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Welcome to all the new subscribers this week, it's great to have you as part of the community!

Today at a Glance:

🏀 SGTV: Inside the Set - Josh Schertz "Teaching Split Cuts"​

🎤 Inside the Episode: Sean Sweeney​

🥇 Best of the Week: Jump Hooks & BLOB Staggers​

📋 Coaching Clinics!

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Let's dive in...

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Josh Schertz - "Teaching Split Cuts"

We return this week to what is becoming one of our favorite segments on the SG platform called, "Inside the Set". This podcast/filmroom mashup allows us to go all-in with a coach on a few of their favorite offensive sets or actions to get to the whys, whens, and hows of teaching some of their favorite stuff. In our latest edition of "Inside the Set" we had the pleasure of sitting down with one of the best coaches in the game today in Indiana State Head Coach (and past podcast guest talking all things defense), Josh Schertz. For years Coach Schertz enjoyed a tremendous run of success at NCAA DII, Lincoln Memorial University, before taking over the reigns at Indiana State, and today he joins us in Part One of a two-part series to dissect how he teaches his Elbow Split Game.

Whether it be High Splits, Low Splits, Chase Action, or "Gaggle Action" (more on Gaggles next week), the unpredictable nature of the actions, "Organized Randomness", as Coach Schertz coins it, can be a nightmare for opponents to guard and often much tougher to prepare for. Rather than relying heavily on more scoutable offensive "patterns", the "randomness" Schertz refers to is the unique mixture of read-based outcomes that can take place on any given possession built from an "organized" number of spacing, cutting, and screening concepts.

Before diving in, here's a couple of definitions of terms referenced throughout:

• "High Splits" - Read-based cutting/screening/slipping action taking place at or around the opposite elbow area from where the catch is made (High).
• "Low Splits" - Read-based cutting/screening/slipping action taking place below the Free Throw line with a player/players spaced to the corner (Low).

Coach Schertz discusses a number of key tenants in the video on how he teaches the offense...

Teaching Point #1 - Spacing

As the old saying goes, "Offense is Spacing, and Spacing is offense", so before pulling back the layers of more complex split cuts and reads, Schertz discusses where he'd like his players spaced before the initial flow of the offense (more on the importance of "re-spacing" later).

When it comes to the initial entry of the offense, Schertz talks about the preferred alignment of all five players, with the initiator being somewhere in the high middle third, two players spaced to both corners, one player at or around the wing/hash opposite the Elbow Man, and that Elbow Man at or around one of the Elbows (more on the Catch Area below). Schertz further discusses the importance of the starting point and spacing of the initiator in that middle third. Entering the ball in that Middle Third area gives the initiator equal opportunity to quickly play High Splits, Low Splits, or Chase Action with the Elbow Man.

An interesting teaching point that Schertz highlights in the video, is how the Wing Player starting too high toward the hash can be a detriment in executing a quick, proper split, especially with the High Split (as shown below). Though spacing toward the opposite hash is generally a good thing within an offense, when it comes to being in position to run a High Split, starting too far out creates a longer distance to begin the action and can throw off the all-important timing of the split. Having more ground to cover by the two offensive players involved can give the defense extra time to see, communicate, and react to the developing action...

On the other hand, poor spacing creates tougher passing angles...

In Part One of this two-part film room session Coach Schertz further discusses the teaching points of:

• Catching Areas
• Respacing: Cut to Score, Sprint to Space
• "Don't Fight Pressure"
• Right of 1st Refusal and Understanding Roles

As Coach Schertz moves through the film he details many of their coverage solutions to the three types of ways teams often defend the splits (point switch, contact switch, or chase). Beyond understanding the solutions to those coverages, we discuss how Player Development plays a critical role in helping players understand their strengths and improve their cognitive ability to process the actions. It is a process that can be ugly at times as players struggles to navigate the reads offered by the split actions, and a process for coaches as well to relinquish a bit of offensive control and instill trust in their players. As Coach Schertz alludes to several times throughout the film, other than knowing how a possession might start, he has no idea how it will end. The gold of this offense, as in any, is in a teams' joint understanding of the spacing, screening, and cutting options as well as their own individual strengths that produce quality results.

To learn more insight on Indiana State's "Elbow Splits" here is Part One of our "Inside the Set" film room session with Coach Schertz on SGTV...

Stay Tuned! Part Two with Coach Schertz on his "Pistol X" & "Post X" actions, including "The Gaggle?", coming next week.

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Inside the Episode

It was another fun week on the Slappin' Glass podcast as we sat down with one of the best defensive minds in the game in Dallas Mavericks Assistant, Sean Sweeney! Known as one of the great defensive tacticians in the NBA we doubled down on Coach Sweeney's area of expertise and discussed:

• Building a Transition Defense: The Mavericks were one of the top Defensive Transition teams in the NBA last season and we walked through the building blocks and key tenants in building that type of defense. Our discussion included further concepts of handling cross matches, simple vocabulary, understanding shots to live with, and much more.
• Playing to Strengths vs. Covering Weaknesses: Within our defensive conversation we also discussed how Coach Sweeney thinks about building a defense in the halfcourt, and how playing to strengths is balances with covering any weak spots in team defense.
• "Start, Sub, or Sit?!": During this always fun segment we explore the ideas of "Tough Actions to Switch", how staffs can handle conflict, and how Coach Sweeney learns from film.

You can listen to the entire episode with Coach Sweeney here...

Listen Now!

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Tactical

📺 Toronto Raptors - BLOB Stagger Screens​

"Attacking the inbound defender shading middle by immediately stagger screening the inbounder after the pass, forcing the chase."

✚ Pair With: Learn how Nick Nurse and the Raptors neutralized the Golden State Warriors using a "Box & 1" from our recent release of Luka Bassin's Clinic on "Implementing a Box & 1."​

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📺 Ode to the Jump Hook​

"Appreciating the value of the Jump Hook. Stressing patience in getting to the spot, turning over the shoulder for the finish and its effectiveness across all levels."

✚ Pair With: Our Deep Dive Breakdown on how teams are using the Post as a Trigger Man to facilitate offense and run automatics.

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Interesting Reads

📚 Without Numbers, You Can’t Tell the Story: Understanding the Gender Stats Gap in Sports​

"Chayka makes a good point. Collecting data costs money. And men’s sports generally bring in much greater revenues than women’s sports. Yet even when men’s and women’s leagues are partners – as we see in the NBA and WNBA – the men’s leagues seem reluctant to fully invest in closing the stats gap. In 2021, the WNBA announced it was going to track extensive data via a company called Second Spectrum for the championship of the Commissioner’s Cup. Progress? Yes. But only for one game. To date, the WNBA website is still not displaying Second Spectrum data that the NBA is now routinely reporting for its players."

*Thanks to our friend, Alan Keane, for the tip on this one.

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📚 Little Ways the World Works​

"It might sound crazy, but once you understand the basic principles of your profession, you might gain more expertise by reading around your field than within your field. Connecting dots between fields helps you uncover the most powerful forces that guide how the world works, which can be so much more important than a little new detail that’s specific to your profession."

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📚 Bill Belichick: "We're Not Really that Big on Titles and All That"​

"We're not really big on titles and all that. It's important that we all work together and create a good final product. That's what we're going to try to do. That's what we've always done."

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We've added a number of clinics to SGTV from some of the world's best coaches. All clinics are now available on SGTV for purchase or included when you become an SG Plus Member!

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Quote of the Week

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Thanks for reading and have a great week coaching,

Dan and Pat

info@slappinglass.com​
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