JEREMY SCHILLER – IMG ACADEMY BOYS’ VARSITY BASKETBALL HEAD COACH – EPISODE 722

Website – https://www.imgacademy.com/people/jeremy-schiller

Email – Jeremy.schiller@img.com

Twitter – @CoachJSchiller

Jeremy Schiller is a boys’ basketball varsity head coach at IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida.  He has more than 20 years of experience in both college and high school basketball. During his career, he has won over 400 games and several Coach of the Year awards, including the 2019 National Federation of High Schools Florida Coach of the Year. He has also coached numerous players who have gone on to play in college and professionally.

Before IMG, Schiller served as the head coach at Lakewood Ranch High in Bradenton, Fla. During his tenure, Lakewood Ranch won four district titles, played in three regional finals, made it to two final fours, and was the State Championship runner up in Class 8A. Prior to Lakewood Ranch, Schiller was as an assistant coach at Eckerd College and a graduate assistant at the University of South Florida.

Schiller serves on the FHSAA advisory board and the executive board of the FABC.

If you’re looking to improve your coaching please consider joining the Hoop Heads Mentorship Program.  We believe that having a mentor is the best way to maximize your potential and become a transformational coach. By matching you up with one of our experienced mentors you’ll develop a one on one relationship that will help your coaching, your team, your program, and your mindset.  The Hoop Heads Mentorship Program delivers mentoring services to basketball coaches at all levels through our team of experienced Head Coaches. Find out more at hoopheadspod.com or shoot me an email directly mike@hoopheadspod.com

Be sure to follow us on Twitter and Instagram @hoopheadspod for the latest updates on episodes, guests, and events from the Hoop Heads Pod.

Grab your notebook before you listen to this episode with Jeremy Schiller, boys’ basketball varsity head coach at IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida.

What We Discuss with Jeremy Schiller

• Developing his leadership skills as high school player despite not playing much on a team that had two future NBA players and 13 college players
• How an injury in his freshman year of college led to him returning to his high school to help coach
• The freedom he had to develop his coaching style in his first job as a jv coach
• “When I’m developing a drill, I keep the main thing, the main thing. I don’t want it to be too complex where we lose sight of what we’re actually focused on.”
• The way IMG organizes their teams to meet the needs of all their players
• The collaboration between coaches at IMG
• “If you love basketball, IMG is the best place in the world. I can’t imagine anything can even compare to it.”
• The off-court benefits that IMG provides players (leadership, nutrition, mental training, strength, etc.)
• “Being at University of South Florida was a really fun experience to be at Division One, but it also opened my eyes that being a part of the business of basketball at that level may not have been what I wanted to do.”
• Turning around the program at Lakewood Ranch (FL) High School
• The challenge of building team culture at IMG
• “College coaches know when they come to us and get a kid off of IMG Blue, they’re built to make winning plays.”
• “We’re compiling film for our guys so when college coaches see them and like them, that they check every box related to how hard they play, how committed they are to winning, how unselfish they are, and how they guard the basketball.”
• “Demonstrating on a daily basis that you live the characteristics you’re expecting from those kids.”
• “If we’re not doing it as a leader, there’s no way to get others to do it.”
• “Often we spend all our energy on the kids, but we’ve have to get the parents invested. We have to make sure our administration’s invested.”
• “Although wins and losses are important, and that’s what we’re working towards, it’s really more about making sure that they become successful people and that we live that every day.”
• “Luck goes to those that work the hardest.”
• How to work with parents in a positive manner
• “Common sense is not common.”
• “The ability to accept responsibility when we make mistakes as a coach is super important for building that relationship with parents and players.”
• “I don’t always know how good I am at things, but I’m confident that I’m going to work as hard as I possibly can to achieve whatever that is.”
• Why he decided to leave Lakewood Ranch (FL) High School for IMG
• “The first step is to help players generate a roadmap of specifically what they need to work on that college coaches are going to want to see.”
• “Fit over level”

Like this show? Please leave us a review here — even one sentence helps! Consider including your Twitter handle so we can thank you personally!

Become a Patron!

We’re excited to partner with Dr. Dish, the world’s best shooting machine! Mention the Hoop Heads Podcast when you place your order and get $300 off a brand new state of the art Dr. Dish Shooting Machine!

Prepare like the pros with the all new FastDraw and FastScout. FastDraw has been the number one play diagramming software for coaches for years, and now with it’s integrated web platform, coaches have the ability to add video to plays and share them directly to their players Android and iPhones via their mobile app. Coaches can also create customized scouting reports,  upload and send game and practice film straight to the mobile app. Your players and staff have never been as prepared for games as they will after using FastDraw & FastScout. You’ll see quickly why FastModel Sports has the most compelling and intuitive basketball software out there! In addition to a great product, they also provide basketball coaching content and resources through their blog and playbank, which features over 8,000 free plays and drills from their online coaching community. For access to these plays and more information, visit fastmodelsports.com or follow them on Twitter @FastModel.  Use Promo code HHP15 to save 15%

Your first impression is everything when applying for a new coaching job.  A professional coaching portfolio is the tool that highlights your coaching achievements and philosophies and, most of all, helps separate you and your abilities from the other applicants.

The key to landing a new coaching job is to demonstrate to the hiring committee your attention to detail, level of preparedness, and your professionalism.  Not only does a coaching portfolio allow you to exhibit these qualities, it also allows you to present your personal philosophies on coaching, leadership, and program development in an organized manner.

The Coaching Portfolio Guide is an instructional, membership-based website that helps you develop a personalized portfolio.  Each section of the portfolio guide provides detailed instructions on how to organize your portfolio in a professional manner.  The guide also provides sample documents for each section of your portfolio that you can copy, modify, and add to your personal portfolio.

United Basketball Plus has over 3,000 plays, 45 Deep Dive Courses with some of the best minds in the game including Tyler Coston, Paul Kelleher, Tobin Anderson, Dave Love and more. You can also view United Basketball Clinics, and receive 50% off in-person clinics. United Basketball Plus partnered with Jordan and Joe Stasyzyn from Unleashed Potential to create their Skill Development Curriculum. United Basketball Plus is a one stop shop to help you grow as a coach, leader and culture builder. Use the code ‘clinic’ and receive an annual membership for $50.  

The first Training Camp – Elite Skill Development and Performance Combine will be held on the campus of Western Reserve Academy, just outside of Cleveland, OH powered by Unleashed Potential & the Hoop Heads Podcast. The camp is designed for boys rising to grades 6-9 and will take place June 29 – July 1, 2023. An emphasis on improving your individual skills in the context of a team environment will be the hallmark of the Training Camp. 

Mike Klinzing from Head Start Basketball/The Hoop Heads Podcast & Joe Stasyszyn from Unleashed Potential will serve as the Camp Directors of this inaugural Training Camp.

Campers can expect 3 days of hard work, intense skills instruction, and learning how to be a great teammate on and off the court at the Training Camp.  Players will participate in 10 Elite Skill Development Sessions led by some of the best coaches from across the country.  Visit headstartbasketball.com to get registered.

THANKS, JEREMY SCHILLER

If you enjoyed this episode with Jeremy Schiller let him know by clicking on the link below and sending him a quick shoutout on Twitter:

Click here to thank Jeremy Schiller on Twitter!

Click here to let Mike & Jason know about your number one takeaway from this episode!

And if you want us to answer your questions on one of our upcoming weekly NBA episodes, drop us a line at mike@hoopheadspod.com.

TRANSCRIPT FOR JEREMY SCHILLER – IMG ACADEMY BOYS’ VARSITY BASKETBALL HEAD COACH – EPISODE 722

[00:00:00] Mike Klinzing: Hello and welcome to the Hoop Heads Podcast. It’s Mike Klinzing here without my co-host Jason Sunkle tonight. But I am pleased to be joined by the head varsity coach at IMG Academy, Jeremy Schiller. Jeremy, welcome to the Hoop Heads Pod.

[00:00:12] Jeremy Schiller: Mike, thanks for having me. I really appreciate it. It’s a huge honor.

You’ve had some really, really big time guests and hopefully I can add a little value too.

[00:00:23] Mike Klinzing: We’re excited to be able to have you on and talk to you about what you’ve been able to accomplish thus far in your coaching career. Want to start by going back in time to when you were a kid…Tell us a little bit about some of your first experiences with the game of basketball.

[00:00:38] Jeremy Schiller: So my story’s a little bit unique in the sense that I started basketball pretty late. So I was in seventh grade. We had moved to Brandon, Florida. And I was at a very small private school and I played soccer and I was actually pretty good at that.

I led the team in assists in soccer. And then basketball season came around and the school was small enough that the coach was the same coach. So you know, although I was limited in skill, he kept me around because I worked really hard and I was a good kid. And I scored two points my first season in seventh grade.

That was an exciting time. Pretty good. And I basically just got ate up and fell in love with basketball. So started practicing on my own, four, five hours a day outside my friend’s house to the point where sometimes at night his parents or he would come out and kick me out and make me go back to my house.

And during falling in love with it, I had the opportunity eventually to make varsity at a really good high school, Brandon High School in Tampa, Florida. A lot of really good players have come through there before me like Jeff Turner, Dwayne Schintsiuz, and actually while I was there, had the opportunity to play with two guys that ended up playing in the NBA Joey and Steven Graham.

So really unique high school playing experience. During that time I tore up my shoulder and kind of led into a very short lived freshman team experience at Eckard College and actually moved into coaching when I was 19 years old, my sophomore year of college.

[00:02:07] Mike Klinzing: So as a high school player, when you think back to that time, do you have a favorite memory that sticks out from your playing career in high school?

[00:02:16] Jeremy Schiller: I didn’t have a major role on the court. I think the parts that stick out to me the most were when I was younger there was this Adidas commercial where they showed the kid on the sidelines cheering and jumping up and down and being engaged and kind of going up and down with every moment.

And that was always kind of the big joke with my friends is that’s how I was and the leadership things that I went through in high school bled pretty naturally into becoming a coach. And I did start out coaching at my old high school. But my memories are more like, we were at a really big tournament in Ocala, Florida, Kingdom of the Sun, and we were struggling and we had a big team meeting and everybody was not saying much. And I really dove into kind of leading that moment. I remember my teammates who are all significantly more talented than me. I mean, not only do we have two NBA players, but we had, I think five or six division one players. We had 13 guys that played college on our team.

One of our guys that barely played ended up playing on a Final Four junior college team. So, just a ton of talent, but my ability at that time to kind of connect everybody and help them galvanize, even though I wasn’t out on the court as kind of the main memory. And then I remember my first two points in high school very clearly because it was a fast break layup and all I hoped was I score while I’m a varsity basketball player. And in my first game, like second possession, I score a transition layup. So the pressure was off for me at that point.

[00:03:49] Mike Klinzing: So when you think about stepping up there in the locker room in a time of crisis, was that something that you felt comfortable with… something that maybe in your background there was some piece of kind of who you were or how you were brought up that made you rise to that moment? Or just when you think back to that, because obviously that’s something that not every high school player, not every high school kid is capable of.

So when you think back to that moment, where do you think that came from?

[00:04:20] Jeremy Schiller: So I think like most things were kind of like products of all the different moments in our life. And for me, some of the things that I’d gone through, pretty significant prior to them was I was voted as student government president for our entire school.

Had gone to a leadership camp run by Rotary called S4TL. And I think those experiences outside of basketball helped shape my basketball experience. So for me it was really natural because I was extremely passionate about what we were doing, even though like most kids who were sitting on the bench kind of are disengaged.

I was anything but that. I don’t know that I ever thought it would turn into coaching. I just knew that whatever it took to help my teammates in this group of people I cared about do better. So that was the thing I could do. So it really happened naturally just from my educational development experiences, if that makes sense.  More than sports necessarily.

[00:05:17] Mike Klinzing: No, it does. It makes a ton of sense. And I think it’s interesting when you look at sort of the way we talk about as coaches now, right? Helping our players to develop as people. And I think it’s something that coaches are probably more intentional about that today than they’ve ever been. And certainly there’s lots of opportunities for players to develop outside of the game, whether that’s through their schoolwork or through internships or just all the things that kids are doing today. So it doesn’t necessarily, as you said, have to come through sports, but as you and I both know, sports is such a great microcosm of what kids are going to eventually face out there in the world, whether it’s in their job or with their family relationships and all those things.

And so it’s always interesting to kind of hear where that leadership characteristic, where it comes from in different people. You talked a little bit about the injury in college and how that sort of pushed you towards getting into coaching. And you said a couple times that you never necessarily thought about it from a coaching standpoint, but then was there a point where you started to recognize that, hey, maybe coaching is a direction that I want to head.

Was there one sort of seminal moment that hit you? Or was it sort of a gradual process?

[00:06:33] Jeremy Schiller: So I’d say it was more of a gradual process. You know, once I stopped playing, I knew that I was still passionate about basketball and I still played every day kind of outside when I was healthy enough to do that.

I actually tore my labrum, so there’d be times where I could get through kind of the discomfort. But to do it at a college basketball level just really wasn’t possible. But my high school head coach, who I ended up working for, Mark Herman, I think saw it in me before I did. So really unique situation.

So he would host a spring league every year with all the other high schools in the area would play. And every year we would always have our Brandon All Star team. And it was seniors and kind of alumni that were still in the area. So like older guys would come in and, or just the seniors that had graduated or were about to graduate.

And I was in charge of coaching the team I played as well. And it’s funny because that was kind of the first time I was Coach Schiller. And somehow some probably need to clean out my closet more. But I found that envelope that had the title of Coach Schiller, which would’ve been from like 1998. And I found out in when I was coaching at my last high school and I was able to send a photo over to my head coach, Mark Herman.

Because that was kind of the first time I had been coach. Spent my freshman year trying to see if I could play at the collegiate level, and I just was a combination of not good enough and hurt, and I went back and met with my high school coach and just asked if I could help out on a volunteer level and, and then I guess we’re 23 years later.  It’s been a pretty big part of my life.

[00:08:09] Mike Klinzing: So that first experience where you go back to your high school and you’re working for your high school coach, obviously now that relationship shifts from player to coach, to coach to coach. When you think about that time, is there something that stands out to you that maybe was surprising or different than what you thought when it came to that first experience?

[00:08:34] Jeremy Schiller: Coaching? So, I think the biggest thing is I genuinely didn’t know what to do. So like, as a player, I knew if I did X, Y, and Z or whatever, coach would address it or he would have a plan of what we were doing that day. But being on the other side of it, it’s like, I remember very distinctly thinking I knew where we had to get to, but I didn’t really have the tools to get there on my own.

Like I didn’t know. So I had to do a lot of thinking and things that actually shaped how I coached still do, were just kind of problem solving in a unique environment where we had very talented JV players. And my high school coach gave us support, in the sense of I never dealt with parent issues.

I never ordered a t-shirt. I had to do laundry, but I never had to deal with that stuff. But he really basically gave me the freedom to develop the kids and coach them without a ton of structure. So that allowed me to kind of develop my own path on how I wanted to teach things. My brain’s kind of always worked in a way where, If I see where there’s an issue, I’m going to attempt to be creative in trying to figure out how to solve those problems.

So when I would see that kids didn’t know how to rebound, I would think about how to make up a rebounding drill. I mean, I wasn’t in the generation where you could put on YouTube and find a hundred rebounding drills. I had to think about it, talk with my assistant coaches. They would use their background, talk with other coaches.

But it was a really unique time because what really fostered it was just the opportunity to kind of experiment. And having unbelievably talented kids makes it a lot easier. I mean, we had a JV team where I coached multiple kids that went on to play division one basketball. Those types of kids played jv, so we were really athletic and they covered up for a lot of my mistakes as a coach. So a really unique opportunity for sure starting out in that type of environment.

[00:10:30] Mike Klinzing: When you’re putting together drills. I’m just curious even now today, because I’ll answer my own question in a second, but I’m just curious to get your perspective when you’re putting together a drill, and obviously again today you can just go and find video and whatever, but we all are sometimes creative and we’re trying to think of things that can help our team.

Do you think better in terms of coming up with a drill that meets the needs of your team when you’re on the floor and you’re kind of thinking it up either on the fly or you’re actually out there kind of walking it through in your mind? Or are you better sitting down at your kitchen table with a pen and pad and working it out that way?

[00:11:06] Jeremy Schiller: So I always try to be ultra prepared. So for me, any ideas I have, I would write down, then I would go through, walk through it in my head and think about all the things like the ultimate goal, and to make sure that when I’m developing a drill, that I keep the main thing, the main thing, you know?

So I don’t want it to be too complex where we lose sight of what we’re actually focused on. And then the question in my head is always the amount of time it takes me to teach them how to do this effectively. Right? Is that worth the amount of positive we’re going to get from it. So when I was younger, I didn’t know that.

I just knew after the fact, well that took too long and that didn’t get us where we needed to go. Now with the years of experience when we’re going to try to do something new that’s kind of the filter I take it through. I think that’s where for me, where most coaches get lost is they spend all this time choreographing something that happens two times in a game. And to me the cost benefit of doing that isn’t high enough to do it that way. So I would say I go through it and then now I’m in a unique environment where there’s 40 other coaches with multiple years of experience.

So often if I want to try something new, I walk down an office and talk to any one of the former division one head or assistant coaches and see what they think. I’m in a really unique environment at IMG now.

[00:12:31] Mike Klinzing: Yeah. Talk a little bit about that. I know we’re jumping ahead and we’ll circle back to this, but I’m just curious with the coaching staff there and just how you guys have it organized in terms of the teams.

And obviously you have people who aren’t familiar, there’s different levels that you guys have. You have a national team, and then you have teams that are obviously at levels below that. But do you guys, as a basketball staff get together and meet, or just what does the process look like there at IMG in terms of collaboration between all the coaches of the different teams that you guys have?

[00:13:03] Jeremy Schiller: So like, let me go through, because there’s a lot to unpack with that. So first is describing the structure, I think that’s the easiest way, like how the teams are kind of structured and then I can dive into kind of how we all communicate and connect. Sure. So the easiest way to look at it is we have 18 teams that’s counting post-grad, varsity, varsity girls.

And we have junior level teams from JV through middle school. So it’s 18 total teams. There’s six varsity teams. They are not specifically tiered. So you do have the high school national team, which would essentially be 10 Top 50 players in the country at each of their positions in the high school varsity program.

That’s the national. Then I coach what’s called IMG Blue. We are very specifically designed to be competitive but we’re kind of that next tier where we have three this year specifically, we have three high major kids with recruitment, probably seven or eight other division one players, so still an exceptionally high what most programs would probably call like their regional team.

And then the rest of the varsity teams are kind of balanced and set up to make sure that every kid has this really unique experience that we have at img, where we have a team that fits what every kid needs for their development, including the IMG Blue team, which I coach and the national team. We can provide what they need for their development.

So if a kid needs a ton of minutes and kind of the freedom to play through mistakes, we have a varsity team that plays the appropriate schedule and plays that. And then we have like for my team, there might be kids who need that ultra competitive environment to compete for their minutes because they’ve kind of had those other experiences and now they just need to be in an environment where they’re playing against the best players, some of the best players in the country every day.

So that’s what’s really unique about IMG is that. We have basically whatever team fits what a kid needs as opposed to the kids trying to fit into the team. I don’t know, initially when we make the teams and then we obviously have to create a team culture and we play a singular schedule.

We don’t move kids between teams or anything. They’re on that team. And then we develop our culture from there based on weeks of essentially, we’ll call it a training camp, where we organize the kids based on what we think is best for what they need. So that’s kind of the structure of IMG.

Then when you talk about collaboration, it is constant. So like obviously within our varsity program we may collaborate and work together and just talk cause we have our similar offices, but like the level of basketball knowledge and connectivity, like, I’m literally able to walk down a hallway and go speak with our girls, national coach Shell Dailey, who’s an unbelievable coach. She’s coached, I believe in the WNBA 99% sure she played there as well. And like, that’s somebody I can go talk to about anything. Often when people say, what’s it like there collaborating, I just used this story last year. I was walking in from lunch and Dan Bardo, who’s been there for about 17 years, and Chad Meyers, who was our postgrad national head coach and is now at New Mexico State as an assistant.

I bump into them and Chad and I start talking about peel switching. And then Dan has his ideas and we’re on the court for 30 minutes impromptu discussing peel switching. And I felt like might be the only place in the world where that happens at that level. And that’s kind of a normal occurrence.

The really unique thing Brian Nash, who’s our director, has done an amazing job just bringing in really quality people that really care about IMG and the players there. So we’re all really open to sharing ideas, scrimmaging against each other. It’s just a really unique environment.

I tell people all the time, if you love basketball, it’s the best place in the world. I can’t imagine anything can even compare to it.

[00:17:04] Mike Klinzing: I would think just with the amount of resources, both the physical resources in terms of the facilities, and then you start talking about the quality of the coaches that you guys have there, and the ability, as you said, to collaborate and talk with other people and clearly Look, I think one of the things, and I’m sure you can attest to this, that as a high school coach, a lot of times, just like if you’re a teacher, I think a lot of times in, in those two positions, there’s frequently the feeling that you are kind of on an island and that you’re.

Trying to navigate this whole thing by yourself. And sure as a high school coach, you might have your staff that you can talk to and whatever, but a lot of times you feel like you got, oh man, like I have to deal with this situation. And nobody’s ever had to deal with this before. And I’m sure for you guys, you just walk, as you said, down the hallway or you step out on the court and there’s a myriad of mentors or people that you can bounce ideas or thoughts off of.

And to me, just from all the conversations that I’ve had on the podcast with other coaches, the ability to have that mentor, that person that you can go to when you’re looking at a situation, whether it’s an Xs and Os or probably more likely something off the floor culture related to be able to have somebody that you can go to that’s right there to me, seems like it would just be completely invaluable.

There’s no way you could even quantify that.

[00:18:26] Jeremy Schiller: No. And like you said, I think it’s also unique because there’s younger coaches, there’s older coaches, there’s guys that have played professionally like my assistant Daniel Santiago played on the Puerto Rican national team. He’s in that Redeem team Netflix movie, like for five years.

And that’s the guy I hang out with every day. So like, getting his experiences from 18 years of playing professionally. And he’s seven one, so it helps. We have the tallest teenager in the world is on my team. We have a 7, 6, 16 year old. And so just getting unique perspectives that you can’t get anywhere else.

And when you’re at a traditional high school, even like the last high school I was at Lakewood Ranch, a lot of really successful coaches. There was probably four or five of us that worked at the same level. And then there was other people that worked at different levels related to just the level of passion and intensity to what we did.

At IMG, they’re all like that. So, like you said, it’s not even just the technical ability, it’s just the level of investment and how we’re all professional coaches. Where at traditional high school there’s a lot of people that maybe work hard, but they’re not really professional coaches.

They do it to get an extra stipend or to help out the school. This environment is definitely unique and different, and it really provides an amazing experience for the kids. Cause so far we’ve also only touched on the basketball. It doesn’t count leadership, mental training, nutrition.

We also have strength coaches that are some of the best in the world. Yoga instruction. It’s a really unique environment for players and for coaches.

[00:20:07] Mike Klinzing: Tell us a little bit about how you weave those things that you just mentioned. How do those get weaved into a player’s day?

What does that look like?

[00:20:16] Jeremy Schiller: So, I just walk you through my average varsity player’s day is they go to school in the morning. That varies based on what classes they’re in and everything else. But essentially in the morning about 11:20, they’re done with school and that leads into like every one of our teachers has to have office hours similar to college.

So I want to say those are done by like 12:15, 12:30. So sometime between that like 11:30 ish that they’re done with class and 1:30 when we start practice, they’ll go and get food. They’ll come in and get extra work if that’s something that they want to do, we give them extra skill work with our skills coaches or us obviously they’ll see trainers to get ready.

And then we start practice. We’ll go practice 1:30 to 3:30, that’s done. And they’ll go to weights. And then sometimes that flips. So we might go 3:30 to 5:30, which means we’d lift first for practice. And then at least once a week, sometimes more, we set up group APD sessions with nutrition leadership and mental training.

And then if the kids want, they can actually set up separate as well. So like, think like classroom style with 15 kids. But if a kid says like let’s say we had a kid that needed to lose weight, he has different questions than a kid that needs to gain weight. They can set up one-on-one appointments with them basically like around their schedule.

And then open gym for about three hours in the evening where they have access to the Gun. We actually have a shooting court, which I think, I’m going to say this wrong, but I think it’s got like nine or 10 baskets on one court. So you can essentially set up the gun or the shoot away or whatever on each of the baskets and just get up shots.

It’s the best basketball environment in the world. And it really helps prepare kids that are serious about basketball for their next step, if that’s going to be college, because most colleges don’t even have the resource that we have, so they’re prepared for weights and everything that’s going to be thrown at them.

[00:22:23] Mike Klinzing: So for you, you’ve obviously had an opportunity to coach at the, I’m going to just use the term regular high school. You’ve had the opportunity to work as a college assistant coach at your alma mater addition to being a GA at South Florida, and then now you have IMG. So when you think about those different experiences, It would seem that IMG is sort of, I don’t want to say in between, maybe isn’t the right way to say it, because I’m sure that IMG probably has more resources than many, if not most college programs.

But just talk a little bit about sort of your career path and the differences between a regular high school, college and IMG. I’m not talking about in terms of resources or things you do, but just your mentality about how you approached it and kind of how you felt about each one of those positions, what you liked, what you wish, maybe you would’ve been different about each of those experiences.

[00:23:22] Jeremy Schiller: Sure. So I’ll just walk through from kind of the beginning of my coaching career. So I started as a Junior Varsity coach at Brandon High in Tampa. Phenomenal early experience. My head coach, Mark Herman, was one of the best like program developers I’ve been around like. He just knew to do things that made sense to me now that as a kid I just saw it happen.

And then when I was on his coaching staff, like we had Jordan brand jerseys when no one else did. So it made kids think I want to go there because they’re sponsored by Jordan, those types of things. It just always had the best year. Always made sure we were playing in a ton of games. So that was my first experience.

My first four years I was a junior varsity coach. Really unique environment with a lot of talented players. It was one of my favorite coaching jobs. I’ve really been fortunate. I’ve had a lot of really cool coaching jobs. One of my favorite ones because you really didn’t do anything besides coach. I mean, my head coach just took everything off our plate.

You just wanted me to make sure I gave the kids the best experience kind of thing. After I was at Brandon, I was a GA at USF with Robert McCullum. We were really successful. We actually went to the conference USA semi-finals that year. It was a really fun experience to be at Division One, but it also opened my eyes that being a part of the business of basketball at that level may not have been what I wanted to do, especially having gone from coaching and being really engaged in like practice planning and helping develop players. And as a GA at that time, that wasn’t really the way the position was structured. So I did that for a year.

Then I got my head coaching job at Osceola High School with about 24-2500 students. And that was a really unique experience because the high school I played at, we were really good. So kids showed up every day. They worked really hard. that’s the only thing I really knew.

And then I was at college and when I got to Osceola, I took over a program that had the same coach for 25 years and won 88 games during those 25 years. So really fun to try to change the entire culture. But there was a lot of challenges with things I’d never thought about. Like kids not showing up to practice, kids not working at basketball year round, like all these things that didn’t make sense to me. So it was really good to give me another perspective on what, on what that experience is like. And we won seven games and that was a really big deal. Everybody was really excited on campus. And then I was fortunate that I was able to become a division two assistant for Tom Ryan at Eckerd College.

That was really, really great as well, having a chance to work at the college level that I felt like at the time was more about relationships. Not that it wasn’t about winning and it wasn’t serious and we didn’t have very talented players because we did, we went to multiple tournaments. But working for Tom Ryan, he’s probably the best person I’ve been around as far as building long lasting and consistent relationships.

So it was really helpful to me kind of learning and watching how he built those relationships with guys beyond just the Xs and Os part. And then I spent one year back at Brandon High School while I dealt with some family things. I was able to help one of my former players who became the head coach, which is crazy.

Started to feel old at that point. He became the head coach and I was living in Brandon, and I was able to help him for a year, which was a lot of fun. It felt like I added a lot of value while I was dealing with the family, things I had. My family’s up north, so I was just trying to fly back and forth and I just didn’t feel comfortable keeping a college job at that time.

So did a high school and then I got to Lakewood Ranch High School which was where I was for a decade. And we went from being the worst team in the county to not losing a game in our county from 2014 to 2021. During our time, we went from it, never had a 20 win season. We ended up with six 20 win seasons, and we won four district titles and we went to two final fours and we played in three regional finals at a school that had not been traditionally good at basketball.

So that, that was really fun, building it from the ground up and proving a lot of people wrong on what could be done in a school that was closed to choice and had had to have kids. We’re also in the second largest classification in Florida, so we went to state championship and you’re talking about schools that are like 2,200 to 2,500 students, so that was really fun.

Not only did we have community kids, but they also were top five academically, winning academic state championships twice for basketball while we were there. So that was a really awesome experience too. I was fortunate enough to turn into an opportunity at img.

And you know what, IMG is such a unique place. It’s hard to compare it to high school or college. It really, I think it’s kind of in between, from what we would call traditional high school to this high level sports boarding school. It’s been a lot of fun, but it has unique challenges.

I think the biggest one is I love building culture and long term program building is just kind of the most fun part of this for me along with long term relationship building, having relationships with the kids that I coached 23 years ago or the kids I coached last year is just as important and I’ve been able to maintain those.

But at IMG, the really unique thing is we get our teams announced around the middle of September and before we play a game, we have to find a way to get our guys completely connected, playing unselfish and playing winning basketball, and finding a way to do that within the construct of the environment we’re in, where all the kids kind of come from different places, either in the United States or the world to better themselves at basketball.

So coming from a, a traditional high school where we’re playing for our community and trying to win a state title and transitioning into a school trying to help kids be prepared to play in college only, where winning is a byproduct of them making winning plays. The way I describe it is that’s what college coaches want to see.

So that way college coaches know when they come to us they get a kid off of IMG Blue. They’re built to make winning plays. The actual end score of our games don’t matter as much until we’re in the Prep National Championships. But the idea is that we’re compiling film and habits for our guys, that when college coaches see them and like them, that they check every box related to how hard they play, how committed they are to winning, how unselfish they are, how they guard the basketball. And we’ve already been fortunate enough to see that that works. We had a player last year, Carson Cooper came to us with zero Division one offers and left IMG as a full scholarship member of Michigan State, which is his dream school, and he is playing for Michigan State.

Looking forward to watching him on TV tomorrow night as a freshman. So that’s all.

[00:30:17] Mike Klinzing: That’s awesome. I mean, I think when you start talking about being able to have that kind of impact on a kid, that’s really, when you think about coaching, clearly winning and losing is important to everybody. And a lot of times ultimately you get, and especially the higher level you go, the more you’re judged on those wins and losses.

But the ability to help a kid to realize their dream and move on and, and jump up a level, there’s, there’s nothing better than, than being able to have that long term impact on a kid’s life. I want to talk a little bit about the culture piece of it, and let’s go backwards to Lakewood Ranch first, and then we’ll jump ahead to IMG.

But you talked about how the program when you took over was really down. And you eventually built it up into a powerhouse. And that’s a situation that especially a lot of young coaches who maybe are getting their first head coaching job, they’re oftentimes not taking over the tradition rich program that is just kind of plug and play and you come in and you just kind of keep things going.

Most guys, when they get their first job, you’re talking about an opportunity at a program that has probably been down and you have to turn it around. So when you think back 10, 11 years ago, when you first get that job and you’re thinking about what do we have to do in order to turn this thing around?

When you look at the totality of your time there at Lakewood Ranch, what are some of the things that you feel like you did really well or that you instilled in the program that helped you to eventually have the success that you did?

[00:31:48] Jeremy Schiller: So I think the biggest, the first thing, when I’ve been fortunate to speak on a few situations, a few coaching environments.

I actually spoke at a business association actually a couple months ago about kind of culture building. And I think the, the first pillar is demonstrating on a daily basis that you live the characteristics you’re expecting from those kids. So if whatever I decide is important.

So for us it was working really hard, being committed, being unselfish, valuing each other in the long-term relationship, making sure kids had a great experience. If I’m not demonstrating that on a daily basis, if I’m cutting corners or I’m being lazy, there’s no way to build the culture.

I think that’ the first step where people go wrong is, whatever you’re going to decide is the stuff we’re going to value. We need to reward those things and we need to demonstrate those things on a daily basis. Because if we’re not doing it as a leader, there’s no way to get others to do it. You know?

And then I think the thing is you have to assess what are your strengths or what are the current strengths of the program? What are the weaknesses? Where are there some areas that there’s opportunity? And then what are the things that could really impact us not getting where we’re trying to go?

So you have to come up with a plan related to the resources you have. So for us at Lakewood Ranch although we started with negative $500 in our account, our demographic was good. So I knew that if we really worked hard to fundraise, we could potentially do that. Which if we have the best year, maybe it creates an environment.

At that time, we had choice. Maybe kids want to come to our school. So we started out. Grassroots doing camps and clinics for free initially getting in the community and doing fundraising so that way we could make sure our guys had great gear, great jerseys, all that stuff. And that camp part of it became huge.

We got to the point where we were selling out at 120 campers a week, four weeks over the summer, and that was funding everything that we did. But I think that really the first part of it is to analyze our strengths, our weaknesses for us were that we didn’t get traditionally strong basketball players well, so I can make that an excuse so I can figure out to help develop ’em younger, how to build relationships with travel ball coaches who are in the area, who may want to bring their kids to a place that takes this thing takes it serious, and then you want to look at, okay, what are the things that are going to impact our ability to do that? I think the only way to really build a strong culture is to make sure you understand and you build relationships with all your stakeholders. Often we spend all our energy on the kids, but we’ve have to get the parents invested.

We have to make sure our administration’s invested. And usually if they see you doing things consistently they’re going to be invested in what you are doing, especially if they’re highly successful administrators or parents who really care about their kids. Although they may not agree with every decision you make over time they’re going to agree with the fact that you’re invested in and care about their kids.

So I think those were kind of the main things, you know that we did while we were at Lakewood Ranch to build a culture. And over time it became a thing that everyone really wanted to be a part of, and the kids that were a part of it didn’t all necessarily even want to play in college.

They just loved basketball. They loved their teammates. They built lifelong relationships. Like we have a bunch of guys that are going to be in each other’s weddings. And the crazier part is our parents became connected because of the culture we created. And I still think some of the parents, especially our group of 2020 parents, they still hang out.

Like it’s been years. There’s sophomores and juniors in college, and they’re still off grabbing drinks on Friday nights together and stuff. So you know, I think never losing sight of the fact that although wins and losses are important, and that’s what we’re working towards, it’s really more about making sure that they become successful people and that we live that every day.

And what we value and what we reward in our program you know, I think is a big part of what we did at Lakewood Ranch. And then the culture at img, like I said, is just different. Our, our director Brian Nash does a great job of having an ultra positive culture. And a connectivity throughout img.

But once you’re on your team you really have to find ways to connect. And this team, all 11 players on my team at IMG want to play in college. So the way that I connect with them, and it’s worked both years, so I think it makes sense, is these are the things that you have to do.

And we outline exactly what college coaches are looking for their position related to their size. And I’ve even been fortunate enough, I have enough relationships with college coaches. I actually get their feedback, not on this specific player, but hey if you’ve got a six foot tall point guard, what are you looking for them to do?

If you’ve got a seven foot tall post player, what are you looking for them to do? And what things cross kids off your list? So we’ve been able to connect with our guys and we have really, really good kids and supportive parents, and they understand that they have to play hard and take charges and be unselfish because it’s going to help them be prepared to play in college.

And then over time they get really connected with each other, like our group. Over the last six to eight weeks has become really connected and they hang out together on the floor, in the dorms everywhere. And they really get along well.

[00:37:07] Mike Klinzing: Do you find, and again, you’re two years into this experience versus being at again, normal high school, do you find that they can bond faster just because they’re completely immersed?

Or do you find that because maybe the kids you coached at Lakewood Ranch had relationships going back to elementary school. Just compare and contrast the two in terms of how quickly the kids bond or just what it looks like from your perspective.

[00:37:36] Jeremy Schiller: I think it’s almost anecdotal because it’s only been two years.

It’s like last year the parents and the kids were like, coach, we had a great experience. We love the culture. This was awesome. And they wanted to give me a lot of the credit. And I said to the parents, until this is five or six years of us doing this consistently it might be more that your kids were great kids than it was that that we did anything as a staff myself and Coach Santiago.

But you know, I do think that we try to create a culture with what we’re asking to do on the court helps them, like, we don’t let them say negative things to each other. There’s a positive environment that they’re in and I think it translates to what they do off the court. So far I’ve found, because there’s still a lot of kids on campus, so they don’t all hang out all the time.

They do hang out with football players or other people with the traditional high school kids. I think it was potentially a little bit deeper because it was multiple years. We definitely had kids that knew each other from the time they were little. But then what was really unique is if a kid moved in, like we had a kid move in from Tennessee and a kid move in from a neighboring county and they never knew them.

Well, the guys that were there, without me telling them, took ’em bowling and did things to connect with him because that was kind of the character of those kids and the culture that we supported. So it’s really hard to compare it. I think it’s just different. And some of it’s just luck.

Like you get these great kids from great families and you try to support it, but I guess they always say, luck goes to those that work the hardest. So I think it’s a combination of the culture we create, the things we reward, and just having really good kids. And I’ve had great kids at IMG the last two years and been really fortunate for that.

Just high character kids that are serious about what they do and parents that support it.

[00:39:23] Mike Klinzing: Yeah, clearly that makes a difference if you have kids that you bring into your program. And oftentimes that’s one of the conversations that things that coaches who have coached both at the high school and the college level, they often talk about that when you’re in the college level.

You have some control through the recruiting process of who are the people that you bring into your program, and that can include the players, but it oftentimes includes the players’ parents. And you look and you say, Ooh, I’m not sure I want those parents to be a part of my program for the next four years.

Whereas in high school, you don’t necessarily have as much control over that. So clearly, if you can get good people in your program, that makes your job of building the culture much, much easier. Tell me a little bit about just some of the things that you’ve done. And again, it could be at any of your stops along the way, but just.

Get parents bought into what you’re trying to do to get them on your side, for lack of a better way of saying it, how do you engage them to make sure that you’re building not only as you’ve said, the culture with your players, but you’re developing those parent relationships and that support of the program so that maybe after those kids do graduate or they do leave, that the parents are still hanging out and have positive vibes about the program?

[00:40:48] Jeremy Schiller: So the first thing is multiple parent meetings. So like, I’ll use Lakewood Ranch because it’s a little bit more traditional, which I would imagine more people are at a place like Lakewood Ranch than img since there’s only one of those in the world. So but like we would have meetings, so to go through it, we would have in the.

We would have what we called, we had returners and non returners. So returner was someone who played the prior season. So that meant they’ve already heard me talk about what we’re going to do, what our expectations are, all that stuff. So when we have a meeting with them it’s like, Hey, here’s the stuff good to see you get out, kind of thing.

Whereas we had non-return meeting where we’d start to explain the culture and expectations like in May when school gets out for all the kids that are new and haven’t been a part of the program. So that way when they saw what the summer schedule was and I could show them an outline of what the season was going to be, if they made it through all that that parents could make the decision to see if that fit in with what their goals were, meaning, in a nice way, not everybody was made to be a Lakewood Ranch basketball player. If the idea of six days a week of practice in season and going to big holiday tournaments like City of Palms or the New Orleans Sugar Bowl, where we’re like traveling a lot. If all that sounds terrible, then we just may not be the right fit.

And maybe you can find another experience or something else to do with your time because these are going to be the things we do. If you don’t want to lift four days a week, you don’t want to maintain your grades, you don’t want to be a good person on campus because we built a really strong reputation on campus and we’re not going to allow anyone to impede that or impact that negatively.

So basically the first thing is just information. These are going to be the expectations, these are the standards. Then we’d have a meeting in the preseason, again, returners and non returners. And then when we made the team we’d have another meeting saying, Hey, this is definitively what we’re doing.

These are all the tournaments, this is everything. So we’d meet three times before a kid would be officially on the team. In that we talk about fundraising responsibilities and all those other things. One of the things I thought was really valuable was we would communicate standards, expectations for the parents, the players and coaches.

So for parents, without having it in front of me, things like we’re only going to speak positively in public. If you have an issue or concern, come pull me aside and come talk to me. Our goal was to be different. Our goal was to have parents that said positive things in the stands that didn’t coach their kids.

That allowed us to coach them. It just kind of outlined what would be positive traits for parents. And that way if they, someone stepped out of line, first line of defense was the other parents saying, Hey, if you really have an issue you can reach out to Coach Schiller and set up a meeting.

Have you done that? They said no. They would literally say, well stop complaining because we don’t want to hear it. So creating those expectations and standards in doing that, it was never attacking because it was done before there was a problem. So it was done ahead of time. Same thing for standards of what they could expect from myself and my staff on how we treated the kids.

And then obviously players would’ve standards instead of rules. I’m a big standards over rules guy of what they were going to do. So I think the first part was outlining exactly what expectations were and assuming that common sense is not common. So like we’re not going to yell at officials or whatever other things that we think is coaches like.

I mean, some people just don’t know what they don’t know. So we would outline that at the beginning. And then if we ever had issues, I would be cognizant of meeting with the parents one on one before it was more of an issue. But one of my coaching friends had one of the best lines I’ve ever heard.

I’ve not, I’ve not used it yet, but I do use this as a thought process is if a parent is enough of a headache I don’t know that I’m emotionally mature enough to separate the child from the parent. I want to be, I want to be a good enough person where I say, Hey, this parent’s meeting with the athletic director and attacking me.

Not going to hold it against the kid in my career. I can confidently say I never allowed that to happen, but it’s obviously really challenging, right? If you, with a really challenging parent I really made myself make sure I still treated them for their choices and their actions and not the actions of the parent, but we also would express to the parent and the player what was unacceptable.

And the kids here too, so they know that their parent is not following the rules that were outlined. So it creates kind of a, everybody’s in it together thing. And the kids liked it because it was things like don’t coach your kid during the season. I’m a very animated coach on the sideline, we’re very obviously coaching your son.

This is your chance to just be a parent. And I remember a kid distinctly saying coach, you’re going to stop my dad from yelling at me in the car. And I said, well, I’m trying, I can’t do my best. Because I would often describe to parents, listen, your son is taking this serious, they’ve played poorly.

So first off, they know it because they’re smart. Like we were the number one GPA in the state. They’re aware, they feel bad. They’ve let their teammates down, their coaches potentially express it to ’em. Now they get in the car, all they want is a hug. You don’t need to get on ’em too. They know.

And they’re in a program where we’re going to fix it and help them, give ’em techniques on how to be better. So last thing you have to do is yell and scream at ’em. So I think that really helped with parents. And the other thing that helped especially we didn’t have a single transfer of a varsity rotation player in the 10 years I was at Lakewood Ranch, which in this generation is very rare especially in Florida.

Kids transfer all the time. And a big part of that is we would do future planning, meet future planning meetings with the parents and the players. So I couldn’t do it with every player, but if let’s say an incoming class of freshman, has like six or eight kids and you can kind of tell who your top three or four are, we would sit down with them and their parents and literally outline what we based on their work ethic and doing things the right way, kind of a vision for them.

And that really helped. I think parents get connected that would normally be impatient because they would say, okay coach sees that he is on JV to learn to be a leader this year. And next year when he is on varsity, if he does X, Y, and Z, he’ll put himself in a position to be on varsity and be able to be successful.

So I think the best way to connect with parents is to actually connect with them. I think a lot of coaches put ’em off in the corner and don’t talk to ’em and don’t want to deal with them. And the problem is you’re going to, because they’re going to be the ones that make the decisions about their kids.

Time and time again, the kid’s happy. The parents are not, and there’s a disconnect between the coach and the kid’s gone, and the kids apologizing to the coach for leaving. So I always felt like if I could try to see that stuff ahead of time and communicate it I could maybe prevent that from happening.

[00:47:19] Mike Klinzing: Yeah. I think there’s two things that you said, Jeremy, that stand out for me. The first one is that when you start looking at your behavior as a coach and the things that you do, and if you’re going to demand those things of the kids, Then you have to hold yourself to that same high standard. And when you don’t, it becomes really obvious and the kids see it, parents see it, and then that’s where that trust erodes.

So if you’re talking about dedication and then you’re not there for open gym, or you’re not there for workouts or you’re canceling things, kids see that, parents see that. And then when you do ask them to, Hey, we have to show more dedication, or We have to work harder, even though the kid might not say it right, or the parent might not say it to you in their head, we all know what they’re thinking and they’re not wrong.

Because if you’re going to ask something, you don’t want to ask anything of somebody else that you don’t demand to yourself. So I think that’s the first thing that stood out to me that you said. And I think that’s a great piece of advice or a great lesson for any coach out there that’s just starting out, or somebody who’s been in the business for a while.

It’s just keep that in mind. And then the second thing that I heard you say was about, Proactively communicating with parents and not putting ’em off. Cause as you said, I think there’s a lot of times where coaches, teachers, it’s a lot easier to just kind of ignore the fact that parents are out there and just kind of go about your merry way and hope that things don’t go haywire.

But we know that if they do, your chances of having a positive outcome with a parent are much higher if you’ve already established a rapport and established communication. So I think to me, that proactive communication is something that we’ve talked about with a lot of coaches, that it’s so important to kind of just get ahead of the, the situation where you’ve already built up these positive vibes with a parent so that there ever does become a situation where there’s an issue.

It’s a lot easier. Then to go in and handle that with a conversation when you already built up the relationship as opposed to the first time I’m talking to a parent is when there’s some issue with playing time or discipline or whatever. I just think that that proactive communication to me is critical.

And it sounds like that’s what you’ve been able to do at all your stops.

[00:49:44] Jeremy Schiller: Yeah, and I think that’s actually how I would say it to parents. Like we’d have our first meeting and I’d say, Hey, like we’re going over this. I want our first interaction to be positive. You understand what the expectations are.

Because a lot of times what you said is accurate. Your first discussion is a confrontation because you’re upset or they’re upset. Instead, when we go over the standards, everybody’s happy, this is a new and exciting experience. We get to be on the basketball team. Maybe if I do these things and try to keep it positive and touching on a couple other things kind of made me think of was, I’m not a big fan of fundraising, it’s just not something I enjoy doing. Well, it’s a great time to show parents like, Hey, I don’t enjoy doing this, but this is the process we have to do to make sure your kids get this experience.

And I’m sacrificing this, right? Like it’s, I don’t just say, oh, I hate fundraising, and then can’t figure out what no one wants to fund. Being honest and accepting that that’s not something I enjoy, but I do enjoy the end result, so I’m going to go get it done. And then there’s two other things on communication that I think are really important.

One is communicating trust with players and with parents. So instead of it being an attacking communication, it’s a communication of trust. So the way I always describe it is, like, for our guys, and I changed this a couple years ago oh, you don’t want to win because you’re not boxing out.

Like we all agree at the beginning of the year when we do our goal setting that we want to win. So instead of saying if you want to win or attacking, it’s because we know you want to win. We need to box out. So that way it’s not that we don’t think you don’t want to win, it’s that you need a reminder. And that’s what I’m here for.

So it would be the same thing with like actions of kids. Like I often try to frame it. Hey, your son’s struggling on X, Y, and Z. I 100% believe he’s going to fix it. However, we just want to make sure you guys are aware of what the accountability is if he doesn’t. So it’s not, I don’t think he’s going to, it’s, Hey, I believe he’s going to, but just in case here, here’s some, some of the options.

And then the last one is my girlfriend, who’s also very high level. She’s been a very successful high school coach and a former division one athlete reminded me of this last year. But the ability to accept responsibility when we make mistakes as a coach is super important for building that relationship with parents and players.

Last year I was more negative than I like to be, I try to communicate positively or generate accountability from other things besides just yelling. And last year she was at a game and I did that and I agreed with her and I went in the next day to talk to our guys and I say, Hey guys, that wasn’t what I want to be doing.

I apologized for how I handled it. It wasn’t anything out of, it wasn’t like there was cursing. It wasn’t anything, but it was just not who I want to be and what I want to do. And it got me refocused. And that all of the guys in our exit meeting mentioned that moment as like a really important moment for them where they felt like, wow, I’ve never had a coach accept responsibility for acting inappropriately, even though it wasn’t that inappropriate, but just accepting responsibility.

And it helped them throughout the rest of the season accept responsibility because I was showing them what they need to do. Hey, this is not the end of the world. I just yelled a lot and I shouldn’t have been, I should have just pulled you off the court and talked to you. You know? And just managed it poorly and accepted responsibility.

And I think that’s a huge one for culture because when parents see you do that, it’s a connector. They recognize that you’re going to take responsibility when it’s your responsibility to fix it.

[00:53:06] Mike Klinzing: And that’s a new trend that I think has taken a turn for the better in the coaching profession.

I can go back to my own playing experiences, and I just don’t think that during the time, and again, I grew up, went to high school, graduated in 88, and played my college basketball from 88 to 92. And I just don’t think that a coach apologizing was something that I ever, I don’t think I ever experienced that.

And at the same time, you could think of multiple situations as a player where you’re like, man, I mean, did he really think that? What he just did there, or looking back on it retrospectively, that that was something that helped us. And you wonder in moments of reflection, did, did your coaching staff, did they think about it and say, oh man, we made a mistake.

And then they just, again, it just wasn’t the way things were done. Whereas now it’s so much better that coaches can take that responsibility, they can have that accountability and they can be vulnerable. And then I think, as you’ve said multiple times, that helps to build the trust with your players because they see that, look, coach chiller’s a human being right, he makes mistakes.

We’re not all perfect and we’re not always going to make the best decisions and sometimes we’re going to mess up and when we do, we’re going to accept it because that’s what we ask our players to do. So I think if you can do those things, as you said, it’s going to build trust in your players. Parents see that stuff, whether they see it directly or whether they hear about it from.

There are kids. It just makes sense in terms of building trust that you have to be vulnerable yourself and put yourself out there because that’s what we ask our players to do all the time. Mm-hmm. , when you get this opportunity at img, talk a little bit about sort of your mindset with leaving a place where you had a lot of success and clearly you probably could have kept going there and continued to do what you had done and continued to win.

So was the opportunity at IMG about doing something different where you get an opportunity to basically be full-time basketball, you kind of get out of the classroom? That’s a piece of it. Was it the idea of it being a challenge? Just what was your thought process in pursuing the position and how did it come to your attention?

[00:55:39] Jeremy Schiller: So it was really hard to leave Lakewood Ranch. We built something we believed was sustainable. It was a really challenging dynamic. And as I’ve had different opportunities presented to me at high school or college level over the last 10 years, it was kind of always easy to say no.

And a big factor is my parents and my brother and my niece are all within 20 minutes of where I live. So for me, I’m a big cost benefit analysis guys, so like, is whatever this job is, that could be an exciting opportunity. So much better than what I’m in now and going to potentially take me away from my family, which is really important to me.

And when this opportunity came along I think you touched on the challenges of this unique environment where I can be successful at doing this with these level of players in a different environment, not being able to create the culture that we’ve created. Not having as much control over the day to day because you are a part of a bigger dynamic with other APD and other stuff.

Like I was the nutritionist, I was the strength, well, I would hire strength coach, but I organized all that and now I’m in an environment where we have so many people. And I knew that going in and I talked to a lot of people that had been at IMG when the opportunity came to kind of see what their thoughts were and if I fit in and, and all those things.

And everyone just had such amazing things to say. And a lot of soul searching on it, but just felt like it was the right move for, for my career allowed me to get closer to a college level type atmosphere, work for Brian Nash, who’s our director, and Mike Gillian are both super invested administrators that work really, really hard.

I felt like after spending some time with Brian, especially, we just align so much on how serious we take this and sometimes in public schools as administrations change. They’re not as serious as you are about sport or they have other things that are on their mind. And my administration at Lakewood Ranch for the most part was great, but those things change over time.

So that impacted it, just the unique, exciting environment of IMG just made it a no brainer to go try this. And I tell people all the time, usually when you get a great opportunity and you advance in your career, you’re packing your house and making new friends and leaving your family.

And I went to Lakewood Ranch on a Friday and on a Monday I drove to IMG, stayed in the same place. So that was definitely a positive part of the move.

[00:58:08] Mike Klinzing: As you were going through the process of making the decision, what was your biggest reservation, if you had any, when you were thinking about what maybe made you doubt or what did you think, Hey, I’m not sure how this piece of it’s going to go.

Does anything fit that description?

[00:58:28] Jeremy Schiller: So it wasn’t doubt, I tend to be confident in my ability to work. I don’t always know how good I am at things, but I’m confident that I’m going to work as hard as I possibly can to achieve whatever that is. So, I wasn’t concerned about my ability to do a good job at IMG.

I didn’t know how long it would take for me to do a good job, but I knew that I could do that. The biggest thing for me is I pour very deeply into all of my players. So the idea of not seeing it through with the players that I had developed from the years before not seeing it through with the kids who had been coming to my camp and now weren’t going to be able to come play for me and their parents.

And they had expressed those things. I’m still in the community socially, but like not being in the community as a representative of Lakewood Ranch High School, which I took a lot of pride in, those were the things that were the biggest struggle. Not so much the doubt of the job. Again, I’m not saying I thought I would do a great job, I just know that like, I’m going to work until I do.

I wasn’t doubtful in my ability to do it. I didn’t know what it would look like. But I was more concerned with those relationships changing, obviously still keep in touch with those players and some of those families, but that relationship changed and my intent was to be at Lakewood Ranch for 35 years and retire there and instead I made it a decade and now have a really awesome opportunity at IMG.

[00:59:50] Mike Klinzing: What’s been surprising about your initial couple years here at IMG? Is there something that you kind of went into it and you were. Surprised, I’m guessing mostly in a positive way based on the way you’re talking, but what’s just something maybe that stands out to you that you didn’t expect that’s been even better than what you thought?

[01:00:08] Jeremy Schiller: When you’re outside of IMG you always hear that the kids and the families are really difficult cause they obviously have major investments to be at IMG, you hear all these like, not stories from anyone that knows stories from an assumption that the parents are a problem.

The kids don’t work hard. No one takes it serious, that it’s really more of an image than it is a reality. And when I got there, it couldn’t be further from that. Parents have been amazing and supportive. The kids work unbelievably hard and are consistent with their effort. Been really blown away with the consistency of their character, both like their competitive character and what we do every day.

Great kids. So like outsiders, sometimes people hear these things and I don’t think they have any evidence of it. They just kind of create their own assumptions and coming into the environment, just how great the kids and the families have been to work with. And then not understanding, I live about 20 minutes from IMG or 30, and that’s where Lakewood Ranch is in comparison physically to IMG.

But you just don’t realize all the amazing things that happen on campus outside of the national teams that you see on tv how great, how many talented players are. We’ve had just for my team, we’ve had over 50 division one college coaches come and watch us practice this year. And I didn’t know that that happened for anyone but the national team.

I just didn’t know.  I didn’t know that dynamic happened. So I’ve just been really impressed with the level of investment by Brian Nash as a director and every single kid.  I think that was a thing that I just, I didn’t you meet a director and he’s, you don’t know, he’s a former coach, but Coach Nash’s ability to connect with all 18 teams, 180 players or whatever our total is, and all the coaches, he connects with every single person.

And for me, professionally, it’s also been great because like, I feel as you get older, it’s hard to find people you look up to. And Brian Nash is one of those people for me, like the way that he carries himself. 900 things up in the air that he’s having to juggle. And when you communicate with him he makes every parent, player and coach feel like they’re the only one in the room.

So I don’t know that I’ll ever learn to do that, but that’s an added bonus. And something I’ve been really impressed with

[01:02:29] Mike Klinzing: To be able to work for a boss and an administrator who is working in the same direction that you are. We know, and I’m sure you know, plenty of people in the business who have worked with administration in a public school, that you just don’t get the same support or the support that you would want to have in order to be able to build the kind of program that you want to.

So to be able to have somebody in place, and obviously IMG is a unique situation, but to have somebody like Brian in place who is going to give you what you need, who’s going to support you, who is on the same page with what you’re trying to accomplish, it makes your job all that much more easier when. You’re working with your players and you just mentioned having a bunch of D one coaches come in and watch you practice.

So obviously part of what you’re doing, part of your role is to help your players to navigate that recruiting process. What does that look like for you as the coach of a bunch of players who are going to be getting recruited? How do you look at your role? And maybe it’s different with each family, depending upon what they want or need, but just when you’re thinking about trying to help a player reach their dream of playing at the next level, what’s your role as their high school coach?

[01:03:46] Jeremy Schiller: I think the first step is to help them generate a roadmap of specifically what they need to work on that college coaches are going to want to see. So that’s come from years of experience, both being at that level and communicating. Coaches at that level to make sure that we’re not working on one-legged step back threes for a five, 10 point guard that we’re working on making sure that they have the ability to guard the ball 94 feet to make the paint decision to make open threes and handle pressure.

We have a very talented post player who’s seven foot six, and he is really good. Well, my job is to help say, okay, what are the question mark coaches are going to have? Can he guard a ball screen? Can he make decisions on the perimeter as far as like dribble, handoffs? Can he make decisions on the pick and roll?

You know, when he is in the paint, can he make post moves or does he just finish? So we sit down and we create a roadmap for them for exactly what they need to work on so they can be focused on those things and not get distracted by all the other stuff. So like that’s number one job. The next job is to make sure that I contact every college coach I can.

Last year I sent out two different times, 6,000 emails, an email to counting assistant coaches, director of basketball operations and everything with a profile of all of my players with a highlight link, a little blurb about them. Their GPA or if they were hunting for academic.

And I sent that out to every coach in the country. So my job then is to make sure that I get that information out. And then the other factor is we use our extensive network to make sure that we’re reaching out to the right coaches and programs to help get the right eyes on our kids. Just, it’s so hard to describe every coach there has just this extensive Rolodex of Rolodex of Division one, division two, division III coaches.

So as we go through this, we literally all work together to get those coaches to see the kids. The college coaches only work directly with the head coaches with them. So like if someone like we’ll use Michigan State last year with Carson. Jimmy Carr, our now Postgrad national coach, had the connection to Michigan State.

But when Coach Woj comes down to recruit Carson, he comes and talks with me. He talks with Jimmy too, but he comes and talks with me. I’m the one that sets up the film I’m kind of the main person. But we use those connections to make sure kids get to the levels that they’re supposed to. And then the other thing that we do that’s part of our job is when I have a college coach on campus seeing my kids, I let them know when the other teams are practicing that they may have kids that are at that level and vice versa.

So our national head coach, if there’s a high major guy there, or mid-major guy there, seeing his guys, he’ll literally say, Hey, in 30 minutes you have to go over and see IMG Blue. There’s X, Y, and Z kids there. And having a 7-6 16 year old usually helps. People usually want to come over, but we have two other high major recruit level kids too, so that’s helped a lot of our kids.

So we are the director of the process with the parents and with the player. As they go through each year and we get information on what levels are interested in them, then it transitions into helping them make decisions related to the climate and what college basketball is. This year we had a kid with a Division one offer very strong from a school that he really liked, and he had a bunch of division one interest.

But nobody had pulled the trigger as aggressively as the first school, which he liked, had the major he wanted. And so in this climate where 10 years ago you’d say, well just wait late, you’re going to get a lot better during the. There’ll be a bunch of offers. Now with that transfer portal, we have to help make sure that we’re giving the parents appropriate guidance.

So part of that guidance was, Hey, you’ve got a school you like with coaches you like that have a plan for you. If we wait till late, there may not be that there, no matter how good you get. Because from about now until April, it goes very quiet for everyone that’s outside of an elite prospect, meaning top 50 in the country.

So we have to help educate the parents and the players on kind of how all of all of that works, and then support them in the decisions that they make because it really is their decisions for the rest of their life. For me it’s always about them. It’s not about me. I don’t care. I’m proud of the kids that go division one, division two or do whatever, but it’s really not about me.

It’s about them being set up for the rest of their lives and at a program that fits their skillset.

[01:08:22] Mike Klinzing: Finding that right fit is something that we hear from tons and tons of coaches, both at the high school level and at the college level. And I think one of the things, Jeremy, that we’ve tried to do here on the podcast is just educate anybody who’s out there listening as a part of our audience about how good every single level of college basketball is.

And I don’t care if you’re playing division three or NAIA or juco, wherever. Obviously everybody has that dream of being able to play division one basketball, but so often you see kids get hung up on that where they just say, Hey, if I can’t do that, then I’m not going to play at all. Or you see kids who go to a program that maybe doesn’t want them really that badly, or a program that isn’t a good fit or whatever it might be, just because they’re chasing.

Something that they really don’t need to chase. I think what’s important is you have to find the right fit. You have to find the right coaching staff. You have to find the right school that has the educational programs that you’re looking for, where you’re going to fit in. I think, can’t remember who I attribute this quote to, but somebody told me, you want to go to a school where if you weren’t playing basketball, you’d still want to go to school there.

And to me, that’s a pretty solid piece of advice that the basketball’s obviously going to be a big part of it. If you’re a kid, especially a kid coming from in G. If you’re serious enough to go down there and make the investment and be a part of that, then clearly you have an investment and your parents have an investment in your career as a basketball player.

But I think that if you can look at it and approach it of like, Hey, I have to find the right basketball program, but I also have to find the right school. I think when you could marry those two, that’s when you’re really off to being able to have a tremendous amount of success as a college player and a college student athlete.

[01:09:57] Jeremy Schiller: Yeah, I think a big part of it is coaches making it about the player and not themselves. So I think one of the things that does happen is coaches are like, oh, I said nine guys. Division one. Well, were those kids happy? Did they have a good experience? I think the other thing is helping kids understand their why.

Like why is it D one over everything else? That doesn’t really sound like you love basketball. Cause like to me it’s definitely fit over level.  I think we’re seeing more lower levels, different levels. Like division two are beating division one schools. And I think it’s helping kids understand and navigate that.

One of the things I use to help kids, as I say, you know if they think they’re high major, I have them pick the high major school, tell ’em to find a kid that’s their height, see how much they weigh, and then if they fit the description of the height and the weight, look at their high school highlights and see if they make those plays.

Now, if they’re young enough, that should be a motivator. If they’re older, it should be a realistic vision of, okay, maybe I’m not a D1 player.

If you don’t think D two or D three is good, pull a roster, look up a player and look at it and go, wow, that kid averaged 30 a game.

He was all state in my county, and he sits on the bench for a division three team, because they just don’t know what they don’t know. It’s our job to educate.

[01:11:21] Mike Klinzing: That’s so true. I mean, I think it’s funny because the number of division three coaches that we’ve talked to that have said, they’re sitting down with recruits and their parents and saying, Hey, have you ever watched a division three college basketball game?

And oftentimes the answer to that is no. And I think kids. And parents, they just don’t have any idea how good you have to be. Like I said earlier, to play at any level in college, you really have to have a love for the game. You really have to be a very, very, very, very good player. And I think if you took most high school players and put ’em on the floor in a division three open gym with guys who have played, it’s probably not going to go well.

And I think a lot of high school players and their parents would be really surprised to hear that when you start talking about schools or like, I never heard of this school, or this school’s so small, or this or that. And the ultimate reality is, is that those players are way better than you think. And as you said, you have to find the right fit rather than the right level.

And look, I get it. I get a kid wanting to stretch and if you got one division one offer and everything else is division two or division three, I don’t know that I would blame the kid for trying to give it a shot and see if they could. At the highest level because you could always go back and especially now with the transfer rules and just different things.

But at the same time it’s really important to find that, to find that right fit. And I think that the advice that I hear you giving players and especially they’re at a place like IMG where so many kids have those aspirations of playing at the next level. To me that’s critical that the high school coach is educated and then is consequently able to educate the parents and players to to be a part of it.

Before we wrap up, Jeremy, I want to ask you one final two part question. And first part is when you look ahead, obviously you’re in the early years of your time there at img, what’s the biggest challenge that you see in the next year or two? And then the second part of it is, what’s your biggest joy when you think about what you get to do every day?

So your biggest challenge followed by your biggest joy?

[01:13:21] Jeremy Schiller: So I think the biggest challenge is we were extremely successful last year on the court at IMG with IMG Blue where we’re trying to change the culture to be an extremely high level team that’s recognized at a national level. And then this year I think we have a chance to potentially be even better and we’re playing in really high level events like City of Palms and the Governor’s Challenge and we’ll play at least two nationally ranked opponents.

So I think the biggest challenge is we have some really talented players that we’ll have had for two years. And we may not have ’em for a third year as they may move on to national because they’re good enough to do that. And it’ll be interesting to see the biggest challenge is can we consistently maintain this level?

And myself and staff and the support of Coach Nash that we’ll be able to maintain it. But I’d say that’s our biggest challenge is as we navigate this season and going into next season, can we continue to maintain great culture and making sure we’re helping these kids get to high levels of college basketball.

And then my greatest joy every day going to work is twofold. One is just the overall ability to work in my passion, which is coaching and not have the distractions of anything else. It’s really almost impossible to find that type of environment. And then the other part of my joy from a work standpoint is just the kids I get to work with and coaches every day.

My team is just a great group of guys. There’s 11 of ’em and I have two assistant coaches that work with me on a regular basis, Daniel Santiago and Jesse Edwards. And then one of our head skills coaches, Jimmy Barron, who played at Rhode Islands. The A 10 leader in three Point Makes also helps us out on a regular basis.

And just being around such quality people, just like I can’t get to work fast enough in the morning, I’m really fortunate and it definitely brings me joy every day.

[01:15:12] Mike Klinzing: Well said. And I think it sums up basically our entire conversation of just who you are and what you’re all about. Before you wrap up, I want to give you a chance to share how people can find out more about you, about what’s going on at IMG.

So if you want to share social media, website, email, whatever you feel comfortable with, and then after you do that, I’ll jump back in and wrap things up.

[01:15:31] Jeremy Schiller: Yeah, so I’d love people to reach out if there’s things I said that they like didn’t like or just want to connect. My Twitter is @CoachJSchiller. My email is jeremyschiller@img.com.

And I don’t mind. My cell phone is (941) 840-3538. I can be reached at any of those pretty much at any time and always really enjoy connecting with other coaches.

[01:16:06] Mike Klinzing: Jeremy, I cannot thank you enough for taking the time out of your schedule, really thankful that Jerry Buckley connected us, and to everyone out there, thanks for listening and we will catch you on our next episode. Thanks.