Exploring basketball's best ideas, strategies, and coaches around the world

Happy Sunday and welcome to all the new subscribers from around the world!

ICYMI: Last week, we released the first video from our annual "SG SoCal Coaches Summit" with Coach Phil Beckner's session on "Player Development Myths." Get caught up on our takeaways HERE.

This Week at a Glance:

🔒 SG Plus Content: Tom Bialaszewski - Developing an Offense Identity​

🎤 Slappin' Glass Podcast: Chris Finch {Timberwolves}

🥇Best of the Week: Transition Screens & Gaggles​

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4 Seconds or Less

We dive back in this week with the next installment from our SG SoCal Coaches Summit, this time highlighting the terrific presentation by Pro Coach (and former pocast guest), Tom Bialaszewski, on "Developing an Offensive Identity," including his philosophies and concepts behind building a flowing, high paced offense last season with Italian club Varese.

As Coach Bialaszewski details, in evaluating his roster for the 23-24 season, in order to achieve a high level of success they couldn’t rely on conventional offensive approaches. Traditional European offenses often rely on sets designed to create specific spacings and exploit favorable matchups, but his roster and budget weren’t equipped to succeed within that framework. Instead, Coach Bialaszewski developed an offensive identity that played to his team's strengths, while implementing a unique style that would be difficult for opponents to prepare for—especially in the context of a demanding, two-competition week season.

The key to success, Coach Bialaszewski determined, lay in his team's ability to play with tremendous pace and generate open, catch-and-shoot threes.

4 Seconds or Less

As Coach Bialaszewski explains in today’s clinic, playing with pace is often linked to analytics. However, instead of overwhelming his players with numbers, he focused on creating clarity around what "pace" meant for them. Simply put, whether after a made basket or a miss, the goal was to push the ball into the scoring area—one step above the 3-point line—within 4 seconds or less.

Zooming In: By pushing the ball deep and below the three point line within 4 seconds, the offense can effectively flatten the defense, leaving the opponent scrambling early in the possession and forcing them to defend from the inside out.

To instill this relentless mentality, Coach Bialaszewski emphasizes several key points:

• Empowering players to be aggressive and take early, open 3's.
• A commitment to maintaining pace throughout the entire game—regardless of time and score. Coach Bialaszewski believed it was unwise to shift their style of play in the final minutes. He didn't want to undermine their confidence by suggesting they needed to change the approach that had brought them success throughout the game.
• Valuing pace over plays. Even when calling a play, he emphasized that his team should never get "stuck in the mud" trying to organize. If the spacing or setup wasn’t right, they were instructed to move on to the next available trigger, never sacrificing pace for the sake of running a play.

Offensive Concepts - Kick Aheads

With this philosophy in mind and a working definition of what "pace" meant to them, Coach Bialaszewski goes on to detail several offensive concepts Varese used to shape their attacking strategy. Among these, the Kick Ahead Pass emerged as the most significant factor in creating the desired pace.

Zooming In: By sprinting to the corners, encouraging the Kick Ahead Pass, and empowering his players to hunt for early, open threes, the offense is able to maximize spacing on the floor. As a direct result, driving lanes open up, allowing the offense to generate shots at the rim.

Understanding the crucial role the Kick Ahead Pass played, Coach Bialaszewski developed a Kick Ahead Series he would drill almost daily. This series was designed to build the valued habits and provide solutions for various scenarios that could arise of the pass in order to keep the defense scrambling.

Offensive Concepts - Advance Pass

The last concept we will explore is the Advance Pass during Drag Screens or on drives once the ball is in the half court to create a 2v1 situation. In transition, as the offense pushes the pace, opponent defenses often load up to the ball or wall up behind drag screens. By utilizing the Advance Pass, the offense can capitalize on the defense committing an extra body to the ball, either for a direct catch-and-shoot three...

..or by advancing the pass to continue building off the small advantage created, keeping the defense scrambling and generating larger advantages.

Zooming In: Shown above and discussed in today's clinic, off the Advanced Pass Coach Bialaszewski continues to build out their offensive concepts including the "Middle Cut" and their "Rip & Go's."

Today's clinic is a terrific look into how a team can play with both pace and structure to create high quality possessions on a consistent basis. For much more from Coach Bialaszewski's teaching concepts, actions, and installation of this style, SG+ Members can enjoy his presentation on SGTV...

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Slappin' Glass Podcast

We sat down this week with the Head Coach of the Minnesota Timberwolves, Chris Finch! In this highly thought provoking conversation we dive into Coach Finch's thoughts on late clock management and gaining extra possessions, offensive rebounding habits, and talk defending flare screens and important coaching moments during the always fun "Start, Sub, or Sit?!"

Listen to the entire conversation here...

Together with Hudl

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Tactical

📺 Transition Offense - Weakside Screens​

"When facing a transition defense that's heavily loading up to the ball, using weakside screens can be a great way to attack 2v1 situations across the court, freeing up your shooters for open transition threes."

✚ Pair With: A quick hitting weakside flare screen out of the early stagger entry.

🔒 SG Plus Content: Coach Simon Mitchell's "Bolt" Transition and the Argentina Break.

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📺 ERA Nymburk - Elbow Gaggles​

"Czech club Nymburk using Gaggles at the elbow to generate unpredictability and defensive confusion."

✚ Pair With: Unicaja Malaga screening through the elbow to bring one back to the ball and screen a big to the rim.

🔒 SG Plus Content: Our "Film Room" session with Coach Josh Schertz on the Gaggle Screens.

Interesting Reads

📚 The Case for Slowing Down​

"Multitasking is a myth perpetuated by hustle culture. It's fake productivity. You think you're crushing it, but you're just running around churning out a bunch of C+ work.

Build your day around a few focused sprints with breaks in between. Compartmentalize to focus on one key task at hand."

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📚 4 Signs of Culture​

"The final important item is there can only be one voice, one messenger, one spokesperson. The messaging must be consistent and match the core principles of the organization."

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📚 How to do Great Work

"Four steps: choose a field, learn enough to get to the frontier, notice gaps, explore promising ones. This is how practically everyone who's done great work has done it, from painters to physicists."

Quote of the Week

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Thank you for reading and have a great week coaching,

Dan and Pat

info@slappinglass.com

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