Learning from the International game
There are no magic drills, but structures to promote player development
Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray are leading the Nuggets to the NBA Championship, and Victor Wembanyama is poised to be the NBA’s #1 pick next week, so #BlameAAU season is back. I first wrote on this subject when Tracy McGrady was in high school, and my first book, Cross Over: The New Model of Youth Basketball Development attempted to anticipate problems and provide solutions. Year after year since the 1990s, something has been a sign of impending doom for basketball in the USA, and while each alarm sounded has been overblown, improvements can be made. As I wrote in Cross Over, with the amount of money flowing through basketball in the United States, we should aim for the best possible environment for youth basketball.
Pointing to Europe or Australia as a solution is not practical; skill and talent development is not separate from the culture in which it occurs, as soccer coach and researcher Mark O’Sullivan has written. To “develop players like in Europe”, we would have to re-structure our entire society and culture. Instead, we need to acknowledge that many of the things we celebrate (billion-dollar franchises, university’s practice gyms, eight-figure player salaries, entrepreneurism, and more) also result in many of the problems (children priced out, closed high-school/college facilities, empty recreation leagues, lack of regulation, disappearing junior-varsity teams, and more). As I wrote earlier, to “be more like Europe” would require a strong, centralized governing body to adjudicate ALL aspects of the basketball development system, from beginner through the NBA, which is unlikely to occur. Without cultural and systemic change, what can we learn from elsewhere to improve player development within our current system?
One huge advantage of a club-based system is the club (youth coordinator, technical director, sports director) oversees and controls all aspects of a player’s development. For example, last year, my U16s played in six competitions: U16 Cup (four games), U18 Cup (one), U16 1st Division (14 + four playoff games), U18 2nd Division (22), U16 EYBL (three stages and SuperFinal: 20 games), and BBBL (one stage: four): Roughly 70 games. They had one coach throughout these six competitions. Some played in a few men’s 2nd Division games at the end of the season too; the coach for this team was the assistant for U18 and one of the club’s youth coordinators. They worked with the same strength and conditioning coach and physio (for injuries) as the men’s professional team; if they stay in the same club, and the staff remains largely the same, they could go from U14 to pro basketball at 19 or 20 years old with the same strength coach and many of the same coaches. There is consistency.
When we looked at the week ahead, and decided two to three players would play in the Men’s 2nd Division Game on Thursday, we changed their practice schedule. Thursday was their normal day off, but now they would have a game; we gave those guys an off-day on Tuesday, and then on Wednesday, they joined the men’s practice instead of their own. Because we were in the same club and working in the same office, these decisions were easy to make and plan. Depending on the schedule, we may have them miss the Saturday U16 game if there were U18 games on Sunday or vice versa. The Federation limited players to 60 games, and nobody approached 60 because some games conflicted (U18 and EYBL), injuries, school trips, vacations, and more. We had 15 players and only 12 could be rostered for each game (FIBA rules). We only had to cut players from the roster for a handful of games; the rest took care of themselves.
Our weekly schedule was standard: Monday and Tuesday were 90-minute practices with U15s and U16s together working specifically on skills (primarily small-sided games). Players lifted Monday or Tuesday. Wednesday and Friday were 90-minute team practices following weights. Saturday was U16 games, and Sunday was U18 games. We played one U16 game per week, and when we played U18 games, we played two games. When we traveled to an EYBL tournament for a five-game stage (two Friday, two Saturday, one Sunday), we worked with our U16 and U18 opponents to re-schedule the games on a free weekend. Clubs worked together; we never had to forfeit a game or lose a home game or any of the tricks that teams pull in the U.S.
In our club, with one person overseeing everything, there were no conflicts or arguments over who played in which game or who had to be at which practice. The men’s coach did not squabble with the U16 coach, as might happen when a high-school coach wants a player to practice to prepare for spring league, but the AAU coach wants the player at a tournament. We never had fewer than 10 players for a game because we had 15 players.
Players did not overtrain because the coaches and strength coach worked together. When the U16 coach gave the team a day off after an EYBL weekend, the men’s coach did not sneak them into extra practices with the men’s team, as often happens with the high-school coach gives players a day off and players go to an AAU practice or work out with their private trainer. The physio and strength coach were there to see and evaluate the players; the professional team practiced about 50 steps away from our practice court. It was not a big deal when a player missed a practice because we had 12-20 players at every practice.
The club’s goal was to produce professional players, not to win the U16 league championship. Players who were growing and feeling pain often sat out or missed games. Nobody rushed back from an injury. Nobody was punished for taking a ski vacation in the middle of the season because we had enough players, nobody cared if we won every game, and everyone understood it was a long season from August to May and valued time with families.
Players who wanted to train extra trained with one of the club’s coaches, not a random private coach from the Internet. One coach was employed specifically as a skill development coach and ran some youth skill practices as well as working with a few players in the mornings. I worked with an U15 player during his P.E. class once a week when his school used our facilities for their P.E. class (imagine a high-school allowing a private coach to come and work with a player during his/her P.E. class on school grounds and counting it as attendance at P.E. class). A few U18 players worked with the U18 assistant coach a few mornings per week.
Again, there was consistency. When a coach taught one thing, the other coach and/or the trainer did not teach something else. There were discussions about what a specific player needed to improve, and often these discussions incorporated the strength coach too. The individual work complemented the team practice; the trainer did not criticize the coach for using the player incorrectly, as often happens in the U.S.
Now, I left there one year ago, and things are changing in Europe too. There is no one “European development”. Some clubs and academies recruit 14 and 15 year olds to other countries. Private skill trainers are proliferating as players are swayed by social media much like players here. We had players miss our U18 Cup final to attend an exposure camp to be seen by other clubs and American universities. We had problems with our older youth players (17-20) and the professional team, as several were overtrained and overcommitted, resulting in injuries, dips in performance, near quitting, and leaving for a different club midseason.
The club system, player registration, and federation limits help to control some of the problems, and at least create a more development-oriented schedule. Most weeks, our U16s had four practices, lifted weights three times, and played one game. Our U16s, most weeks, had three full practices (often one half practice/workout based on who played on which men’s team on Thursday/Friday), two games, and lifted weights three times. Players played a lot of games — I assume every player played more than 45 games unless he was out for a few months with an injury (point guard broke his wrist in first game in September and was out through Christmas), but nobody played more than 60 — but they were spread out from September to May. Some high schools play 40 games just between November and March.
The practice schedule promotes development. We rarely prepared for an opponent other than to say “We want to put their 6’10 center in as many pick-and-rolls as possible” or “Their whole team revolves around their tiny guard so pressure him defensively and post him on offense” or “Their best player is a foul baiter so just make him make his shots; no reaching.” In other situations, coaches often use at least the practice prior to a game to prepare for the next game, much like with our men’s team. With our schedule, we had three practices per week to practice, and one practice to prepare for the weekend’s game. In a typical high-school schedule, with games on Wednesday-Friday, teams have one day to practice (Monday) and the other practices are either the day before or after a game (if they practice on Saturday). The schedule is designed to maximize the number of games in a short period of time, not to promote development.
Of course, this is possible because nobody had any thoughts about playing multiple sports. We had one player who trained for triathlons and took up the biathlon, but he missed most of the winter, coming to maybe one practice per week and only suiting up if we did not have 12 players. He had decided to move in that direction, and this was his last basketball season. We did not have guys trying to fit in 14 football games in the fall and 30 baseball games in the spring. The schedule ran August to May, and national team tryouts were in June, followed by national team camp and tournaments for those who made the team. The others got to enjoy their summer and take a break, although they had access to the gym, and those who did not make the national team started earlier in August.
To copy this system, we would have to eliminate ideas of three-sport athletes and either extend the high-school season, replacing AAU, or turn to a club-based system, replacing high school sports. Neither is likely to happen, so the lesson is the cooperation between clubs (scheduling, occasionally loaning players for a bigger competition) and cooperation and communication between coaches for the best interests of the player’s long-term future. Rather than fighting over whether a mid-week spring league high-school game or an AAU practice is more important, coaches could discuss scheduling ahead of time with parents and players and decide when to practice, play, and train. Coaches can lift weights throughout the year. Private skill trainers and coaches can communicate about the skills players need to develop.
There’s nothing magical about the coaching or the drills or the number of games or whatever. The magic sauce is the player as the center of the organization and the decisions centered around the best approach for each player, including allowing players to play with other teams, go to prom, go on vacation, and more.
Other major differences include the rules. These are my experiences. They are fairly consistent within FIBA, but there is some variance from country to country.
Youth teams use the same 3-point line, shot clock, and basket height as professionals from 12 years of age and up. Players play 40-minute games with a 24-second shot clock before they even move to five-vs-five, whereas players in the U.S. do not play 40-minute games until college and do not use a shot clock until high school (in some states) or college.
U12s play 4v4 with mandatory playing time. Players are limited to two quarters of action, and everyone plays. Presses are allowed in the second half, I believe.
U13s play 5v5, but no screens or zone defense are allowed. Players pass and cut or dribble drive.
U14s move to size 6 ball. No zone defense.
U16 boys (14 year-olds) move to the size 7 ball. Zones are allowed in 1st half, but not 2nd half.
We marvel at European player movement, but players play from 8 to 12 years of age with no screening; they have to move. Games feature a lot of one-vs-one with passing off the dribble when help rotates. This is encouraged because the focus on this age is individual skills and consequently, the rules prohibit a lot of the team tactics (screens, zones, etc). This is essentially how we taught our players (Blitz Basketball) when I coached U9s and U10s, except we played against other teams using these tactics in games. However, we focused on our players, so other team’s tactics were not our concern; we played the same way when teams played zone. The smaller balls assist players with outside shooting and passing off the dribble; players are encouraged to make the same one-handed passes made by professionals because their hands are big enough (usually) to manipulate the size 5 balls like a professional can a size 7.
Longer games allow every player to play significant minutes. At U16, there was no mandatory play rule, but every team generally had 12 players on the roster, and every player played. Teams did not wait until the last two minutes of a blowout to empty the bench to say everyone played; every player played in almost every half of every game. On most teams, their best players played the majority of minutes (30-35), but the other 10-11 players split the 40-minute game, meaning almost everyone played double-digit minutes. We were deeper, so rarely did anyone play over 25 minutes in a game, and I tried to get everyone to double digits.
Beyond the scheduling, these rules and cultural practices assist with player development. It is difficult for youth players to develop with no meaningful game minutes, yet I watch junior varsity games, when schools still have JV teams, with six-player rotations. Our youth players through to varsity play almost the same exact game: No ball or basket modifications, no rule modifications, etc. These are the type of changes that are easiest to address: Mandatory shot clock for NFHS, no zone defense before high school, appropriate basket heights and ball sizes, no screens before age 12, etc. As I wrote in Cross Over, players do not need to and cannot learn every skill and tactic all at once. Smart coaches focus on a few things each season, but this works best when there is continuity from year to year within a club; when that does not exist, coaches and players start from scratch every year with different experiences, expectations, backgrounds, terminology, and more. Implementing nationwide rules can assist with this gradual progression of learning, as well as emphasizing clubs rather than individual teams.
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