Should Get, Could Get
This week is NOT Beach Week. Typically, I reserve the 4th week of every month for beach volleyball related content. But (1) the end of the AU season1 and resulting catch-up disrupted some of the normal posting rhythm and (2) we’re approaching the NCAA Beach National Championship!
So next week will be Beach Week, to synch up with that event. If any of you are considering going, I can’t urge you enough. It’s an awesome event and somehow the team element of NCAA Beach Volleyball (which I thought was a little goofy, when I first learned of it years ago) makes it 10x more compelling than something like an AVP.2
I’ll be down in Gulf Shores, enjoying the event as a fan, but also in a supporting role for the LMU Lions. I’ve posted about this before, but I’ve been in a consulting (non-coaching! for you NCAA compliance folks reading this) role with them for several years now. For any of you young volleynerds out there doing analytics work, beach volleyball is both in need and starting to offer a ton of opportunities for those of you who can bring a competitive advantage to a program.3
Anyways, enough pre-amble.
WTF Do You Mean By Should Get, Could Get
I’ve been playing around with a concept with some teams I’ve worked with, and have been getting mostly positive feedback from players about this, so I’ll share it with you.
Volleyball teams need to know what plays they could make and what plays they should make. A “could make” play is difficult. You could get it, but your odds of success are low. A “should make” play is relatively routine. It doesn’t mean you will excute it perfectly every time, but nobody should be surprised at what they are doing on a “should make” play.
Okay, so why does this matter?
The power of this meme is not in the judgment. Hey, you should have made that play! It’s in the reaction to the play. When you don’t make a could-make play, you don’t really do anything. You give each other a high-five and move on. When you don’t make a should-make play, you stop immediately and fix the situation.
Prioritize And Execute
The reaction is important because you only have so much focus and energy. If you’re coaching 13 year-olds, they have a lot of energy and oh-so-little focus. But even us wise and experienced coaches are prone to distraction. By definition, you can only have so many priorities. And if you’re trying to fix everything, you end up fixing nothing.
I like to explain this concept of Could Get, Should Get because it gives a framework for our prioritization. As a coach, you have to know what to ignore. And this is really hard for coaches! You simply cannot have a coherent system if you don’t have a structure to your teaching. Regardless of what you say, players understand the energy you give to something.
Could Get, Should Get starts to resemble the concept of spaced repetition. Your Should Get plays are the core plays that happen more often. So you emphasize them. As they become more routine, they start to fade into the background and are emphasized less. Once a play becomes very routine for your team, it will be commented on less and less and other plays begin to be emphasized.
Coach In Reality
The first time I ever attended a coaching session by Marv Dunphy, I heard the term, “coach in reality.”
When you’re setting up your Could Gets and Should Gets, you need to live in reality. Your 14-U team could successfully connect on a 2nd-step Go and bounce the ball in the seam of the block. But should they? The answer might be yes. There’s some 14s teams out there that are at that level. But not many.
Setting up this framework also helps you understand what is important to you as a coach. It might not be the same for everybody. But to give an example for me, when I start teaching defense to a high school age team, my first priority is getting my middle-back to stay in middle-middle and dig all the medium speed balls that get hit into that zone. We could get the ball hit hard into the seam that lands on the end line. But we should dig the ball that’s hit medium speed to the center of the court. And as that play becomes more routine, we start adding in.
In the recent Athletes Unlimited league, this framework was helpful for some teams to form their defensive game plans with limited training time. At the pro level, sometimes your scouting reports can become, “okay so she likes to hit crosscourt… but she’s also got a good line shot… and she’ll tip sometimes too… oh and she’ll also try to go high hands sometimes.”
Okay, so she’s a good hitter. Got it.
Using the Could Get, Should Get framework, you start to understand that you have to give something to get something. If you want to make sure that you seal the line and don’t give up the tool on the outside hand, you might be giving the hitter some more daylight crosscourt.
A good volleyball team is a consistent volleyball team. I find it hard to be consistent if you’re changing and reacting to every single play. But if you know the most important plays for your team to make and you stay focused on them, you help your team shake off a good play by the other team and focus on winning the next one. (I tried for a solid 20 minutes to find a video clip of a Euro coach doing the “next play” hand circle to turn into a gif. I need to have that handy…)
What are the Could Get and Should Get plays at your level? Drop a comment and let me know.
And the 26-hour drive home over multiple days with a 2 year-old in the car…
And to be clear: the AVP is awesome too!
Debate what competitive advantage I could be bringing to LMU that isn’t brought by their existing staff, but hey, at least I get to hang out in Gulf Shores with some cool people.