No one likes to win any more than I do. But over the past few years of coaching youth sports I have been able to fight the urge to go for the big win and sacrifice the big picture. Now I admit, I may not have created equal playing time for all my kids, but on that note I reward hard work and commitment to the team. The girls who played mostly are the same girls that worked their tails off all year long and committed.
A big issue with youth sports right now is doing what ever it takes to get the win and sacrificing development. In basketball many of the 3rd-5th grade coaches are teaching kids to run zones and press hard all game long. Sure it will create turnovers, but not because the press or zones are any good. It’s because the understanding and skill levels of the offensive players are underdeveloped still. I can teach my kids how to move the ball versus a zone defense, but because they are 10, 11, and 12 years old they don’t have the strength to shoot a pure jumper over the zone, they don’t have the experience and understanding of how to break a zone down, and they can’t accurately throw a skip pass at this age. So a zone creates poor development of the players. Even the team running the zone or full court press takes a backward step in development because they are not learning true principles of defense they are just being opportunistic.
Recently, I had to miss a tournament due to my travels and speaking. I had a report from my wife, daughter, and many others about the behavior of one coach who was furious because we don’t allow zones at our home court. He repeatedly made comments throughout the game regarding not being allowed to play a zone. I see him as a coach who doesn’t get the big picture, can’t win without his crutch of playing a zone, and probably shouldn’t be coaching youth sport in the first place.
This is not the first time I have written or spoken about this topic and it continues to amaze me how shortsighted coaches can be. I know of a program that allowed their youth coaches to run zones all the time in the younger grades. That same program is a very poor defensive team at the junior varsity and varsity level now. The kids didn’t learn the fundamentals of defense while they were young and now it is biting them in the butt.
The urge to win and compete is natural, but having the insight to develop for the long term is what will truly make a difference. How many times have you seen programs where the junior high teams win all the time, but when they get to varsity they can’t win. In many of these cases it has to do with early development of young kids compared to their competitors. It also has to do with the win at all cost mentality at the youth level. These teams make it appear that they are doing the right things and the varsity coaches are not. But what most don’t see is the varsity program is suffering because of how the youth coaches performed. If they bypass the foundations of developing a player’s skills and knowledge it is difficult to catch up at the varsity level because the habits are formed. I am not saying it can’t be changed, but it would be much easier if the players were taught properly in the first place.
So this is my rant again against youth coaching. I am sure it won’t stop any time soon but as I said to my wife the other night; “I don’t feel good about how youth sports are going.” The parents at 5th and 6th grade games are rude and cruel in the crowd. Coaches are trying to win at all costs, and the players are not being properly developed for future success.
The coaches that do understand this…CONGRATULATIONS…and keep up the great work. Plus, try to preach the good word about development to those who don’t get it.
Well said. Though my passion isn’t the game of basketball, I do enjoy teaching the fundamentals of volleyball. For the past 15 yrs. I’ve coached MS & HS athletes in this game, during the past 8 yrs. I’ve been able to train girls as young as 3rd grade. Lately there’s been a push for these girls to beginning competing in addition to training. Interestingly enough, the push is coming from the parents rather than the club, the coaches or the little girls. I guess if there’s a difference, there’s very little that an opposing volleyball coach can do that would disallow the fundamentals of the game to be developed even during competition.
Great stuff! I do believe that teaching a child sport-specific skill instead of focusing on fitness and pressing hard to intimidate the opposition into mistakes is the way to go.
As a young child, they develop skills on the ball, with the racquet, etc. better and even only at this stage as compared to every other stage. Thus, by training them in fun skills and control, you develop their raw abilities and train them to practise economy of movement when they grow up.
Also, excessive pounding of joints may lead to injury. I’m not discouraging them from hard work and I certainly think children should give their all in training and during the game, but pushing them to excessive running would most probably damage their joints and ligaments in future! Of course, I’m not expert, but I think small-sided games in training would be much better than just hard running and training, which most coaches do to develop fitness for sustained pressure throughout the game!
Finally, learning new skills and honing technique is much more fun than just forcing them to press and press at the opposition. I feel that at such tender ages, they should be allowed to play and truly love their sport. Training should be fun but intense in an enjoyable way and they should be taught to focus at the same time, not play a fool! I certainly wouldn’t want the child to develop a phobia of playing and feel that the game becomes just a pressing match where they hassle opponents but don’t get the chance to express themselves! Just look at Arsene Wenger’s Arsenal. He really knows how to make them enjoy the game. And they really do want to fight for the club as well!
100% agreed. There are so many coaches who, for the sake of their own egos (and with the intent of attracting kids whose parents are desparate to be in a winning program early) will completely sacrifice ball-skills and basic understanding of the game in order to run their system. I’ve coached for 20-plus years now, and always encourage my kids at the younger ages (and my parents) to stay patient and applaud the growing demonstrations of individual skill, knowing that in a couple of years, they will be readily winning against the teams that just stress winning early–and that my players will have opportunities to play with better teams when they get older. And it works.
Lee,
What an awesome rant! You are so right. My daughter played jv basketball this year. She had a hard time on defense when the season started and I couldn’t figure out why. After reading this rant, I realized that most of her difficulty was when they played man to man. Then it dawned on me, she has never played man to man. Neither had most of her teammates. The ones who appeared to play “good” defense just played more aggressive and got away with more.
You got me thinking about the times I have coached and wondering if I was just trying to win? I say that because I really like to win! I didn’t have to think very long because I have always placed more importance on what I taught my players than if we won. I wanted to win because I taught my players how to play the game correctly, how to play as a team and to have fun! As much as I wanted to win, it was more important to me that every player improved.
In my 20+ years of coaching baseball/softball I always taught my players that we had the best chance of winning if we practiced our skills often and had fun. Actually, I promised them that if we played correctly, with teamwork and had fun that we would win. I also taught them how to play at practice, not from the sidelines during the games. My 3 things were always; get better, have fun and win!
You are so correct, player development is most important! and it helps you win…
Greg
Dan and Greg,
thanks for the comments. I know for sure we could have one a few more games and probably blows some teams out if i played a zone or full court pressed with a zone. I just can’t do it. My kids (6th grade girls) really have learned how to play good man to man and help defense. My goal is for them to be better in the future than now- should be obvious to most but the way they coach now it doesn’t show up that way.
Keep up the great work!
lee
Unfortunately,coaches want to win more than they want to develop players. No one, who understands basketball and human development, can rationally argue that it best for kids to play zone defenses. Kids under the age of 15 are not physically, cognitively, and, in most cases, not skilled enough to effectively attack a quality zone.
The adult needs of winning have again superceded the kids’s need to develop. And don’t give me the “the kids want to win too” story – no kidding; they want to eat at MacDonalds all the time too, but do we let them? As adults, hopefully, with intelligent perspective we need to understand what is best for the kids development.
If you want to read a great article on this discussion click on the link below. It was written by Mike MacKay, Manager of Coach Education and Development for Canada Basketball.
http://basketball.ca/en/hm/blog/article.php?id=2928&anchor=view
I have coached youth football, baseball, hockey and basketball. I am currently coaching JV Football. You are 100% on. If I could do it over I would do a better job developing the kids instead of concentrating on winning games. In other words: I GET IT NOW. I have to say it’s easy to get caught up in the winning games hoopla. Great article!
Mike
Great post Lee!! In Waterloo Region southwest of Toronto (Home of RIM and the Blackberry) zones have been banned in the elementary schools for the last 25 years. It makes the players develop in all aspects of the game!!! The other rule that we have is that the 8 minute quarters are divided into 4 minute sections and a player is not allowed to play in back to back sections to increase playing time for more players. In the 4th quarter the coaches are allowed to play any players that they want!!
Keep up the great work Lee!!!
Nice rant Lee! You are so right not only with the coaches but the parents. When my son started to play competitive soccer (around age 10)I would see how intense the parents became…not in how well the kids were playing or developing but in WINNING. I found myself many times following a parent that obviously was living vicariously through his son and would simply make statements as best as possible in hopes that he would realize he had no concept of what was really important…that the kids have fun. I doubt it worked as these parents many times looked to be on the verge of cardiac arrest with screaming and yelling – if had been encouraging words that would have been great. I was much happier once he started in HS that the parents were in the stands…and most of the time on opposite sides of the field. My little rant.
Lee,
I remember way back in 5th grade playing a Clifton Park team at the Glens Falls Civic Center. My father was our coach and he was furious when their coach played a 2-3 zone the entire game. His response was that “his kids didn’t know how to play man to man.” We had never seen a zone before and I remember being confused why my man wasn’t staying with me. They ended up beating us by plenty of points. 3 years later we played the same exact team over at a tournament in Plattsburgh. They played the same exact 2-3 zone and being a little stronger and a little more knowledgable we killed their zone. We actually forced them to play man to man. So I think that you are absolutley right in saying that full court pressing and zones at this age will only hurt a team in teh long run.
Also, I saw a local 4th grade team playing a game in which the defense had to stay inside the 3point line.(playing man to man) This seemed to really allow the point guard to start an offense and allow the other players to read their screens.
I would love to see more of us put up a argument in our leagues regarding doing fundamental coaching rather than allowing teams to do what will give us a win. I personally didn’t want to be involved with a league, that played zone, i had my 5th-6th grade girls in the past fall. After the first game where a team went to a zone in the second half and it destroyed the flow of the game for both teams i emailed all the coaches. i told them they can have the win when we play them as long as they play us man to man. i was not in the league to chalk up wins, i was in it to compete hard and get better. I was so pleased when all coaches agreed and played man to man all league.
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