.24@gmail.com Twitter: @CoachBBailey

Brandon Bailey Graduate Assistant Director of Basketball Operations DePaul Mens Basketball

BASKETBALL THOUGHTS
touch.

July 23, 2011

The same is certainly true of partnerships, and especially the romantic kind, psychologists say. In a recent experiment, researchers led by Christopher Oveis of Harvard conducted five-minute interviews with 69 couples, prompting each pair to discuss difficult periods in their relationship. The investigators scored the frequency and length of touching that each couple, seated side by side, engaged in. In an interview, Dr. Oveis said that the results were preliminary. But it looks so far like the couples who touch more are reporting more satisfaction in the relationship, he said. Again, its not clear which came first, the touching or the satisfaction. But in romantic relationships, one has been known to lead to the other. Or at least, so the anecdotal evidence suggests.

Point Guard Mid Range and Pick and Roll Offense

By: Mike Procopio Found at TheHoopConsultants.com Every position in my opinion is in need of development of a mid range game. This isnt new to anyone as with young players nationwide the ability to get shots from the 15-17 foot range is a very much lost art. Our game is filled with point guards that want to take three point shots and try to get to the rim on as many dribbles as possible. Point guards at all levels need to understand that they need to do more with less. Meaning get to where you want to get to on as few dribbles as possible. One of the more common ways to score as a point guard is by using screen and roll. Here are some common skill sets to being effective on screen and roll. Keep Your Dribble Alive One of the more common mistakes that a point guard makes is picking up their dribble too soon. This usually leads to turnovers and/or bad possessions. Keep your dribble a live up to the last possible second that you either take a shot or make a play for a teammate. If a play breaks down dont pick your dribble up, even if you need to dribble through the paint and bring it to the other side. Set Your Defender Up Dont make it a track meet with your defender. Like any other race you can win and some and lose some. Like I previously stated in the article you have to do more with less. Dont exert more energy or dribbles than you need to on any given possession. Before you initiate pick and roll take your defender away from the screen and
(847) 609-4595 Bbailey3@depaul.edu Brandon.bailey.24@gmail.com Twitter: @CoachBBailey

Brandon Bailey Graduate Assistant Director of Basketball Operations DePaul Mens Basketball

BASKETBALL THOUGHTS

July 23, 2011

then change direction and bring them back into the screen. Its your job to make sure they hit the screener and dont give them room between yourself and the screener to enable them to get through the screen. Change Speeds No good point guard plays at one speed. Beyond taking your defender away from the screen being able to set them up and finish them at a quicker speed is essential for any point guard at any age. Keep your defender on edge at all times, you need to play at different speeds. To be an effective point guard you need to be able to get in the lane. You need to be able to shift your defender one away (back forth, side to side, up/down). To open up your mid range game on screen and roll you are going to have to get your defender on your hip or backing up. Changing speeds play a big part in your ability to create separation between you and your defender. I think the most important shot that a point guard can make off of pick and roll is the 15-18 foot jumper.

Next coaching generation: Reason to fret?

By Dana O'Neil Found at ESPN.com Editor's Note: A group of 15 head coaches from around the country were recently asked a series of questions by Dana O'Neil. Here are each coach's pick for best late-game strategist and smartest overall. NORTH AUGUSTA, S.C. -- Bruce Weber was 24 years old when he joined Gene Keadys staff at Purdue University. Wet behind the ears and eager to learn his trade, Weber did everything he was asked, and back then the NCAA rules allowed him to. He could recruit. He could coach. It was grueling and challenging and to Weber, the only way to understand what it takes to be a basketball coach. Which is why now, Weber is a little worried. He doesnt doubt the passion in the next generation of basketball coaches. Nor does he worry so much about their integrity. Its the experience that gives him pause.

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Brandon Bailey Graduate Assistant Director of Basketball Operations DePaul Mens Basketball

BASKETBALL THOUGHTS

July 23, 2011

Im sure my dad said the same thing about me when I was a kid, but Im just worried that maybe we havent developed the guys like we used to do, Weber said. When you were a GA, you did it all. Now you have to start as a recruiting coordinator. So Im worried to be honest. Hes not alone. During last week's EYBL Peach Jam, ESPN.com surveyed 15 coaches on a wide variety of topics, including this simple question: Do you trust the next generation of coaches to care for the future of college basketball? Plenty did. Eight of the 15 said they had full faith in the next generation, with three more straddling the fence. Sean Miller, Brad Stevens, theyre such good men, so I do trust them, said Louisville coach Rick Pitino, echoing the sentiments of many. Theyre so smart and so focused and they really do care, so I think were in very good hands. But some coaches, including some whose opinions are often valued because of their own stature as the games elder statesmen, had reservations. And the worries are similar to Webers: That the coaches of the next generation have been denied the chance to be schooled in their profession. I dont have a lot of faith and thats a shame, Michigan State's Tom Izzo said. Im just not sure theyve come up the right way and at the same time, we probably havent been the best mentors. Now youve got guys who are good recruiters and guys who are good coaches. Well, when you have your own team, you have to be both. This isnt just old worrywarts braying that the young whippersnappers dont have what it takes. As the game becomes more and more of an arms race -- about collecting and even hoarding talent because he who has the most talent wins -- some even of the next generation worry that the emphasis has been misplaced. Too few coaches learn the right way, Georgias Mark Fox said. Do people know how to make men out of kids? Im not sure. They know how to recruit. Thats where the emphasis is now and theres too much emphasis there. The catch is: how to fix it? For good reason, the NCAA cut back on how many coaches can actually be on the floor coaching during a practice and how many can recruit. Some schools
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Brandon Bailey Graduate Assistant Director of Basketball Operations DePaul Mens Basketball

BASKETBALL THOUGHTS

July 23, 2011

were creating staffs as big as an army, so the NCAA made strict rules about staffing sizes and job descriptions. Consequently, it has become equally difficult to cut your teeth as a young coach and to stay on as an old coach. You cant afford to keep an older coach on your staff because he wont necessarily recruit, Weber said. So theres a lot of wisdom thats missing. But is it really that bad? Or is the generational shift merely that -- the gap between the end of one era and the beginning of another. Roy Williams will be 61 on Aug. 1. Mike Krzyzewski is 64, Jim Boeheim 66 and Jim Calhoun 69. None are headed out to pasture, but certainly the current Mount Rushmore of college hoops is aging, and in their place is the shift, that of the next group growing into its new roles and finding its way. I think when youre immature you make mistakes. Youre in a hurry, new Maryland coach Mark Turgeon said. Over time, you figure it out. As guys mature, things get better. And there is, plenty of coaches argue, reason to be happy right now. This Final Four showcased two of the brightest young coaches in the game -- a pair of 34-year-olds, Brad Stevens and Shaka Smart -- coaches who did come up from their bootstraps, who boost even the doubters sagging hopes. My worry is that the game is tilting to the very young and you need experience and you need beacons of light, said 56-year-old Phil Martelli of St. Joseph's. Having said that, I think every administration right now is endeavoring to find the next Brad Stevens and he is a beacon of light. If we have guys like him, were in great shape.

Late-game coaching starts in offseason

By Fran Fraschilla Found at ESPN.com Make as many late-game, pressure decisions during the non-pressurized time of the offseason as possible. That was my philosophy as a college basketball coach. The idea that most college coaches have a magical clipboard and pen and draw up game(847) 609-4595 Bbailey3@depaul.edu Brandon.bailey.24@gmail.com Twitter: @CoachBBailey

Brandon Bailey Graduate Assistant Director of Basketball Operations DePaul Mens Basketball

BASKETBALL THOUGHTS

July 23, 2011

winning plays at the end of a game is wrong, although being able to think quickly, improvise and adjust on the fly to an opponent's strategy is important. Instead, the art of being a successful decision-maker in the final minutes or seconds of a close game should start, for a coach and his staff, way before the arena lights come on. So when faced with the pressure of the final moments of a game, I wanted to rely on well-thought-out ideas that had been analyzed from every angle months before in the quiet of a coaches' meeting room. The first thing a coach has to do is to come up with all of the late-game decisions that have to be made. Some examples: How does your team play from behind and how does it play with the lead? How do you treat defending the late-game 3-point attempt when we lead by three points? How do you teach fouling? Which players can you rely on to create scoring opportunities at the end of a game and where on the court do you get them the ball? Do you call a timeout or let your team play on? When you systematically think through those and many other situations before the season starts, you can incorporate them into preseason and in-season practices, so that when those situations do pop up in a crucial moment of a game, they have been rehearsed already. No one was better at that than North Carolina's Hall of Fame coach Dean Smith. The Tar Heels' comebacks at the end of games were legendary. In 1974, Smith's team trailed Duke by eight points with 17 seconds to go. Without a 3-point shot, the Tar Heels tied the game and eventually won in overtime. Smith's ability to inspire confidence in his team was all about preparation. In fact, his former assistant coach, Eddie Fogler, once said, "In 15 years, I never saw Dean Smith write a play on a clipboard during a time out. It was all talked about or worked on in practice." Butler's Brad Stevens does very little coaching by the seat of his pants but rather has a well-thought-out plan for every special situation in a game. In Butler's thrilling win over Pittsburgh in the second round of the NCAA tournament, it was his well-executed side inbounds play out of a timeout to set up Shawn Vanzant's drive and dish to Adam Smith that put the Bulldogs up late in the game. On the play, Vanzant "rejected" Matt Howard's ball screen at the top of the key, keeping
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Brandon Bailey Graduate Assistant Director of Basketball Operations DePaul Mens Basketball

BASKETBALL THOUGHTS

July 23, 2011

the second defender from trapping him. The corners were filled with shooters Zac Hahn and Shelvin Mack, insuring that their defenders could not help on the drive. That left Vanzant to beat the Panthers' Gilbert Brown in a 1-on-1 situation to the basket, opening up the pass to Smith. When I went back to the Synergy Sports Tech video, which catalogues every play of the college season, I found the same side inbounds play for Vanzant, who made a game-changing 3point shot in the final minute in Butler's Horizon League semifinal win over Cleveland State. I guarantee the Bulldogs worked on that play in practice long before it was needed. When John Calipari and I were young coaches at UMass and Manhattan College, he gave me a great late-game play called "Winner" on the phone one night in the middle of the season. I put the play in for my team at the next day's practice but told them we wouldn't use the play until we absolutely needed a critical basket at some point during the season. Over the next two months, we practiced "Winner" every day. It wasn't until we were in the final seconds of our conference championship game that we pulled it out. It worked to perfection, as we were fouled with one second on the clock. It gave the Jaspers their first NCAA appearance in 35 years. There are ways to add plays or "wrinkles" to plays as a part of a coach's late-game repertoire. It takes a team with a good basketball IQ to pull these off. It is what I call being "coached on the fly," and it is a definitive basketball skill. When Indiana's Tom Crean was coaching at Marquette, he would routinely add new set plays or late-game plays, even on the morning of a game. Because he had many NBA coaching friends who constantly encountered late-game situations over the course of a 100-game season, he would see a play that they ran that he liked and incorporate it into his next practice. His teams got good at recognizing adjustments on the fly. Before a game against in-state rival Wisconsin, a visitor to the team's walk-though showed Crean a lob play on an inbounds underneath situation. The coach liked it and added it to the team's game plan on the spot. It resulted in a dunk for Dwyane Wade that night. Remember that during a 30-second timeout late in a game, there often isn't much time to draw plays up. The time flies. Instead, it is more prudent that your team runs a play it is already familiar with because it has a better chance of working.
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Brandon Bailey Graduate Assistant Director of Basketball Operations DePaul Mens Basketball

BASKETBALL THOUGHTS

July 23, 2011

Some coaches keep a play card with four or five late-game plays -- the Celtics' Doc Rivers has this down to a science -- that are already drawn up and easier to read than being scribbled on a clipboard under the duress of time, and with water and sweat flying everywhere. One of the key decisions to be made late in a game is whether to call timeout to set up a final play. I have always believed that calling a timeout yields a worse shot than if my team attacked without allowing the defense to set up or adjust its look during the time out. This is the perfect example of a situation that is talked about by a coaching staff in the offseason then practiced throughout the season. And, not calling timeout in key situations is the equivalent of a football team going 70 yards in 45 seconds without timeouts. It must be worked on. Of course, calling timeout can often benefit the offense. Kemba Walker's magical game winner against Pittsburgh in the Big East quarterfinals came after an offensive rebound by Jamal Coombs-McDaniel and a timeout call by coach Jim Calhoun. Because the Panthers rarely trap the ball out of an opponent's hands, Walker and Calhoun knew they would either get a good matchup against a guard or a great matchup if a big man switched out. Walker's last-second step-back move on Gary McGhee was one of the best one-onone moves of the entire season. More importantly, it was a great use of a late-game timeout. When Pete Carril's Princeton Tigers knocked out UCLA in the 1996 NCAA tournament, in one of college basketball's all-time stunning upsets, he set up his team's final play out of a timeout. It was the same backdoor play that created an easy layup against the Bruins at the end of the first half. This time, his "wrinkle" was that the Tigers' Gabe Lewullis' first backdoor cut would be just a decoy, as the UCLA defender bit on his second fake and the defending NCAA champions were beaten. It's also a coach's job to practice what I call the "running timeout," when the clock is stopped because of a foul or a dead ball and the team can sprint to your bench for 15 or 20 seconds of instruction without wasting a timeout. Speaking of timeouts, I remember first hearing about the idea of practicing "timeout organization" from Hubie Brown at a coaching clinic. He felt it was critical in a late-game
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Brandon Bailey Graduate Assistant Director of Basketball Operations DePaul Mens Basketball

BASKETBALL THOUGHTS

July 23, 2011

timeout situation that everyone know exactly where to sit in relation to the head coach so there was less room for miscommunication. I always wanted my point guard directly in front of me so that I could look him in the eye when giving him directions. It makes sense. Surprisingly to me, in my travels during the basketball season, I see little in the way of late-game preparation at practices. Maybe I have had bad luck or bad timing in terms of when I've observed practices, but I don't think so. I just think some coaches utilize their practice time in other ways. Ultimately, the job of a good basketball coach is to prepare his team for every situation that may arise in a game and give his team a chance to win. Being good in late-game situations is just as important as a football team having great special-teams play. It should result in more wins. It doesn't always play out that way, and preparation doesn't always result in success, especially when talent may not be equal. But Brown puts it best when he says that a coach's ingame reputation "is a direct result of his team's execution under pressure." It's what a good coach is paid to do. QUOTES: Discipline is doing the right thing at the right time to the best of your ability. - Jay Bilas, Coaching U Dont let what you cant do get in the way of what you cant do. - Kevin Eastman, Coaching U Are you going to give in and give up? Or are you going to get in and get up? Kevin Eastman, Coaching U Sell out with your ball pressure. Mike Dunlap, Coaching U

(847) 609-4595 Bbailey3@depaul.edu Brandon.bailey.24@gmail.com Twitter: @CoachBBailey

Brandon Bailey Graduate Assistant Director of Basketball Operations DePaul Mens Basketball

BASKETBALL THOUGHTS

July 23, 2011

Play of the Week:

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Brandon Bailey Graduate Assistant Director of Basketball Operations DePaul Mens Basketball