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

Happy Sunday! Welcome to all the newest subscribers from around the world.

ICYMI: Last week, we recapped our SG+ Coaches Roundtable on culture, exploring how coaches can build and sustain it throughout a season. Read the full newsletter HERE.

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This Week at a Glance:

🔒 SG Plus Content: Contesting without Fouling - Transition Verticals​

🎧 Slappin' Glass Podcast: Coby Karl {NBA/G League}

📢 Dr. Dish Semi-Annual Sales Event!

🥇 Best of the Week: Corner Drives & Elevator Screens​

📋 Coaches Corner: Drive the Gap

📚 Interesting Reads

Let's dive in...

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Vertical Contests

A theme we hear often on the podcast and in conversations with coaches is the importance of contesting every shot. Great defenses carry the mindset of finishing each possession with a contest and a rebound. No matter what happens in the first 95% of a possession, if your team finds a way to challenge the shot at the end, chances are high the defense competed throughout the possession and forced the opponent to earn their points.

Instilling this mindset also carries the responsibility of clarifying how your team will contest shots—most importantly, how to contest without fouling. Demanding effort without teaching discipline often leads to unnecessary fouls, or worse, and-one opportunities. In the past, we’ve studied a closeout technique to contest perimeter shots {🔒} while avoiding one cardinal sin—never foul on a jump shot.

Zooming In: The strength of this technique lies in its ability to encroach on a shooter’s space while avoiding incidental contact on the landing. It emphasizes contesting with two hands to control momentum into the contest while maintaining a wide base to ensure the shooter has their landing "halo."

Today we will be talking about vertical contests at the rim—the last line of defense when a player or coverage has been broken. These contests give defenders a chance to challenge the shot without fouling, using timing, body control, and verticality to protect the rim and in a lot of cases rescue the possession.

An effective vertical contest starts with a defender’s ability to recognize and diagnose the threat at the rim. This means understanding their position between the ball and the basket: can they slide in time to meet the pass or driver outside the lane? Can they set their feet for a potential charge? If the answer is no, this is where discipline must meet aggression—executing a proper vertical contest without fouling. Without defensive clarity, players may see these moments as opportunities for highlight-reel block attempts or early fly-by pokes for a steal—low-percentage plays that often result in a made basket, a foul, or, at worst, both.

While a solid vertical contest won’t always stop a rim finish, combining effort with proper discipline can tip the scale enough to save a basket or two. Its value is perhaps most evident in transition situations, when the offense is holding all the cards. A well-timed vertical contest can be the difference between conceding an easy layup and giving the defense a chance to reset—or even swing momentum in their favor.

Transition Verticals

At nearly every level of basketball, the most valuable possession is numbers in transition. These situations often lead to easy points at the rim, but they also put defenses at risk of committing fouls.

Great vertical-contesting teams, like Troy, don’t concede or gamble for low-percentage plays on the ball in these moments. Instead, they stay disciplined and commit to confident vertical contests—giving themselves a chance to be disruptive without fouling.

Zooming In: A key technique in vertical contests is the idea of jumping slightly backward with the shooter, matching their momentum toward the rim. By jumping backward, the defender softens the impact while maintaining verticality through the contact, avoiding the type of heavy collision that can cause their hands to drop forward and put the call in the hands of the official. This technique also disrupts the shooter’s timing and balance. Talented scorers often hunt contact at the rim, using the bump to slow their momentum and take a controlled layup. But when the defender jumps backward while staying vertical, the offensive player is left driving forward at full speed, often leading to missed attempts that sail long or hit hard off the rim.

One-Step Verticals

When talking about verticality in transition, inherently we are dealing with some challenging scenarios as a defense. In these moments, the worst outcome is a desperate swipe at the ball—high-risk, low-reward plays that usually result in fouls. Instead, defenders should rely on a quick one-step load into a vertical contest.

Because one-step verticals often occur when the defender isn’t perfectly square between the ball and the rim, the goal is less about sealing off the drive and more about showing size, absorbing contact with the chest, and forcing a challenged finish. And as always, defenders must remember: they can get away with far more physicality through the body than they can with their arms or hands.

4-Point Swings
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​While many programs still commit to teaching the art of taking the charge and are having success protecting the rim this way, it remains a difficult play. Charges are tough calls for officials, and in recent years many rule books have shifted language to make them even harder to earn.

Another drawback is that a charge attempt almost always stops the game with a whistle. When contact leaves players on the floor in transition, officials blow the play dead one way or the other.

Vertical contests, on the other hand, keep the game alive and create the possibility of momentum-swinging four-point sequences. Against a strong vertical, the shooter often falls out of bounds, or at least toward the baseline, after the miss. Meanwhile, teammates crashing from behind unbalance the floor and struggle to organize their transition defense, giving the defense a natural opportunity to push the ball and score quickly on the other end.

At its core, teaching vertical contests is about blending effort with discipline, finishing possessions the right way. When defenders understand how to contest without fouling, they not only have a better chance to protect the rim but also create momentum-shifting opportunities that can define winning basketball. To see these concepts in action, SG+ Members can now check out the full video breakdown now available on SGTV!

Together with Dr. Dish

Our partners at Dr. Dish Basketball are having their Semi-Annual Sale right now, and you can score up to $4,000 off their professional shooting machines! Whether you're a player, a parent, or a coach, this is the sale you've been waiting for. Dr. Dish machines are proven to help players improve their shot form, build consistency, and gain the confidence needed on the court. Don't miss out on these limited-time savings. Visit drdishbasketball.com today.. Score these savings before August 31st!

Slappin' Glass Podcast

🏀 Slappin' Glass Podcast w/Coby Karl

This week on Slappin’ Glass, we sit down with NBA and G-League coach Coby Karl for a thoughtful and wide-ranging conversation on leadership, teaching, and connecting the many layers of a basketball program.

Coach Karl shares his philosophy of “coaching the whole”—how schemes, relationships, and organizational dynamics all intertwine to shape performance. We dive into:

• Building Flow and Simplicity: Why starting with fundamentals like spacing and pattern recognition is the foundation for freedom, creativity, and player confidence.
• Coaching Human Beings, Not Just Players: How empathy, integrity, and trust form the backbone of development both on and off the court.
• Leadership Depth and Growth: The personal challenges, failures, and reflections that help coaches evolve in meaningful ways.
• Tactical Insights: From the value of opening possessions with a cut, to designing pressure releases, shoot-around efficiency, and adjusting systems to fit personnel.
• Failure as Micro vs. Macro: How to reframe mistakes as opportunities for learning while balancing the real-world stakes of professional coaching.

And of course, Coach Karl joins the always-fun “Start, Sub, or Sit” segment to break down offensive concepts and leadership lessons with his signature depth and honesty.

Whether you’re a coach, player, or fan of the game, this episode offers a masterclass in how basketball’s details, relationships, and philosophies all connect to create something greater than the sum of its parts.

Together with Hudl

Hudl Powers Every Possession

If you’re already using tools like FastDraw, FastScout, or FastRecruit—you know how essential they are to your workflows. And now that they’re fully part of the Hudl ecosystem, they’re more powerful than ever. From film and play diagrams to scouting reports and custom recruiting boards, everything flows together. One system. Built for high-performance programs.

​Learn more about Hudl and their variety of products or subscribers to Slappin' Glass can also directly email Winston Jones of Hudl at winston.jones@hudl.com.

Tactical

📺 SLOB - DHO Throwback • Rip Drive​

"Throwing back to the corner after the DHO for a rip drive, aiming to attack the DHO defender off the ball."

✚ Pair With: A few other stampede options to punish a corner defender sitting in their shell.

🔒 SG Plus Content: Our breakdown on the effectiveness of step-up heavy offenses shortening the pass back to the middle third with a Stampede catch.

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📺 Decoy PNR • Elevator Exit​

"Rolling the shooter off the decoy PNR into an Elevator Screen."

✚ Pair With: Popping the stack screener out through an elevator screen from the roller and corner, creating a clean scoring option.

🔒 SG Plus Content: Our breakdown on rim running 4-man turning their rim seal into a stack ballscreen.

🗞 Attack the Space Between Good and Great

Coach Mayes shares his 3-part weekly newsletter...The small habits, mindset shifts, and cultural behaviors you choose define the difference between good and great.

👉 The Game Plan – Habits. Mindset. Culture.
👉 Insight to Impact – “The Loneliest Voice in the Room.”
👉 The First 15 – Habits show what you demand. Spacing shows how you play.

Interesting Reads

📚 The Tail End​

1) Living in the same place as the people you love matters. I probably have 10X the time left with the people who live in my city as I do with the people who live somewhere else.

2) Priorities matter. Your remaining face time with any person depends largely on where that person falls on your list of life priorities. Make sure this list is set by you—not by unconscious inertia.

3) Quality time matters. If you’re in your last 10% of time with someone you love, keep that fact in the front of your mind when you’re with them and treat that time as what it actually is: precious.

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📚 How To Get Promoted​

Third, become a “surplus value” employee. Companies keep and promote people who create more value than they extract. Mentor others, solve problems before they become crises, and make the company culture better. When you consistently deliver multiple times what you cost, your promotion becomes a rational business decision.

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📚 Performance Culture​

Mediocrity is the silent killer. Organizations are not getting killed by their C players. Everybody knows who they are, and performance eventually is addressed. The people who kill organizations are your B players. It’s the scourge of the enterprise because there are many and they are generally accepted. Often, they are seen as not bad enough to fire, but not good enough to keep. They are the ultimate passengers.

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Quote of the Week

Thank you for reading and have a great week coaching,

Dan, Pat, and Eric

info@slappinglass.com

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