DR. OLIVER ESLINGER – CALTECH MEN’S BASKETBALL HEAD COACH – EPISODE 708

Website – https://gocaltech.com/sports/mens-basketball?path=mbball

Email – hoopitup@caltech.edu

Twitter – @docsheadgames

Dr. Oliver Eslinger, an NABC Guardian of the Game, the 2019-20 conference Coach of the Year, and Caltech’s all-time program leader in NCAA wins, was named Head Men’s Basketball Coach for the California Institute of Technology in the fall of 2008. Since his initial campaign, “Doc’s” Caltech squads have set more than 150 team and individual records, including most conference wins in a season, the best start in history, and most victories in a season since 1954. in 2019 Eslinger was appointed to the Division III Men’s Basketball National Committee where he serves as the Region 10 chair. He is actively involved in the Coaches vs Cancer program supported by the NABC and the American Cancer Society.

In Doc’s third season, after a slew of media coverage, including a front page piece by Pulitzer Prize winning writer John Branch in The New York Times, Caltech finally pulled through and made history on February 22, 2011 when it topped Occidental 46-45 in the last game of the season — the first conference victory for the program since 1985a streak of 310 straight losses.

Eslinger spent the six seasons at MIT, where he served as associate head coach and the program’s top assistant.

Eslinger previously served as Head Coach at Boston University Academy and as an assistant coach at his alma mater, Bethlehem Central High School in Delmar, NY. He stays actively involved in camps and clinics at all levels, making significant contributions to Bentley, Harvard, Boston University, Boston College, Rising Star, Crossover Sports in Shanghai, China, and the Matt Lottich Life Skills Basketball Camp in the Bay Area.

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Grab your journal and take some notes as you listen to this episode with Dr. Oliver Eslinger, Head Men’s Basketball Coach at Caltech in Pasadena, California.

What We Discuss with Dr. Oliver Eslinger

• “It wasn’t really about a specific player, it was just about the game itself, the beauty of the game.”
• Moving from Oklahoma to Albany, New York in High School
• Playing pickup basketball in high school in New York
• “Pickup ball made me study the game more because I didn’t have a trainer showing me what to look for.”
• “I had no idea I was going to be a coach. I mean, I wasn’t dreaming of being a coach.”
• As a kid studying college and NBA games he had recorded and diagramming things he saw
• “I was looking at basketball as a problem set to figure out.”
• The vision and toughness he developed from pickup basketball
• “We spend so much time from a mental and a physical perspective as far as our player development programs and really fine tuning the technical aspects of development.”
• “We spend a lot of time assessing and evaluating where somebody is and what he wants his future self to be.”
• Accelerating learning through a focus on the mental side of the game
• “We do try to put them in leadership positions throughout and get them to use their voice and be confident with their voice.”
• “We have to make sure that the coach’s definition of leadership matches the player’s definition of leadership.”
• Creating player led opportunities to build leadership
• Switching up the dynamics to improve relationships
• Tips for practice design and making practice more efficient
• “Players know why the drills translate, that there’s purpose behind everything that we’re doing.”
• “Some of our best drills that we do, were created in my mind when I was in the gym.”
• “You want people in the university community to understand what you’re doing and what your vision is.”
• His plan for rebuilding at Caltech when he first got the job
• “When you’re losing and expected to lose by a lot, every single game, it’s like you start to identify with that and become that. So in order to break out of that takes a heck of a lot of mental fortitude.”
• “It’s just pretty amazing when I look at all the players that we’ve coached since I’ve been here and what they’re doing now.”
• Learning from different athletes and teams in other sports
• Check for understanding from your players
• Keeping track of winners in practice and analyzing how players impact winning
• Looking for ways to improve even when things are going well
• Strive and thrive

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THANKS, DR. OLIVER ESLINGER

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TRANSCRIPT FOR DR. OLIVER ESLINGER – CALTECH MEN’S BASKETBALL HEAD COACH – EPISODE 708

[00:00:00] Mike Klinzing: Hello and welcome to the Hoop Heads Podcast. It’s Mike Klinzing here without my cohost Jason Sunkle tonight. But I am pleased to be joined by the head men’s basketball coach at Caltech Doc Eslinger. Doc, welcome to the Hoop Heads Pod.

[00:00:14] Doc Eslinger: Appreciate you taking the time, looking forward to it. Thank you.

[00:00:18] Mike Klinzing: Yes, absolutely. It’s going to be a lot of fun. Definitely looking forward to diving into all the things that you’ve been able to do in your coaching career. And then Doc and I are also going to dive into some sports psychology stuff. So let’s start by going back in time to when you were a kid. Tell me a little bit about your first experience with the game of basketball, what you remember as a young kid getting introduced to the game for the first time.

[00:00:41] Doc Eslinger: Yeah, so I was actually born in Atlanta. And so my first memory of anything having to do with basketball is my dad out in the gravel driveway shooting hoops. You know, the hoop connected to the garage and our house kind of elevated looking down and I was probably three years old when we were there because we moved to Oklahoma when I was five.

And I just recall sitting on looking down there and, and wondering what he was doing and asking my mom, right, what’s dad doing? She’s shooting basket . So then flash forward to, to moving to Oklahoma and Broken Arrow suburb Bat Tulsa. And watching I guess my first full game on television with Syracuse Georgetown.

And so that memory sticks on my mind. Just watching that rivalry Major Big East, back in the old Big East and, and watching those two teams go at it. I don’t remember really anything from when we, my dad was a professor at West Georgia College. And so we used to go to all those games.

I mean, we lived right next door, and my mom tells me that yeah, we would go to every game and how much I loved going to the live games. I don’t really remember the live games there, but I do remember watching that Syracuse Georgetown game on tv. Who’s your guy? Oh, back then. Yeah. I don’t, I don’t even know if I had a guy.

It was just the flow of the game. Yeah. This, this beautiful game that we were watching. I did end up becoming a Georgetown fan when we were still living in Oklahoma. We had family that lived in DC We had visited the campus even later But I don’t know. Back then it was Reggie Williams Yep.

Back when those teams were going at it. But it wasn’t really about a specific player, it was just about the game itself, the beauty of the game.

[00:02:48] Mike Klinzing: As you got into high school and you started playing the game and getting more serious about it, do you remember what you did to prepare yourself to help yourself become a better player?

Obviously a different era than the one where kids are growing up today with trainers and the proliferation of aau. So just talk a little bit about what your experiences were like as a high school player when you think about maybe what you did in the summer to try to get better and improve yourself.

[00:03:18] Doc Eslinger: Well, that was an interesting transition because I started high school in, when we had moved to Albany, New York. So we were in Oklahoma through 1989 and then moved in the summer 89 to Albany. So I was switching high schools at this major transition area as far as my development.

So it was basketball that allowed me to have a network and make friends in a totally new state, New city, new high school. So I used the basketball as sort of that connection and even going back to, to Oklahoma and we started playing in fourth grade, organized basketball. The thing, the cool thing about our neighborhood was there was you could just go outside and there were, everyone had hoops and you’re in a great neighborhood where you knew all the kids and you could just play pickup basketball all around the neighborhood.

And then we’d go to local community center and play with the older guys. And so, I mean, I fell in love with hoops in Oklahoma as far as playing it. And then being able to bring that sort of mentality. Just the love for it to New York was, was something that was huge for my development. But I ended up in New York.

I mean, there were so many great places to play outside as far as pickup. I mean, we have our local park, but then we go downtown and we’re all the much better competition was, right. City game was, and a lot of trash talking. A lot of go back to the suburbs,

Me and my couple buddies that would go, sort of travel around the city to find a game. And I mean, that’s what you did back then to expose yourself to different styles and different environments and just different people. And you tried to win and stay on

So it took a lot of courage, like when I go back and think about it, we didn’t have cell phones back then, so it’s not like our families knew where we were. Sure. We were just driving all around the city trying to find a good game.

[00:05:34] Mike Klinzing: Yep, I remember those days. Well we’ve talked about it a ton on the pod, just how different kids grow up in the game today compared to the way that you just described, which is the way I grew up in the game playing pickup basketball, whether that was in my driveway in the neighborhood.

And then eventually as I got older, just traveling around to knowing that, Hey, on Wednesday nights this is the park where you need to be. And on Sunday nights this is the park where you need to be. And on this Tuesday, this random gym on this campus is where a bunch of players are going to show up. And it’s so different from the way that kids grow up today in the game.

I’m just curious, what’s your thoughts on how we develop players today compared to the way that you or I developed as basketball players where it was pick up basketball and if you were working out on your own, working on your game, you were kind of just having to figure it out on your own.

You couldn’t go to YouTube and be like, Hey, I need some new drills to work on. It was kind of like, okay, I just have to invent stuff on my own. So how do you think about, as a college basketball coach, how do you think about that development piece when you think about your own experiences versus what your players experience today as they’re coming up through the youth basketball ranks?

[00:06:49] Doc Eslinger: Oh, definitely. I mean, that’s significant, the difference in it. I know that I’ve even sort of half joked with our players here over the years as far as I’ve had to teach them how to play pickup up basketball.

[00:07:01] Mike Klinzing: That’s so true.

[00:07:02] Doc Eslinger: So you check it and they, you go season and threes or are ones, or how are you doing this?

So Yeah, I think, I mean, it’s certainly different. I mean, we had to go find the games. We were more self-made back then growing up, but there was something great about that freedom and it was on you. I mean, we were developing autonomy as far as, okay, this intrinsic motivation to go play and get better.

And I think it also made at least me, it made me study the game more because I didn’t have a trainer showing me what to look for. I certainly had mentors, but they weren’t paid trainers that we were scheduling sessions with, but we played heck of a lot of one on. Two on two, Three on three. I mean, if we didn’t have fives, that’s what we did.

We made up games, we made up shooting games. We competed that way. And I think the self-study was really important. At least for my development. I had no idea I was going to be a coach. I mean, I wasn’t dreaming of being a coach. I just loved the game. And I thought it was always important to limit the limitations as far as, Okay, what kind of player am I supposed to be?

Well, let’s make it as eclectic as possible, while by watching all different types of players and, and their skills. So although we didn’t have YouTube or anything like that, we did have a vcr. So I recorded everything. I recorded college games. I recorded NBA games. I recorded inside the nba with Fred Hickman or whoever was posting that there

[00:09:04] Mike Klinzing: Inside stuff.  When that first came out, I recorded it. Willow Bay and Amahd Rashad

[00:09:08] Doc Eslinger: And yeah, I have all, I mean I still have all these tapes back at my mom’s house. So, and slowly every year I transfer them over to DVD and then upload ’em so I have ’em digital, but that was part of the studying.

And then I would diagram, I would start diagramming stuff myself, just because I was interested in it. I always looked at it as like a problem set. That’s what our, our Caltech students call their homework here, their problem sets. So I was looking at this, I was looking at basketball as a problem set to figure out, alright, how is this team getting it done?

What are they running what kinds of skills are involved? And then shoot going back. And I remember when we got the good VCR where you could pause it in slow motion.

[00:10:02] Mike Klinzing: So, oh man, coaches today have idea what we all went through trying to watch video back in the eighties and early nineties.

[00:10:11] Doc Eslinger: Right. So I would watch the game, but I’d record it too and I’d pause the commercials because I knew go back and wouldn’t have to watch commercials. I mean, I had the thing down and even Oklahoma, like we would, my buddies were always over there and we’re watching a game Sunday afternoon when, when the NBA was on Sunday afternoons and a commercial break.

And then we’d sprint right outside to the backyard where the hoop was and shoot a couple hoops and then come back in and watch it. I mean, I thought it was a really good childhood with what we had.

[00:10:47] Mike Klinzing: Yeah, I could not agree more. I say to people all the time that I feel bad for my own kids that they didn’t get to grow up in the same era that you and I did, where we had that freedom.

As you said, there were no phones. So when you’re out driving around with your friends, trying to find that game, or even for me like the, the local park that I would play at a lot that always had good games, that was a bike right away. And here I was as a, whenever, 13, 14 year old going up there for the first time trying to get into games with the high school kids and college guys and the adults that were up there playing.

And I’d always have to be the first one there so I could make sure I could get in that first game. Hey, he’s one of the first 10, so he’s in this first game. And then kind of have to fight your way through. Earn your reputation and it’s just completely different. There’s obviously some huge positives to the way that kids grow up today.

They have more gym access, I think in a lot of cases they have access to better coaching, and then clearly through the video and internet and all the things that they have access to there. I think that’s a huge positive, but I always say that I feel like the way. I developed as a player, and your experience sounds very similar to mine, that by having the opportunity to play against players of different ages and have mentors that were out on the floor that were helping you and older guys said, Hey, you should try this.

Or Hey, let’s pick up this young kid and get him on the team with us, and you have to figure out and play a role. Learn how to win. There’s just so many positives to the way that it was back in the day. And again, I. It’s not coming back. We’re not ever going to go back and, and see that era come. So we’ve have to embrace what we have today.

And I do think there are, are certainly positives to it, but I, I definitely am nostalgic for my own childhood and my own experiences and I feel, I feel bad that today’s kids don’t get to experience that, that pickup basketball culture that was so prevalent back in the day that now as you were talking about, driving around to a bunch of different courts outdoors and those courts just either, either the courts themselves don’t exist, or in many cases they sit pretty empty most of the year.

[00:12:55] Doc Eslinger: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I asked again, our guys here how often do you play pickup? And I mean, it’s very limited.

[00:13:08] Mike Klinzing: Well, and especially outside, right?

[00:13:09] Doc Eslinger: Yeah, exactly. That’s what I’m talking about. Like wherever they’ve grown up. But the part is, Or a park that you play at. No, I mean you’ve got your trainer and you’ve got your club ball.

And you have access to your gym more often now. For sure. And so I think going back to, to our time, I think a couple, as we’re sitting here thinking about this, and I’m reminiscing and just terms of development, I mean, the positives for me, I know were the ability to see the game and read the game from what now as a coaching standpoint was, that was certainly part of what I learned back then and having a vision of the game because you couldn’t just go to YouTube, like you said, and, and just look up new drills or new techniques and also just the toughness factor.

And when we say fio, figure it out. Trying to figure out how to win and stay on so you don’t have to sit for two hours, and just going up against strangers and, and just older, more athletic people who presented tons of challenges, you know? So that I think the vision and the toughness were definitely factors that helped development.

I think technique-wise though, I mean, you can just get so much more technique now because you can go ahead and look up videos and you have this culture of training as well. So I think back then I wasn’t necessarily learning great technique. It was more just doing what’s coming natural.

Right. Experimental. Yeah. Just as far as shooting. Or how we’re defending and these different aspects of the game. And, but I know that’s also why I place such an emphasis on the development of players here and why we spend so much time from a mental and a physical perspective as far as our player development programs and really fine tuning the technical aspects of development when players come to you.

[00:15:40] Mike Klinzing: And you’re recruiting them and you’re having those conversations and you’re bringing ’em into your program, and you talk a little about the mental piece of it. Let’s just, let’s touch on that just briefly before we get back to kind of continue on in your journey. But just tell me a little bit about, when you talk about the mental side, just gimme a quick synopsis of what are some of the things that you tried to incorporate with your guys as you’re bringing ’em into your program from a mental approach standpoint?

[00:16:06] Doc Eslinger: sWell, I guess there are a number of things, but in general we definitely want to know about their ability to focus, their motivations behind playing whether it’s, what level of intrinsic motivation are they bringing to be a college basketball player, to be able to stick with it for four years, especially at a very challenging university academically.

Yeah, with a lot of other things going on in terms of the academics and the research and then the confidence too. So we do spend a lot of time in our mental training, managing, and talking about and working on confidence and specifically what we would call self-efficacy, situational self confidence, because we know they’re going to be peaks and valleys and that happens with every athlete, especially when you’re dealing with performance anxiety, other sorts of pressure, other sorts of stressors coming in just from being a college student athlete and whatever else might be affecting someone’s ability to focus.

And  really self-awareness. And we spend a lot of time assessing and evaluating where somebody is and, and what he wants his future self to be. So there’s so much in terms of the complexity of the human mind, and I think a lot of times coaches assume things without really digging into it and asking questions and asking the right questions.

So certainly part of our philosophy is being able to build relationships by asking questions about those notions that I just mentioned.

[00:18:20] Mike Klinzing: What’s something that you’ve seen coaches assume about a player that you’ve then realized, Hey, this isn’t really what’s happening. There’s something else going on here.

Can you cite an example or just a generality around that?

[00:18:35] Doc Eslinger: What happens a lot where a coach might say and it could be one of our staff members or another opposing coach, or just someone you see on TV where a coach says that the guy isn’t tough or he doesn’t care. And that’s not necessarily the case.

It’s assumed because of maybe his negative body language or you know, inability to reach a level that was perhaps expected. And there’s just so much going on in terms of an athletes mindset that it’s not always that he’s not tough or he doesn’t care.

I think a lot of times there’s miscommunications, there isn’t great clarity. There’s not sort of a parallel vision between coach and player. And maybe that’s because they haven’t really talked about what each of them wants, for instance. So the, the other thing is that really influences all this is emotions.

And it’s in an intense, high paced game like basketball. There’s so many emotions going on, especially in the heat of a competitive drill or a competition. And as humans, a lot of times we don’t understand how those feelings that become emotions and we’re interpreting them in different ways affect how we’re communicating, how we’re looking, how we’re building a relationship or breaking a relationship.

And the more we’re aware of that, I think although it can be difficult to deal with some of those, those authentic situations, the more they’re talked about between coach and player. I just find that that’s better. And that’s not just me as a sort of working through this as a coach.

It’s also coming from my background in counseling and sports psychology and, and even working with other teams as a performance consultant, so even outside of basketball. So over the last two decades of being able to see things from that perspective too. It’s eye opening when you’re looking at things that way.

[00:21:19] Mike Klinzing: All right. So how does that differ from your experience as a college basketball player. The experience that you’re having with those interactions with your players, which that stuff doesn’t take place accidentally, obviously, you’re having to put a lot of time and effort and preparation into building those kinds of relationships and having those kinds of conversations with your players.

I’m guessing that your experience as a player wasn’t anywhere near that level of focus on that mental side of the game. So just maybe compare and contrast your experience as a player with kind of what you’re doing now with your players.

[00:22:02] Doc Eslinger: Well, I think part of the reason I got into this, the psychology side in the first place, whether it was at Clark University as an undergrad or at Boston University as a grad student, was because of this, I guess, inherent interest in and how people develop and how people learn.

And then of course my experiences with all different sorts of coaches. So I mean, I’ve always tried to, no matter who the coach is, stick with it, have an open mind and, and respect and learn from the person. And so in my career as a coach, and I can think about all the coaches I’ve had and maybe something that was really great and I learned a lot from a positive side and then maybe something I didn’t necessarily agree with or take to maybe other people did.

And I do try to keep all that sort of in a filter. But yeah, I think for most coaches, because they’re not, they hadn’t gone to school for it and they’re not trained formally in the mental side is, I mean, we coaches talk a lot about the mental side, of course, and use some of the same terms. But it just doesn’t go as deep.

You know, in terms of how are we activating mental performance? What does current research demonstrate? What are the trends in performance psychology, in terms of like how the brain works. I mean, over the last 10 years, we’ve just learned so much from the neuroscience side too.

So lots that we could dive into there. But I mean, the main thing is I think what we do here is just obviously very different than a lot of programs because there’s not that substantial background and in paying attention to how people are thinking, feeling, and behaving.

[00:24:16] Mike Klinzing: So what does that look like day to day for you guys in your program? Is that individual meetings outside of the practice setting? Is that pulling a player aside and having discussions during practice? Exactly. What does it look like day to day as you’re practicing and trying to get the players to, to understand and, and to better be able to master their own performance, master their own mind and, and go through and, and, and deal with some of the things that you’re describing here?

[00:24:52] Doc Eslinger: Yeah. It’s interesting because obviously because it’s, it’s coming from the head coach, it’s embedded in what we do for sure. And so I have to be like you said, intentional in how we’re doing it and also teaching our assistants what we’re doing at the same time and why we’re doing it.

And really what I try to do is present it as, look, we’re trying to accelerate learning here. And if we can accelerate learning, if we can attend to different factors on the court and the scout and maintain focus that way, I mean, shoot, we’re already ahead of the game. So in thinking about the efficiency of practice, it comes into practice planning, but from a more, I guess a broader psychological perspective, we do what we’ll have mental training workshops as a group.

So we’ll do something in the conference room, we’ll do something in the gym. We’ll go out to the beach and we’ll work on our deep breathing and relaxation, our ability to be more aware of connecting the breath to the body. I mean, it’s such a great coping skill when you talk about different forms of mindfulness.

And then we’ll also depending on our roster and depending on what’s happening and depending on dynamics we can incorporate this stuff into a video session. So we might be sitting in the office watching an edit and we will slow it way down. And, and I’ll present some questions about, Hey what do you, what are you seeing in this situation?

Or what do you, can you remember how you were feeling when you made this move or this decision or this possession was going on, or wherever it is. So it’s, it’s part of what we do every day and sometimes it’s very formal. And then other times I think it sort of comes out organically. And I’m sure when we’re addressing the team, and I’m using some of the, the phrases or terminology that it starts to make an impact eventually, but certainly there are different ways to activate it.

[00:27:29] Mike Klinzing: When you think about the way that your players are able to react to it, I guess is the wrong way to say it, but the players are able to maximize what they’re getting, how do you compare when a player comes in as a freshman to where they are as a senior in their ability to be receptive to some of the things that you’re trying to get to?

And obviously I know each player is different and their makeup and the way they go about things, but I’ve have to believe that there’s a tremendous amount of growth in a player from their freshman year to their senior year in terms of. Being able to understand their own mind and to be able to go through and see the value in and get better at some of the, let’s the breathing techniques, the, the imagery, the visualization, all the different things that you’re doing.

I’m sure there’s a growth chart as they go through. So just talk a little bit about the difference between Okay, kid is here at the beginning of his freshman year versus what you see with a senior who’s been through this for four years.

[00:28:31] Doc Eslinger: Yeah. It’s night and day as far as when a first year comes in and sort of all the fears one faces this as a freshman.

I mean, these guys are just trying to figure out how to maneuver through a very high academic university, first of all. And a lot of our guys are not from California, so they’re all over the world. And so trying to establish. A sense of unity, a sense of belonging is really what someone goes through that first year, maybe even into the sophomore year.

And when you start to see them figure it out I think the really good ones start to figure it out going into the junior year and then the champions of the program. Those, the guys that end up becoming the chance champions of the program who, who are seniors at that point. And, and you know that they’re going to know what to tell the family of a prospect that they can carry on a conversation with an alum about how they’ve developed.

And more importantly, just strictly speaking about basketball, like they could run a practice. So we do try to put them in leadership positions throughout and, and, Get them to use their voice and be confident with their voice. And whether that’s, that looks different, that’s going to look different to different people in terms of how they want to lead and what they’re comfortable doing.

But by the time they’re seniors, I mean when they come over the sideline and you might be trying to give them an instruction and they just say, We got it. Coach , I mean, that is just like coaching enlightenment where I can just go sit down because they got it. They see what’s going on on the floor.

They, they know how to call an audible on a defensive coverage. They know what play to run out of bounds based on what they’re seeing from the defense and the spacing. They can come out to a timeout and take the whiteboard and draw it up themselves. You know, so we’ve had a number of those guys over the years.

And that’s, I mean, the question is great because it does make me think about the different levels of evolution in terms of one’s ability to process a very invasive, fast-paced game, but also doing it in a way that embodies what we’ve been trying to teach in our environment. And really that’s the transformation.

And it’s definitely tangible and it’s even more tangible when that senior can talk about it, when he can come into the office even before the senior season and have a, have a complete outline of what he wants his team to be able to do that year. And we’ve had guys do that. Yeah, that’s a

[00:31:57] Mike Klinzing: Yeah, that’s a tremendous amount of growth And obviously, From a coaching standpoint, what an asset to have kids who have that capability in your program. I know that we talked to lots of coaches on the pod and you know, so many of ’em, we talk leadership and we talk about developing leaders on their team, and we talk about guys who have understanding of what the coach wants to accomplish and therefore what the team wants to accomplish.

But that doesn’t happen by accident as you use the word intentional. And I’m thinking about coaches who maybe don’t have as much experience in this area as you do. One of the things that I think you hear coaches asking about or talking about is, Hey, we want to develop leaders in our program. And I hear coaches say that a lot.

And then oftentimes I look and I say, Well, how are they providing opportunities for players to actually be leaders? Like, Hey, we want leaders. But then you have to be able to provide the players space in order to allow them to demonstrate leadership. So if you were going to give advice to, let’s just say a high school coach who wanted to develop leaders on their team and thinking about where you’ve been able to get a kid from their freshman year to their senior year where they’re coming in and they have a really clear vision of what it is that they want the team to do, what are some simple things or some things that you can think of that a high school coach could do to be able to provide space for a kid to show their leadership so that the coach can develop them as leaders, if that question makes any sense.

[00:33:37] Doc Eslinger: Oh, definitely. So usually with something like that, if we’re talking about leadership or some other concept. I mean, we always start with, well, how do you define it? Because we have to make sure that the coach’s definition of leadership matches the player’s definition of leadership for sure. So we would have just a session on that.

You know, maybe if it’s the team and you got your whiteboard in the, out on the corridor in the conference room or in the office, say, Okay, just get split into small groups and define leadership. And you might say you have a team of 12 and you got four different groups of three, four different groups might define it differently.

And that’s really interesting and insightful in itself. And that can create some conversation. So obviously we have to find some consistent words to use that make sense to. Yeah, just starting with that. And when I find that, when we can do an activity like that, it’s great.

It’s creating space, We’re creating space for the players to make some decisions, but we’re also creating an environment where it’s shared which can lead to a shared vision and collaboration that way, collective effort, but it also gets the players to talk with each other. A lot of times you can go into a practice and players aren’t communicating you can go through a whole two hour practice to our game, and there’s really not much said, if you’re deliberate about it, though, you can get them to talk.

And I’m not talking about just like talking on defense, but the psychology of cohesion is so integral to building a dynamic team, and it also leads into the idea of leadership. So you know, that’s one thing I’m thinking about just in terms of definition of it, but also a second thing that we definitely try to do is create player led opportunities.

So whether it’s having different players lead the stretching or becoming a game captain or leading a scouting report, we’ve done that. We’ve had it where the players, a couple players present the scouting report and we’ve done player led practices where the coaches don’t say anything and it’s, it’s on them to figure out how to do it and how to communicate.

And that’s an amazing activity too, because sometimes people surprise you, some kid some, some players who haven’t talked at all, then they step up because oh, if the coach isn’t there to say anything or this guy’s not there, well now there is an opportunity. So that’s allowing space as well.

So changing the dynamic is really important because otherwise we get into complacency periods where, like, if you don’t, if you go and say, All right, do dynamic, right? And everyone lines up on the sidelines, it’s the same thing as when you go into a classroom the first day and every kid sits in a seat, it’s not assigned.

But then the next time they go in that classroom, they sit in the same seat Right. Even though it wasn’t assigned. And then the third, and then they’re there for the whole year. So, When I look at that stuff, I’m thinking about that’s the brain trying to conserve energy and not have to make a decision.

It’s just they’re just going there. So in like dynamic stretching, I notice that guys will go to the same part of the court. This guy likes that wall. This guy likes that wall. And then he is there. If you don’t manipulate it, they’re there the whole time. Yeah. They’re there the whole season.

So, we’ll try to put some of the quieter guys right in the middle and put them in a different lineup where now hey they’re physically centered rather than on the outskirts. And that can be very, it’s subtle, but it can be very, very advantageous to the team.

[00:38:26] Mike Klinzing: It’s interesting when you talk about just those subtle tweaks that you can make that can refresh a scenario, and I think you see that, as you said in the classroom. I think you see it during practices, whether it’s basketball or any other sport where you can have something that can get to be. Wrote, for lack of a better way of saying it, where I’m going through, and I’ve done this so many times that I’m not really even thinking about it.

I’m not really even concentrating on what it is that I’m doing. And to some degree, obviously, right, we want players to be able to pray, play free. And so there’s, there’s some value in that to some degree. But at the same time I think that when you, when you run into trouble is when players are kind of doing things and they’re not really thinking about it, which gets into the whole idea of you want to make your practices as game like as you possibly can so that it’s a dynamic environment and not an environment where they’re doing the same thing 10 times over.

So it’s that block versus random practice type of thing where you’re putting ’em in new situations which challenge their mind to be able to think and figure out and make decisions. And ultimately the more you can make your training, your practices look like, the games, the better off you’re going to be when it comes to their performance.

On the floor. And I think that the mental side of it and some of the things that you’ve been talking about and being able to create leaders and to be able to give kids the opportunity to think through what they’re doing and how it’s being done, can only enhance their ability to make decisions in that dynamic environment.

And we have to just keep providing them as many of those chances to make those decisions as possible. And that’s kind of what I hear you saying when you talk about how you’re designing your practices on a daily basis. I’m guessing.

[00:40:23] Doc Eslinger:  Part of the one thing I love, I guess, about this professional job is the practice and the practice design.

And I guess going back to our conversation about just growing up and problem sets and trying to figure out the puzzle, I look at every practice of the puzzle as it builds into the bigger puzzle of preparing for the next game. And in order to make the practices very, very efficient very motivating intense in different sorts of ways in order to engage everybody there to continue the opportunity to learn present a platform that allows them to be challenged, but also be free.

I mean, that whole thing in terms of designing a practice it’s like the teacher designing a lesson and, and trying to figure out how to serve everyone in that room in the best and we certainly put a lot of pride in our practices as far as the tempo of them, the build.

When maybe we’re learning something new. We certainly want that in the beginning of the practice. When minds are fresh, we want to stagger, I mean, all the shooting and, and hit on something a few times, especially if they’re trying to retain it for the game or the next day. And then just in terms of the, how quickly we move from drill to drill.

I really enjoy that part of it. It feels like it makes the practice fly by, but we’re getting a lot done. So drills that are no more than two minutes you go two minutes, and then you go to the next two or three minutes and you go to the next one. And it’s really enjoyable, especially as you get into the season because the practice starts to run itself.

And when the practice is running itself, it actually means the players are. In, in, in, in control from, from the standpoint of they, they know the drills, they know the purpose of the drills. They’re going to work really hard in the drills. They know why the drills translate, that there’s purpose behind everything that we’re doing.

And I just find that it makes it a really motivating and inspiring atmosphere when we can do that.

[00:43:08] Mike Klinzing: What does your process look like for putting together a practice plan? Is that something that you’re doing by yourself or you’re sitting down at your computer? Are you sitting on the couch right, on a notebook?

Are you doing it by yourself? Are you and your assistant sitting together? Just what does that process look like of actually planning what the next day’s practice is going to look like?

[00:43:33] Doc Eslinger: I think all sorts of methods. Some of those that you mentioned, whether. Whether it’s writing in one of my notebooks or journals or doing some imagery as far as what we want it to look like, collaborating, of course with our staff on what we need.

Collaborating with the players at times too. Hey, what do you think we need to work on? What’s important to you? I think that’s crucial is being able to ask them questions too. Sometimes bringing them in, watching video and figuring out what to focus on and really I think my best method is me being in the gym by myself, going through a shooting workout on my own and imagining the practice.

So I think some of my, some of our best drills that we do, were created. In my mind when I was in the gym. So, I mean, it’s completely authentic because I’m getting a sweat on, I’m also getting some exercise in, and we know when you’re exercising you get great ideas because of the endorphins and all the other chemicals that are, that are firing.

And so I make sure I have a notepad in there when I, when I go into exercise too, and I might go as far as, as videoing something or, or speaking, recording a video. And I did this last year. I, I was, I was thinking of something in there and I recorded a video so that I could send it to one of my assistant coaches so I didn’t lose that train of thought.

Right. And how good it felt. I also think it’s important to change it up in how we’re designing, because again, you can fall back into the trap of complacency and. You can get a lot more creative when you are coming up with these ideas in different ways.

[00:45:44] Mike Klinzing: Yeah, I think that’s a great point. I like the idea of being on the court as you’re coming up with thoughts and ideas.

I know when I was doing some training back a few years ago before I was. A podcaster, , where that became my, my thing that I’m doing with my time. But when I was, when I was training, I always felt like I could, I could come up with better ideas and better ways to help players improve if I was actually out on the court as opposed to me sitting at a desk and just kind of staring at a piece of paper or looking at a computer screen.

I felt like being on the court helped me to, to think better and to be, be more creative in terms of what I was able to come up with and create to be able to help my players to get better. And then I know I’ve read, and I’ve, I’ve tried to do this a little bit. I haven’t done it maybe as much as I should, but I know that I’ve read that if you, if you switch around kind of the, the location of where you work, that you’re not always in the same place when you’re doing things.

That can sort of bring you a fresh perspective. So instead of sitting at your desk in your office, maybe you’re sitting at the dining room table, or maybe you’re sitting at the kitchen counter, or maybe you’re working on the couch one day, whatever it might be, that if you, if you switch it up that you don’t, you don’t get stale.

And it doesn’t become, again, too routine and it just sort of breaks up and gets you to think. And I think that’s exactly what you’re talking about when you’re, when you’re talking about being on the court or, or just using different methods and different ideas of how to put together a practice plan.

[00:47:15] Doc Eslinger: Well, we’re talking about associations and memories. So if you’re changing your location or changing an environment you might not consciously know that you’re processing something that you see, or even an odor that reminds you of something. It might be in the subconscious, but it can make you think differently.

And so I think that’s a great point in terms of, of, of changing it up. So, I mean, you can watch video, but you could also watch video in a lot of different ways, right? You could have, you could have the video in your office. You could, sometimes I take the iPad over to, to campus to the the dining hall and eat lunch over there and watch it, or I’m watching something at home in a different spot.

So that’s certainly a great point that you bring up about changing environment. And also what we do, what we know about artists or songwriters or authors who, if they sit down to write, it’s not always the same. It doesn’t just have to be at their computer, right? They might write hand in journals or handwritten notes.

They might audio record thoughts that they’re going to later transform to the computer. So, I mean, we know that they do that intentionally as well  to change it up.

[00:48:37] Mike Klinzing: All right. Let’s go backwards in time and then move forward. When did coaching get on your radar? Cause I know you said early on when you were playing that you weren’t necessarily, even though you were diagramming things and trying to figure the game out, coaching wasn’t necessarily on your radar at that point.

When did it sort of seep into your consciousness and when did you think, Hey, maybe coaching is a direction that I want to go with my profession?

[00:49:05] Doc Eslinger: I certainly did not envision it as a career until I was an assistant at mit. I think before that it was, it was fun. I had coached in high school for a couple years  before finishing grad school and before moving on to mit, I did a lot of work at summer camps.

Throughout college. I mean, that was sort of my summer job, was working different basketball camps. And I enjoyed coaching at those too. But even then, I wasn’t thinking about it as a profession. So I think once I got into the MIT days and working with Coach Anderson is when I, at some point, I don’t know what year it was like, Okay, yeah, I can, this is what I want to do.

Because really up until that point, it was all about the performance psychology, the sports psychology. That’s what I had intended to do, make a career out of that solely and was so passionate about the mental side of performance and helping athletes and performers from all levels of all sports.

I mean, I really loved that. And I think back then this is 20 years ago when sports psychology was really in its infancy stages. There weren’t a lot of jobs, there weren’t careers in it. It was really hard. And so I think I looked at coaching slash teaching as a way to actually pay the bills too.

So I was doing all these things when I was at mit. I was an athletic director at a charter school that I was a founding faculty member of, and I was coaching mit and then I was tutoring and training and running a blog and then doing my sports psych consulting too. So I was doing all sorts of things.

But I think once, once I interviewed for some college jobs later in my MIT career and thought I could really see myself doing that. That’s when. I guess that’s when it really got serious.

[00:51:28] Mike Klinzing: Did you always know that college was where you wanted to end up? Cause obviously you had some, early on, some high school experiences, thoughts of, of staying in high school or once you were in that college environment at MIT thought, hey, I think college is probably the best spot for me.

Or was it just more a matter of opportunity?

[00:51:46] Doc Eslinger: It was probably opportunity, but I wasn’t that interested in being a high school coach. I did enjoy the ability to connect with the university environment and be a part of that and build community that way. And I was very fortunate to work at the places that I did, I mean, when I was in grad school at BU and I was the head coach at Boston University Academy, which is small private school connected to the university.

I just enjoyed the students there a lot. And so that was a great experience. And then, I mean, really the MIT thing came out of the blue. I mean, I didn’t really apply for that job. It just, Coach Anderson had coached against me when I was at Clark and he called me out of the blue one night and essentially offered me the job.

[00:52:45] Mike Klinzing: There wasn’t lot of major interview prep on that one.

[00:52:48] Doc Eslinger: It was not, Yeah, it was not on my radar. I mean, my interview prep little did I know was the way I, I played the game with sort of a a I guess a limitless intensity and Coach Anderson would, and he loves telling a story about how we were playing the MIT back in 1997, and I dove for a ball, a loose ball three times on one possession, clear across the court. And he told me later that when I did that, he was going to hire me someday.

[00:53:33] Mike Klinzing: Hey, performance speaks for itself, right?

[00:53:36] Doc Eslinger: So, yeah, And, and it wasn’t like when I was there, it wasn’t like, Oh, I’m just going to be a college coach the rest of my life. I had an open mind, then I have an open mind. Still. You never know what sorts of opportunities are going to come, come along if you, especially if you are doing a good job and continue to learn.

[00:54:00] Mike Klinzing: What did you learn in your time as an assistant at MIT that you still. Feel like is a part of you as a coach today? So after you take over as a head coach, what’s still lingering that you learned at MIT that’s still a part of what you do?

[00:54:19] Doc Eslinger: Well, just the, the over philosophy of building community. I mean, we would talk an awful lot about how do we take all these random players from all over the world and get them to become a cohesive unit.

And it’s not just the players, it’s everyone affiliated with a university. So first, the first couple things I did when I got to Pasadena and got to Caltech was in the very first week, I made sure that I went over to the alumni office and asked, Hey, what sort of list do we have here for former basketball players?

From then on, I mean, we started this annual alumni event that we do here, which has been great for community building and networking. And then the other thing that was really important was just starting to eat meals on campus at the central dining hall where the student center is and a lot of the student houses are.

So that I started to just run into people and meet people from dining and from the bookstore and just getting a sense of the environment that way, meaning faculty, meaning staff, grad students, whoever it was, because especially at a university where it’s tight knit and recruiting is always important.

You want people to understand what you’re doing and what your vision is. So those sort of upper level concepts were integral.

[00:56:04] Mike Klinzing: Obviously for people who don’t know, you stepped into a situation that was not, let’s say there wasn’t a huge winning tradition. How about we put it that way? Right? And so you have to come in and in building that community, you’re having to sell people on your vision, sort of site unseen, especially in that first year.

Now obviously after you’re there a while and people see the success that you’ve been able to have and the things that you’re going to do, it becomes a much easier sell. But in that initial first year when you’re going and doing those things and trying to build that community, what does that look like? And what were some of the challenges that you remember from that first year where you’ve have to turn around a program?

Hasn’t won in a long, long time and you’ve got a long conference losing streak, and there was a whole bunch of things that you had to overcome. What do you remember about that first year and just what the challenges were?

[00:57:05] Doc Eslinger: Really, the first thing comes to mind is, was fun because I knew that there weren’t going to be any expectations.

Yeah. As far as on court success, I mean, the expectations were we were going to lose by 40 and not be in any game, which was fairly accurate. So what we tried to focus on with our staff was the things I mentioned before about building community. The other important part of building that community is we needed to know that there were good connections and that there was some possible confidence building going on as well.

Coaches certainly need support. I mean, people don’t realize if they’ve never been a head coach, you know how lonely it can be and how isolating it can be. And so I also knew for me that if I had some champions of the program around that believed in this vision, that it was going to make it a lot more, it was going to soothe things psychologically because we were going to take a bunch of beatings,

So the second part of it was, I mean, any time I think one takes over a job, they, they want to take it to the next level. You know, they want to make it better than it was, and certainly here because there weren’t expectations besides losing and those sort of scoreboard outcomes, well, how would we take that to the next level?

So we had to find a way to make us competitive. And so, I don’t necessarily remember if what if we had specific game goals back then, or when you’re looking at the stats. But we did say that we want everyone to earn his PhD at Caltech, meaning play hard and develop. That’s what we were looking for that first year.

That’s earn the PhD play hard and develop. So we said we were going to focus on that. We were going to put effort into not bending we knew every team was going to press us. Even teams that didn’t press you no matter what. Yeah. And so, I mean, I remember one of the first practice we had when we introduced our press attack and I’m acknowledging that, hey, let’s get into the mindset where we want teams to press us and we’re going to show you how to attack it.

And I remember one of the players just shaking his head like, What are you talking about? We don’t want teams to press us. But those guys, the first year, I mean, I inherited a lot of them. A lot of them were seniors. They had been through it and give them credit because they were still there.

They were still there as seniors and they believed, They believed in what we were doing and we wanted to make sure that they knew that they were really going to be vital for whatever the future held.

[01:00:20] Mike Klinzing: Being able to connect with those players. I think when you come in, that’s one of the things that I always hear coaches say is you come into a new situation and you.

Try to sell those players on your vision, and you, the ones who have the most success, the coaches who have the most success, are the ones who really do connect with those players who are holdovers from the previous regime. And you get them to buy in, you as the coach, sell them on, Hey, here’s what we’re going to bring in, here’s what we’re going to do differently, and here’s what we’re going to do to help you to improve and to be a part of the kind of program that you want to be a part of.

And I think that that’s a, that’s a critical selling point, and I think it’s, it’s hugely important for any coach that’s taking over a job is to be able to make a connection with those returning players who, quote unquote, aren’t your players, right? They’re not the players that you recruited. It’s not your first recruiting class.

They’re guys that are holdovers. But I think it’s important that they very quickly become your guys. And I think the coaches. Most quickly embrace that are the ones that are able to, to have that success and have those guys be an integral part of whatever turnaround you’re trying to put together.

[01:01:31] Doc Eslinger: Yeah.  Going back to what I said, I just thought we had a great group that year. I didn’t get the job and when I was hired until late September, so we started October 15th. I mean, that’s just not a lot of time. Right, right. At all. But I felt like I did have a really good connection with one of the senior players who was on the search committee.

Travis Hausler, who’s still, I mean, is a friend to this day. And you know, I, I was fortunate that he was there and, and we could connect and he believed in the vision that we were talking about. And they wanted us to be serious. I mean, the handful of guys who were serious about basketball wanted Caltech basketball to be taken seriously, even though a lot of people didn’t.

And talk about changing mentality. I mean, that was the biggest, And I mean, that’s the struggle, right? Because we had some good players. But, when you’re losing and expected to lose by a lot, every single game, it’s like you start to identify with that and become that. So in order to break out of that takes a heck of a lot of mental fortitude.

[01:03:01] Mike Klinzing: So here’s a question that I always think is interesting when it comes to coaches who take over a program that hasn’t won very much. And you come in and as the new guy, you’re talking about the things that you’re going to do and the new ideas, the new vision, the excitement, the anticipation, and that’s all really well and good.

When you think about the record being zero and zero, so you obviously had a very short time from September to October 15th where you had this period where you’re trying to sell your kids on, Hey, this is what we’re going to do, this is how we’re going to do it. You’re trying to build that community like you talked about earlier, but then when the games start and you don’t win, I think it gets a little tougher.

And so you have to get people to believe in the process and get them to trust that even though maybe those results, as you said on, on the scoreboard, may not be what you want, they have to be seeing things going on behind the scenes in the process that indicate that, hey, this is the right path, even though it may not show up right away on the scoreboard.

What do you remember about. The first half of that first season in terms of guys buying into that process piece of it, and you being able to help them to see what your vision was for the program.

[01:04:27] Doc Eslinger: I remember them buying in pretty quickly and I mean, we did have the non-conference slate that year. I mean, I didn’t create it, so we had some of the top teams in the country come to play us.

And well we had some other, we had a couple other games that were certainly competitive and we won a game that fall or winter too, which was relatively historic. And as far as a non-conference game, and it’s another division three school. And, and so we had a little bit of success that way.

We tried to dissect every game in terms of the segments that were successful and things were doing well. And maybe we go on a seven to two run, or nine 0 run. And how did that happen? How did, what was the mindset there against good teams? And so just trying to sort of stack those was important. I think also, I mean, we did have a lot of seniors, so we knew we had guys on that team that weren’t going to be returning.

And so there was certainly an emphasis on the recruiting class for the next year, because this, the second season was like a completely different team and it had a lot more, I guess, basketball experience on it, although they were mostly freshman. But it was going back to the mentality, how we were communicating, how we were presenting things, the reason we were doing what we were doing, the purpose behind it was, is if I can recollect.

I mean, that’s what we were emphasizing.

[01:06:15] Mike Klinzing: Yeah, absolutely. I think that that’s really where you have to go and you think about how much we’ve sort of bought into the idea of the process. You hear it all the time, right? Coach is talking about, we have to focus on the process as opposed to the results on the scoreboard.

And I think that there’s a lot to be said for that and, and it, and, but it does take, it does take the coach making sure. They’re articulating that vision and making sure players understand what the process looks like. Cause ultimately players still look at the scoreboard just like fans do, just like parents do, just like coaches do.

Ultimately, that scoreboard is something that we all are interested in and everybody wants it to be in our favor. And I think the idea as you’re, as you’re building something is that the process, doing things right day in and day out is what ultimately gets you to where you want to go on the scoreboard as well.

And you talked about that first recruiting class. And I guess if you look back at that time and, and then you look over the course of your times, the head coach at Caltech, when it comes to recruiting, you obviously have a, you have a very, I don’t want to know if narrow is the right word, but you have a very specific profile of.

Players that you’re looking for, and as you mentioned, you have players from all across the country that are coming into play as a part of your program. So what does the process look like for you in terms of from the beginning where you have first identify a player that might be a fit all the way through the time when they actually enroll in school and show up on your campus?

Maybe just kind of walk us through step by step what that looks like for you guys at CalTech.

[01:08:04] Doc Eslinger: Yeah, I think just in general, without getting into all the nitty gritty of it, I mean, we’re looking for what anyone else is looking for. You know, really, really good players who want to be in the gym and want to learn and are open to coaching and development and want to compete and have had some success maybe in high school.

You know, been around good teams. And so, I mean, basketball-wise, I think it’s pretty easy in terms of what we’re trying to identify. And then just, I mean, like any high academic school, you have to find people who are the right fit, so mean Caltech is a world renowned STEM institution.

And I mean, it’s such a unique place and such a special place with what the students and faculty do here. I mean, these are people who go on to literally change the world for the better and also do things not in this world like in outer space, Right. I mean, I have former player, he’s his name’s Goel.

He’s now getting his PhD in, in astrophysics at University of Maryland. And he wants to be an astronaut and he probably will be someday, but I mean, these are the kinds of people that I get to teach and be around. And so when we identify folks who are good players and can make an impact here, but also are going to be here for the right reasons academically, then obviously  that’s the win-win for us.

And they just, I mean, whether it’s the internships during the summer or the summer, or just regular summer, not a regular summer job, but the summer job that CalTech students get, I mean,  these are opportunities that nobody else gets, but they’ve earned it and they go on and whether it’s working for a big engineering company or doing computer science for another organization or starting their own company, and it’s just pretty amazing when I look at all the players that we’ve coached since I’ve been here and what they’re doing now too. It’s just not like any anywhere else on the planet.

[01:10:49] Mike Klinzing: Yeah. That ability to bring in players who are both a good fit basketball wise, but also a good fit academically. That allows you to do some things that you need to do in order to be able to, to build your program and to be able to put the kind of student athletes into this university setting where they can thrive on the basketball floor, and then they can also thrive academically and be ready to move on and go to their careers.

I know that as you’ve gone through and you have your background in counseling psychology and sports psychology, and you’ve done some consulting on the side in addition to your coaching. Talk a little bit about some of the experiences that you’ve had with that with that consulting business.

Maybe pick out one or two things that that might be interesting or, or just unique that, that you’ve had an opportunity to experience in that realm.

[01:11:47] Doc Eslinger: Well, yeah. Talk about teaching and learning. I mean, I’m always trying to. People I’m working with to learn. But those opportunities provide a learning environment, environment for me as well.

So even if I’m working with another athlete or another organization, there’s always something to pick up about how, how they’re doing it and how they’re developing. Especially with different sports. There’s a huge advantage in getting outside of basketball and looking at how a football team is running its program or how, you know a rugby team from overseas is doing it.

And again, guarding against that complacency factor. Basketball can become really copycat And okay, this, hey, this play worked for them. We’re going to run this play and this drill looks great. Other sports are doing some pretty innovative things as well. And so that’s, that’s just one thing, I guess that I’ve picked up along the way, but also just in terms of how different athletes from different sports are learning and what their valuing especially maybe it’s an individual sport versus a team sport and how one is thinking about his or her tennis serve how one is interpreting action on the tennis court for instance, or in the swimming pool.

The thoughts that are happening when one is swimming laps and competing and trying to go really, really fast without thinking just based on, based on training. I mean, there, there’s some stuff that can transfer there. You know, especially when you’re think thinking about a really good basketball player who might have trouble with free throws, because the free throw situation is so different than anything else in the game of basketball where it’s, you’re isolated.

Everything is, the pace has slowed. You’re sort of, you’re starting the shot when you want to, without a defender forcing you to that the same as like a pitcher in baseball or a, a kicker in football or whatever it may be. So I’ve certainly learned a lot and, and change different approaches just based on the different athletes that I’ve worked with.

And then in terms of even consulting with different sorts of analytics startups or organizations, Looking at big picture, what are we trying to answer? What sorts of questions do we have to ask in order to make an informed decision based on all this data? You know, that, that, that stuff is, is really fascinating to me in terms of how, how people are making decisions from organizational level on down and then even amongst the coaching staff.

But, gosh, there’s so many, there’s, there’s so many years of, of being exposed to different environments that I try to keep track of it.

[01:15:16] Mike Klinzing: What’s your method? I’m curious, like how do you go and do something?

[01:15:21] Doc Eslinger: You write, I write, I have my different journals. I have what my programs on the computer and I have my notes on the iPhone, iPad, and just try to get as much of it down as they can. Cause there’s just no possible way I’m going to remember all of it. Especially the specific anecdotes,

[01:15:43] Mike Klinzing: Yeah, absolutely. What’s the latest thing that you learned somewhere that you’ve incorporated into what you do on a pretty regular basis?

[01:15:54] Doc Eslinger: I think one of the most important things is the ability for a coach to ask questions. A lot of coaches spend time directing and commanding and demanding, and we have to do that. We have to do that. And it depends on the tone of it and how it’s communicated, but we also have to exercise caution in doing it too much.

We don’t necessarily realize what impact it’s having. We might think. We just had a great practice because the coaches feel really good, right? And we got stuff done, we think because we made shots. But was it fake success? You know, was it a fake practice? And really the only way to know is to check for understanding from your players.

So we spend time right at the end of practice, at just asking a couple questions, Hey, how do you rate the practice one to 10, How did it go? What did you like? And we don’t necessarily do that every day, but the ability to incorporate questions and build information that way is really important.

[01:17:16] Mike Klinzing: What’s something that you like analytics wise, that you feel like. Has given you an advantage or has given you a better understanding of what you’re seeing as a coach, whether it’s practice games, just something analytically that you’ve incorporated into what you do.

[01:17:42] Doc Eslinger: Yeah, man, there’s so many things. I understand. So when I started really getting into, and I’ve always been, we’ve always been into analytics without knowing it, right? It’s just, I mean, analytics is just, it’s information. I mean, it’s statistics and data, but it’s just easier to get all of it now.

So even back before we had all these programs, I was charting things myself, shot charts and, and looking at the different actions, getting into those and, and creating my own spreadsheets and. And trying to figure out player efficiency because you know that that can be eye opening when, hey, this, this guy on the, he’s really good on this court.

I mean, his team wins. Why is his team winning? So we’ll keep track of that, even in practice with two on twos or three on threes or whatever we’re doing. Just keeping track of the winners is, is good information. Why is this, why is, why is Joey, why does he have the best winning percentage? He’s not scoring, he doesn’t stand out defensively necessarily, but he’s always on a winning team.

And so I think having that sort of philosophy and being able to talk about it amongst staff and then going back to look at video to see what’s happening there can be crucial because it can also help add depth to your rotation. I mean, there’s been times where. We’ve had teams that maybe we knew we could play these seven, eight guys, but we also know that fatigue is a factor.

We want to keep guys fresh. And I also think it’s important just for overall development to play as many guys as we can. So we like to do that just from a philosophical standpoint for development and game engagement. But there’s also times where we’ve noticed some things that, hey, we can actually play these guys and they’re going to help us even though they’re not standing out on the eye test or with highlight films.

[01:19:57] Mike Klinzing: It is kind of crazy that you think that you can identify things or, and a lot of times, sometimes it backs up maybe what your gut tells you. But you have some things now, some, some tangible statistics that you can point to that, hey, this guy impacts winning when he’s on the floor. And I think, look, good coaches have probably always known those things, right?

We know that this kid plays great, helps side defense, or this guy sets a ton of screens. Or even though this kid’s not getting a rebound, he’s boxing out his guy and half the time he’s boxing out half of another guy. And those are all things that are winning plays that contribute to a team’s success, but they’re not in the past, at least always measurable.

And I think now because we have the ability to see some of those things through the statistical measures, it makes it easier for coaches to be able to understand that those of us who have embraced analytics and are able to look at those things and really understand them, I think that there’s a ton of of good information that can be unlocked through that.

[01:21:06] Doc Eslinger: One other thing that I think is that we’ve learned how to do this over the years is when once we started getting really competitive and winning games and beating teams that probably we shouldn’t beat based on their rosters and their resources and what they’re able to get.

And the couple times where I know we were up in the top half of the conference, even on top of the conference and we were on these winning streaks, is, cause now you’re looking at it from a totally different way, right? So  we’ve been on the losing side, the big time losing side.

And then we’ve also been on this winning side. And we try to emphasize even in a win. Dissecting the game even more than when we’ve lost, because I think it’s, it’s probably easier, hey, if you win, right? You can just get onto the next practice and the next game. But it’s, it can also be a fake good practice, right?

So, I mean, even if it’s a one or two possession game, especially, or even if it’s a a 10, 12 point win, there are things that we still have to look at to figure out how to get better and continue to evolve. So I almost look at that under the microscope even more so that the emotion of the win, right, doesn’t just brush over the work that we put into it and what we could actually improve.

[01:22:51] Mike Klinzing: And that’s that process piece of it too, where it’s, the scoreboard isn’t necessarily indicative always of. Your performance, right? You can play an inferior opponent and win by 20 and get away with doing a lot of things wrong and not really playing to your best level. And then conversely, you could play a team that is much better than you and you could lose, but you could find lots of good key moments and things where you executed and did what you were trying to do and the opponent was just better.

So there are some things that you can control and other things that you can’t. And as a coach, and I think as players, and ultimately when you’re talking about how to get the most out of your team, you want to try to maximize their performance game in and game out regardless of the level of the opponent.

And if you can get the most out of your team, That’s going to translate eventually to those wins and losses. But I think you make a great point that no matter whether you win or you lose, there’s always ways and things that you can go back and look at. Whether you look at it on film, whether you’re looking at it through the analytics lens, whether you’re just looking at it anecdotally, there’s always, there’s always ways that you can go back and look at things and find stuff that you can, that you can work on, that you can improve upon.

And I think that’s, that’s the mentality of a coach, right, is I’m going to look for ways that we can continue to get better each and every day and each and every time out when we play, when we go to practice, there’s always ways that we can improve. And I think it kind of goes back full circle to sometimes what you need to improve on is some of the physical things and your technique.

And then there’s other times where maybe what needed to improve was your mental approach and your ability to withstand adversity or your ability to. Have something go against you, and now you have to bounce back and have that next play mentality. And so I think if you can get that and instill that in your team, then that’s when you’ve really, that’s when you’ve really got something as a coach.

[01:24:59] Doc Eslinger: Yeah. Again, it’s teaching and learning, just continuing the cycle. I mean, it’s when you have, for instance you know, as a teacher, you’ve got the better students in the class, or me as a parent you as a parent with like one of our kids. I mean, our kids, if they’re doing well in school, you’re not worrying as much.

Right? There’s, there’s not as many issues. So you have a parent-teacher conference and the teacher says, Well, she’s just, she’s doing really well. There aren’t any issues. So then I’m saying, Well, there’s still something we can develop there, Right? So what’s the key factor here?

We know that she’s doing well, getting good grades, great behavior, right? Pleasure to have, but there’s have to be something that we can still focus on. And a lot of times it’s easy to sort of brush over the good players, the good students, and, and we can spend more time trying to help the ones that we know need help.

That is so true. So, yeah, I mean, I just had, I mean, I just had this discussion with one of my one of my kids’ teachers today,

[01:26:18] Mike Klinzing: What do they need to work on? I’m just curious. I’ll tell you a story with my daughter after you share yours.

[01:26:25] Doc Eslinger: I think participation, just being more engaged for sure. Having the courage to raise a hand  and use a voice and speak up and that same stuff we try to teach our players too.

[01:26:39] Mike Klinzing: My daughter who’s in college this year. I mean, that was the theme. Basically what you just said was the theme of every parent-teacher conference that I went to from kindergarten through 12th grade is a pleasure to have in class. Does all her work super organized, love having her in there.

But we’d like to see her participate and share more and be able to engage with other kids and just be, put herself more out there. And like you said, there’s, there’s always, and I think you, I think you learn this more for sure. I know at least personally from myself, I know that I appreciate this idea more as an adult than I did as a kid.

I guess. I think as a kid, and maybe you’re the same way, like I looked at it improving myself. I thought about that as a kid from age, whatever. Six to age 22 through the, through the lens of being a basketball player and trying to get better and improve. And then I didn’t really think about it in other aspects of my life.

Other aspects of my life were kind of like, let’s kind of get through it, let’s get that done. And, and I wasn’t really necessarily worried about improving. Then as an adult you realize that there’s so many different avenues and ways and places that you can grow and it’s exciting to be able to learn and grow in different areas.

And I think that’s what always fascinates me about the conversations that we have on the podcast is always, There’s themes that run through it, but then there’s always different things that come up. And every time I, I walk away from doing an interview with somebody, I, I pick up something, I’m like, Oh yeah, makes me think about that.

Or it challenges the way that I previously thought or makes me think, Hey, the next time I’m coaching a team or I’m with a group of kids, or I’m running camp, can I approach it in a different way? And I think I appreciate that so much more as an adult than I did as a kid. And I think that’s one of the jobs that we have as teachers, as coaches, is to be able to help kids to understand that sometimes just good enough.

You can always be better and you should always be looking for better and your life’s going to be better if you can always be striving to continue to improve. And I think that, I think I see and hear that that’s what you’re trying to do with, with your players, is give them skills that are going to help make ’em better basketball players, but ultimately are going to make ’em more successful in whatever they decide to do in life.

Which obviously at a school like Cal Tech, they’re going to have the opportunity to do amazing things in the business world or wherever it is that they end up.

[01:29:23] Doc Eslinger: Strive and thrive. Yep. I mean, to understand that we’re modeling behavior, we’re modeling how to run an organization, how to lead, how to delegate all of it.

I mean, we know that this stuff transfers and to life skills. But even how, I mean, we do spend time talking about how to go through your first job interview, how to build a resume and a cover letter. Cause the students here, even though it’s Caltech, they’re not necessarily getting that.

So I do look at my job as a coach and a mentor to help them with all of that as well.

[01:30:13] Mike Klinzing: Yeah, I think that it’s really cool that for any of us that are basketball coaches or whatever we do related to basketball and I think back to the beginning of our conversation and just the love that we grew up with for the game and the appreciation that we have for it.

And then to think that you get to use the game to be able to have an impact on the people that you touch on a daily basis. To me, that’s one of the greatest things about the profession of coaching. And it’s one of the small pieces of, I think this podcast for me, is just being able to have conversations with coaches to be able to.

Allow them to share their stories and to be able to have an impact on the coaches who are listening that are part of the audience, that they can hear from somebody that maybe they would’ve never had an opportunity to hear from and, and pick something up that can help them to be a better coach and ultimately can have an impact on their players that they’re working with.

To me, that, that’s exciting, That’s fun. And that’s, that’s really what I love about what I get to do. And I’m sure it’s what you love about what you get to do.

[01:31:17] Doc Eslinger: Well, yeah. I mean, you have an amazing podcast and so many guests and you get to learn from them and then you’re also giving back and the fact that you’re sharing all of it is really special too.

So that’s a really cool thing and I know we’re grateful for it and yeah, just to be able to share information with our students, with our players, and. I mean, if we can impact them positively in just one way throughout the whole time, and then years later we hear about them doing the same thing.

Now we’re talking about true human connections and keeping this thing going.

[01:32:07] Mike Klinzing: Yeah, it’s kind of crazy. I mean, it really is. When I think about just how long we’ve been doing this podcast and the number of people that we’ve been able to talk to, and hopefully somewhere along the way,  you like to think that that you’ve made an impact and that you’ve been able to allow people both on, on both ends, on the, on the.

On the interviewee end, people who have come on as guests to give them an opportunity to share. And then hopefully the people that are out there listening that that they’ve been able to take some of the, some of the information and some of the, the knowledge that that our guests have, have been so willing to share.

It’s been one of the things that I’ve loved is just how, how willing people are to share what they, what they know and their knowledge of the game and, and the things that, that go around the game. It’s blown me away in all honesty. And I’m just, I’m just so thankful to have had the opportunity.

We are blowing past an hour and a half. I feel like we could still go back and dive into a bazillion more things on the mental side of it. I think what we’re going to do is we’re going to, we’re going to reserve the right to, to bring you back on Doc for another one and, and dive a little bit deeper into, into some of that sports psychology stuff.

But for now, I just want to say thanks to you for being willing to jump on. Before we get out, can you share. How people can reach out to you. Find out more about you and your program, social media, website, email, whatever you feel comfortable with. And then after you do that, I’ll jump back in and wrap things up.

[01:33:35] Doc Eslinger: Yeah, always welcome to connect with anybody, discussions, questions, whatever it is, email. And it’s right on our Caltech website. Hoopitup@caltech.edu And then  on Twitter, I’m @Docsheadgames. And then the Caltech one is @CaltechHoops. And then on Instagram it’s @Caltechbasketball.

[01:34:02] Mike Klinzing: Perfect. I cannot, as I said, thank you enough for being willing to take time out of your schedule to jump out with us tonight. It’s been a pleasure. Look forward to getting you back on again at some point in the future. And to everyone out there, thanks for listening and we will catch you on our next episode.

Thanks.