1,000th EPISODE CELEBRATION! – EPISODE 1000

On this special 1,000th episode of the Hoop Heads Podcast Mike & Jason bring on some of their favorite guests and friends of the pod to answer and discuss three questions.

1. Why was becoming a basketball coach the right choice for you?
2. What is your favorite basketball story?
3. Who is the most influential person in your basketball life and why?

Check out the time stamps below to navigate through this marathon 1,000th episode…

4:41 – Session 1: Dell Leonard & Joe Stasyszyn

29:26 – Session 2: Bob Walsh, Brendan Winters, & Dwayne Killings

50:23 – Session 3: Monty Patel & Munch Williams

1:14:21 – Session 4: Bob Krizancic, Mark Schult, & Nick Logalbo

1:33:40 – Session 5: Casey Korn, Greg White, & Rob Brost

2:00:18 – Session 6: Dan DeCrane, John Shulman, & Justin Brantley

2:26:14 – Session 7: Joe Harris

2:46:00 – Session 8: Don Showalter

2:58:26 – Session 9: Erik Buehler

3:12:42 – Session 10: Mike Klinzing & Jason Sunkle

3:49:14 – Session 11: Jefferson Mason

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TRANSCRIPT FOR 1,000th EPISODE CELEBRATION! – EPISODE 1000

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Hello and welcome to the 1000th episode of the Hoop Heads podcast. Jason and I have been at this thing for six years, since June of 2018. And over the course of the history of the Hoop Heads pod, we’ve made a lot of great friends and we’ve brought some of those people back on the show tonight to share their thoughts on three basketball questions that we think will get to the heart of what the Hoop Heads podcast is all about.

Has been all about. So we thank you for joining us on this journey to episode 1000. We hope you enjoy the episode. If you haven’t yet seen or heard that we’re going to be doing some special giveaways from our sponsors as a part of this 1000th episode. So we have giveaways from Dr. Dish, where you’ll be able to win an IC3 home shot trainer, Fast Models giving away a one year team license of their software.

From Game Changer. We have Stanley Water Bottles from Coaching Portfolio. We have their premium package from Coach Don Showalter, who you’re going to hear from in this episode. We have copies of his book, Cornfields to Gold Medals. And finally, we have some Hoop Heads Pod swag that we’re going to be giving away.

So look for those posts about the giveaways on social media, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, retweet, repost, share. If you do, you’ll get entered into the drawing, which will take place this coming Sunday, which will be September the 22nd. So look out for that. And we hope you enjoy this episode with all of our previous podcast guests.

Some of your old favorites will be on. And at the very end of the episode, you’ll hear from Jason and I answering the same Three questions that all of the guests have answered. And you will also hear our favorite all time Hoop Heads Pod story from Jefferson Mason from Dr. Dish Basketball. If you want to skip ahead to any specific parts, you can check the show notes where we have a timestamp for each one of the parts of the 1000th episode.

I know it’s a long one, but sit back, relax, do your workout. Do your commute, whatever it is that you’re doing here with the Hoop Heads Pod and enjoy episode 1000.

We’re going to welcome in Dell Leonard from Mountain Home High School in the state of Arkansas and Joe’s Decision from Unleashed Potential in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. Guys welcome in. Thank you. Thanks for having us. Yeah. Thanks guys. Appreciate it. Really appreciate it. We are beyond excited to have you guys be a part of this 1000th episode of the Who Pets podcast.

I just can’t believe that we’re here. What we thought we would do is ask each of you three questions that I think will do a good job of summarizing some of the themes that we’ve touched on over the six years that Jason and I have been doing the podcast and just want to get your thoughts on some, I think really important and deep meaning questions when it comes to coaching.

So let’s start with the first question and we’ll let Dell, we’ll have you go first. Why was becoming a basketball coach the right choice for you when it came to a career? Well, honestly, I didn’t know that it was going to end up being the right choice. I played college baseball. I thought that I was going to coach baseball and, and eventually coach college baseball.

That was my goal. I ended up just right place, the right time. And my high school coach was a huge father figure in my life. And as soon as I graduated from college, I was trying to. Find a job. And he helped me get my foot in the door and I’m still the same place 29 years later here at Mountain Home High School in Arkansas, but his name was Dennis Copeland and he was a big part of my life.

Still is. I think the world of him, he’s, he is like a father to me and he helped me get my foot in the door. And then basketball had a lot of tradition at Mountain Home on the boys and the girls side. And the girls coach, hall of fame coach, Janet Wood. I’ve talked about both of those people on the show before.

And I volunteered to be an assistant for the boys and the girls high school teams. And lo and behold, coach would end up hiring me officially along with the boys. And then she shortly thereafter went into administration and I never thought I would end up being the head coach, but I, I did. And I actually at the time thought, well, this will just be you know, a couple of years and I’ll be one of those old baseball coaches talking about how I used to coach girls basketball.

And I, I love it. I mean, it’s. I stepped into a great situation and everybody talks about following the legend and how hard it is, but I think if you do things right and you learn from their example, try to do things like they did, you know, keep them close by, you know, to talk to. And I’ve, I’ve been here for 29 years.

So my story was you know, my family, I, you know, growing up here in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, we. We have a very storied basketball history here in Carlisle with Billy Owens coming through and Jeff Lebo and Coach Lebo, Jeff’s dad who came in a year after I graduated from here, but he’s from Carlisle also.

You know, they won four state championships back in those days in big school. And when I first got out of college we had a family business in town, a restaurant and sports bar. You know, I decided, you know, that really wasn’t for me growing up into that business. So my wife and I, you know, we couldn’t find a job.

We’re both, you know, from Carlisle. So we ended up being teachers. We uncle lived in Florida. They needed teachers down there. So we thought, Hey, we can’t get teaching jobs here cause there weren’t any openings. So we actually went down to Florida and started, I started out my teaching career for you know, two years down there.

Then we ended up finally being able to get back here to Carlisle. And at that point Coach Lebo at the time wanted to put me on his staff, you know, being a former player and a college player and all that kind of stuff, wanted to put me on his staff. But he said that, you know, they weren’t any openings at the time.

So I actually got in on the girls side first. And it was really ironic because I was assistant coach on the girls side at Carlisle. And that very same year we had Jeff Lebo and Billy Owens on the boys side. And they went on and won the state championship on the boys side and we were one game away from winning the state championship.

on the girl’s side. So, you know, that really got my interest in coaching. You know, even I started, I started on the girl’s side, which I really enjoyed. And then, you know, from there went on to the boy’s side, but I, I always felt like, you know, I still believe this today that the best teachers make the best coaches because there’s so many, you know, similarities between teaching and coaching and me, you know, having, being a basketball player in high school and college.

I always felt that someday that’s what I wanted to get into. So, you know, in the, you know, doing lesson plans every day as a teacher, doing a practice plan to this day, when I speak, you know, around the world, around the country for USA basketball, you know, I have a detailed lesson plan. I always plan for more than what I need.

So I mean that the parallels between teaching and coaching are very similar. So that’s why, you know, I really, you know, I, it was a natural fit for me to go into coaching and being a teacher and a coach. So that’s, that’s how I progressed. Ended up being the head coach after coach Lebo left, I coached him for a while.

Then he left. I took over, was the head coach, coached my son at Carlisle, who wanted to play division one basketball, Fairleigh Dickinson university, actually coached as an assistant on the D3 level at Dickinson college for a while. And now to the point where, you know, I’ll get into this a little bit later now, to the point now where I work with USA basketball and they work all over the country and all over the world doing team player and coach development.

So that’s, You know, it’s been a part of my life forever, basketball, and then it was a natural fit being a teacher and being a coach. So two kind of almost, I don’t want to say opposite stories, but one guy thinks he’s going to be a baseball coach. Other guy’s been probably a basketball coach from the day you could walk.

So it is interesting how we all get to this profession in a different way. All right, question two. What’s your favorite basketball story? Del, we’ll go to you. What’s your favorite basketball story? I’m interested to see what direction people take this one because I’m leaving it open ended kind of for a reason.

So you want my favorite story with me involved or period? Any story you got, whatever, just when I say your favorite basketball story, you give me, you give me what pops to mind. Well, I was actually talking to my buddy, Daryl Fimple at North Little Rock today, and we shared some stories, but I’ll go with this one.

Early on in my, my career you know, I was, I was so lucky to. You know, to be with coach Copeland and coach Wood, but I, Joe Foley, who was at Arkansas Tech coaching women there and won national championships and went on and coached the University of Arkansas Little Rock. He, from day one, you know, he’s been a mentor for me and I ask him, you know, coach, who do I need to go see?

What clinics do I need to go to? Because. I had went to his practices a lot and learned from him, but he directed me toward Don Meyer and he he told me at the time to go to his coaching academy, which he had in Lipscomb over in Nashville. Well, when I tried to find out about the clinic or the academy coach Meyer, and, and I can’t remember if it was South Dakota state or North Dakota state, but it was one of the Dakotas up there.

And he, he had a great coaches academy and I signed up for it. I went up there. It was just the very first part of the summer. And it was awesome. And he had guest speakers would come in each day. And I remember Tubby Smith. I remember Bill Self. So, so long story short, the Academy ended. I had three or four notebooks full of notes.

Couldn’t write fast enough. The coaches Academy ended and everybody left. My flight didn’t leave till the next day. And they had a post players camp and I remember some of the best post players in the country in division one college basketball walking in this gym. I remember Sylvia Fowles specifically and, and I’m thinking I’m going to be in trouble because I probably need to pay for this and I’m sitting in the bleachers and coach Meyer comes by and he says, Hey coach, how did you, how did you like the academy?

And of course we small talk for a little bit. I said, I loved it. And I said, Hey coach, my plane doesn’t leave till tomorrow. Is there any way that I can stay and watch this post players camp just to learn and I’ll, I’ll pay if I need to. He goes, no, you’re not paying. And where are you staying tonight? I said, I’m staying at the all day in express.

And he goes, no, you’re not. You’re staying with me. And I said, yes, sir. And so anyway, We go to his house. I remember Mrs. Meyers cooking dinner for us and he took me downstairs into the man cave. And I remember Bill Self being down there and I’m sitting on the couch and we’re just, I’m kind of listening and they’re talking basketball and coach Meyer gets a phone call and he kind of gets into it with whoever he’s talking to, and I’m not going to use the exact language, but it was entertaining.

And he gets off the phone and come to find out it was Bobby Knight. I’m still pinching myself. Like, I can’t believe this is happening. And they would start talking about man to man and different stuff like that. And they would look over me and say, what do you think Dell? And I was starstruck. I could not, but that, that’s one of my favorite stories.

And I was so lucky to, to know coach Myers and get to experience the academy and to be invited into his home. And that’s, that’s probably one of my favorites. The willingness of the coaching community to share. I think that’s the theme that when I think about what we’ve learned from the pod that sticks out from that story.

I mean, just how willing, no matter what the level of coach is, people are willing to share. I’ve found that to be, I guess, maybe a little surprising from when we first started, but now it doesn’t, that story doesn’t surprise me at all. It’s amazing how many people have stories like that with famous coaches that.

Have just reached out or put their arm around somebody and said, Hey, come in, you know, come with me. Let me, let me carry, let me help you. And let me help you to become a better coach. Yeah. You think about just the places that orange ball has taken us is pretty unbelievable. Absolutely. All right, Joe, your favorite story.

Yeah. You know what, just to, just to back up what Del said, you know, Del, you know, I always say that we all need someone to help us along the way. And, you know, for the young coaches. I think you’d be surprised if you just ask or just get around the right people, how willing people are to share with stuff.

And I know, I know, I could do a whole show on this. Just talking about the amount of people that helped me, you know, through my time in coaching and just, they’re so willing to help, you know, and that’s, that, that’s, what’s really cool. So, yeah. So I’ve been really thinking hard about this. My, my story has been really crazy.

Like where I, where I was, where I came from, where I’m going now. I’ll pull out a couple here. I’ll pull out one where, you know, when I was a player, cause this really had a big impact where I’m at today, especially with working with my son and daughter in law and my daughter on our own business, Unleashed Potential with our player development.

So when I was, I was like a young seventh grader, this is as a player, my favorite story. My high school coach was a Bobby Knight, you know, fan, disciple, whatever you want to say, really tough coach. We used to, used to load us up in a station wagon. I was in the sixth, seventh grade. And we’d go to this little college in the mountains of Pennsylvania called Juniata College.

And this is really hard to understand, hard to believe, but Press Maravich and Pete Maravich would do a camp there every summer. I don’t know how they ended up in the hills of Pennsylvania or some kind of connection there at Juniata College. But anyway, he would take us up there and sit there and Press would put Pete through a workout.

Right. And it was just unbelievable. It was like magic. So, I mean, that, that just mesmerized me and all of us just to watch this guy was so way ahead of his time, doing the stuff he was doing, that basketball. You know, and, and, and that really got me excited about, you know, only as a, not only as a player with being a better player, player development, but later on as a coach wanting to be able to, to teach, you know, other players how to play.

And you know, and I’ll never forget this too, Press Maravich, and I still have it to this day. He did a handwritten evaluation for every camper in the camp, handwritten by Press. And I still have it today with his handwriting and, you know, this signature on the bottom, like he was talking about toughness, how your ball handling was, all that stuff.

And that’s just, you know, that’s incredible, you know, that he did that. So that’s, that’s my story as a player. And one of the other stories I wanted to share as a coach, cause this is just something, you know, I’d say this all the time, you know, that I don’t know anybody else who’s had an opportunity to do something like this.

So I’m very fortunate to say. After I got done teaching and coaching at Carlisle a, a really good friend of mine who’s also a good friend of Coach K as I am, and, and Coach K was our mentor. This guy by the name of Carl Liebert, who was a teammate and roommate of David Robinsons of the Naval Academy six eight guy, played high school basketball in Indiana.

He’s now on the on board of directors Jimmy v. Board directors with, with Jim, with Dickie V and Coach K and Phil Knight and those guys. So he got this idea. He said, listen, Joe, he goes. You know, he’s running this big company called 24 Hour Fitness. He said, we’re going to, we’re going to change the face of basketball across the country.

We’re going to, we’re going to start teaching it like it should be taught fundamentals and all that kind of stuff. So he named me director of basketball for the whole country. And we had all these facilities in every NBA, WNBA city in the, in the United States. So my job, our job was to try to bring in the best coaches we could bring in.

You know the best performance trainers we could bring in, you know, do, do interviews, put them in our gyms. I was in charge over like 350 gyms nationwide and all the NBA, W eights and eight cities. I did that for five years and it just, to be honest, that had a big impact on my career because I got to work with some of the best of the best in the country.

I had former, former development coaches working for me. Who are now in the NBA, WNBA, former college players for WNBA, NBA players working for me you know, doing player development and I literally go from site to site and that’s really, you know, to me, it’s a great story for me because it really helped me develop as a, as a coach to be able to, you know, not only share what I know, but to learn from all these other people who are tremendous.

I mean, I literally did clinics with Dominique Wilkins. You know, and, and I had, you know, and then I have, I had a girl, my name is Danielle Big Leone, who’s now an assistant with the LA Spark. She worked my Sacramento market for me. So I’d literally travel around to all those places and just monitor what’s going on, help them run the business side of things.

And then obviously the major part was helping them run their player development side of it. And that was just to me, I was just like the greatest story of, of, of, of what I could possibly be doing, not only locally, but nation, you know, nationwide. And then that was the impetus for us starting Unleashed Potential.

I got done doing that. My son said, dad, why don’t we do locally what you did nationwide? I was like, yeah, let’s go for it. And that thing has just gone through the roof, you know, and doing that in my experience with that. But it was so funny. One of the, one of the side stories of that. So we’re in, we’re in Dominic Wilkins at the time was president of basketball for Atlanta Hawks.

We’re doing a clinic in one of our Hawaii clubs down there facilities and we’re riding around at night You know going out to eat stuff like that He gets a phone call from the owner of the Atlanta Hawks and the owner says hey, Dominique, you know As you know, we’re looking for a new coach He says, you know, I just want your idea on some on some of the people who you think would be good candidates So they’re talking and talking so he gives them a name right and then he says the owner excuse me Can you can you hold on a second?

And he looks over at me and he says Joe, what do you think about this guy being an ex coach at a Hawks? I’m just like, I’m looking at him. Are you kidding me? You’re literally asking me for feedback on who I think the next coach should option me. So I gave him, you know, I told him what I thought and all that kind of stuff.

But I mean, that’s just, you know, I could tell stories about that kind of stuff all night. That’s just the, you know, the stuff that I, that I did for five years. You know, nationwide that I, you know, it had a tremendous impact on me in a lot of different ways. So I would say that’s probably one of my, one of my biggest and craziest stories in it.

Like, you know, like Del was saying, man, this ball, I say the ball has magic. You just never know where the ball is going to take you, what’s, what’s going to do for you. So that was probably my biggest one. Yeah. And I, you mentioned Danielle Viglione. I saw her, worked with her at Snow Valley one year and you know, I would, I would regret if I didn’t mention that, you know, Being at Snow Valley, I mean, being able to work that for the years that I’ve worked, it is, you know, those are some great memories too.

Right. I worked closely with Don Showalter and actually, Del, to your point he just had me out there this summer. He’s been asking me every summer and I just, you know, it always runs up against the stuff I got to do over in international, but I was able to get two days and go out there and do some clinics for him out there.

And like you said, yeah, that’s, that’s, that’s, that’s the best. I mean, our experiences and those things like that, we can go on for days. That, that stuff just, yeah, it’s tremendous. I mean, Snow Valley obviously has had a huge impact on just the number of guys that have been on the podcast that have been a part of Snow Valley and obviously coach show and what he’s meant to us and just meant to the world of basketball in general.

Jaws waiting for your story to take a turn where you told me Dominique taught you how to dunk. That’s what I was waiting for. That’s the, that’s the twist I was waiting for in the story, man. He, he took you out in the backyard and we, you know, put you on an eight and a half foot hoop. He said, here’s how I, You know, here’s I go and rock the baby and, you know, put the ball down between my legs and throw it out two handed.

That’s what I was waiting for. Well, let, let, let me tell you this one real quick thing. I know I don’t want to take up too much time, but I want to tell you one more quick thing. So one of the things he did tell me though, it’s sort of funny, amongst many things he told me, some of it I can’t tell. But he said, you know what, Joe, back in the day, he said, we used to call it, if you came across the middle, he said, we’d lay the wood on you.

I’m like, what do you mean? He says, you know, we’d put the forearm up. He says, you’re not coming across the lane. He goes, especially if you’re one of these guys that are beating on your chest, they’re all this crazy stuff. He said, we would just say, we’re going to lay the wood on them. They’d come across the lane.

We’d give him the forearm shot right to the throat and you know, it was just, it was just really cool to hear some of that stuff. Some of those stories. Yeah, for sure. Absolutely. All right. Mike. Most influential person in your basketball life, Dalgo. Well, I mentioned a couple earlier, my high school basketball coach who is just still is a father figure to me and I went to a small school here in Arkansas and he coached me in basketball and baseball and if we ever experienced anything else like track or cross country, he coached that as well.

And then, you know, for him to, to help me get my first and only job, which I’m still here, To be able to work with him during that time, I learned so much from him. And I, we still talk today and stay in touch. And then the lady that I worked for, Janet Wood as I said, right place, right time, I feel like that this is probably was, you know, this was the plan for me and this is the way it was supposed to be.

And I had just, I had a little stint in the Marine Corps between my first year of college and my, my last part of college. And she, she was intense and she made me realize that you could coach girls like boys at the time. I think that’s changed a little bit over the years. But she loved them, but she was hard on them and she held them accountable.

And I thought, you know, I can do this and never thought I’d get the job. But again, I still talk to her today and call her for advice and talk all the time. Turned in, you know, both of those people not just people I worked for, but people who I feel like they’re family members and, and I’ll always be in touch with them.

And then I mentioned Joe Foley and, you know, coach Foley, I, I’m pretty sure he has almost 900 wins. I think it’s like 866. And only 324 losses and him and Coach R. M. Yukon are the only I think Gino’s the only active coach with more Division I women’s victories than Coach Foley. And he just, you know, he’s a man of few words.

He just recently retired. I’m just so lucky that he took me under his wing when I was young. And just taught me. And again, he still, we still communicate and I just, I cannot say enough about how lucky I am. And kind of referring to what Joel said earlier, I have tried so hard to give back to, to other coaches.

I’ve tried to take care of the younger coaches and always honor every request. You know, I just, coach Foley will forget more than I’ll ever know. And it’s just, it’s just so nice to have him as a resource. And, you know, he’s. I mean, he doesn’t have to, you know, coach Copeland, coach Wood, coach Foley, none of them had to make time for me, but they did.

And I feel like I’m not only a better coach, but I’m a better person from having them in my lives. First boss and high school coach are definitely, I think, two people that we’re going to hear a lot about tonight when people talk about who had the most influence on them for sure. Joe, go. Yeah. And I back up everything Del said.

That’s tremendous stuff right there. And you know, I’ll start with my dad. My dad came from very humble beginnings. He had a basketball, one basketball. They were very poor growing up in the coal regions of Pennsylvania. My grandfather was a coal miner, died of, you know, a black lung disease. So, you know, they didn’t have much, but he had a basketball.

And he wore that thing out. He only had one ball. And I can remember as a young kid, he’s the one that got me involved in basketball to start. So I just want to pay my respects to him. And then the other one, like I was saying, my high school coach was like a second father figure to me, just tremendous, taught me discipline, taught me so many different things, not only about basketball, just about life in general, being a hard worker.

Being a great person, teammate, all those kinds of things. And then, and then last but not least, God has been probably, you know, after that, coach K has been tremendous to me. He’s been a tremendous mentor, friend. We’re still very close to this day. You know, I do some work with Duke, you know, in, in, in terms of mentoring their coaches and doing some player development stuff, you know, it’s all because of him and, and USA basketball.

He recommended me for USA basketball. I worked his camp for over 25 years, you know, and, and, and he, you know, He, he just has taught me so many different things about leadership, about coaching, all those kinds of things. And, you know, one thing that, that always sticks out for me is one of the last years he was there, we always had a coaches meeting right before camp started.

And he called me out, he said, you know, out of the group, he just said, he’s, you know, he’s just talking about coming and working hard. Being great where your feet are. And he, he said to me, he said, you know, front of the whole group, he said, Joe, he says, lemme ask you a question. He goes, did you ever think over 25 years ago when I asked you to come work camp, you were a young coach, that you’d be doing what you’re doing today when you were sitting in a little classroom in Carlisle being a, you know, high school teacher and a high school coach.

You ever think one day you’d be working with us, a basketball and doing all the things you do today? And I, I mean, I was first was shocked, you know, and I said, coach, you know, honestly, I, I really did. I came to Duke. I know people. You know, try to network and do all those kinds of things, which, you know, if that works for them, that’s great.

But I was never one of those guys that did that. I just came and worked hard, you know, try to earn my way and everything I did. And, you know, I, and I tell young coaches today that, you know, that’s what gets you noticed, you know, that, you know, people notice when you do a good job, work hard, it’s about relationships more than it is about networking.

And he’s been such a great friend. And like I said, You know, working, working with him for 24, five years straight. I mean, I look back on that now, it’s just unbelievable that I think that, you know, for, you know, one quarter here of a century, I spent every summer down there with him and just learn from him and during the season going to practices and games.

And like I said, I can’t be more thankful for everything that he has done for me. And he’s just one of many, like I said, I’ve had a lot of people help me along the way. That’s why I like to help young coaches like Del said, because I’ve been very fortunate to have great people around me, so I try to, you know, To pass on any knowledge I can to anybody, any young coach or anybody that asks.

I share, I share everything. I got to say that this lady right here, get in here, mom. Oh my. She, she taught me a lot about. Single mom raised us, taught us how to work, faith, family, all that. I got to give her a lot of credit too. So Joe, when you talked about your dad, I want to throw that in there. But another great memory of mine is going down to Duke, watch coach K’s clinics.

Good stuff, man. I mean, moms, dads, high school coaches, famous coaches, coaches that nobody’s ever heard of besides. The guys in the room, I mean, that’s really what it’s all about. And so Joe and Del, thank you guys for being a part of episode 1000 and for being our guinea pigs and getting this thing started and we will see what happens when we put all of this content together and what the episode sounds like.

So thank you guys.

Welcome me in for session two of the Who Peds Pod 1000th episode. Bob Walsh from St. John’s, Brendan Winters from Pro Skills Basketball. And Dwayne Killings from the University at Albany. Gentlemen, welcome in. What’s up, guys? How’s it going? Thanks for having me. How’s it going, Mike? Great. Glad you guys are all here.

Looking forward to hearing what you guys have to share with us on the questions of the night. So let’s start with the first question. And that question We’ll start, we’ll start actually with the one about your favorite basketball story. I want to make sure we don’t miss out on this one. So Bob, give me your favorite basketball story.

Well, I have a, I have a number of favorites that probably aren’t appropriate for this podcast. So probably it might be different if we were hanging out, having a drink somewhere. You know, I had a conversation with a former player of mine just this past week. He just had his first. child. His name is Bobby Bailey, and he played for me at Rhode Island College.

And he, he came from a, a really tough background. Was a great player in high school, Durfee High School in Fall River, Massachusetts, but admittedly didn’t pay a lot of attention to his grades and wasn’t going to qualify Division I. Ended up playing for me Division III, and, and just getting to college was a bit of a struggle for him.

Ended up being a Dean’s List student at Rhode Island College was the player of the year in our league a couple of years back now, probably five or six years, you know, he graduated from, from Rhode Island College and got his master’s degree recently from Northeastern married, moved back to Fall River, just had his first child about two weeks ago.

And we connected the other day and he’s, Back working in his hometown, having a huge influence on, you know, the youth in his area. And, you know, it’s not just that story, but there’s gotta be a million stories like him where basketball has had an impact like that on somebody’s life. And then that spreads, you know, to the impact he has on other lives.

So you know, there are some funny stories out there about basketball that we all have, but that’s the one I couldn’t get out of my head was a story like Bobby and all the people like him who have had their lives impacted by the game and then go on to do the same literally worldwide. Absolutely.

There’s no question. That’s been a theme that’s come up over and over again on the pod of Just coaches talking about the impact that either somebody had on them or that they were able to have On one of their players dk. How about you? Yeah, I mean when I when I was at temple working for Fran Dunphy, you know, we had a student athlete that You You know, arrived to the university, probably reading at a ninth grade reading level.

You know, he was public league player of the year, he had a baby his senior year, and I think the odds were stacked against him and a lot of people didn’t think he could make it. And over the course of his career, it was, it was a bumpy road, you know, red shirted and the whole deal. And he went on to become an Atlantic 10 player first team, all league basketball player, really grew as a human being.

You know, watch his daughter grow up, you know, literally within our program. We, as coaches, we babysat her sometimes when he had to do study hall and, you know, the kid went on and we go to the NCAA tournament, had some big moments. And when he graduated college, you know, he said to, to, to me, you know, I couldn’t have done this without you guys.

And I think that’s what this is all about. You know, I think, you know, when you find the guys that get average 30 and get a 2. 8 GPA or a 3. 0 and go on, it’s easy for them. I think that’s one thing, but when you find like an ability to put your community together and your academic support people the people on your campus really help grow people.

And you watch a kid where some people would say, man, he might not make it, but you watch the university kind of come alive and put their arms around him. That’s what it’s really about. And now years down the road, you know, I start to age myself a little bit. You know, he’s, he’s doing really well in the world.

You know, he had a long career. You know, he made some money. Now he’s coaching. He’s got a full time job. You know, his kids now are teenagers, which is crazy to me to think about how time flies so fast. But I think that that’s the best part about college basketball, watching the evolution of a person, especially when some people think like he can’t do it.

Reddit? Yeah. A lot of stories. Yes, some obviously probably not appropriate for this podcast, but one of my ones that I don’t know if it’s my favorite, but I, I tell it a lot and I used to tell it a lot to the players that I coached was my time at Davidson, I’ll never forget. We’re in the film room after a game and they used to be pretty brutal sessions with with coach McKillop.

And he was just a stickler for, for the details of everything. And we were reviewing a play, and I was supposed to be free throw line extended. And he didn’t think I was. I mean, you couldn’t really tell, and he broke out a yardstick and measured it. And, I mean, it looked like, to me, I was right on it to this day.

I still, but for about 15 minutes, we had a little standoff about if I was free throw line extended or not. And and he just absolutely blew up at it but I mean I might have been an inch off it but he was such a Detail kind of freak that it’s really stuck with me since then just the importance of the attention to details And everything you do whether it’s on the court off the court and I learned so much from him But that that little story right there.

I I I’ll always tell people about just because he was so anal about the details. And now I’m kind of that way today. And, and you know, I’ll, I’ll never forget that. Question number two, why was becoming a basketball coach? Why was that the right choice for you in terms of who you are as a person in terms of your career?

Bob, we’ll start with you. I would say the biggest thing for me is just being a part of a team. You know, I don’t think there’s anything quite as special as being a part of a team. And growing up, I was. I was good enough to play sports in high school. You know, trust me, I’d still be playing if I was, if I was good enough to do it.

But the value of being a part of a team, the leadership aspect that comes with being a part of a team, you know, what it takes to be a part of a high performing team and a consistent high performing team an elite team, you don’t get that anywhere else, quite honestly, other than athletics. I just think the word is really overused because everywhere, you know, every school is a team or a family or every, you know, if you work as a teacher or a lawyer in a doctor’s office, you know, we’re a team, you know, those, those teams aren’t waking up at 6 a.

m. to lift weights. You know, they’re not going to the beach on Fridays to run sprints and work out and, you know, You know, they’re not coming into the gym at nine o’clock at night to shoot 500 shots. So there’s a physical aspect to it that is terrific that you don’t get anywhere else. And I just think the value, I’ve always loved being a part of a team.

I knew I wasn’t good enough to keep playing. I also knew I didn’t want to put on a suit and tie and get on a train and go into an office every day. So that’s pretty much why it was, it was right for me. That rings true to me, Bob. That rings very true. DK, what about you, man? Yeah, I would agree. You know, the part about a team.

I mean, there’s something about a locker room. Something about galvanizing a group of people to be better versions of themselves. You know, I’ve always loved like, you know, you watch a guy on day one, you know, we started practice last week. And, you know, what can we do with this individual, this young person to try to grow them?

Over like six, seven, eight months span as a person, as a student, and as an athlete, I’ve always loved it. You know, I love the competition love the sense of community. I mean, you know, at our program here at UAlbany, we have an opportunity to like really impact the community here at a really high level.

You know, whether it’s young people, you know, little kids in the community, or trying to get kids on campus to talk about like different programming that, that, that involves. at the institution, I think is an amazing opportunity. And then, you know, when you talk about like having a team, you know, how do you build an identity?

How do you get people to sacrifice? You know, I was fortunate to work at Temple and Marquette. We won a lot of games. You know, we’re at UConn. We didn’t have great years. You know, what are those lessons you can now build into the team that you have this year? Because your lessons from last year don’t obviously apply every year to every team, but can you move the right pieces and get the minds in the right order?

to grow in one game at a time and try to win a championship. I mean, there’s nothing like it. I mean, I, I, I think as a head coach, you know, when you, when you realize like what you’re doing works, there’s no greater satisfaction. And then when you watch a team grow and grow and grow, and sometimes you realize, you know what, you grew through a loss too.

I mean, you see the guys respond. I mean, okay, we didn’t have a great day of practice. We got our butts kicked, but guys are in the gym, they’re in the film room, they’re doing what they’re supposed to do. You’re growing these, these individuals. Day by day, and there’s no better feeling of it. And then when you feel like people are really with you and believe in your vision and what you’re trying to do it’s a very unique thing, I think, in the world.

And, and I think to really understand it, you got to be a part of sport. And I think the game of basketball is very unique in that respect. So I’m very grateful for this opportunity. Brandon White coaching. Yeah man, I, I totally agree with, with both of those, those answers. But for me I grew up the son of a coach and I always wanted to be like my dad as a player and then, you know, following in his footsteps as a coach.

When I got done playing overseas I had the opportunity to potentially coaching college a couple of times, but I just decided to stick at the youth level because I, I found that I had a real passion for it. And then also Growing up with my dad coaching, we moved around a lot and you know, I think things only have gotten worse in that respect over the years.

And so I didn’t want to put my family through that. Even though I had a great time, we lived in eight different cities and it made me a better person. I wanted to stick in one location, but once we started working with the, the, the younger kids from elementary school and middle school to high school, And then ideally, hopefully one day sending them off to, to guys like Bob and Dwayne at the College of Love Life.

I think that’s where I really found my niche. I was able to settle down in one spot and, and really thankful that, that we’re able to kind of impact kids and At those ages, help them make their middle school team or their high school teams. And maybe that’s it. Maybe they go on to play in college, maybe not, but yeah, just have an impact in their lives at a younger age.

I think that’s a great piece of knowledge that we’ve gained through the pod too, is that there’s great coaches at every single level of the game. It doesn’t matter if you’re coaching at the NBA, there’s guys who are great coaches who are coaching AAU basketball with fifth graders. There’s guys who are doing a great job at the college level.

And it just, it speaks to, again, the knowledge that’s out there in the coaching profession. It also speaks to knowing what you want out of the coaching profession. I know I can kind of relate to Brendan’s story a lot because I spend a lot of my time now working with, working with younger kids and working, doing camp, which I’ve done for, I don’t know, 32 years now and all with elementary school kids.

And it’s just a, it’s an area that I have a lot of fun with and I feel like I’m making an impact, again, on the kids that. You know, that are right here in front of me. And so I can totally relate to, relate to that story, Brendan. All right. The last question, gentlemen, the most influential person, person in your basketball life and, and why you feel they were the most influential.

So Bob, go back to you. Well, I’ve been lucky. Like I’m sure everybody here, I mean, I’ve been surrounded by some great coaches in my life. And a lot of them, you don’t realize it until, you know, you’ve left them, you know the guys that you played for and people that you worked with and. you look back and you realize there were a lot of things that made them special.

I’d have a hard time picking one or two coaches. The, the, the biggest influence honestly in my life is, is from a basketball perspective, it is the players. You know, it’s the players that I’m coaching and it’s the players that I have coached. I, I always, you know, I was lucky to be a head coach for 13 years and I always said I learned the most about my teams by talking to my players.

You know, it wasn’t through watching film or. or scouting or evaluating or having staff meetings. It was actually communicating with my players. So, you know, when I sit here, I mean, obviously I’m very fortunate to be working for a guy like Coach Pitino, one of the best to ever do it. But I think about just the connection you have with players and how that impacts me and how they challenge me and, and how they put me in a position where I have to work every day to continue to make them better.

So and, and it, you know, we all know this, it stays with you forever. You know, I have players that I coached 15, 20 years ago that are texting me about, you know, a promotion they got at work and how, you know, if they hadn’t played for us in 2011, when we were at Rhode Island college, they didn’t think.

You know, they, they’d be able to be where they’re at and, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s all those players that really has the biggest influence on me because they continue to drive me and make me better as a coach. D. K. How about you? Yeah. I’ll give you two people. And I love Bob’s answer about the players.

You know, Bruiser Flint for me. You know, I was a ball boy at UMass and he gave me an opportunity and I thought his professionalism was something I learned from his ability to, to care and engage with people, you know, at the institution were really, really important. And I, and I thought he really cared about the place he worked, whether it was UMass or Drexel.

I mean, he only cared about the soccer coach, he cared about the equipment manager, he cared about, you know, the staff, he cared about the student managers. And I think that’s a, that’s a really unique thing because on game day, if you go into one of his games, I mean, everybody’s leaning in. They wanted to win for Bruiser because he cared so much about them.

And he cared so much about his players, which allowed him to really coach him at a really high level. Was one of the lessons I learned, you know, from him. Just a really good dude. And I thought his professionalism showed up from the minute he walked out of the car. From how he’s dressed, how he engaged people, how he welcomed people.

I mean, you know, he’s a pro’s pro, if you will, at the college level. And then, you know, Fran Delphi, I mean, I think he’s one of the elite college coaches, but he’s one of the most elite people out there ever. And Darren Savino, who was at Cincinnati at the time, He said to me, you know, Coach Dumpy is one of the first coaches he ever saw in all his years of coaching.

That after the game he felt bad if you beat him. And I think because of how good of a person he was. You know, like when he shakes your hand and says good luck, he means it. When he asks about your family, he means it. You know, some guys They say it cause that’s what you say in our business, but he really means it when he says it.

And I think he wore the badge in the institution that he worked. Now he’s at LaSalle, he’s at Temple, he’s at, you know, Penn. He really worked it and he had a kind of a way about himself where he never ate lunch by himself. Every day he took somebody out, you know, it was a Dean, it was a provost, it was a student, it was an athlete.

He was always kind of like paying it forward through the institution, which. I think it was really important because sometimes he’d come back to the office and we’d have meetings and, you know, he’d talk about like the issues we were kind of battling. He had a really good perspective because he understood the university at a really high level, but also on the ground with like the students, the professors and everything.

And I think he understood what it took to, to know the institution also where the badge and institution, which I think was really, really unique. And I was really fortunate to, to. One, played for Bruiser Flint and had Bruiser as a mentor, I’ve known since I was six years old, and then worked for Fran Dunphy for eight years.

Hey Mike, can I jump in on that? Just because I love Fran Dunphy, and I was lucky to get to know him. I loved what DK said about him. When I was an assistant at Providence, and I was young, he was coaching at Penn, and they used our gym to practice when they were playing Brown, and I just set him up in the gym, introduced myself, Hey!

He asked me where I was from. I actually, my brother had graduated from Penn. So I said, yeah, my brother’s a big fan, you know, and he goes, Oh, you know, he goes, Oh, it must be really smart. You know, he made a joke like two years later was the next time I saw Dunf. I was out on the road and I saw him in a gym somewhere and he came and sat down next to me and he just goes, Hey, Walshie, how you doing?

I, he goes, how’s that really smart brother of yours? You know, like it was literally, I hadn’t seen him in, in two years. And. He’s such a genuine dude. One of the great ones out there. Yeah. I mean, that, that speaks to the people that can do that, the people that have that ability to impact everyone and to give back to everyone and not just the people who can do something for them.

Those are the dudes that, you know, have got it figured out. And obviously Dunphy fits into that category. Brendan, what do you got for us? Yeah, I, I, I’ve got three, but I mean, the obvious one is my dad. Yeah. You know, he, he believed in me my, my entire career. I mean, always worked out with him, trained with him.

But when I look back at it, I mean, I think he, what he really taught me is how to be a, a basketball parent or a sports parent. He wasn’t the one screaming and yelling at the, the refs or the coach or whatever, he was just sitting there watching, being quiet. Then after the game, he wouldn’t get on me about anything.

He’d ask if I wanted feedback or whatever, and we’d chat about that. So, I look at him as like a role model of how sports parents should be. But it’s funny, it’s always the ones that know the most that are the quiet ones, I feel like. And then, of course, Bob McKillop. I think he taught me how to be a coach.

I probably didn’t really pay attention that much until I got to Davidson. You know, in terms of the X’s and O’s and how the game is, probably should be played or is played. And then I, the third I would say is Jamie Sullivan, who’s the head coach at Worcester Academy now. When I was there he was just the assistant coach.

He was really young. And we had about nine division one players on the team. I came off the bench as like the eighth guy, so I didn’t even play that much. Jamie spent a ton of hours with me in the gym on the weekends and was kind of one of the first guys who really believed that I would end up being a good player, which I really wasn’t at that time.

I didn’t probably Become a good player until Davidson. But Jamie was pretty early on between him and my dad. They were, they were two of the first that believed in me. And then of course, of course, coach McKillop, he offered me my first scholarship and I didn’t have any offers. So I’d say between those three, it’s yeah, they’ve had a huge impact on my life.

That belief piece, I think is huge, right? When you get somebody that believes in you, whether you’re talking about when you’re a player and it’s a coach that believes in you, or when you’re a young coach and somebody on your staff. Puts her arm around you and helps you and guides you. I think that that certainly is something that when I think about who is important in the coach’s lives that we’ve had as guests, that’s definitely a theme that, that runs through it.

So fellas, session two, Who Pets Pod, episode 1, 000, thanks for answering all three of those questions. Truly appreciate it. And we will be moving on to session number three. Thanks guys.

Session number three of the Who Peds Pod 1000th episode. Welcoming back in Monte Patel and Munch Williams. Guys, welcome. Welcome, welcome. Thank you for having me. Appreciate it. Appreciate it. Let’s do it. Let’s do it. All right, here we go. We are excited to have you guys on, looking forward to hearing your answers to these questions.

Let’s start by going to question number one. Why was becoming a basketball coach, why was that the right choice for you in terms of your life decision? Munch, let’s start with you. Yeah, I think for me, it was just the ability to put some type of structure into my life, right? And, and balance and, and some type of calm and just being able to center myself.

You know, I was, when I was fresh out of college, I was doing like Teach for America. I was doing grad school. I was in a relationship. I was back home into the city. And I was just doing a lot of things. So I think the calm and the structure and just having, you know, some some people I needed to be accountable for.

Right. Like, I think those young men sent to my life and made sure I wasn’t drinking, I wasn’t smoking, I wasn’t staying up late. It just put me on some type of, you know, foundation. Right. And having an answer to those guys made me feel like, hey. I need to be, I need to be more mature and a faster rate. So I think being able to coach and being able to be a mentor centered my life to be honest with you, right?

And had everything aligned and the right, the right place without me really knowing. So I would say that the organizational skills and, and just having people to answer to made, made coaching perfect for me at that given time, fresh out of college. What the game gave to you and what the structure gave to you instead of what you gave to the game, right?

That’s what, it’s amazing how many stories are like that. Monty, how about you, man? I mean, I think part of it is from a cultural standpoint of being able to prove I can, I can do whatever I want to do. And I think just some success that I’ve gotten lucky to have has helped me prove that, Hey, I didn’t have to have my community’s approval.

On this type of career path versus what we generally are supposed to be in terms of like Everyone expected me to be a doctor a lawyer something in that aspect But instead I said i’m going to be a basketball coach and everyone else thinks i’m crazy And I think i’m the most sane one in the room so I think that that has been a big part of it of just like why I think It became the right choice because I loved it so much and i’m not a traditional person with Everyone else around that I’ve grown up with.

And then, you know, my ability, I feel like the best ability I have is to connect with people on any level of any topic. And I think that helps so much in our, in our field. And so being able to do that, you know, my teacher’s telling me I run my mouth too much to now the job is to run your mouth and find a place for your players to go to, I think that’s helped me so much to prove that, Hey, I did make the right decision because now I’ve gotten the touch.

You know, hundreds of lives of players who still call back and invite me to their wedding and invite me, you know, to their engagement or whatever, whatever their event in their life is that they find to be important that I get to just be a part of if I’m available. And, and I think that has helped me just realize, you know, how important I can be to others by just treat them right and, and try to give them opportunities.

And if the opportunities don’t work out, at least I know I still treated them right and try to help them along their path. Question number two, your favorite basketball story. Now, this can go in a million different directions, so I have no idea where you guys are going to take this, but Munch, give me your favorite basketball story.

Yeah, I mean, going back to college, my late junior year, I’m on the basketball court, and You know, I’m, I’m hoping I shoot the jumper and coach subs me out. Right. And we had had some, some risks at the time at Wesleyan University about shooting and versus passing. And, you know, I was immature at the time.

Didn’t really want to listen to him. So he subbed me out and when he subbed me out, I kind of like the inner city came out of me, to be honest with you. And you know, I literally just walked off the court, right. Took my jersey, walked off the court, kind of had that high school moment in college. Walked into the locker room and just literally never came back, right?

Like never went back on the team. And I think what happened was that emotion of like, wow, a couple of days later you want back in, but you kind of like, you quit on something, right? And for me, it just put me in a space where I was like, listen, I never want to feel that, that, that energy, right? I never want to feel that feeling inside of my soul.

And it also, Opened the door for me to start figuring out at that point in time. Hey, what I want my career to be, right? Like I was done playing college basketball. I wasn’t going overseas. I wasn’t going to the NBA. I was playing division three basketball. So I, in a sense, turned the lights off on myself.

But since that day, I never quit on anything, right? Like, cause I always go back to that moment of like, Hey, do you want to be considered a quitter? Right. And I mean, at that age, I didn’t really know what I was doing. I was frustrated. I didn’t learn at that point in time, how to deal with my emotions. How to deal with adversity, right?

Like as a black man in America, you’re going to always have to deal with adversity, right? Every single day and different forms of fashion. And at that point in time, I just didn’t have the tools to deal with something I wasn’t, you know, accustomed to, right? Had always played in high school, always played in middle school, all the way up.

Never felt the, the, the quote unquote yank from the game. Right. And you know, like I said, it, But it fast forward me getting into like, all right, well, what I got to do next, right? And I know people always say now at some point the basketball is gonna stop, right? And at that point I kind of stopped it for myself.

No injury. No anything. And like the Crossroads was like, hey, you’re not going back to play basketball and you’re not going back to any city to sleep on your mom’s couch. So what are you going to do at this moment? Right. And for me, adulthood kicked in pretty quickly. And in senior year, I just started focusing on myself and becoming a better man and figuring out what I want to do with my career.

So that’s how I ended up like making sure that when I graduated Wesleyan, you know, I had a job ready for me and a career kind of like career path. So I take that moment, you know, and just say like, Hey, it’s sent to me again. You know, it took away the whole survival of the fittest stuff. It kind of made me think about other people after that.

And ultimately, I think that’s one of them strange basketball moments for me that I hold dear to my heart. But, you know, it taught me something, right? It taught me never to never to have this feeling again in no form or fashion. Like you got to learn how to fight through everything. Now, when I deal with guys and they go through that stuff, you know, not being coachable at that time, I have something to tell them like, hey, listen, even somebody that you might look up to, I failed in that moment in some type of form or fashion.

So being a living example of, hey, you can get through this and still get to the other side. And I don’t want them to do what I did. Like, you know, that was very immature of myself, even though I did feel otherwise at that point in time. Right. So. Walking away from the game is probably the craziest thing to happen.

And it was that, you know, that moment where my emotions weren’t being controlled in the right form or fashion. So, yeah, I would say that was kind of like that, a wild basketball story for myself. Picking a moment of adversity and turning it into a positive, even though in that moment, wasn’t probably, if you look back, what you would have done if you had to do it over again, but at the same time, it sort of set you on your path.

Right. And as you said, Gives you a story now that you could tell, like, look, and I know this is something that you’re a big believer in is taking the examples of things that you’ve had happen to you in your life, things that you’ve been able to experience and then be able to share that with guys and say, look, I’ve been through this.

I know guys who have had these things happen and I know what’s on the other side. If you keep working, you keep fighting through it. And so that’s a really powerful story. Munch, man. I appreciate you sharing that. Monty, how about you, man? I think mine’s like a two parter of. How little I just didn’t know that I, that I thought I did, you know, when I got out of high school, I’m from small town America.

And, and I think, you know, I go to Arkansas state and I’m a manager and I just think I walk into the gym and I see 12 dudes that can dunk. And I’m like, we’re going to win the national championship. It just how ignorant I was to it. Cause I’m sitting here watching. I’m like, yeah, man, we’re good. I’m over here wiping up.

You know, the sweat off the floor, I’m doing laundry. I have half of it. I feel like I’m way too big time to be doing this, even though I’m 17 in college. And I’m, and I still think we’re going to be national champs. And we go to our first game and we get drummed by 30, we get drum and I’m like, Man, I think we just suck.

And I just got, I don’t know, like, again, I don’t know. I got a lot of respect for the guys now that I know, but like, I realized how much I didn’t know because the same team that drummed us by 30, they’re in the national championship game versus Kansas. And I’m, we played Derek Rose. I had no idea who these guys were.

And I’m like, yo, I, I know very little about this career path of trying to go coach in college or trying to. To grow in this career because at that time, I’m like, I just came from a 3A small school that, that, you know, my false reality was there was a guy from our town that made the NBA and got drafted from Arkansas State.

So I’m sitting here like, oh, well, these guys can do it. But I really don’t understand how good these guys really are, but then how good these other guys really are. And so figuring out how much, how little I just didn’t know. And so that, that always threw me for a loop because I tell kids all the time, like, you think, you know, stuff at 17, 18.

And I sure thought I did. And then I got put in my place very quickly in FedEx forum while Derek Rose just busted us left and right. But then, you know, like, like then, then how much I undervalue who I am and, and what I maybe, maybe do or don’t know, because when the TBT opportunity we’ve talked about for like came up.

I was so unsure of it and I thought it was a joke and I’ve been on record saying that and I call a player that’s played at Kansas and been all over and gotten to play and I call him because he’s a buddy and I’m like, hey Hunter, can I coach in TBT? His literal reaction question was, Do you know anything about basketball?

How much, like how much like I undervalued even maybe what I knew and, and now how much I like people undervalue people at the high school level or, or the AAU level or, or any level of basketball, where there are so many guys that actually can do so many things. And we just undervalue it by the title or the level they’re at.

Like, you know, going to the final four, you see D three coaches. And they’re sitting with NBA coaches that they’re cool with. They’re sitting with, you know, final four coaches that they’re cool with and how, how connected our business really is. So I just think the biggest thing, like the funniest thing and the biggest thing I’ve like learned about this is just how little, I don’t know how much I do sometimes undervalue myself.

The best part of like basketball is that one way or another, that ball is going to humble you. In any which way you go on in life and you just got to go with the punches. But I think those are two of my favorite stories from how much I feel like I’ve grown up in just the last 15, 16 years from not knowing anything to still feeling like every now and then I do know something, but I really still don’t know anything because someone else will put me in my place.

I’m teaching me something new and I’m like, okay, just learn, just learn as much as you can. That is so true, man. That growth mindset. And I think you made another great point that We’ve already talked about a little bit with some of the other guys that have been on so far. And that is that there’s just, there’s just great coaches at every level.

And you can look at somebody’s title of this or that, or they coach in high school or they’re coaching at the college level, they’re coaching the NBA or they’re coaching sixth graders in AAU, man. And there, there is great basketball minds at every level. And to your point, Monty, I think that self awareness, right?

understanding who you are and what you know and what you don’t know. I think that’s a really valuable tool for first of all, for any human being, but I think also for coaches, for sure. If you’re kind of aware of yourself, that allows you to make good decisions, be able to have an impact and just understand that as much as you think, you know, there’s always room to grow.

I mean, I know when I was 22, I knew way more about basketball at age 22 than I, that I know now, you know what I mean? I thought I was the greatest thing. Ever at 22. And I look back now and I’m like, I didn’t have any understanding of anything other than just being able to play. And I knew nothing about the game besides how to play it.

And so there’s lessons to be learned. I don’t care if you’re 16 years old and you’re a manager or you’re 85 years old and you’re a retired coach, there’s always something that you can learn. So appreciate you sharing that one, Monty. All right, let’s go to you Munch, most influential person in your basketball life.

Man, yeah. I mean, there’s a, there’s a young lady named Martha Stipio. She, she’s a mentor of mine. She, she clearly has no clue about, she has nothing to do with basketball, right? And I think why she’s the most influential is because she was able to basically put me on a track where I became a student before, before athlete, right?

And we used to go to after school program and she ran, she ran this program called Reach for the Stars when I was a young teenager. And I used to go there on Mondays with friends and, you know, it’s kind of like rap sessions and ability to get away from everything and basketball, you know, had nothing to do with it.

So the reason why I say he’s so influential for me is because I’m a firm believer that mentorship and the people that you’re around can kind of like guide you in either the right way or the wrong way. Right. And in the, in the grassroots space, you have so many different people and different adults that Got to navigate in this process and helping kids in one form or the other and kind of like pushing them this way or pushing them left.

And just to have somebody for me at the time when, you know, my mom wasn’t, you know, able to, to help me in that space. So my dad wasn’t able to help me make, make decisions. I had someone that was, you know, coming from an academic space. Like she was, she had just graduated from Yale. And she was young.

She was like 22, 23 years old. So everything that she was saying to me was pure, right? There wasn’t no, no thoughts of NBA. There wasn’t any, any basketball thoughts behind it. It was purely me, the person and me, the human me, the, the, the You know, the student and, and, you know, she was trying to figure out how to help me get online towards towards greatness.

And she made, she helped make a decision. I say she made the decision for me to go to boarding school after I had graduated high school. Right. And I had went and did a postgrad year at Holden School in New Hampshire. And, you know, at the time I thought I was ready for college, right? Like I’m a solid 75, 80 student in a public school.

And I’m like, Hey, listen, I’m going to college. And she understood my foundation and my roots wasn’t strong enough to academically survive if had I gone D1 to play college basketball at that time. So she, you know, she made the decision to be like, listen, you should go to boarding school in the middle of New Hampshire.

I had no idea what New Hampshire was. I never visited. It was just a, a, a lifetime decision that luckily for me, I had a mentor that was able to, to make this in a calm space that, that she knew, you know, four or five years from now it would, it would turn out to be something productive. So, you know, I’m always grateful for that.

And I always look at. The young men and women that are playing the sport and hope that they’re able to get at least one Martian they like that it’s like, hey, I’m trying to help you navigate all of this space, but not doing it for the wrong reason, right? Like she was pure. To this day, she still is pure and she understood what I needed at the time when my family couldn’t help me.

So, and I, at that time, at 17 years old, had no clue what I was doing, right? Like literally just no clue. Like I’m playing basketball and I’m dealing with girls like and playing video games, like those are the three things that are consistent in my life at that time. Right. And she knew like, Hey, there’s something in this young man that if I help him navigate this process now, you know, it could come in, it could come in handy.

I’m super grateful that I’m just able to have a mentor that didn’t really love the game of basketball at that time, right? And, and I, and I compare it to what guys go through now and they’re handlers and fake mentors and all of this stuff that, that happens, right? Like just to have people that are really, really looking out for you when you don’t know, right?

You just don’t know at that time. So, Yeah, I would say she, she literally the most important person I’ve ever met that has something to do with somewhat basketball, you know. Finding someone who’s genuine and really cares and it’s difficult to sift that out sometimes, right? You can’t always tell right off the gate who has your best interest at heart and it’s for for you to be able to find someone like her to be able to give that to you and set you on the right path and help you to make good decisions when just like Monty was talking about, like I was talking about, when you’re.

When you’re a teenager, when you’re in your early twenties and you think you know every single thing that’s out there and it’s always good to look at some people who are, who are wiser than you and hopefully you find, you find the right one. Monty, how about you, man? You know, I think it’s, you know, I think for me it’s very hard because I have gotten to know a lot of good people that, that have influenced me, but one person that really stands out and, and it’s crazy to think about is, is a guy named A.

D. Malhotra. He is at FAU right now. He is the associate head coach. He was with the sons, he was with Baylor. You know, I was in Grant McKesson’s office at Arkansas State after, you know, my, my stint of being the best manager on the planet. Later on when he got the job and he had said, you need to talk to AD mid conversation.

I was like, who is ad why? He’s like, he’s an Indian guy. You know, a lot of Indian people get put off by stuff like that. And I’m like sure, sure. I guess that’s where the conversations go and grant like, that’s fine. And so but but what he what he didn’t know and I didn’t know is he introduced me to someone I really look up to I really value as a friend really value as a human being a coach you know, we got to visiting and I got to go down to Baylor and meet him in person he left us a lot of tickets to go between some recruits and my friends just go watch a game and we got to visit for the first time We started texting more and more we got a little closer Then just over time the relationship just naturally progressed So I’d go to him for a lot of advice of struggles that I was going through that he may have went through at some time which he had and I could identify with because again that’s harder for me because there’s not as many Indian people in this business of coaching especially basketball and you know to where he gets the son’s gig And now he’s he’s roaming around with James Jones as as his direct boss And i’m like, this is so cool And he’s like this is work like you shouldn’t hype this up like you’re doing influential stuff So one day he calls me, he’s like, do you need an assistant coach for TBT?

And I’m like, you know, I’m iffy about anybody that wants to just get onto TBT. And I’m like, ah, how do, I don’t know. Just kind of depends who you think. And he’s like me. I was like, done. That’s easy. And he’s like, he’s like, are you sure? I was like, dude, I didn’t, I didn’t know who you were going to say. I’m very picky about this.

You in a heartbeat and, and, you know, him coming. And not, not even getting a hotel, staying at my house with the position that he’s in, that other people would view as such a big time position. Staying at my house, we go roam around to eat good food locally. We watch film till 2, 3 AM. We laugh, we talk basketball.

He’s amongst my friends and my people. And it’s just very, very humble about how he, how he was. And I’m just like, man, I. I wish I could be better about stuff like you are to watch them be on the bench and he’s like I got the door for you. What do you need? Hey, let’s think about this But he never never made me feel inferior even though I knew because now i’m a self aware human being from everything else He is a way better coach than I am to where one of my other coaches that’s on our bench brock winners that Coach schulman actually mentioned on your podcast Hey, I’d said, man, Brock, do we win a single game without 80?

He’s like, absolutely not. We, we, we wouldn’t got toes. And I was like, bro, I agree, but it was so, it was so incredible of how much ahead he was than us, that it helped us to where he’s like, Hey, I’ll come back. We’ll make it work. It’s putting video playbooks together to now. Like, I don’t even care about his time.

I text him when I need to text him. I, I reach out to him like, Hey, I need to know how y’all do this. What, what are your teaching cues for this? Like I want to learn from you because I mean you won a national championship, which is great But you were a successful high school coach you you grinded through the Baylor times You now are an associate head coach.

Like I love him. Like he is my guy. He is someone I respect a ton He knows that we we he helps me through my tough times and you know, I hope somewhere in there I’m helpful to him in any which way I feel like it’s more of a one sided relationship But it has helped me so much to where even to the point like again, I the sons are in town You Where it’s the final four, Scott Drew is hosting his own event for all his Baylor folks.

And yet AD still finds a way to come put on an event with me for Indian coaches there. And I’m like, dude, like this does mean a lot to me that you are, you are going to help me build this and we can do this together to find others. Cause no one’s coming for me. Like when I market this, I’m like, it’s 80 beholder with the Phoenix suns and then very small print and money to tell, but you respect it so much.

He’s like, Hey, no, look, it’s both of us doing this. Like you don’t have to put my title so much humbleness that I hope I can, you know, get that at times and be better about stuff and not, not overthink or. Or try to avoid people when you know, sometimes these times get busy for all of us That you don’t respond to this message this and that and I try to think hey, man He responds to people he gets back people I can do the same.

I can’t use I don’t have time as an excuse. I can get back to them on my own time But I think he’s the most influential what I mean, man I’ve got you know There’s so many coaches that have done so much for me over time and that that’s the only reason i’m here in the first place but I look up to A. D. a lot, and I hope I can ever come close to being the coach that he is, and especially the husband and the father that he is with his family.

I hope I’m close to that. It’s great stuff, Monty. I mean, the influence. Obviously, I know that you know, when you think about, as you mentioned, just being an Indian in this basketball community, when you look around at the basketball landscape, To just, you know, you’re kind of a lonely face, you know, and so to be able to find somebody who has traveled along similar paths to you, I’m sure is just tremendously valuable.

So Monty and Munch, I want to thank you guys for being a part of this 1000th episode of the Who Pets Pod. Again, truly value both of your friendships. So glad that you guys have been a part of it. We will be moving on to session number four of the 1000th episode of the Who Peds Pod. Thanks, guys.

Session number four of the Who Peds Podcast, 1000th episode. We’re welcoming in Nick Legalbo, Mark Schult, and Bob Krasancic. Guys, welcome. Thanks for having me. Thank you. Glad to be here. Thank you. Excited to have you guys on. Nick, we’re going to start with you and Question number one. Why was becoming a basketball coach the right choice for you in your life?

Yeah. All right. So two minutes started. Here we go. I think I could talk about this for probably 20 hours, but I just feel at the end of the day I think it’s, it’s our job as human beings to find our purpose. You know, I think we all have a purpose in this world. And I, I truly believe that I’ve been put on this earth to, to serve and, and using the game of basketball as that vessel.

So I just feel blessed every day to get to do what I do to impact lives through the game that I love. You know, I’ve talked 20 years, I’ve coached for 20 years, but I think the thing that’s cool about coaching is that you get to use something that everyone, you know, you’re, you’re choosing to be there, right?

And it’s something that we all really want to improve upon. And, and again, I, I still pinch myself. It never has felt like work. It just feels like something I truly enjoy. And the stories now and the, and the relationships that have come from this. Through all these, you know, all these years it’s something I’ll never take for granted.

Right. So definitely the right move. I truly love what I get to do every day and very blessed. I think that was under two. You did it, man. Nice work, Nick. You do, you, you got in under the time limit. All right. Mark, let’s go to you next. Yeah. You know agree with what, what Nick said. I think coaching is, is certainly a calling, you know, and I kind of stumbled into it.

What, what got me into coaching was, you know, like a lot of guys used to be a player. Got to college and found that I wasn’t as good as I, I used to be when I was in high school. You know, so when my playing career ended, you know, getting cut as a college player, I, I knew I had to stay around the game.

So kind of just eased into a student coach, a manager role. You know, kind of learning, seeing the impact from the other side that coaches get to have on their players. Seeing, you know, all the time, all the dedication to it, you know, and kind of having the opportunity to, to be that big brother that, you know, that, that uncle, that father figure for some guys was something that was really special to me, you know, particularly in the high school and college age, which is an important time for, for young people to grow up, you know, so that’s kind of.

A young guy with, with nothing to lose. I kind of stumbled into it fell in love with the game at a young age and then kind of fell in love with, with the opportunity to, like Nick said, you know, build relationships, get to know God and, and hopefully help them kind of get ready for the next chapter of their lives.

So it’s, it’s been a fun journey doing that. And like Nick said, it’s, you have to pinch yourself almost every day to think that you can wear shorts or to back, you know, to work every day. So. It’s, it’d be hard to imagine doing something else right now. All right, Bob, you’re up. Hey making a career choice at a young age is, you know, not always easy.

And, and nowadays they say every 4. 2 years, people change professions, jobs. So I always tell my players, you’ve got to hate losing more than you like winning. And I think that’s one of the reasons why I got into coaching. I never wanted that day to day, that factory type. We’re business type where you come, same feelings, same emotions.

I love that high and that low. And I hated to lose and playing basketball at Youngstown state. You know, the competition Ron Jaworski was there, a couple other players that you know, made it in the professional ranks, Cliff Stout. Jim Trestle was there. I became really good friends with him, but I love the mentality that you could control so much of that win loss.

You could control your program. You could control so much and make lives better for so many athletes, your staff, your program, your boosters. So as a coach, you do have a lot of control. I think as much as maybe in a business and you affect lives. So I, I was very, very fortunate and I definitely made the record.

All well said, I think again, when I go back and think about the episodes that we’ve had, over the course of the time doing the podcast, the number of people who have shared similar themes to what you three guys just talked about in terms of just the why behind it. Everybody wants to share their why.

Everybody’s is slightly different, but I think it all comes back to a love of the game and then being able to use that game to impact, to impact the young people that you get a chance to interact with all the time. All right. The next question is a basketball story and we left it generally vague. to see what kind of direction people would take it in.

We’ve had funny stories. We’ve had serious stories. We’ve had stories all across the board. So you can take it in whatever direction you want. Nick, start with you. Okay. That was the hard one, I think. I think we probably all, for doing this long enough, we probably all have some pretty cool stories about, you know, big wins, tough losses, what have you.

You guys know my story about my cousin and the non violent stuff we’ve done in the city. So I was kind of going there, but that was also very traumatic. So I try to look at something. That turned out to be really positive my experience with coaching at Lane Tech and we actually had a student he came to our youth camps for years really wanted to play for our school, wanted to play, you know, he and I built a relationship, wanted to play for me.

I ended up having him freshman year in English class and he walks into my class and within the first week or two, you know, I got to know him a little bit from our camps and he Was just kind of off a little bit. And one day he has to see me after class and turns out the, the, you know, the sad part of the story is that he found out he had a rare heart defect just weeks prior and doctor told him he can never play competitive basketball again.

So I mean, he’s literally there crying in my classroom, you know, and I I try to get really creative in that moment. This is a kid who clearly really cares about it. He’s a leader in our, he’s a natural leader in our class already. We’re only in school two weeks. We got almost 5, 000 kids in our school and he’s already standing out.

So we created like a player coach role for him. His freshman year, he was up with our varsity every day, helping keep stats, helping film, helping coach, just jumping into drills. And he fell in love with it, you know, and it’s so much so that by the end of his freshman year, he had loved it so much.

His mom and I started talking about how much he loved it and wanted to stay involved. But then they started talking about how they can make this bigger for other athletes who were, you know, who would be sidelined with injuries or what have you, because at the end of the day, everyone’s career comes to an end at some point, right?

Whether you’re cut, whether you get injured, whether you just max out your time. So they started a non for profit called Sideline Chicago. And then that became Sidelight USA. They’ve become like a national organization. And just seeing him take that on as a high school kid. He just graduated from Baylor University, just got married actually.

And he’s just living his best life, but it was really cool to see him turn a negative positive and impact so many lives from that. So, and in a small way, I think we helped that. All right. Thanks for sharing that one, Nick. I mean, that’s a powerful story. Again, I think when we start talking about, again, something that goes beyond.

The game of basketball and grows into something bigger. That’s, that’s really the impact that we’re talking about. Mark, your favorite basketball story. It’s a good question. Like I said, it’s a hard one. There, there’s so many memories you have in basketball. One of my favorite ones, a little bit lighter note.

You know, so I was a freshman in college Wittenberg university, you know, and we were getting ready. Obviously in high school, you always have Thanksgiving off, you know, Christmas day off, but. We had to play the Friday after Thanksgiving. So there was one year, my freshman year of college, where, you know, I had to leave Thanksgiving in the morning with my family, go up to school and practice.

And then at night, we had like an eight hour drive to Memphis, Tennessee, you know, to prepare for our tournament. And we always joked that, you know, we’re driving, you know, we’ve been on the road for four or five hours. It’s, you know, six or seven o’clock. We’re getting hungry. And the only place that we could, we could find, you know, to feed 20 guys and three vans was was a gas station subway, you know, so Thanksgiving night I got a turkey sub from, from subway.

And always remember that turkey, you know, I’ll never forget that story, but you know, basketball takes you to so many places. And that, that was just a fun one that, that always sticks out. I love that. Turkey dinner, baby. There you go, man. Well, we’ve all probably had a, we’ve all probably had a turkey or a Christmas dinner similar to that on the road somewhere.

I know I, I know I’ve had my share of those. So Bob, how about you, man? Oh, without a doubt. This was 2013, but in 2010 in the state semis my toughest loss in basketball. We lost an OT to Moeller and my son was a junior, Cole, the oldest one. Then he graduated the next year, never, you know, experienced that state run, but not the state championship.

2013, we’re playing for the state title game. D1, Schottenstein, great crowd. You know, most of the men are there. If not, everybody is watching and we win the game, we win the state title. Afterwards, I meet my youngest son at center court, probably the best hug ever. And my oldest son was right behind the bench with a number of my players and my family.

You dream of moments like that, especially with your sons. It’s just, you know, it, the epitome would have been both of them on the court, but they both got the experience that we did get the state title with my youngest. And again, with my oldest was still like part of the team and his buddies, just one of the most elite, best moments ever that I could imagine.

Like I said, you dream about that stuff all the time and it came to fruition. That’s powerful. A very, very few people get the opportunity, A, to experiment. You’re combining like multiple experiences right there to be able to coach yourself. I did. Yeah. You had a bad experience, which not many people, you know, and then, and then you combine that with the opportunity to win a state title with your, with your son on the team.

And it’s just, again, there’s, that’s things that you know, people go to bed, coaches go to bed at night dreaming about the opportunity to do those things and to be able to wrap them both into one package, man, I mean, that’s you know, that’s a powerful story for sure. All right. The most influential in your basketball life.

We’ll go back to you, Nick. Thanks. Yeah, well, I always joke, I kind of feel like I’ve had two North Stars. I mean, it all started with me for Coach K when I was a kid. I went to the same grammar school and started dreaming big dreams when I was, you know, eight, nine years old, watching him coach the system, the dream team and Duke.

But I mean, if I’m being completely honest, right it’s got to be Coach Show. I mean, Coach Show Walters. I think he’s, he’s the goat man. He’s the North Star for so many of us. And what he’s done through Snow Valley Basketball School, what he’s done through USA Basketball. the opportunity he’s afforded so many coaches and players his guidance, his mentorship.

I don’t think there’s been in the past 15, 20 years a big decision in my life that I haven’t kind of consulted with him or talked to him about things, whether it’s taking on an athletic director role at our school and then stepping down from that role to focus more on the coaching and growing our program, the birth of my children, my wife changing careers.

I mean, I’ve called him and spoke to him. on so many occasions. And, and then, you know, you know, still pinching myself the past, you know, eight to 10 years, getting to work with USA basketball and having him there and, and, and to be a mentor in that capacity and really even just X ing and O ing with him and talking shop.

Again, I don’t know outside of my father, there’s been an individual, my, my mother and my father, but, you know, just my dad with his coaching and stuff. There hasn’t been an individual who’s impacted my life more and I say it to him all the time and he’s probably sick of hearing it, but just I don’t, I don’t know where I’d be without him.

Yeah. You’d be at a bad steakhouse, Nick. Yeah. You’d be at a bad steakhouse. And I get a lot of steak advice too, man. For sure. We get a lot of steaks, but I, I wouldn’t know how to grill the steak like I do. And I sure wouldn’t know what a good steakhouse looks like. So that’s, that’s, that’s for sure, Jay. I mean, what, what coach show has meant to our podcast, it’s I mean, it’s immeasurable.

So, all right, Mark, you’re up. Yeah. Another, another obviously hard one. You know, we, we’ve all talked about, it’s, it’s the relationships that makes this game so special. I’d be remiss to not mention the first coach I ever had, you know, my, my dad parent volunteer and in the second or third grade. And, you know, I, I used to be tall when I was younger.

And then, like I said, I got to college and averaged out. But you know, I was, I was a tall, awkward kid and I just remember so well him kind of you know, telling me you need to get five rebounds this game and every round you get one, look over at me and you’d have a one up and then you have a two up.

So that was, you know, what really got me into basketball at a young age. My high school coach, another guy who’s been on the show, Scott Rusatz who, who coached me my sophomore year of high school, you know, really taught us taught me at a young age, just. How to fall in love with the work, you know, fall in love with what it takes to get better.

You know, the sacrifices you have to make that, you know, go, go far beyond just on the court. You know, it’s, it’s staying in on a Friday night when, when your friends are out getting in trouble, you know, it’s, it’s getting extra shots up after practice. Like him teaching me that stuff along with the foundation my dad gave me again, really influenced me as a player.

And then as a coach, there’s, there’s no question. He’s my boss now. Dave Moore, University of West Georgia, you know, gave me my first opportunity coaching at a four year college. You know, and then after I finished my graduate assistantship for him, two years later, he, he’s brought me back, you know, and now to have an opportunity at a young age, you know, to, to jumpstart my career in a really good spot, you know, Dave Moore is just the ultimate grinder, you know, the, the early mornings, you know, the dedication that he shows to his players, to his staff is second to none, you know, so been very, very blessed.

I could probably name a dozen other guys but like I said, can’t, can’t not mention my, my own father, you know, my high school coach, Scott Rusatz, and my, my first college, you know, four year college head coach I worked for, David Moore all just fantastic influences in life and basketball. Thanks for sharing that, Mark.

All right, Bob. Last but not least. Okay. When I speak, one of the things I emphasize is Everybody’s son, daughter, even themselves are going to become very much like the five closest people in their lives. So be very, very careful who you associate with. Everybody I believe in coaching has had mentors and people that gave them great advice.

And again, you’ve got to go and find people that are successful and find out what they do. The best piece of advice I ever got, which has carried me through my career. A coach named Ed McCluskey, seven times state title in PA, and he was finishing his career and we scrimmaged him on the 25 year old head coach at Girard High School.

And afterwards he was kind of frustrated, said, coach, can you give me one little nugget, one little piece? Of something that will help me in my career. And without hesitation, he said, eliminate problem players, eliminate problem parents, eliminate problems period as fast as you could. And he said, make sure that you make the decisions and no one makes them for you, or you don’t put them off.

And my first year I cut 10 out of 12 seniors. After game two, I cut the best player on the team because he didn’t bust. We won one game and I don’t know if I would do that in this day and age. But I took his advice so literally and it’s been amazing and he was exactly right and after that we didn’t lose.

And I learned to make decisions, you know, don’t put them off. Don’t procrastinate. And make sure that somebody along that same line said, if you’re ever going to get fired, make sure it’s for your decisions. Nobody else’s are the decisions that you didn’t make. So great piece of advice. And very fortunate to be around so many great people in the game.

A lot of times young coaches can struggle with that, making those tough decisions, having those tough conversations where, man, maybe it’s easy just to kind of dance around it instead of getting right to the point and doing what you need to do. And ultimately, I think the sooner you can get to those tough conversations, the sooner you can get to those tough decisions.

The easier it is for everybody who’s involved in them to, to move forward and make it in a positive way, both for, again, you as a coach and your team and for a player, if you have to cut them, whatever it is that’s going on that, that causes that tough decision to be made. So I think there’s, that’s great advice that you got, and obviously you put it to great use.

And then again, over the course of a tremendous career that continues to, continues to go along. So I want to thank you guys for jumping on to the thousandth. Here are the Who Pets pod. Just again, I look at each one of you guys and I’m just thankful that that you’ve come into. Yeah, come into my life, come into Jason’s life and just been a part of what we’ve been able to do here on the Who Peds Pod and hopefully in the course of, of doing this thing, we’ve been able to give back to the game and somehow give it at least something from what it’s given us.

So Nick, thank you, Mark. Thank you, Bob. Thank you for being a part of it and really appreciate it and glad you guys were a part of this 1000th episode of the Who Peds Pod. Thanks guys.

Welcome in to session number five of the 1, 000th episode of the Who Peds podcast. In this session, we’ve got with us Casey Korn, Rob Brost, and Greg White. We are going to start with question number one, and it’s going to go to Casey. When you think about becoming a basketball coach, why was that the right choice for you in your life?

It’s an evolving question, right? Cause it changes as I continue to mature and, and, and, you know, continue down this path, but it started cause I loved the game. I, I, you know, the, the game of basketball was competitive. It was a great outlet. And then I quickly realized that it’s all about people. And you know, I taught now, I, and, you know, we talked about this on an earlier episode, right?

I transitioned from the high school level to the, to the collegiate level. And. You know, the one thing about the high school level was you know, I was also teaching and whenever you’re teaching, you get 150 people and you know, you’re making some type of impact in, in, in people’s lives. I will tell you when I was going through the interview process to, to move up to the college level, that was one of my concerns.

I was just like, well, I know I’m, I’m reaching, maybe not reaching all of them, but I know I’m making an impact in a couple of people’s lives. The, the response that I got back was you, you won’t have 150, but you’re going to have 20 and the impact is going to be so much greater. And that right there was kind of what, you know, it’s become my why and why I do it.

It’s because of the people, because of the people I get to reach and impact and have conversations with that have now become my friends and my coach, my assistant coaches. And, and you know, it, it keeps me around. It keeps me loving it, loving it, and it keeps me you know, engaged. That’s for sure. I think, you know, basketball has a way of bringing people together, just like the, the five of us.

Right. And so you know, I think basketball was what I chose to do because I had so many great mentors and so many other adults that kind of mentored me through basketball. And I wanted to do that for somebody else. Right. And I know we’re going to get to that in some of the other questions that we’re going to get here, but you know, to echo what Coach said, you know, it’s all about the relationships and you know, the basketball piece brings us together.

The relationships last for a lifetime and the friendships last, last for a lifetime. And just like us, like I’ve known Greg for years and years now, and we’ve become friends because of basketball, but now we’re friends without basketball too. And so, you know, that’s, that’s the great thing about the game and not only this game, but any game you can make like long friendships, relationships through this game and that’s, that’s why I think I do what I do and that’s why most people do what they do.

Greg, how about you? I think kind of, you know, following Casey and Rob, like, I don’t think any of us would have dreamed, you know, when we got into this profession that we’ll be sitting here tonight, you know, with friends from across the country and different levels the experiences we’ve had that, you know, all came because we fell in love with the ball.

You know, we were kids and more importantly, we had. Someone that taught us to love the game. Like you don’t, I would have, you don’t just wake up one day and say, you know, I love basketball. Somebody taught you to love basketball and it’s because they loved you and they, they showed you attention. They showed you, you know, how to work.

And so at my point in my career, like seeing my son go into profession now, like you, I think the right choice for me was I wanted, I wanted to be impactful just like I was impacted. And, It just so happens we’re doing it through a game we all love. And so looking back, you know, where I’m at now, why this was the right move for me is because I’m passing on lessons that I learned from Rob this past, you know, spring watching Rob coach what conversations with Casey, conversation with you and Jason, like it’s, it’s an evolving, like Casey said, it’s an evolving career.

I don’t think we’re ever going, once we’re done learning, once we’re done evolving, we need to get out. We just have to hope we’ve taught enough people, you know, around us and younger than us to protect the game and keep it going. I love that idea of, again, leaving a legacy, right? You’re doing it directly through your son.

And I know Rob and I have talked a lot about my son and his son, and just, again, they’re still in the playing phases of their career. But just again, how Meaningful and special that is to be able to, to share something. As you said, Greg, that you love that somebody showed to you and now good, you’re passing it on to the next generation.

And man, there’s nothing, there’s nothing more powerful than that. All right. Question two, this one. Is your favorite basketball story and I intentionally left it sort of open ended so that people could take it in a lot of different directions and we’ve had serious stories. We’ve had funny stories. We’ve had kind of all up and down the scale.

So you can take this one in whatever direction you want. Casey, you’re up first with the, with your favorite basketball story. Yeah, I debated which one of these I was going to tell kind of went back and forth. But because, you know, I, I got two really good coaches on this call with me that have won a lot of basketball games.

I want to remind people that I was part of a national title team. So I like I want to tell that story, I guess you can, you can say, haha. You know, any recruits are listening, right? You know, if we’ve had some success in the past, you know, always be recruiting. However, my favorite story is, you know, we go through and I’m with UW Oshkosh and, and, and I’m experienced this with my best friend, my college roommate, Matt Lewis, right?

We we’ve known each other since we were 18 years old when it goes back to the relationships. But I mean, for three weeks, you don’t sleep, right? You’re, you’re preparing for these games. You want to know. I want to know what the other team had for breakfast. Like there’s no stone left unturned as we were preparing and we’re preparing.

And, you know, it was my job to prepare for our first game, but it was also my job to have the other assistant coaches prepared for, for Saturday. So if they had any questions, you don’t take it to that coach, you took it to me. And so I was the one that kind of, you know, navigate, no, you need to make sure you do better here.

And then once you won that game on Friday, you played, you know, Less than 24 hours. And so I had to then stay up until, you know, all hours of the night to make sure that we’re ready to go. So three weeks go through, we win the title. It’s an awesome celebration. There’s this big party back at the hotel.

There’s, you know, hundreds of people hanging out in there and I’m exhausted. Like I’m sitting down, I’m just waiting for the wild wings to come through so I can get a, you know, a bite to eat. I don’t want to go to bed. And this fan comes up to me and, and. You know, division three assistant coach didn’t make a lot of money.

If I was Calipari making a little bit more money, I would understand the questions, coach, you got a lot of guys coming back, you don’t want it again. Next year. I said, dude, we’re two hours away. We just, you know, give me, give me a day here. Let me sleep once and then maybe I can answer that question. So, you know, it, it made me remember, it was a great story to tell.

I remember that entire evening, but. You know, sometimes you forget that you know, it’s, it’s always the next thing, right? Always the next thing. So you gotta enjoy those little moments as you go. What have you done for me lately, right? What have you done for me? Absolutely. You know, sorry, we haven’t won a game in two hours.

I apologize.

All right, Rob, top that one. Go. Well, I don’t know if I could top that one, but I am, I am the freshman. This is my first head coaching job. I’m the freshman boys coach at Cedar Falls High School, which is the school that I attended. And Coach Likas hires me before I even finish my undergrad. and puts me in charge of the freshman team.

So, you know, I’m really fired up for this opportunity and I’m going to, you know, I, I guaranteed him I would do a good job and I was meeting with him, you know, once a week, just, you know, during the season. And he, he, he gave me this bit of advice and he said, you know, the day before one of your games, just put five minutes on the clock and tell them to shoot, tell the players to shoot game shots that they would get in the game.

And see what they do and just see what their IQ is like and see, you know, kind of what they do. And you can kind of evaluate from that. So this is, I think after our third or fourth game, and I’m all fired up to do this cause coach gave me the, you know, this is what, this is what I should be doing. And I’m all of, you know, 21 years old and I’m coaching kids that are 15, 14 and 15.

And so I get out there and it’s the day before the game and I say, all right, fellas, you’re going to, I’m going to put five minutes on the clock. You’re on your own. Just take game shot. And I remember this like it was yesterday. This kid, Jimmy Johnson is the kid’s name. Jimmy goes and gets the rack, the entire rack of 15 balls, rolls it to the half court and just starts heaving half court shots, one after another, after another.

And I was like, what is he doing? So I just watch him for a second to think like, like, is he joking? Is he mocking me? What is he doing? And he went through the entire rack, all 15 balls. And, and I just watched him do this. And then, then I blew my whistle and I was like, Jimmy, what are you doing? I said, game shots.

And then he said, coach, I only get in with less than five seconds left. These are my game shots. So it happened just like coach Slyketh said. He said, you know, they’re probably a little bit smarter than you give them credit for. They’ll figure out their game shots. And sure enough, He figured out his game shots because he had played in two of the three games and it was in garbage time where he was in with less than 10 seconds to go.

So those were his game shots. So that’s my, that’s my funny story. Again, a little like coach, I had a couple of things that maybe I could have had options for, but that was a, a really good, good story on players know more than you think. And their IQ is better than sometimes you give them credit for it.

That’s a good one. All right, Greg, you’re up. So I tried to, I wouldn’t, I saw this, I just, like everybody, memories just flying and like, what’s the best one? What’s the best one? I think for me, you know, what it was there’s a, I got to have a really cool moment with my, both my sons. And it kind of taught a part into why it’s a cool story for me.

So, They were four years apart in the head coach. I got to make a decision, well, Hey, we’re going to move a freshman up. So I moved Evan up so he could be on the floor with his brother. Nolan, you never want to go into it knowing it’s your last game, but we’re playing North Little Rock who has Moses Moody who’s now with the Cone State Warriors.

So we kind of knew that was going to be a tough task. And so I was able to orchestrate like the game, you know, for Evan to go sub in for his brother and just unscripted on rehearse when he went to check in for his brother, he gives him a hug. Luckily, someone captured that moment for me. I have a picture of me watching it, see it happen, not knowing what was going on.

Cool thing was last year I got an opportunity to go to the Hoosier gym. And if you’ve ever been there, it’s basketball heaven. I have a list of all these places you’ve got to go. Well, I got to go there and speak in a clinic and I got to go into the, down into the locker room, you know, where it’s strapped spraying and they’re waiting on the game.

And I’d seen pictures so I was prepared. So I took the jersey that both of my son and if anybody from Bentonville West is here and I’ll send you a check, but. I took the jersey and they both wore in the game and put a note inside it. And I gave the boys, I said, here’s the option. I can keep this jersey or I can make you immortal.

And they’re like, what do you mean? So my son’s jersey is hanging in the Hoosiers gym locker room right there. But where it says, you know, welcome to Indiana basketball. And that was kind of the coolest thing. Cause probably my favorite moment. Cause that was one of those, like, regardless of anything we’ve ever done, somebody’s going to walk in there and be like, what’s this?

And. Hopefully they look at on the inside and there’s a card that says, you know, Hayden and Evan White wore this Jersey playing for their father. So my son’s team played at the Hoosier gym this season. And there’s a, there’s a long story that I’m not going to tell. We were supposed to play two games. The one game, the one game, the one game got, so the first game we played, we won by like 35 or 40.

And I will honestly say that I think playing in the Hoosier gym meant more to me than it meant more to, than it meant to. The kids on the teams, they didn’t have the same connection to the movie that I did. But then the second game, there was an incident, two minutes into the game, and the other, the other team, the other team left the floor and went home.

And so two minutes, two minutes into the game, the game was, the game was over. And Greg, just so you know, just so you know, Greg, that was the only game that they played in that gym. That was the only game they played. So, they drove four hours to come and play for two minutes and then I’ve seen that part of the movie.

Yeah. Your kids were playing like Yeah. It was They pulled a punch. It was Kroger. It was one of the Were the trophy cases okay and everything? Everything was okay. Everything was okay. Like, it’s one of those things where, and for anybody who’s been there, like you go there and it’s, the people who are working there are for the most part, I would say older gentlemen.

And it feels like, it feels like a shrine. Oh. Right. And Those guys feel like the caretakers of just like a basketball temple. And to go in there and have what happened happened, I still, I almost, I’m really surprised it never ended up on the national news that just that this went on. It was like a death, the desecration of a, of a basketball temple.

But anyway, I, I, it was, if, if anybody has not, who’s listening has not had a chance to go and experience the Hoosier gym, it is, it is well worth your time as, as Greg just described. It’s, it’s just an incredible, incredible experience to, to be in, walk in that gym and think about all the scenes in the movie that were filmed there and everything that went on.

It’s just again, it was an honor to just, and I didn’t even play, obviously I just sat there was watching my son’s team play, but man, it was, it was a blast. So I’ll tell the story off air. Okay. All right. Question number three, our most influential person in our basketball life. Casey, go. Yeah. Another, another great question.

Another thinker. You know Greg mentioned earlier, right? Somebody made you fall in love with it, with, with the game. And you know, that, that started with, with probably my, my pops. And, and I’m going to circle back to him here in a second, but my high school coach Bill Gunn he was a guy that, Brought me in under his wing as a young kid and taught me like the actual intricacies of basketball and coaching and how I did some film for him.

And then, you know, I mentioned Matt already. You know, he allowed me to come coach college basketball with him and taught me, you know, the recruiting process, right? I done the, The high school and the X’s and O’s, but I didn’t know anything. I, he took a chance on me. But, but overall, when I, when I said my dad, even though he had nothing to do with basketball, he had everything to do with, with relationships and people and taking this and to not too dark of a spot.

But after he passed, like you thought about, right, you remember about. About guys and, and, and, you know, you think of him and he’s, he was one of those people that everyone loved. There, there’s, you know, and you try to think about why, right? You know, you, you go back and why did everyone love him? Well, it’s because he cared.

He cared about people and he cared about people first and he asked questions. He, he, he listened to their answers and when you know somebody cares about you, you’re willing to, to, to give a little bit more. You’re giving a little bit more to the program, a little bit more to what they need to need to know and it’s something.

You know, I find myself in that role, maybe more than the X’s and O’s maybe more than, you know, calling timeouts. It’s about the people as we’ve, we’ve talked about, and it’s, it’s about making sure that they’re going to be successful when they walk out of here and those, those relationships. And I learned that maybe more so just by observing my dad never told me how to ask the right question or listen to, to what somebody had to say.

But he, he absolutely 100 percent modeled it. And, and, you know, it’s something that, you know, I wish I could ask him the questions now, now that I’m old enough and now I can think about it. And so he would be the, the, my most influential person probably in life, but especially basketball and the relationship building and the people process that we, we go through.

Yeah, I mean, I think from a parenting standpoint, right, I think. Whether it’s directly through sports or whether it’s just the influence on who we are as human beings. I think parents are probably right up there for, for everybody, depending on how you want to frame it. Rob, how about you? Yeah, I, I referenced coach a little bit earlier, but other than my dad, the person that had the most influence on my life, especially basketball wise, was coach Slycus, Jerry Slycus, my high school coach.

You know, he passed away in an accident in 2016. And I saw him about a week before he passed. In fact, he came over to a game at our place. He stayed at my house and, and just you know, he taught me several things about the game, but he taught me more about how to be a good person and how building relationships were the foundation of what.

You know, you do. And then, you know, he passed and then, you know, he was really, really good friends, well, best friends with Don Showalter. And so, of course, I know Coach Showalter very well. And after Coach passed you know, I don’t know if I was one of the closest players to Coach or what, but then Coach Showalter and I got very, very tight, or much tighter.

than we were prior. And so, you know, that’s kind of been a natural transition of mentorship, if that makes sense, from Coach Slykis to Coach Showalter. And so you know, I would say those two guys in combination with Coach Showalter more recently, but Coach Slykis over, you know, a long period of time had really influenced the person that I am, the coach that I am, but more importantly, like, the dad that I am, the type of person that I am, all of that.

And again, it goes back to the stuff that we always talk about. The basketball brings us together, but the relationships are the most important piece. And I think you hear that echoed by all really good coaches. And you hear it tonight from, from the other two guys that our, our coaches as well. And so that’s who I would say.

And, and, and it goes back to what coach was talking about earlier about the relationships. And I’m just glad to have them all in my life, including my dad, coach Likas and coach Showalter. And I’ve just been very blessed to be, you know, mentored by all of them. Absolutely. Greg, go ahead. Mike, I’ve never been a good role follower, so I can’t, I can’t go to just one.

So I have my, my list maker. So I have my top five and I will be fast. No, and it’s because they’re all just when I, when I saw this, I was like, okay, So I started writing my list out and I haven’t keep it. I was like, ah, but I gotta and so I debate who’s who And so I was like, all right, i’m gonna do my top five won’t be top 10 Jason.

We’ll keep moving quick. But You know, and I grew up without a father. My dad passed when I was was five years old. My high school coach, so I call him father’s day. He’s the guy that treats my kids like he’s their grandfather And so without him, you know, taking interest in me as a seventh grader, I don’t know what I would have done because we were, I was looking for that mentorship.

And so he’s, he would be, his name is Lance Taylor. He would be in my, in on my Mount Rushmore or with five, I guess my top five. My second one’s Mike Nabors. He’s one of my best friends. Mike you know, is successful division one women’s coach. When he moved back we kind of, we spent a lot of time during COVID talking and just.

life, basketball, didn’t know what we were doing. And kind of grew that, and he taught me to be a different thinker, which I think has led our programs to success quicker. So he would be there for me. You know, Tate Slott kind of took me under his wing at Snow Valley and got, really taught me to teach.

You know, and, and he was influential on me really falling in love with basketball again. Cause I never really, I’d always tell, I’ve told the story before, I didn’t think I knew how to coach. I just did it. And then when I, once I was introduced to snow Valley and, you know, like Slyke and, and those guys you know, it, it was big no one’s my aunt, my aunt’s most successful coach in our family.

She’s a five times state champ. She’s Arkansas hall of fame as a player and a coach. And she let me work basketball camp when I was 11 years old. That’s why I decided I want to be a basketball coach, you know? And, and then lastly it’s coach Showalter. The opportunities that he’s provided for me like I, I, I’m not deserving of it.

And, you know, I, I work, you know, Snow Valley with Casey and with Rob and, and just, you know, I, I tell people when I grow up, I want to be Don Showalter because it doesn’t matter if you’re Drip White, if you’re, you know, Martin guys have been, you know, we’ve all been introduced because of this guy. Like he is the basketball coach.

He’s, I say this to him and you guys know how humble he is. I’m like, you’re the John Wooden of my generation. You’re the guy that we all want to be, that you’ve taught us how to pass the game on, how to treat people, how to, you know, like I’ve, I’ve never seen a guy own a room, whether you’re a junior high, seventh grade basketball coach, or you just won a national championship.

And so I, you know, if I had to put somebody at the top, it’s probably coach Showalter, honestly, for the impact he’s had on me. My career and just, you know, random texts and calls. You know, when I met Rob, we’re sitting in Vegas together talking and through high school guys, you know, that got an opportunity and Rob would tell you the same story.

We’re sitting there and this guy walks up and goes, Hey, how you guys doing? My name’s Frank. Yes, sir. We know you’re Frank Martin, but he just, you know, it’s just a game. Like it just goes it all in there. And you know, I’m rambling so many, so much stuff we can talk about, you know, Rob, I knew when Rob played for coach Slykis I remember finding out when coach Slack has passed.

I couldn’t, couldn’t practice that day I left. I was so upset just because of the time Jerry had spent with me at Snow Valley. And it’s, it’s hard to, when you started talking about all these topics, I was like, yes, I want to talk for you. I want to talk for days on this stuff. And, but it’s, it’s awesome. The impacts of people and, you know, and what everybody on this call has been able to do in their lives with people.

It’s really cool. It’s awesome to be a part of. Me and I’ll just double down on Coach Showalter and you know, what, what he’s done for, for us on the podcast and just his support over time. And I think about the first time I met him in person was at the Jay Billis camp. And he had, I had seen it, you know, he had, I had had him on the podcast, but we’d obviously never met in person.

And we’re standing there in the line in the food truck and Jay Billis driveway, and he grabs his plate of food and I grabbed my plate of food. And next thing you know, we’re going in, we’re sitting down at Jay Billis Dining room table and he and I are talking for an hour and some other people came down and came and sat and joined us, but just again, it would felt like he and I had known each other forever.

And I think that, you know, at the time I was, I remember walking away from that being really surprised. I’m like, Hey man, wow, that was, that was something. And now I realized. It really wasn’t something. It was the way he would have treated every single person that he would have known. It could have been a complete stranger.

That’s just the way that show has always been. And I didn’t know it at the time, but he showed me his true character that first, that first time that I met him in person. I think that anybody who’s connected with them would, would know that. So, Hey, I just wanted to say thanks to all you guys for being a part of this thousand thousandth episode.

Again, an honor to have you guys a part of it. I’m honored to call each one of you guys a friend and I look forward to continuing to, you know, to build our relationships and again, who knows when we’ll see each other in person, but yeah, it’s it’s great to have you guys be a part of it, so, so thanks fellas.

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Session number six of the Hoopeds Pod 1000th episode. For this one, we’re welcoming in Dan Decrane, John Shulman, and Justin Brantley. Guys, welcome. And we’re going to go a little round table action here and get your input on these three questions that I sent to you guys. First one, why was becoming a basketball coach the right choice for you in your life?

Dan, let’s start with you. Yeah, this is my favorite of the three actually. What basketball has allowed me to do coaching is it keeps a sport that was so special to me growing up and allows me to remain competitive in it still. While also empowering young people, which is why I got into education.

So it just combines a lot of my life goals and missions and hobbies all into one. And trying to get a group of kids and from 14 to 18, since I’m high school to, to you know, accomplish, you know, one, one common goal. All right, John, man, that was succinct. Dan’s on it and you got a lot of pressure on you now.

God, Dan’s making me look bad. I just wanted to ball. I just wanted, I just you know, number one, I don’t work. All right. So I know that the right job for me because I’ve never had to work except when I was out of coaching. I went to a Tennessee Kentucky game when I was in the third grade. And watch Ernie and Bernie and Johnny Darden play against Kyle Mathy and Goose Givens.

And I knew at that moment, man, that, that bug bit me right then, and it was a drug to me. And, and I wanted, you know, just be honest. I wanted to be like my coaches. And, and, you know, I’ve said this many times, I guess when you go to med school and you become a doctor. It’s a big flipping deal to become a doctor.

Well, when I was growing up, I didn’t want to be a doctor. I wanted to be a coach because I love the coaches and the impact they had on me. And I thought being called coach was just like being called doctor. You remember the sports illustrated cover goose Gibbons was on. Do you remember that cover?

Do you remember the title of that cover? That’s the first college basketball game that I have. A memory of is that game and I had that cover and not that I was a big Kentucky fan, but I had that cover for years and years and years. Do you remember the title of that cover? Well, didn’t he have 42 in a championship game or something?

Yeah. Yeah. The goose was golden. Yeah. Yeah. I remember. I remember watching the game and I remember coaching against Kyle Mathy and looking at Kyle Mathy when he was at Moorhead going, you are a God, even though he was bald headed and looked like you Mike, but like he was the God and that’s how I grew up.

I grew up idolizing those guys, just thinking may, maybe one day I could be a coach too. And that’s why I’m very fortunate and blessed to have that opportunity. April 3rd, 1978. Was that, was that issue? April 3rd, 1978. Crack research team. The producer is on it over here today. Nice job, Jason. The goose was golden, baby.

All right, Justin, go, man. You know, I’ve got to really piggyback on what John said. Growing up for me, the most influential people in my life, the people that I look to for guidance, direction, love, protection, all of those things they all had one title and that was coach and you know, that was something that immediately for me I knew when my playing days were over the best way to give back the best way to pour into those That were coming up after me was to do the same that was done for me You know, I think back to all of the coaches that I had They did it for the love man.

They did it because they wanted to be there. They wanted to help us They wanted to see us, you know, reach whatever goals we had set for ourselves, but they didn’t More importantly, they were so much more than just a coach, right? Like, whatever we were going through, whatever was happening in life, they were a safe space for us.

You know, they were our counselors. They were our, you know, secondary father figures. They were, you know, just really every example of what an adult is supposed to be. We, we received that from those coaches, and it’s crazy. You know, 30 years later, bumping into some of those guys and it’s still coach, right?

Like it’s not calling them by their first name or, you know, Mr. Whatever it’s, Hey coach. And that’s something that it’s, like you said, you know, some people want to be doctors. Some people want to be lawyers. When I think back on it, the ones that meant the most to me and the ones that I adored the most were all, they were all titled coach.

Well said, Justin. All right. Favorite basketball story. And like I told the other groups, I’ve left this intentionally open ended in that it can go a lot of different directions. We’ve had some serious stories. We’ve had some funny stories. We’ve had stories of guys as players. We’ve had stories of guys as coaches.

So take it in whatever direction you want. Dan, you are up first. All right. I, this was a tougher one. I went with a more recent story and it won’t go too long winded, but. Went with a more recent coaching story. So in December of 2020, which was kind of our notorious COVID year, which I know brings back some bad memories for many people.

And it was a bad memory until the end of our season. So my wife was, and I were going to give birth to our fourth child right before Christmas. We hadn’t played a game yet. Our school was going through a lot of different protocols. I was watching the Browns on a Monday night football game against the Steelers.

It was like a shootout. My wife’s going to get deuced the next day. We had our first game in three days. It was kind of just a whirlwind. So we go to the hospital. Our season gets paused again because of a COVID protocol where my wife and I had COVID a month before our son was born. So we were like in hazmat suits.

But we have four kids, they’ve all had, we’ve all had healthy births. It was just, it was like the weirdest, surreal feeling. I had players who kind of reached out about like, what’s going on? Like, should I transfer away? This is the final place to play. So. I’m getting like text messages in the middle of the night.

My son was born at like 1230 in the morning the next day, just trying to like weather the storm, celebrate the birth of my son with my wife. And we get back home a couple of days later, things sort of starts to settle. But for the next few months, it was just rollercoaster. It was starts, stops. You know, we, we, we didn’t know who we were going to play 24 hours later.

We do one scattering report. Then it was somebody at some juggernaut. We’d have to play the next day cause someone else canceled. So we enter the tournament at seven and nine. I don’t even know what that means really, because it was such a weird season. We were the smallest school in Ohio in division two.

And I just kind of felt like we’re, we’re just going to do something special. And sure enough. You know, we play a really good Warrensville Heights team because all the tournament games were at the higher seeded site in the districts, which is the first time that Ohio had done that through that level. So we won our first game, we go on the road, we picked a spot in the bracket that just kind of thought we could make a run and I thought we were about 15 point underdogs with who we were playing on the road.

They had two 1500 point scores and our disguise was played phenomenal. And it just kind of went on to the district final, which was two days later at home because someone else got an upset win. We played a really good team from Youngstown in the regional final to go to the, to the, to the regional semi to go to the final.

So we ended the year 11 and 10 in a regional runner, you know, runner up, going to the lead eight, doing something that three months ago, I didn’t even know if our guy was seasoned. I didn’t know if I was going to be that coach anymore. You know, it was just, it was just kind of neat. And I always look back at that.

Like just kind of persevering the kids just, I don’t know why they believed in us or each other, but they kept doing it and it turned out to be a kind of a special end and it really kick started a really good run for us too at Gilmore in our program. So sorry if that was longer. That’s a good story. I mean, again, when you’re talking about fighting through adversity, right, I mean, that’s what it’s all about.

If there’s, there’s a lot of good, there’s, there’s a million lessons of adversity in there for sure. All right, John, you’re up man. Well, I’ve got a lot cause I’m old. I, you know, I, I, I got a couple of funny ones, but you know, listen, when I was the JV basketball coach at university high in Johnson city, gave a kid frostbite because I didn’t have a trainer won a game, even though we got beat 11 because they forfeited in the last 50 seconds of the game.

As the high school coach against Darius Garland and got thrown out of the state championship game, that was a good one. I let Steph Curry outscore us in a first half at Davidson one night, but that’s, those aren’t the stories. I guess the best story is kind of meaningful to me and kind of who I am.

And I don’t even know, Mike, if, if you know this or if I’ve told you this I went when I was, I knew I wanted to be a college basketball coach and, and I, I thought I knew it all. And I was a cool guy and I was 19 years old. And what’d you do in the summers? You went and worked camp and my first camp I ever worked was Furman University, Butch Estes, and Al Daniel was his assistant, and I went to Greenville, South Carolina to work my first camp, and I was going to show the world that I had arrived, here I am, the next John Wooden was showing up at Furman to work camp.

You did share a name with him, John, you were halfway there. Yeah. And so what do I do? The first day I get paired up with their assistant coach, Al Daniel, and we got the young kids and, Hey man, what, what do you need me to do? I can coach O, I can coach D, player development. What do you need? And he looked at me and said you’re in charge of making the Kool Aid.

And, and I, I, excuse me. Yeah, you’re, you’re going to make the Kool Aid. That was my responsibility and, and I will never forget it. I was stuck at Greenville, South Carolina, making Kool Aid for these kids. I didn’t even know how to make Kool Aid. And so I didn’t know how much sugar to put in there. And the kids drank it at break.

They were throwing it on the ground. It wasn’t strong enough. And, and I became known as Johnny Kool Aid at that camp. And, and that put a chip on my shoulder, Mike. All right, and the story is not over yet. So, so, you know, I didn’t have a pedigree, and so I became Johnny Kool Aid, and I had to work through that.

And, and my first year as the head coach at Chattanooga we played the University of Tennessee at Tennessee. Buzz Peterson was the head coach. On that staff was a guy named Al Daniel, the same Al Daniel that made me make Kool Aid at his camp. At Furman if I’d have been a high level thinker, which I’m not, or very confident, which I’m not we beat Tennessee at Tennessee that night, 69 68.

For Chattanooga to beat Tennessee on the road was a big deal. And we beat them 69 68. And if I’d have had enough guts, I would have taken some Kool Aid or some Gatorade and during the handshake line I would have said, hey Al, here’s your Kool Aid now. Good game. And walked on. I just wasn’t, I just wasn’t smart enough or tough enough or confident enough.

But you know, it’s part of what made me still to this day. I’m not 19 anymore, but still to this day I’m still trying to prove myself because of that stupid Kool Aid experience in Greenville, South Carolina, when I was 19 years old. And, and, but thank God it helped. It helped mold me to be who I am today because I’m still in, I gotta prove it mode.

Funny, because I know at least for me personally, that there are things that People have said to me over the course of my life that I still, they, they still stick with me. I don’t even know if the people who said them necessarily even remember them, but there’s some negative, some positive, but those are things that when times get tough or when I question myself, those are still things that I reach back to that those people have no idea that what they said or did had such a big impact on me that I’m still carrying around.

And that’s what’s, I think it’s, it’s a powerful thing about coaching, right? Is that there’s, there’s so many things that we say a lot of times that. Players carry with them and, you know, we don’t even know about it. And 50 years down the road, there’s, we’re still, we’re still impacting them in some, in some way, hopefully positive, but yeah, there’s, there’s, there’s some power in, there’s some power in a negative story like that.

Right. Where, where somebody may, somebody puts that chip on your shoulder. And so I completely, I get it, man. I completely get it. All right, Justin, you’re up, man. Yeah. You know, I’ve got two for you and I’ll make them short. You know, I’m long winded, so I gotta be careful here. First one I’d say is 96 you know, 96 March Madness and sitting there with my, my granddad watching Marcus Camby and just seeing what he did, you know, with that UMass team and how good he was.

I mean, it was just like, it’s a memory I’ll never forget. But from that perspective, you know, just seeing the moment and, and sitting there watching March Madness and kind of seeing. Man, this is what it’s this what it’s all about, right? Like these these magical moments that make or break players that change their lives Really put them on a platform put them on a pedestal.

So fast forward. 2000 2018 we’re down at holiday hoops giving in atlanta and You know, sold out gym, right? Like everybody’s there to see LaMelo, you know, he’s, he’s the star of the show, but there’s a kid on that team from Dubai, Ribu Paul, who maybe played 37 seconds that entire season leading up to that, but he was one of the favorites of that team, just because.

His attitude, his work ethic, like, you couldn’t tell him he wasn’t the next Michael Jordan, right? Like, he didn’t care who was on this team. He’s like, I, I belong on the floor. I need shots. I need minutes. So we’re, we’re winning this game, and we sub him in, maybe three, three to five minutes left in the game.

Immediately, he jacks a three. Nothing but the bottom of the net. The entire place goes crazy, right? Because they’re looking and they’re like, this kid doesn’t even look like a basketball player. But in that moment, he said, it’s my time to shine. He knocks down a three, turns around, knocks down another three, plays great defense.

I mean, he stole the entire show to the point where at the end of the game, they rushed the floor and are like, hugging him, surrounding him, and it was an inconsequential moment, but for me, what stood out was the fact that this is something this kid will never forget for the rest of his life, right? Like for the rest of his life, when he’s talking to his kids, his grandkids, whoever, he’ll talk about that day that he played alongside LaMelo Ball and Isaiah Jackson, you know, these guys that, Hey, you can see them right now watching NBA and in that moment, I was the star and it’s just like, those are the memories, those are the reasons why we do this is to be able to, you know, make somebody’s life and, you know, for some people they might say it didn’t really make his life, but for me, this kid came all the way from Dubai to come get the American experience.

And what better experience can you have, right? Like what, what more is there than knocking down some big shots in a big game, sold out crowd, they’re rushing the floor. I mean, it’s something that I know I’ll never forget it. So I’m sure that he’ll never forget that. Awesome, man. I mean, again, when you think about just having those singular moments as a player, man, there, those, those, those are the kinds of stories that give you chills when somebody gets an opportunity to, to do that.

I mean, it’s just, Man, that’s, that’s a great, that’s a great one, Justin. That’s a really good, that’s a really good story. All right. Most influential person in your basketball life. Dan, go. All right. I’m going to cheat a little bit here. So the easy answer for me is the person who got me into coaching cause I wouldn’t, you know, have started my career.

And that was my high school coach TK Griffith at Archbishop Hoban in Akron. I just modeled the guy I wanted to go to battle form as a player. I just embraced the program and he’s, he’s been doing it for 32, 33 years now. But that’s what got me into coaching, but for sure now at this point of my career, Just finished my 10th year as a head high school coach.

It’s gotta be my wife because we have four kids, 11, 9, 7, 4. They’re at every game. They sit right behind the bench. They’re there genuinely. You know, as John knows too, I mean, Justin, this is something we do this every day. This isn’t like, you know, we don’t do this for just, we don’t just coach the season.

We coach, we work at our program every day. And she works, she’s a nurse, she works, you know, early hours in the morning and just seeing what she, she does support what like my career and passion is and you know, my calling it’s, it’s pretty neat. But it just, you know, when we, when, when things are great, my kids are, you know, they’re more excited.

The, the, the Gilmore Academy is the Cleveland Cavs of my kids. I mean, that’s how much they’re all into it. My wife’s on the refs more than I’m on the refs and I don’t get on officials very much. But it just really, it just makes it a family you know, an important part of our family. So that’s kind of why I chose, I think I chose her for, for this part of my career.

Well said, and not a beggar truth has ever been spoken that you better have your significant other on board. If you want to do it well and be happy in the course of Dan’s going to play that Dan’s going to play this part of the podcast or his wife gets some brownie points. I can tell you that much rated.

I love it. All right, John. All right, John. Follow that one. I’ve, I’ve got, I’ve got four real quick. Joe McPherson got me into coaching at university high school. One of the best high schools in the country, even though it’s single a in Tennessee. And we, we like 70 people in his senior class. We thought we were good.

We couldn’t have beaten anybody, but he got me in this business. Had a great time with him. Richard Johnson, who was the athletic director at Wofford and the head coach at Wofford took a chance on me when I was 22 years old and, and Alan LaForce, who is now 89 years old. Who was still mattering a Hornet.

He’s not coaching in a, in a senior living home in, in Greenville, South Carolina, those three, but I I’m, I’m with Dan, listen, I’m sitting here in Conway, Arkansas, never been to Arkansas and my wife didn’t blink. So Amy Shulman did not blink. Sweetie, we’re, we’re, we’re leaving Chattanooga and going to Huntsville, Alabama, didn’t blink.

NN. Leaving Huntsville, Alabama and going to Conway, Arkansas, even though neither one of us had ever been to the state, she didn’t blink. And for another human to support another human like that without blinking and flinching is pretty special. Allowing me to live my dreams and my life. So hopefully we’re living our dreams together and, and our lives together.

So I I’m with Dan and Dan, you stole my thunder, man. I mean, it was going to be my wife and then he, you know, now all of a sudden it’s going to look, I copied him, but, but it’s, there’s no chore. We’re all in this thing because we got a great support system, and if we didn’t, we wouldn’t have a prayer. Maybe she’ll ask you to make some Kool Aid, John.

Jason, I don’t appreciate No, I’m just kidding. I do, I do cook. I do cook a little bit, but, you know, I did make her some chocolate milk earlier. And I gotta make my, my youngest lunch here in a second. As soon as this, as soon as this it’s not a zoom, I don’t even know what we’re on. As soon as we’re off of whatever we are on.

It’s a talk. It’s a little, it’s a little chat. It’s a chat. All right, Justin, give it to us, man. Listen, that was absolutely amazing and I want to take a moment to, you know, tell both of your wives, you know, thank you for what you’ve done because I think without a doubt You know, that support is what makes us better and what creates better coaches that allows you to pour into those young men that you’re, you’re tasked with assisting.

So without them, there’d be no you, and without you, there’d be no them. So that’s amazing. I’ve got two people, you know, I’ll start with Anthony Solomon. You know, at the time when I connected with him, he was the associate head coach at Dayton. Probably the first person to really pour into me from that perspective.

You know, didn’t matter if we had players or didn’t have players, you know, you know, Anthony and I developed a relationship when He was coming in that that first year that he came and visited us at Spire We didn’t really have a player for him, you know And that didn’t change how he interacted with us or that didn’t change how he interacted with me You know, I laugh and I call, you know There’s a certain time of the year that I can kind of set my clock by it that I’m gonna get phone calls from coaches And hey, how are you doing?

What’s going on? It’s like, okay There must be somebody entering the portal or there must be something going on that they want Anthony’s one of those guys that, you know, I don’t think there’s a week that goes by that I don’t hear from him in some capacity of how, how are you, right? Not how’s the team, not who do you have, but how are you?

How can I assist you? What’s going on? To the point where, you know, I can even call Anthony and talk about issues within my marriage or, you know, what’s going on with my kids and, and being able to have that wise counsel that understands. We’re humans outside the game of basketball and, you know, we need some genuine relationships and some genuine people to be able to pour into and be able to lean on in tough times.

So Anthony’s been phenomenal. He, he’s changed my life from that perspective. And the other one’s gravel, Craig. And, and when, when I hired Gravel at, at Spire and he came and joined me, I didn’t really know him previously, you know, we, he had came up and scouted some players for, for a while, but. There was something about him and, you know, to go from It being a situation where, hey, we’re, we’re gonna hand over the keys to the, to the post grad program to you, which he did a phenomenal job with, but turned into being one of my best friends and, and another one of those people that, you know, Anthony, I speak to maybe on a weekly basis.

It, it, it would shock me if I didn’t speak to gravel every single day. And it’s just, you know, the relationships that are built through this game and, and through the connectivity of the game. That’s what I love the most about basketball. Is you know, you look back on it and you think about okay Hey, I’m where’d I meet this person at nine times out of ten you’re like, oh we were in a gym somewhere scouting a player And now you know, you’re you’re going on vacation going out to dinner or whatever the case may be So for me those two, you know stand out.

But it’s the relationships across the board. I think that i’ve been blessed with a phenomenal, you know, just surrounding of good genuine people that Not only want to win because i’m very competitive and I want to win but they want to see everybody be successful They want to see people even even if they have nothing to do with that success They want to see the people they care about be successful.

And I’ve been blessed to have those types of people around me. And that’s some great stuff, guys. And I just think when I try to consider all the people that have had an influence on me, and I can go back to when I was a kid and start with my dad and just work my way up through all the different coaches I’ve had, and then through doing the podcast and all the people that have poured into me through, through this thing and the things that I’ve learned and just, you know, Man, it’s it’s, as you guys have said, that basketball is about relationships and I, I can never repay the, repay the game what, what it’s given me.

I can never even come close to giving back what the game has given to me. And I just want to say to you three guys, thank you for being a part of this thousandth episode. I really appreciate your time. You know, again, as I look out and think about everybody that we’ve had on this thousandth episode you know, guys who are genuinely my friends and you know, that’s, I never would have thought that was going to happen six years ago when we started this silly thing.

And You know, now you hop on and it’s like you know, you see an old familiar face and there’s nothing better than that. So again, thank you guys. I truly appreciate it.

Welcome in to session number seven of the Who Pets Podcast 1000th episode. And for this session, we only had one guy who was willing to stay up late with us, although it’s not very late where he is. He’s one of the OGs, Mike. He’s one of the OGs. Exactly. Right. He’s right there in the, in the, in single digits.

I’ll take whatever. You were, you were the number six, number six, I believe, number six. So it’s been it’s been, we’ve, we have known, we have known Joe Harris for quite a long time. Joe, welcome in. Yeah, man. I appreciate you guys having me on again. We are excited to have you. Yeah. And looking forward to getting your take on some of the questions that we’ve been batting around with other people tonight.

Let’s start with question number one. Why was basketball coaching the right choice for you in terms of your career and your life? Oh man, I look back at my hoop career and there’s so many reasons really that it was the right choice for me. My only hope is Really giving me some of the greatest gifts in my life.

I met my wife of 36 years early on in my coaching career. Went to the, her place of work, looking for a basketball hoop for a youth camp, and she was working there. And I asked my buddy who was working there with her, who is that gal? And a couple of years later, we ended up getting married. So strange how, how hoop is, can lead you in some directions, but I’ve been blessed with so many great friendships as a coach and as a result of basketball, you know, whether it’s officials or opposing coaches, I’ve been around the globe because of this game and following my son or, or other players and, and in, in reality the memories that I’ve created over the, my 32 years of coaching that, and, and the things that it’s given me and my family just really, truly cannot be replaced.

So I’ve been blessed all the way around in the whole coaching world. It’s amazing when you think about just how much, and I say this all the time, how much the game has given, you and I talked about this in our call the other night, that the game has given us so much that there’s no way I can ever repay the game of basketball for all the things that it’s given me and done for me in my life in terms of the people, the experiences, the places I’ve been, all those things.

And most everything that I have. in some way, shape or form relates back to basketball. It’s shaped who I am, where I am, what I do. And it’s amazing that at age 54, a game that I picked up that, you know, there’s pictures of me when I was standing up for the first time at whatever, 12 months old or 13 months old with the ball and my dad holding the little hoop and me slamming it through that Here I am still talking about basketball.

Yeah. 53 years later. It’s kind of amazing. Yeah. And Joe, I like when you were talking about all those opportunities, I, I think back to the time, I think it was the second time we had you on when you were talking about Joe winning the three point contest. And it just came through how proud you were of him and like the whole experience.

I just remember you. And I, I know just talking about Him and everything. It just, it may, when you just said that now, it made me remember that. And so I think the things that you think about, it gave you personally, but then like just getting to see him live his dream and think about what you gave him too, you passed it on to him.

So, so the you know, the game has really shaped my life in a lot of different ways. And. And not only myself, but my family. I mean, I’ve been fortunate to have them follow me around the gym from the time our children were little. And my wife was involved with summer league and camps and registration and all that stuff.

As you guys well know, it’s a, you know, the term floats around out there and sometimes things are a little cliche, but the ball really is life for me. And that’s the way it is. I know for you guys as well. It’s, it’s, it’s taken me places I’ve never even dreamed about being. Absolutely. All right. Let’s go to question number two.

Your best basketball story. And as I’ve told other people that have been on the pod so far, I left this specifically open ended so that it could go in a lot of different directions, whether you want to be, share a serious story, a funny story, whatever, when I say the best basketball story, just give us what you got.

Yeah, that’s that’s pretty wide open. I mean coach for a long time, he got great memories all over the place. He’d talk about bus rides after game things stuff that happens in practice with your assistant coaches. So it’s really it’s hard for me to narrow it down, but I’m going to try and do my best.

There’s really two stories that kind of intertwine themselves. Before in 98, we played and won the state championship basketball here in the state of Washington. And before that season started, we moved into a new home. And with that goes a lot of things. One was painting the walls and all the bedrooms.

And Joe was five. comes up after we’d cleaned up things and decided that he asked his mother if he could put some quotes on the wall. We’re thinking, yeah, with a pen and paper. Well, about an hour later, his sister comes up with a sharpie and he’d written all over his wall some goals. And among other things, as a five year old, he wrote, be the best, never give up, prove people wrong, be a pro and following that following that, That episode I guess when we moved in we ended up playing in the state title game and I have a picture on my wall in my office of him walking out of the Tacoma Dome with holding hands with our senior captain who was 6’10 who years later reminded me of a conversation that basketball will take you as far as you wanted.

I wish I had given him. So we fast forward to 2018. These two guys and myself met again at the Frostbank Arena in San Antonio when Joe was playing with the Nets. So really You put things on your wall and you look at it. We were pissed maybe a little bit about him writing on the new wall and one of them was become a pro and that you know, that series of events really has stuck with me all my life about, you know, kind of an affirmation about, you know, if you put your mind to it, you can make it happen.

And you know, obviously very proud of him, but very proud of Phil who’s with the San Antonio Spurs now. And Joe looked up to him as a young man and look where it’s gotten him. That’s a really, I think, powerful and moving story. It’s funny when you think about sort of that. I don’t know if premonition is the right word, but when, when you write down, Hey, I’m going to become a pro.

And there are obviously lots of kids that dream about that. And not every kid gets to have that experience like Joe had to be able to reach that goal is amazing. Whenever I think of a story like that, and I don’t know if either you or Jason will remember it, but I remember reading a story about Steve Alford.

Maybe it was in Sports Illustrated back in the day. And His parents had taken a picture of him when he was in the crib and they set a ball next to him and said, here he is, Mr. Basketball of Indiana, 1984, or whatever year. Alfred would have been a senior. And of course he obviously went on to be Mr.

Basketball in the state of Indiana in his senior year. And it’s one of those things that you just, You look back at it and you’re like, did they, did they really know? Did they, what was it? Just was there, was there 1500 other kids that had the ball stuck in their crib and their parents were putting the same side next to them and those just never came, came to light?

’cause the kids never got to that point. But it is interesting when you think about just. Yeah. You can put your mind to it and you can, you can definitely make things happen. It’s a great, it’s a great story there. Exactly. Exactly. Mike. And I don’t think you ever really know if they’re that good, but it’s just the possibility and as coaches, that’s one thing we always try to get our teams and players to do is out, out, shoot themselves a little bit and, and reach for the stars, so to speak.

And you know, when he put that on his wall, of course, yeah, we were a little fired up about it cause it was a brand new paint job, but that’s something, if we ever move from this place, we’ll cut that wall out and take it with us. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, it, it speaks to, like you said, from a parenting standpoint and also from a coaching standpoint that you want your kids, you want your players to have those goals and you want them to understand what it’s going to take to reach a goal like that.

And there’s a lot of characteristics then that you would want to instill in your players and in your kids. That could allow them to get to that particular level. And so there’s a great lesson to be had and I could see, I could see you moving and having taking a chunk of drywall and putting it, putting it over your, putting it over your shoulder and carrying it out to the car and be like, yeah, we’re taking, we’re taking this with us.

We need a drywall guy to patch this thing up. So that’s a, that’s, that’s a really, that’s a really good story. All right. The most influential person in your basketball life. You know, there’s been so many people have been really responsible for my success and longevity in the game. And you know, one of those people is obviously my wife.

I spoke about her earlier. She spent a lot of time with me in and out of the gym. But I think the person that really influenced my game was as an undergrad at Eastern Washington University, our head basketball coach at the time was Dr. Jerry Kraus. And I played a year of JV basketball at the university, not real inspiring for a lot of people these days to play JV basketball, but I gave it a crack.

And I think some of the things that I learned with him. As I got farther into my career, I kept looking back on the things that he taught us and the things that, and I was doing those naturally because he had instilled in me how important fundamentals were and a need for a purpose in whatever you do.

And that even though you may look at it like it’s, it’s work, there’s a daily grind, but at the end of the day, just enjoy what you’ve done and enjoy the fact that you’re getting better. And you know, again, as my career went on, And I got a little more established and more confident, I guess, as I, as I got myself seasoned.

You know, he was one person that I’d run across with and, and he was still teaching me up until the very, the very end of his life. And, and every time I saw him, he’d give you a little tidbit to follow. And so I can’t thank him enough for what he gave me because my career really, and the, and the, the way I approach practice and the way I approach games and, and player development was really set on the foundation that he gave me as an undergrad clear back in.

1983 and 84. It’s amazing how much the influence of your early coaches and how much those guys have a hand in what you end up doing yourself as a coach. And I think, you know, when we all start out, I see this all the time that when I started coaching, I thought I knew a lot more than I did, but the only thing I knew was what my high school coach had done because I had the same high school coach for my entire high school experience.

And then I knew what my college coach did because I The same college coach for my entire four year experience. And so when I became a coach, everything I did was based on what those two guys did for good, for better, for worse. And obviously eventually you learn and you pick things up from other places.

But at that time, that was really all I knew. And when I think about sort of my basketball coaching philosophy, a lot of the things that I take that I do, and maybe some things that I know I would never do. I take from those two, those two people. And they were certainly huge influences on who I was as a player and then who I became as a coach.

And probably most importantly, who I am just as a human being. And that’s really, when you talk about coaching to me, that ability to impact people. And here you are sitting there at, you know, retired as a coach and still, and still, and still, right. And still talk, but still talking about. somebody who coached you 40 years ago and the influence that they’re still having on you.

I mean, that’s, that’s powerful stuff when you think about what you do or what we do as coaches. And sometimes I think we forget about that, that we look at the day to day and the impact we have on players and you think, ah, they just, you know, we move on from this practice to that practice. Man, there’s things that, there’s things that those players are going to remember.

They’re going to be telling these stories about us 40 years from now. Yeah. Well, you know, you’re exactly right because early on, I, you know, you think you know more than what you really know. And I guess as I, as I became more seasoned, those were the kinds of coaches I like to coach against because I figured out smart them and whatnot.

And I didn’t I didn’t give Coach Krause enough credit early on, and it, it was only as I became more established and more confident in what I was doing that I really realized I was doing what he had taught me. And just the fact that I’m hoping that I can make him feel proud about what I was doing and, you know, kind of live the way that he did with his players and, and whatnot.

And hopefully they’ll look at me like I, I gave them something to live by. It’s funny because this past, what was it, yeah, that last spring, my college coach, Jim McDonald, who I played for for four years at Kent, he passed away. And the funeral was in Toledo. So that’s about from where I am. It’s about I don’t know, it was about an hour and a half drive for me to, to get up to his, to get up to his services.

And I mean, he and I had not talked, we had talked maybe one time since I graduated. And the way that kind of he went about his business was, was different than I think the way that Coaches oftentimes go about their business today and that he was much more business like and the relationship piece that we all talk about in coaching today.

I’m not sure that as a head coach that he always knew how to, I think he cared and I see that looking back. In the moment, it was sometimes hard to, to get that feel. But anyway, going back to his services, you start to look at and you start to think about what your experience was like With him and you, you have a greater appreciation than maybe what you did in the moment when you were playing for him when times are tough.

And he, again, he was much more of an old school coach. And, and I just look at it and I, I remember I had a conversation with him who it’s probably been, it’s probably been four years ago now. And I hadn’t talked to him since I graduated. So we’re talking, that’s a period of probably close to close to 30 years, but he and I talked for almost two hours.

And he remembered like all these things and details about, Asked me about my sister or things about my parents that I would have had no idea that A, he would have even known or cared about any of those things back in the day. Let alone to remember him 30 years after the fact, and it, it gave me a much greater appreciation.

And then obviously with his passing, it just made me reflect on, again, the lessons that maybe I didn’t see quite as clearly when I was 18, 19, 20 years old, that now that I’m 54, I can, I can see those things that he passed on to me much more clearly. It sounds clearer. Yeah, definitely. When It does. And again, I think that’s where I’m at with, as I got farther and deeper into my career and you know, the winning didn’t really matter.

It was about developing kids and, and players and program and culture and, and coach was like that, but he didn’t really need to show that because in the 70s and 80s, that’s not how you coached. Right. Exactly. It was a completely different era. And I think if you, if you took guys from that era and you, you brought them up in this era, it’s sort of like the game itself, right?

If you took guys that played in the seventies and eighties and brought them up with the three point shot, there’d be a lot more three point shooters. You can’t really look back Guys who played in the seventies and eighties say, ah, these guys were terrible three point shooters. Well, they weren’t. Maybe they weren’t because they never, they never shot the ball.

I think this Mike, I think, I think this goes back to I think whether there was a first session or second session tonight that basketball is ever evolving. I think that was something always, we came up, we talked about like early on tonight was like, things are constantly changing. How, how we go about doing our business is changing and what it looks like now, five years from now is probably going to look very different.

I mean, you, you go back five years from now, go back five years. We hadn’t experienced COVID yet and then experienced all that and all that change that brought, you know, now who knows what’s coming in the next five years and, and how game’s going to change. So I’m not trying to be foreboding with COVID, but I’m saying, like, think about five years ago.

I mean, just look at, just look at coaching at the college level today. If you would have told coaches 10 years ago that coach at the college level, that we would have the situation that we have with the transfer portal. And then you would have, you would have all the NIL money that’s out there. And then, then you think about guys that were suspended or their programs were, they lost their jobs because they text messages somebody outside of a particular timeframe.

And now we’re just, we’re just paying, we’re just paying kids directly to come to our schools. It’s kind of a crazy situation. So yeah, the game definitely involves coaching, coaching, coaching, coaching, coaching. It really is. And so coaching has definitely evolved. It’s the wild west. Well, you know, my boys subscribe to the fact that basketball is really more than just a game.

It’s really life. And you’re gonna, and what we’re talking about now is that very same thing is that it’s, it evolves and you don’t have 45 seconds to sit in the huddle and figure out a play. You have to go on the fly. And how many times does the washer break right at the time you’re taking kids to school?

And you got to figure out how to make that all happen. So yeah. And it’s really you know, the game has been so good to myself and our family. It’s just I could never repay it for what it’s given me. Could not agree more. Could not agree more. And I think that’s a great way to end it because that has been a theme, Joe, that has come up over and over again tonight is the game has been so good to all of us.

I think Greg White always says there’s the ball has magic in it. And it’s true. And I wouldn’t be here without it. He wouldn’t be here. I know Jason wouldn’t be here. And so we appreciate you being part of this 1000th episode. As Jason said, one of the OGs of the Hoop Heads pod. We appreciate you being a part of it tonight.

OG is the old guy? Is that what you’re saying, Jason? No, original gangster. Original gangster. That’s what it means. Original gangster. I appreciate you guys just doing this because what a great way to grow the game and just let people, you know, Listen to what other people have gone through. And again, that goes right back to what we said.

Just appreciate it so much, fellas. Yep. The learning never stops.

We are welcoming everyone into session number eight of the Whoop Heads podcast, 1000th episode. And we are very, very pleased to have coach Don Showalter from USA Basketball. First of all, Don, welcome back. And again, thank you for, for everything that you’ve done for, for me and for the Who Peds podcast over the six years we’ve been doing this.

Your podcast is certainly well known across the country and you’ve done a lot for basketball. I’m just happy to be a small part of it. Well, we are thrilled to be able to have you join us for this thousandth episode. First question for you. Why was becoming a basketball coach the right choice for you in your life?

Well, I always knew that I wanted to stay in, in in sports in some manner after ever since I was probably five, six, seven years old. I mean, I just loved to play. I loved all sports, baseball basketball and grew up on a farm south of Iowa city. And we just, we just enjoyed, I just enjoyed, I just loved the competition.

I loved the ability to, you know, try and get better and scoop snow off the driveway and shoot baskets. And that was just I was just, I just really fell in love with the game basketball. And part of it was some of the really good coaching I had at a really, really young age just made it so much fun for me that I knew I wanted to continue in, in in basketball in some form after I got into playing.

And obviously one of those ways was to be into coaching. So I really, really bought into coaching. And that was from an early age. It was just one of those things I knew that that’s where I wanted to go and be a teacher and coach. It’s amazing how many stories that we’ve heard from guys that talk about Again, the influence of coaches on them and how the fact that their coaches made the game fun, like you just described, and allowed them to flourish in the game.

And then people say, I just wanted to, I wanted to give that same experience to kids that I had an opportunity to teach and coach. And so I think that message that you just shared certainly will resonate with a lot of coaches out there who are listening that, you know, Yeah, my experience in the game was so good that I just knew I wanted to, to give back and to, to continue to have it be a part of my life.

We all have a lot of people that really affect our lives and the direction it goes, and I think we all look back on coaches and teachers that had a great effect on our lives. Absolutely. There’s no question about that. Question number two, and we left this one intentionally vague to see what direction people would take it.

Your favorite basketball story. So Don, we’ve run the gamut. We’ve had funny stories. We’ve had serious stories. We’ve had stories all the way in between on that scale. So take this one in whatever direction you want to go. Yeah, that’s a good question. You know, my favorite basketball story, obviously, you know winning some gold medals with USA basketball has to be kind of the top of the list.

As, as one of those stories, but, you know, I also think that just, just coaching and developing relationships is huge for me, was just a huge story and, and, and you know, those of you who happened to read the book that Pete wrote about about me, I think that stands out from, from, from my standpoint is what those kids remember as, as I, as I coached him.

But Another really great story for me was my connection with John Wooden at a very young age, right out of college, writing him a letter and getting on as a counselor and then getting on as a camp coach. To me, that’s, that’s really a big story from my standpoint of of the ability to reach out to him and then, and then working his cast for 20 years.

Just being able to make that connection with John Wooden and a lot of people who are remember John Wooden, who are younger than you and look at him as just such a revered figure. And I know you felt the same way about him and to be able to sit down and have the type of interaction that you had with him and just his influence.

You think about how long it’s been since he was coaching and yet how many coaches, when you talk to them, cite so many of the things that he said and did as huge influences. in what they still do today and for you to be able to have the opportunity to sit by his side and talk to him and, and get to form a relationship and then have that have an impact on you and shape the way that you thought about basketball and the way you thought about coaching and the way you thought about relationships is just, I mean, very, very powerful.

And for someone like me, who’s a little bit younger than you, it’s hard for me to even think about. Hey, I’m sitting in John Wooden’s living room and having a conversation with him. That to me is just, I mean, it almost seems surreal and the fact that you got to do that and the impact that I know he had on you from our previous conversations just speaks volumes about again, what a giant he was in the game.

No, no question. Yeah. I feel very honored. You know, it was just one of those deals. Yeah, I wrote a letter to him and that’s how I got to be a counselor first year and then on the staff second. So from a basketball standpoint or basketball story, I think that’s a good lesson for young coaches to reach out.

And if you’re going to really become as good as you want to be, I think that’s a good way to do it. Don’t be afraid to ask, I think is the lesson there too, right? It’s you, you never know. And I, I’ve said this so many times on the pod that before I started doing this thing, I had a feeling that coaches would be open, but I had no idea that I would be able to a talk to the number of people and the great quality of people that we’ve been able to talk to.

And just how willing the basketball coaching community is to share what they know. So if the lesson for young coaches out there, for any coaches. Hey, if there’s somebody out there that you think you can learn from, that you think that what they do is, is something that you’d like to learn more about, the worst thing that can happen is they’ll, they’ll say no.

And I would say that more often than not, you’ll be surprised how many people say yes. So please reach out, reach out to coaches, reach out to people and, and don’t be afraid to get out there as a young coach and, and learn from some of the best in the business. All right, the third question, the most influential person in your basketball life, and we’ve had people cheat on this one, Don, and Greg White gave us a list of five and we’ve had people go with multiple, multiple numbers.

So you approach this however you want to approach it, but the most influential person in your basketball life. Well, I think it starts for me with John Wooden. You know, I gained a lot of knowledge on how to teach the game through him. I watched him conduct his, his camps with players and that’s how he did the same thing with his team.

So I would say he’s definitely at the top of the list, but then also I think probably a close second is coach K. When he coached our Olympic team back in 2008 for three Olympics, I had a good chance to meet with him for a lot of the training camps and. And player selection and, and those kinds of things.

So I really learned a lot from, from what he did with our Olympic team. And it was very had a very good chance to just be a fly on the wall when he was in meetings and, and learn, learn a lot from him. And then I think third guy would be Jay Wright, who I really admire as someone who is very humble, very willing to share his knowledge.

And those three, I think are very, very top of my list, but there’s also, I mean, you had other, you’ve had other coaches give you a list of five or six. I don’t, I don’t think they’re just hard to go. Just one guy, because I think that is, you know, you talk about mentorship and mentors. We all have mentors in our lives.

You know, some of those mentors are really you know, you just pick up so much from, from the leadership standpoint, communication standpoint. But I think those three, for me stand out as being the three top. Let me ask you about coach K real quick. Give me one thing that when you think about what you learned from him, what one thing stands out that after watching him, you took away and you said, I have to make sure that this becomes a part of who I am as a coach.

Well, he was so good at developing relationships with his players and he just kind of knew what butt to push and. really what made his players tick, so to speak. And so I really took away a lot of that relationship building that he did, especially with the NBA guys who, you know, NBA guys, they don’t really care what you’ve done as an NCAA coach.

So I think Coach K really had to work on developing relationships with those guys. And you know, he got, he got the main guys to buy in. And when he got those main guys like Kobe and LeBron to buy in, the others certainly fell in line. So. That’s probably the one main thing I picked up from, from Coach K is, is really work to develop relationships too.

And it just doesn’t come automatically. You really have to work at it. He certainly did that with the, with those NBA players. Yeah. I mean, that absolutely goes along with what we talked about a second ago, whether you’re talking about as a coach, trying to build a relationship with your players. Or whether you’re talking about a coach trying to build a relationship with another coach.

There’s a piece of that, that you have to put the time in and you have to genuinely care. about the other person. And I think that is a huge lesson that I think I probably knew it intuitively prior to starting the podcast, but I’ve just had that message go through my ears so many times from coaches of, Hey, you’ve got to put the time in.

You’ve got to really genuinely care about the people that you’re working with. And, and I think, again, if you’re a young coach and you’re trying to take some lessons away from this, I think that there’s, there’s a lot worse lessons you could learn than that one. Let’s put it that way. Yeah, and, and Coach, Coach K did such a great job of developing his gold standards for his teams.

And I think that it took, took a lot away from those. And I think the number one was gold standard that he really emphasized was building trust. And you know, when you have relationships, you build that trust factor. So they kind of go hand in hand. Yeah, absolutely. And I think. We’ve all probably been in situations where we’ve seen that go both ways, where you see where there’s a team that everybody trusts one another and man, it’s a fun team to be around.

And then conversely, probably seen situations where there’s not a lot of trust involved and things can go south very, very quickly when that trust isn’t, isn’t present. So Don, I am so thankful again that you were willing to jump on and be a part of this 1000th I think you’ve kept your streak intact of participating in every one of the round tables.

So this one just continues to keep, keeps it going. And as I’ve told many groups of people, there has been no bigger supporter of the Whoop Heads podcast than coach Don Showalter. And I’m forever humbled that someone with your level of accomplishment has graced us with your presence, your knowledge, and it speaks to your willingness to share with the basketball coaching community that we talked about.

And hopefully we’ve just been a small little vessel to help you to have a greater impact on the basketball world. So thank you for being a part of this 1000th episode. Truly appreciate it. And I’m sure we will be talking to you again in the very new future the very near future. Thanks, Don. Sounds good.

I’m honored to be a part of it. Thank you, Mike.

Welcome in to session number nine of Hoop Heads Podcast episode 1000. Eric Buehler joining us for this one. Bueh, welcome in, man. Glad to have you. Thanks for having me back, guys. Looking forward to hearing your answers and getting your contribution to this episode at 1, 000. Can’t believe we’ve been going for this long.

Question one. Why was becoming a basketball coach the right choice for you? They’re all tough ones. This was this one I had to think on for a while. I think just because I had a lot of really good coaches. They coached me growing up and they inspired me and they were Not just that they were coaches, but they were good people, as I look back on it, and I wanted to be more and more like them.

And, it’s just, I don’t know, when you love the game as much as we do, as much as I do I think it’s really the only pure way to stay in it in any level, and I have friends that, They’ve, they’ve worked in ticketing for professional teams and stuff like that, but they’re not really part of the, the team.

And, and as a coach, you get to influence the game in a big way. And then the one I always go back to is I had a mentor that I coached for for quite a few years and he used to joke, but I think he’s pretty serious about it. And I think it’s pretty true for me. Like he’s like, well, what else are we going to do?

We’re not good at anything else. And I think that’s true for me. And when I say that, Tongue in cheek. I, what I really mean is like, it’s the only way I know how to like be a better teacher. And I, it’s the only way I know how to influence young people. And as I’ve gone through this journey of coaching I’ve learned that that’s what I’m really passionate about.

It’s not just basketball. It’s like making impact impact on the next generations. And yeah, it’s just really special to be able to do that on any level. I think there’s two things that I take away from that answer that One that I’ve never heard before. And then one that I’ve heard before. And so the one that I never heard before is kind of thinking about coaching as a pure way to stay in the game, because you’re right.

There are lots of different ways and lots of different avenues and lots of different things that you can do within basketball or within sports that can keep you connected or keep you sort of tangentially involved. in the sport, but as far as being able to compete and getting as close to the game as you can without playing it, I certainly think coaching fits that.

I just never heard anybody describe that as being pure. And so that’s, I think, a really interesting way of kind of looking at, you know, coaching. And then I think the second part is that being able to use basketball as the tool. to be able to impact young people. Like there are lots of people out there who want to be able to impact young people, whether it’s teachers, whether that’s coaches of other sports, whatever it may be, but getting an opportunity to use something that you love, like the game of basketball, use that as the vehicle to be able to impact young people.

I think that is, when I think about coaching, that’s what makes it special is being able to use something that’s been so good to you or to me or to Jason. To be able to have that as sort of the, the backdrop around how we impact kids, it’s, it’s really meaningful. And I’ve heard other people say that, I agree with that wholeheartedly and, and I love the word pure that you used.

I think that was an interesting way of kind of, kind of going at it. So thank you. All right, let’s go to question number two, your favorite basketball story. And as I’ve told everybody else, I kind of left this one intentionally vague with the idea of let’s see where people take it. And some people took it in the, here’s a funny basketball story.

Here’s a, Meaningful coaching story. Here’s a, so you can take it whatever direction you want. Just give me favorite basketball story. What comes to mind? Wow. Yeah. I didn’t even think about funny stories. That one probably take a while for me to remember some of those. Cause there’s a lot. Yeah, this was another one to heart kind of, it was hard to hone in on the, an exact one.

I’ve, I’ve played in a state championship game. I, I gotta like be a part of a college basketball program. But the. I think the ones that I’m going to remember when we’re sitting here and we’re in our 80s still talking about what we used to do I think is definitely the ones that go back to like influencing kids and there’s some game winners in there as a coach where like kids just hit big shots and made big plays.

So it’s, it’s, it’s kind of a, if it was a four year story, so it’s not like one quick, like quick hitter or something like that, but I coached a kid, he graduated a couple years ago and he had cerebral palsy and he couldn’t use basically most of the right side of his body. Like he could run and he could catch and, but his right arm just didn’t work as good as his left arm.

His right leg didn’t work as good as his left leg. Still was an incredible athlete. Despite his disability and he even has been approached by like to be a Paralympian and, and, and stuff like that because he is such a good athlete. But he was, he is the best shooter I’ve ever coached. And I don’t think he would have been as good a shooter as he was, if it wasn’t for his disability.

He had to shoot with that pure one hand with his left hand. That one handed finish. And he just, he, he really impacted me as a coach and as like daily, I got to see this kid who has it harder than everyone else in the gym, but comes in and works harder than everyone else in the gym. And he, he didn’t really like to, he, he’s cool cause he would talk to kids who had CP and he talked to people who had CP.

And he knew that he had an impact that way, but he didn’t really want anybody to talk about his disability because he didn’t want to be treated differently than anybody else. And so that was like fun to be around him. One of the most competitive kids I’ve ever coached, most driven kids I’ve ever coached just went above and beyond.

Like I talked with a lot of coaches and when they saw him, they see him on film and they’re like, Hey, this kid can shoot. We need to take him out of the game. And when they saw him live, they’re like, holy cow, he’s really limited. Like, how does he make as many shots as he does? How many, how does he play as well as he does?

Which is always cool to have them come up to me and a lot of them go up to him and, and praise him for who he’s become and how hard he’s worked. And now he’s a, he’s a, he’s a student manager at Colorado state and he’s still in the game and he’s. Because of his disability, he obviously had to think the game much differently than your average high school kid.

And I’m just excited. I think he’s going to be a college basketball coach. And I think he’s just gonna, he just got the it factor with a lot of those things. And so just a kid I’m really proud of, and I’m just like blessed to be part of his story. I got to see him from freshmen through his senior year. So that’s my favorite one.

Very cool. I think that’s a case where he learned something from a player, right? You probably never would’ve guessed it. You would coach somebody with that particular disability and then with that particular ability to go along with it and to be able to take that and have, there’s an impact that goes both ways, right?

We always think about what’s the impact that we have on kids and there’s the reverse where a kid has an impact on you, who you are as a coach, kind of how you look at things. And like you said, that’s a story that you’re going to remember that kid clearly for the rest of your life and the impact that.

He had on you. So it’s kind of a two way street, which I think is really cool. All right. So let’s get to the last question, which is who in your basketball life has had the most influence on you? And we had people cheat on the question and give us Greg, Greg White gave us a list of five. And we’ve had people listen.

And then he called it a Mount Rushmore, Eric, but I think he forgot that Mount Rushmore only has four people on it, but that’s all right, Greg, we’re coming to you. Yeah, but it’s all, but it’s all good. So again, the person slash people. That have had the biggest influence you on you in the game of basketball.

Well, I’m glad I’m not going to be the only one that has more than one. It’s hard. Cause as we all know, like we, hopefully we’re influenced by multiples to, to get to where we get and to be who we are. I’ll start with the big one that just like. Became a hot diehard of basketball. That was Jordan.

Like, I don’t know. I don’t know how original that answer is, but like, It’s the only, it’s, you’re the only Jordan, you’re the only person that said Jordan. And I’m really mad because he’s on my list and I’m really mad that you just took that. So when we do our part. Yeah. I mean, like, I’m not I’m not a basketball, I didn’t grow up in a basketball family.

I grew up in a sports family. And if you’ve ever been to Denver or you live in Colorado, it’s all Broncos. It’s all football. And I’m a huge Broncos fan. I . We can’t talk though. Cleveland Browns were not very good on yesterday either, so let’s not talk about that. Yeah, I won’t, I won’t mention it, but but like basketball in Colorado isn’t a big thing.

It’s getting bigger. But I’m just a nineties kid and I fell in love with every chance I could get to. Like, I would pray the Bulls were playing on, on Saturday so I could see them cause we didn’t, and then when we got when they had games on WGN on like Basic Cable, like that was the best thing ever.

That’s probably why I’m a Bulls fan is cause I gotta watch them as much as the Nuggets. I was a Jordans fan, I’m a Jordan fan, I’m not a Bulls fan anymore, but I’m a Jordan fan, so. I mean, he’s the one that like made me want to go on the driveway and shoot endlessly and follow basketball. The next one is like, just cause he’s probably my hero in general is my dad.

Like he wasn’t a basketball guy. He coached my first few basketball teams when I was growing up. Just cause he wanted to coach and help me out. But he’s the guy that was like, I laugh at kids that have like shooting machines in their backyards now. And like, my dad was my shooting machine. Like my dad would rebound.

until I didn’t want to shoot anymore. And he was the one that kind of taught me a lot of those integrity things that how to go talk to a coach and how to have tough conversations and how to go into a tryout. And he just was a big influence on my life and sports in general. So definitely my dad.

And then the big one that I always look back to because he impacted me as a player, but then once I became a coach, I was like, holy cow, this is probably the reason It was my my JV coach, shout out to him. I’ll send him this, this one. Will you guys get it done? John Steckle, he probably the biggest impact, like he saw the most potential in me as a player, worked with me probably more than any other basketball coach I’d ever have on a one on one basis.

Made me the player I was in high school really taught me the game and taught me what my role could be and how I could carve it out no matter what gym I stepped into in the world. And, and then just looking back on it, he’s the coach that I want to be. And he, he definitely impacted me becoming a coach.

And so I’d say as the biggest one is Coach Steckle. Like he, he, he’s the reason I’m doing what I’m doing now for sure. And he was a teacher. So like, I didn’t know it back then, but I kind of followed in his footsteps. Well, that’s a pretty good list. I think when you start with the greatest player of all time, and then you go to your dad, and I think about, Just the influence that my dad had on me.

And I know that most coaches somewhere along the lines, their dad had a big impact on kind of who they were as. a person, especially when it comes to athletics and then picking out the coach that had a huge impact on you. Again, we can all kind of look back in our, in our history and look at, okay, who was, who was the coach that kind of set me on the right path and that coached in a style or a manner that A, I was receptive to as a player, but also then influenced me and kind of how I became a coach.

So I think those three are, are really good choices. But you cannot thank you enough for being a part of episode 1000. It’s been great. Hard to believe. I know when you sent me the text message, you’re like, I can’t believe I was number 169 in the list. And it’s just it’s crazy when you go back and think how long we’ve been doing this almost six years.

When you really look at those numbers and I think, man, 169, or I think we had Greg White, I think was our earliest one. He was number four, I believe. So it’s just, it’s crazy to think back on all the people who have contributed throughout the years to, to what the Hoopeds pod has become. And so Jason, I know I want to say thanks to you and thanks to everybody who’ve been a part of this.

Thousandth episode. And we will catch you on the next one. Thanks.

Welcome in to session number 10 of the Who Pets Podcast episode 1000. No guests, Jay. No guests. It’s just you and me. Just you and me. Just you and me. So we’re going to answer, we’re going to answer the same questions that we had all of our guests answer and just kind of give you maybe a little window into what Jay and I are thinking in relation to these questions.

So. Let’s start with the first question. Why was becoming a basketball coach the right choice for you? And I’ll let you lead this one off. So, so this is kind of a funny story that I don’t know that I’ve ever told you on the pod. So like I, I coached some basketball stuff, obviously with you, with Head Start and like small refereeing for a little bit.

I just didn’t find joy in refereeing. It was not fun for me. And it wasn’t like, It wasn’t like parents were yelling. It wasn’t actually too bad. There was a lot of the ones CYO incident, which I think I’ve shared with on the pod before. But so when I got to Olmstead Falls when I filled out my application, I had said, Oh, I’m interested in coaching.

And I mean, basically checked all the boxes just because I was like, I want to coach, coach, coach. So like, it’s like October 15th and I hadn’t heard anything. And a middle school principal comes over who I didn’t know at the time because I was. In my little, I’m in the fourth grade world. I’m trying to focus on my fourth grade stuff.

He comes over and he goes Jason Sunkle, I’m like, he like literally randomly walks in my classroom. Like, yeah, he’s like, so we haven’t had four teams in a while for girls basketball, but we’re going to have enough girls to have a fourth team and I’d like to have a fourth team. So I was told that you had some interest in coaching basketball.

Would, would you like to do it? So I’m like, yeah, sure. When’s it start? Tryouts are after school today.

So so, so he’s like, but you can’t, you won’t be able to lean anything because you don’t have your coaching license and you don’t have to, but, but if you could please just do your first aid tonight and then, and then we’ll go from there. So our first day, first day during your planning period today, we’ll go from there, something along those lines.

So I ended up busting out my first aid so that I had my first aid and my CPR done. And then the next day I, I ended up coaching, like I was able to do it cause I like, I literally applied, get all the classes done that night. I was up till like 1 or 2 AM just doing everything so that I was, and then yeah, so the rest is history.

I’ve coached girls basketball for, what is this, this’ll be since year one. So it was year one. So this is year nine in Olmsted Falls and I’ve coached boys basketball. This’ll be year four for boys basketball. So I do both. And then. I also coach cross country and this is year 7 for cross country. So why is it, why is it right for me?

I just really enjoy it. I really enjoy coaching basketball and cross country. Ironically, I think I am at the point where I’m almost enjoying cross country more than basketball. Honestly Mike and it has nothing to do with. The game itself because basketball, basketball, when my kids ask me, basketball is my, like, my love.

My first love. I, I love basketball the most, but I just, I just really enjoy coaching in general, but I just like the being able to have all the kids and there’s just so many, like when we have cross country, I have 50 kids that I’m working with and it’s fun because I get to hear different things and different perspectives from all 50 kids, whereas basketball is 10.

But I also love the camaraderie of coaching basketball. And I’m really, really enjoying basketball as well. And we’re gearing up for another season. I’m gearing up for year nine right now. We’re putting the planning phases of our tryouts and all that fun stuff. So, yeah, so I just think I, I really enjoy it.

I don’t win a lot of games cause but I’ve, it’s fulfilling and we’re, we, we work really hard. So that’s, that’s why basketball is right. I guess. And, you know, it kind of tells you how I got into the game, like coaching at the current level. But yeah, that’s, that’s where I’m at with that, Mike. Well said.

I’ll share my story. So what about you, Mike? Why is basketball coaching the right thing for you? So I’ll go back to, I kind of got to tell a backstory that will lead into why I think basketball coaching was the right decision for me. So obviously anybody who’s listened to the podcast knows that. As a kid, I was relatively single minded.

Basketball was, I would say, by far the most important thing in my life. It was something that I thought that I was going to be able to do for the rest of my life. Obviously, when you’re young, everybody has that dream of, I’m going to play in the NBA one day, and I was no different than anybody else. And eventually, you come to the realization that, hey, that may not happen, but I went to Kent State as an 18 year old kid, having never had a job other than I guess working some basketball camps as a high school kid.

But I never worked in a fast food restaurant. I never delivered pizza. I guess I was a paper boy when I was like nine years old, but I never had a real job and really had no idea what I wanted to do. So when I got to school and eventually had to figure out what my major was, I thought, well, Let me do something that gives me the widest array of options.

So I chose business. And again, anybody who has a business degree, especially today, you know, you can kind of go lots of different directions with that. And I graduated and I kind of thought that maybe I would have an opportunity to play when I got done and nothing ever materialized on that front. So I had to go out and start looking for a job.

And the summer after I graduated, which would have been the summer of. 1992, I had some different interviews with companies and I had one with Nestle, which has a, a big I don’t know if headquarters, but here not too far from where, yeah, in Seoul and not too far from where I live. And I went and did this interview and actually there was a guy that I knew that I had played pickup basketball with me, that he was kind of the conduit that sort of got me the interview.

And I went in and I don’t remember much about the interview. In terms of its content. I don’t really even remember too much about what the actual job was. I know I went to the interview, came home and another day or two later, they called me up and they said, Hey, you know, we’d like you to, we’d like you to start in about two weeks.

And this was probably end of June, maybe the beginning of July. And I just remember after I got that call, I hung up the phone and I’m like, They want me to put on a suit and go to work. It’s July, man. It’s like 90 degrees. I don’t want to put on a suit and go to work. And both of my parents were educators.

So my mom was an elementary school teacher and my dad was a professor at Cleveland state. So other than my dad teaching like one summer school class, I never really had seen anybody work in the summertime. And so I looked around and I said to myself, I, I don’t think I want to go to work in July in a suit.

And so I started thinking about, well, what. were my other options. And obviously I couldn’t teach with a business degree. So I actually took a year where I didn’t do anything. I actually helped out coach Iker who at the time was the JV basketball coach at Strongsville. And then he ended up being Cal’s varsity assistant coach, which is again, kind of one of those full circle things.

But I helped Ike’s out for a year as a assistant JV coach and was working at the Strongsville Rec Center trying to figure out what am I going to do and debated whether or not to go back to school. And eventually after about eight months, I think when that basketball season ended, I think I started the following summer going back to school to get my teaching at that time teaching certificate with the idea that I was going to teach and coach.

I think that when I saw that the game was going to kind of go away for me. I think that’s when I realized, and we talk about it on the podcast all the time, right? That there’s people who they know they’re going to be a coach from the time they’re eight years old, and they’re drawing up plays on napkins, and they’re thinking about the game like a coach.

I was not like that at all. I did not think about being a coach for one second while I was playing, not during my high school career, not during my college career, never. And not until, again, I sort of was, I don’t want to say forced into it, but I had to make a decision about kind of what direction, what direction I wanted to go with my life.

And in doing that, I ended up going back to school at Cleveland state, getting certified to teach elementary school one through eight, and then ended up having to make a decision after I graduated after five quarters at Cleveland state, I had an offer to be the head basketball coach at North Royalton, but I would have been a study hall monitor, or I could have taken the job at Richmond Heights High School and been the assistant coach with Phil Schmuck.

and have a full time teaching job. And so I ended up taking the full time teaching job, although it was something I debated, it took me probably two weeks to make that decision. I went down to the very, very, very, very last second of when I had to tell North Royalton no, and it was a hard decision. And anyway, I ended up opting for the full time job.

And then obviously I started my camps at about the same time. So to answer the question, why it’s a long winded way to get there, but my why is that. The game of basketball has been everything to me. It’s given me so much in my life that I can never repay. And so the opportunity to use basketball as a vehicle to be able to impact other people and in various different ways, whether you think about through camp, whether it’s through coaching teams, whether it’s through this podcast, I just think that the why is trying to give back, trying to help people to be, to be better, to impact their lives and getting to do it with something that.

I love that’s been a part of my life forever. And so that’s my why. Okay. All right. Your best basketball story goes. So for those that don’t know, I didn’t really play really competitive basketball. I won’t get into that. So I’m, I’m going to take a coaching aspect of one and I actually wasn’t even coaching the game.

And I know we’ve mentioned it on the podcast, but I think my Favorite moment of being a coach was after Olmsted Falls won the championship last, state championship last year. And just being at the game, spending the game with my, getting my dad to go to the, say, Hey dad, let’s go to Dayton to watch the Olmsted Falls girls playing the championship game that we didn’t know how it was going to turn out.

We went and golfed beforehand. We went to a terrible Wendy’s. Have you ever found, Mike, that there’s two types of Wendy’s? There’s either a really good Wendy’s or it’s really bad Wendy’s. We went to a really bad Wendy’s that was really slow on a time that we were trying to get to date in a timely manner.

Anyways and just being able to see them win the championship, know that I coached in some way, shape or form. And I taught, I, I taught three of those girls like in the classroom or four of those girls in the classroom, four of them. And then I. Coach them and like, maybe not directly because they weren’t, I think only one of them was on my team and one should wait in one year.

We were in, I mean, we practice together every day. So all, you know, all four teams are together and I sat on the sideline for some of their games and just having a hand in all but one, I, I literally, there was only one girl who was like a move in. Yeah. And then winning the championship, state championship, and then getting to go on the floor and just like celebrate with them because we got invited onto the floor.

It was, it’s probably my favorite basketball moment and I don’t know that, you know, anything like, obviously I didn’t win the state, I didn’t win the state championship, but even if I have like one half of a percent because I helped coach in some way, shape or form or, you know, I worked summer camp with coach Eaton or.

And you know, I just, not that I had any, like a real direct hand in anything, but just knowing that something maybe that I said to them or something impacted them and then they went out and won the state championship. And I don’t, I can’t, you know, I can’t really say anything other than that. And you know, that’s probably my best basketball story, even though it does not directly relate to me playing basketball or me coaching basketball.

But it does have to do with your impact, right? I mean, I think that that’s ultimately what. It’s all about very few people get to win a state championship and to be able to have a personal connection even to somebody who’s winning a state championship is pretty rare. And I think that when you start talking about impact as a teacher or as a coach, a lot of times we don’t always necessarily see our impact.

And you don’t get to see the results cause it’s way, you know, it’s a ways away. Yeah. But, but there’s a case where, and look, I don’t know if you could, as you said, what the percentage was that you contributed, but to know that you spent. Again, in the case of the girls that you taught, you know, you spent a whole school year with them and the girls you coached and to be able to just have one of the girls I had in fourth grade and in eighth grade.

So there you go. And I mean, just to be able to, to know that, look, somewhere along the way, something you did or said or interaction that you had impacted those young ladies in some way. And again, it’s, it’s just cool to be able to. To see somebody that, you know, and in a community where you spend a lot of your time to be able to have that kind of accomplishment.

So that’s a, that’s a really cool, that’s a really cool story. I try to think about what story I wanted to tell. And I’ve got some like quick hitter, funny ones from primarily from college, but there, there’s a million different stories that I can think about. And what’s funny too, Jay, is that when I think about my playing stories, Like a lot of what’s memorable and it goes to, I know we had an we’ve had at least a couple of episodes about this and discussions about, do you love to win more?

Do you hate to lose? Like honestly, like a lot of my stories are about, are about losses. Like those are some of the best stories I, maybe because, maybe because the memory of those losses is the most, is the most vivid. But. I decided that in honor of the Who Peds Pod 1000th episode, I’m going to try to keep it positive.

So I went back to my playing career. I went back to my playing career. I’ll try to set it up. I’ll try to set up the story so that there’s, I mean, there’s a good, there’s a good ending to it, but I’ll try to kind of set it up because there’s some pieces to it that I think make it, you know, make it a little bit more interesting.

So going into, and I’ve told this story on the podcast before, but basically. The summer before my senior year, Kent State was recruiting me. That’s obviously where I ended up going to school. And they said, Hey, do you want to come down for A, an official visit. And at that time, and again, free internet, no coach that was working with me, no parents, nobody that, I knew kind of what was going on and I said, I don’t know if I want to take an official visit.

I’m still waiting. I’m waiting for that call from Ohio state, from North Carolina. And I still am. I’m delusional at this point that I think that those calls are still coming as I’m heading into my senior year. And so I tell him, no, I’ll come down for an unofficial visit. So we come down and my mom and I, here’s another Wendy’s reference to go back to your story.

I still remember my mom and I. Going down and meeting with the coaching staff and then going and sitting at Wendy’s. We had to pay for our own lunch because it was an unofficial visit. And then after we left that visit, basically there was no interest from Kent State anymore. Calls stopped, the postcards stopped, the letters stopped.

They basically stopped recruiting me. And which again, looking back on it, completely understandable. So anyway, going towards the end of my senior year as all of the Interest that I thought was going to be coming my way was not coming my way. I decided, well, maybe I can re recruit myself to Kent State. So I make a call, my dad and I call down and we say, Hey, you know, we’re, are you still interested?

Is there any, is there any interest? And basically at that time they had all their scholarships were used up. They didn’t have another scholarship to be able to give, but they said, you know, if you’re interested. We’re still at least interested if something would change in our situation, you know, we might consider it.

So we go into the last game of my senior year. It’s a home game against one of our rivals, Brunswick High School here in the state of Ohio and two neighboring communities. I’ve got friends on the other team and coach Jim McDonald, who’s the head coach for Kent State, comes to that game. And the game is televised on local broadcast, whatever cable, So, there’s two announcers, so the game’s getting announced, it’s on TV, and Coach McDonald’s there, and Brunswick has two players that go on to play Division I college basketball.

They have another kid who was a really good friend of mine, Todd Grabowski, who goes on to play tight end for Michigan State. So, a really good team that we’re playing against. And

the game is tight all the way through. It’s tight all the way through. And I’m having a good game. And it’s, again, it’s tense. It’s a big rival. Last home game. The game goes to overtime. And at that point, Coach McDonald is gone. He leaves before the game ends. So it goes to overtime. He’s gone. He’s gone. To be honest, I don’t know if I know he’s gone.

Again, it’s been so long and I’ve seen the video so many times that I don’t know if I know he’s gone because I’ve seen the video of him leaving and no longer being in his seat. Or I don’t know if in the moment, I feel like in the moment, I knew he was gone too, because I was aware of him. Being at the game, but anyway, the game goes back to overtime and it’s going back and forth.

And we have the ball with maybe, I don’t know, we have a possession. We’re kind of working the clock down at the end of overtime. Let’s say the last, I don’t know, 30 seconds, we’re passing the ball around the perimeter, we’re passing around the perimeter. And I go to make a move with about maybe, I don’t know, 10, 12 seconds to go.

And I go into the lane and I spin. And as I spin, I get stripped. And the other team steals the ball. And the kid who I referenced before, who was a good friend of mine that ended up going to Michigan state, he ends up with the ball and he’s dribbling down the court and he gets into the lane and one of my teammates, Andy Cromer goes up and blocks the shot that he takes with maybe, I don’t know, maybe four seconds, five seconds to go, and the ball kind of kicks out to me off this block and I dribble down and I pull up from, you know, Like the volleyball line.

And as the buzzer goes off, the ball’s about halfway to the rims and swish. Other than that, three pointer, the game was tied at the time. So we ended up winning by three. The place goes crazy. The student section storms the floor. The janitor. I get, the janitor, Pat, you said the athletic custodian. If you watch the video, he like drops his broom over in the corner cause you can see him just kind of the way the angle is.

N. It’s funny cause I think back to that shot and again, I look at it now and it was, I mean, it was a deep, deep three well before I had to get, I had to shoot it from there. Not because that was my range, just because the clock was about to expire. If you see the shot, it looks just like a normal jump shot.

I don’t know if it was adrenaline. I don’t know if it was what it was, but anyway, the shot goes in, the student section storms the floor. I get carried off. Last game as a senior, of course, I’m disappointed that coach McDonald at home before he got to see before he got to see that it’s on this local cable whatever station.

So there’s commentary. It’s not just a film. There’s commentary about it and they’re talking about this and that and whatever. And they’re showing shots of the crowd. You can see my dad jumping up and down. I can see the parents of. The kid who was from Michigan, who eventually went to Michigan state and his parents, the Brunswick crowd’s just kind of looking around and whatever.

And so the thing that I remember most, honestly, about the night, I say this all the time is after it’s all said and done and you shower up, which I know kids don’t do anymore, but at that time, everybody showered up and got changed and headed out onto the town and ended up at Burger King. I just remember walking into Burger King and when I walked into Burger King Burger King no longer exists.

Burger King no longer exists. No longer exists. Now it’s a, now it’s a Freddy’s Freddy’s steak burger. But walk into Burger King and get a standing ovation in Burger King. After this, after this game, I walked in and people just stood up. And so when I think about, again, the best moments or the best moment for me, As a player, at least in terms of organized basketball, that’s what, that’s what stands out.

So that’s my, that’s my best story. And then obviously Coach McDonald must have seen something he liked because eventually somebody transferred and I got the seventh, the seventh scholarship out of seven, seven freshmen. And luckily ended up having a, having a good career. And thanks to all my coaches at Kent, Coach McDonald, who passed away earlier this year, Coach Groob and Coach Smith and everybody else that was a part of my success there.

All right. All right. Last one. Most influential person. Mine will be shorter. I know that one was long, but mine will be shorter. So go ahead. So this is, this was hard for me, Mike, because like my, my dad really was not a big basketball guy. And like my mom was not a big basketball. But my dad was big on like watching, we watched like the MJ tapes and I’ve, I’ve talked about that on the podcast.

So like, that was really my introduction to basketball. He, they got me a hoop when I was in second grade, third grade. And then I like, I was thinking, I was thinking, and you’re going to hate me when I say this, Mike, I think it’s probably you. Yes. I can see that. It’s crazy. But I, I think I think back to when basketball camp and just thinking about like the hot box and the center middle school and having to be up there.

And I, there’s just things that I remember distinctly about, like, I broke my finger. I don’t know if you remember this, but I broke my finger at camp, like broke it. And I came back to camp cause I was supposed to just, I said, I’m not missing camp. I’m just going to go and do like the drills and stuff. I won’t play in games.

And this was back in what, like 97, 96, no one even cares. Like, so I’m sitting there and my team’s losing and I’m like, I’m going in the, I’m going into the game and you let me go in the game because it’s 96, 97. And you don’t have to, I’m, I’m 25, 26 years old. What do I care? And, and you go and you’re, and you’re calling the game and you’re, you know, like doing your calling the game, which you don’t obviously do too much anymore because you’re not always reffing, but you like, and you always would call the game.

You were like, An announcer called me and he’s like, Jason’s uncle coming off the bench. It’s the, it’s the Michael Jordan, his version of the Michael Jordan flu game or something like that, or something along those lines, or I just, so probably it was closer to 98. I, you know, I don’t remember exactly, but I just remember you saying something along those lines and then knockout, you just, like you used to say out all the time.

And I just remember that. And I do that to this day. When we’re playing knockout at practice or when we’re at camp I And I, I, so I think it’s, it’s you and the only other person that I probably would throw in there is is Berkey just because you know, he got me into refereeing, which you would think, well, how is that a biggest influence of basketball influence on you?

He got me there. I appreciate the game way more and I appreciate referees way more. And I think I’ve changed my coaching style because of the way of I don’t think I would have coached the way that I coach now You know, I, a lot of, a lot of coaches do not, I won’t say that I’m chummy with the officials, but before every game I talk to the officials and like, I never talk, I’m never talking about basketball because I know all the guys that refer games, like, just because through my time as a referee and, you know, obviously being coaching there for so long, I just feel like majority of the guys, I, you know, and I think Berkey, Mike Klinzing.

I think that definitely played a role in that because I don’t know that I would have that level of, I’d like to think that I would be as respectful as I am, but I think that definitely played a big role. So, so that’s where I’m going with that. Got it. So top three, I feel honored to have made the top three.

It’s funny because again, the things that you’re talking about, obviously I remember them in generalities. I don’t necessarily remember them in specifics. I do remember that. the year, I think when you were going into seventh grade and you won the MVP that year. You said it was a legacy. Yeah. Well, you had, you know, again, you were a kid who had come to camp for, for many years.

And this still happens to me occasionally at the time, but I remember distinctly with you is, When, when you want it, it’s one of those things that you’re getting up and you’re kind of talking about, okay, this is what the MVP means at the Head Start basketball camp. And eventually I, you know, when you say the name, it’s like you kind of start to choke up a little bit.

And I remember when I gave you the trophy and again, you’re always kind of, obviously you don’t want to be up there and, you know, be boohooing and, you know, having a tear run down your eye. But there’s a part of you when you just think about again, somebody that spends whatever you spent as a kid, you spent whatever five summers with me or six summers with me over the course of multiple camps in a summer.

And there’s a, and I think this is something that when you think about coaching, it’s, it’s a two way street, right? I think the players have an impact on coaches and coaches have an impact on players. And I’m not sure that either one always necessarily knows. The impact. I think sometimes we discount the, we discount the impact going both directions, if that makes any sense.

I think coaches sometimes discount how much of an impact they have on players. And I think players for sure discount how much of an impact they have on coaches. And I always will remember too, one more thing. I always remember that last camp. I think you did it intentionally, even though I don’t think you’ll admit to it.

You’re putting me on Rebecca’s team in the last, the last camp. I think you totally, I think you totally played a puppeteer with that a little bit. I don’t know. I don’t know if you would have been, I have, I have no, I have no recollection. I have zero recollection of that, but it was just, it was not because it’s not beyond, it’s not beyond, it’s not beyond my capability.

How about that? Yeah. I, I’m just saying like, I feel like, cause it was the last time and then. We ended up winning the championship that year too. So that was you know, but I’m like, I think back to when I, you know, obviously we see the players play now and like, your daughter was there, but I just think back to when I don’t know how it was even physically possible that you would put me and her on the same team because she was a better basketball player than I was probably, but you know, for being a girl and being two years younger than me, she was definitely serviceable.

So I just remember that. For sure. For sure. That’s funny. That’s funny. Hey, a little manipulation never hurt anybody. Yeah. All right. So my most influential person, and I think, look, I could obviously cite. My coach in high school, Bob Casey, I could talk about the impact that my coaching staff collectively as a group at Kent had on me.

But I think when I think about my basketball career, the first person that I think about is my dad. And I think about the amount of time that he spent with me on the driveway, him and I, shooting a hundred free throws, battling it out to see who could make more out of a hundred. Me getting angry if he would beat me, me always telling him, even when I was really, really little, Hey, you got to play me one on one, but you got to have both hands behind your back.

I was doing the constraints led approach with my dad way back when, even before we knew what it was called, or my dad could only use one arm or whatever that might’ve been. And so I just remember the amount of time, number one, that he spent with me out on her driveway. Number two, We think about the, and we talk a ton here about just sort of how AAU basketball and the youth basketball landscape has kind of changed and AAU has taken over.

And back when I was in high school, that was kind of at the, we were kind of at the genesis of AAU basketball. And my dad was always the coach of, of those teams. And I still remember he had this folder where he’d write stuff down and he’d have lineups and he’d be trying to figure stuff out. And, you know, looking back on it as a 54 year old, you see again, just.

Like the amount of time and the amount of care and the amount of love that he put into it, again, to, to give me every possible advantage that he could. And then, you know, I think about him and my mom and every high school game I ever played, they were there. College, the number of games that they came to at home, on the road, when we traveled and I could always look up in the stands and see them sitting there.

So the amount of support that they gave me, and just, I mean, Again, I can never repay what my dad and my mom gave to me in terms of, in terms of the game. My dad was an exercise physiologist. So he always had me doing plyometrics and printing uphill and downhill. And I always say, I mean, I never became an explosive athlete.

I wonder how unexplosive. I wonder how, I wonder how unexplosive I would have been had I not been doing all the things that. My dad had me doing, which were way before probably anybody else was doing them. I was doing box jumps and bench blasts. And like, if you think about the, the Vertimax, like my dad basically had a homemade Vertimax with some rubber tubing and a wooden platform.

And he was tugging me behind a motorcycle to try to increase my speed or my, my stride length. And I used to run sprints in the Strongsville Cemetery going different directions. So I’d run downhill and uphill and on the cinders. Just all this stuff that, again, all that came from my dad and I guess I’ll end my little section here with just, and I think I’ve shared this on the podcast before, but there was a piece of advice that my dad gave me that stuck with me as a player and I think that anybody who ever played with me at any level, whether it was organized basketball, whether it was pickup basketball, I think that The type of player I was, I think, stemmed from this piece of advice that my dad gave me.

And it was after a rec game when I was maybe in fifth or sixth grade. And I don’t remember if he even won or lost the game, but I just remember I was frustrated that I had thrown some passes that teammates had dropped or didn’t catch. And I just remember being mad and thinking to myself or saying out loud, man, I, you know, these guys got to catch the ball.

And I, you know, I should’ve, I should’ve just shot it. Why am I passing? And, I remember my dad saying, Mike, you just have to keep passing the ball because it’s the right play. And eventually you’re going to play with guys who are going to catch the ball and they’re going to score. And I think I took that to heart.

And I think that was sort of the kind of player that I became was somebody who tried to make the right play, somebody who tried to involve my teammates. And again, I think that all stems back to. My dad, who I think was my biggest influence in the game.

Well, once again, you know, a little few people, a little, we cheated a little bit. Right. But that’s all right. We’re allowed to cheat. It’s our podcast. Exactly. That’s, that is, that is, that is, that is true. That is true. So that ends session number 10 of the Who Peds podcast. We think it’s the last session, right Mike?

We think it’s the last. Maybe. Well. Well, unless session 11 becomes the Jefferson Mason story, which I’ve got to figure out where I’m going to put that. So that could very well be session 11. And if it is, that will be the greatest story that has been told to this point on the Who Pets Podcast. I literally, Mike, I literally was telling the story to some quote, and we’re not going to, I’m not going to spoil it now.

Cause I want, if we’re, we’re gonna, I think we’re going to play the clip after this, that we do this, but. I was telling people at school about that story. We were, cause I had a few people come up to me cause they saw my tweets and stuff about it being a thousand episode. And I was like, yeah, we’re going to, I think we’re going to end it or put it somewhere in there.

But with our favorite story from the podcast and I was kind of, you know, obviously doing it in my words, not in his words. And they thought it was, it sounded, they thought it sounded hilarious and I was giving it a paraphrase version. So Jefferson’s version is, Jefferson’s version is definitely better than you and I could We tell it for sure.

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So that’ll end session 10. We think you’ll be back for session 11 here in just one second. All right, we’ll check you out on this 1000th episode.

Last but not least, part 11 of the Who Peds podcast, episode 1000, our favorite all time story from Jefferson Mason of Dr. Dish basketball. The craziest overseas basketball story. I have so many different stories that I can tell you. I played in, I played in so many countries. I’ve been all over the place, but one of the coolest experience I actually had that, you know, some of my close friends and family know about I actually played in northern Iraq.

So I actually played in Kurdistan as it’s called. So it’s kind of the southern tip of, of Turkey, but it’s technically the northern part of Iraq. And so I went there and I played kind of towards the end of the season in, in playoffs. They had asked me to come and I had no idea that they even played basketball there.

All I knew was, is that There was a war a few years prior and that all this crazy stuff was going over there and I had no idea that they had any sports going on whatsoever. But I’ll never forget, I got a, I got a call from my agent at the time and said, hey, there’s an opportunity to go play at the end of the year in, into playoffs.

You know, over at this team. And I said, you know what? I don’t know if it’s safe to go over there and play basketball. I mean, I would have never even thought or imagined in my mind that I would to go to the Middle East or anywhere over there and play. And I, I ended up making the decision you know, opposite of what my mom and all my family wanted me to do.

I ended up making the decision to go there and experience and see what it was about. And on top of that, they were paying really, really good money. So I ended up deciding to go there for about three months. And I I played all over the country, actually in Turkey and Kurdistan and also Iraq. But the, the craziest story was, is I’ll never forget.

We were traveling from Dohok. It’s the northern part of Iraq, technically in Kurdistan, and we had a tournament in Baghdad. And so I was kind of nervous and shocked at first when they told us, hey, we’re going to go to Baghdad and play in a tournament, because one, I didn’t even know that they played basketball there and I didn’t think it was going to be safe.

But I, I, I said, Hey, you know what I’m willing to try it. The other American on the on my team at the time, he said, Hey, I’m willing to go and, and see what it’s about. And so we jumped on the road on a bus and we drove about three hours there. The crazy part was, is we were in the middle of nowhere, the desert in our bus, and we got pulled over by.

You know, cops at this rest stop and they were checking our bus for explosives and you know, all of that crazy stuff. And I’ll never forget the, the, the officers or, you know, kind of the, the, the military they had there got on our bus and we only had one person in the organization that spoke English.

In Arabic as well. So he told us, Hey, just be quiet. Don’t say anything, just sit down. And my heart is pumping a million miles per hour in the middle of nowhere in Iraq, heading to Baghdad. And nobody really speaks English, and I’ll never forget the, the military guy said, Hey you know, who are these two guys here?

And, and our translator basically said, Hey, we play basketball. They’re Americans. And they told us to get off the bus. So me and my teammate we get off the bus and I’ll never forget. We’re walking off the bus and he whispers in my ear. If we gotta run, we gotta run. If, if we gotta fight, we gotta fight.

And my heart is, you know, pumping a million miles per hour wondering, like, what’s gonna happen? Are we gonna get killed out here? Are they gonna put us in jail? Like, I don’t even know where we’re at. I was, I mean, freaking out. So we go into this security spot building that’s run down. There’s no windows.

It’s just a concrete building. And The guys in broken English kind of start to ask us, you know, you play basketball and we were like, yeah, and they asked us, you know, to jump. And so I kind of was like, what does that mean? And our translator had come in with, and he said, it means jump. So we started to jump up and down.

And, you know, I almost started crying. If I’m being honest with you, I almost started crying and thinking to myself there, you know, They’re messing with us. We’re going to, we’re going to get killed out here. And they just kept telling us to jump, jump higher, jump higher, jump higher. And so I’m getting nervous.

My teammates looking at me like, Hey, we’re going to, you know, they had machine guns on them and all this. We’re going to, you know, we’re going to go out fighting. And I’m thinking, this is crazy. This is insane. And all of a sudden they told us to stop and they said, Do you know Michael Jordan? And we were like, no, we don’t personally know him, but yes, we know Michael Jordan.

He’s amazing. And then they just started laughing and, you know, talking to our translator and asking about Michael Jordan and all these NBA guys and all this type of stuff. And essentially they just wanted to see how athletic we were, how high we could jump, and that’s why they had us doing it. So we ended up getting out of there and we went to Baghdad and we played four games, but I thought that I was going to lose my life that night.

And it was probably the craziest, scariest experience that I had you know, with basketball, but just in general life, to be quite honest with you. Did part of you think to say that you did know Michael Jordan, thinking that might save you? I, you know what, I honestly did. But you know, when when all those emotions and feelings are going on and you got your teammate next to you saying that, He’s going to go down swinging and fighting and, and, and running when we’re in the middle of the desert.

You know, at that time I was just thinking I’m going to be truthful. I’m going to be honest. I’m going to, I’m going to just do everything to a T in the right way so that there’s no reason that anything bad can happen to me. So I just kind of went with the flow and, and whatever came out came out and that’s kind of what it was.

Jefferson, that’s a great story, man. That’s a pretty good one. That’s about, it’s, that’s gonna be a hard one to top. We might have to do a lot of podcasts before we top that one. So nice, nice, nice job on that. We like it. And that, and that’s a story that I haven’t told many people. So yeah, it’s out, it’s out, it’s out there now.

It’s out there now. Yeah.

Hoop Heads Nation. Thanks for listening to this special episode 1000 of the Hoop Heads podcast. Be sure to go and check out all of our social media postings. Get entered into the drawings from all our great sponsors. We appreciate you listening and we will catch you on our next episode. Episode. Thanks.

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