¶ Introduction and Welcome
All right guys, it's Q. Welcome back to another episode of The Ride. Today's discussion is with coach Kyle Hayes, the current offensive coordinator with Long Island University. He's going into his fourth season with the program. Before that, he held the head coach role. at manhattanville college as well as various coordinator roles at mizzy accordia
Wheaton and Babson College. We got into the weeds on the offensive side of the ball today. As most of you know, I'm a defensive coach, so I got schooled today. I love getting into, you know, really detailed discussions on how these guys think about building.
up their offenses from the bottom up player development how they think about you know even as small as where your hands are on your stick when you're in various positions on the field and doing different things we talked a lot about you know different actions that he likes to run and how he
Kind of builds that through fall and into spring. So, you know, you can tell he's got a wealth of knowledge on the offensive side of the ball. Definitely one of the rising stars in the coaching ranks. Also, there was some friendly jabbing on the show as both myself and Kyle played against each other. in the mcla uh him at old miss and myself at auburn and it was a really cool discussion to talk about his rise from those ranks you know not the typical
blue blood experience and being able to get to the position he's at now, which was a great conversation. So as always, hopefully you find some value in it and enjoy the ride. All right, coach Hayes, Kyle.
Welcome to the show. Appreciate you joining us. It's not our first time meeting here. You're the first guest that I've ever met in person beforehand. We met this summer on the recruiting trail. You came down to my neck of the woods and you were able to... see virginia beach man so happy to be talking to you again thank you for taking the time and being on the call it's going to be a great combo yeah zach absolutely i i really appreciate it and you're probably one of the first um
You know, guys that I've played against in college that I've talked to since in the lacrosse community, you don't get a lot of guys that play in the MCLA or the SCLC, which is the SEC for lacrosse. So, you know, very excited to get going. Yeah, whatever questions you have, I'd love to break down. Man, in that way, I'm super proud of you coming from the MCLA ranks. You were at Ole Miss. I was at Auburn. We did, I think, cross past one season. I think I'm just a tad bit older than you.
Yeah, man. How's Ole Miss doing this season? They're having themselves a good season on the football side. Yeah, they've been up and down the last bunch of years. This year, they're excellent. I think this is Lane Kiffin's, maybe his fourth or fifth year. But when I had gotten there, football was not great. It was 2012, and they had just gotten...
Hugh Freeze, who's now the Auburn coach. I certainly was not expecting football to blow up the way it did. Then all of a sudden, my senior year, it's the first year of the college football playoff, and they were in the mix. It's been pretty amazing to see the improvements they've had. I mean, having Lane Kiffin there has been unbelievable for them.
You guys had that one year. It was with N. Kim Dietschy was there. I forgot the name of the quarterback. Yeah, it was Bo Wallace and then Chad Kelly. It was a great experience, too, because you always saw those guys. My coach at the time was one of the advisors for the football team. So they were great guys, super personable. I think sometimes you'd expect football players at that level.
at times maybe to not be the most personal guys, but they were just great to be around. It was a fun time to be around college football, especially when you're from the Northeast where there's pretty much, there's not much presence for. That Division I college football field is definitely heavy towards professional football with the Jets and Giants, who unfortunately I'm a Jets fan. Oh, I was just about to go into the Giants win last night. The SEC experience for sure is...
I tell people all the time, and it's unique. It's one of a kind. Cam Newton, I actually had a class with, and he was one of those guys where he would just be at class, and he would be engaged and all that stuff. He wasn't sitting at the back of the class. There were a ton of...
players that did that stuff. But, yeah, you just get to run into these guys just walking the halls. Hey, what makes – I don't know if you've studied Lane at all. That's one thing I love to do is study different sports and coaches and all that stuff. What makes Lane a great coach, you think? I think, and something I've just watched from him and learning from him, just watching him coach the last few years, is just his ability to be himself, I think, doing this a long time and starting out young.
Being a little bit insecure when you come out of college and you're coaching these kids who are pretty close to your age, I think that it's a little bit hard to feel really comfortable with who you are as a coach when you're just graduating college. I think I've gotten to a point where I don't have imposter syndrome anymore as a coach and very confident with what I do and with who I am as a person and as a coach. And so watching Lane be...
himself every day and watching him be very personal with the players and having those connections. I think people look at...
¶ Coaching Journey and Imposter Syndrome
at him for more so his X's and O's and what he does offensively. But I think how he can just be himself on a daily basis and not shy away from that, I think really makes him a great coach. And then there's just ability to, to recruit. at a high level. There's no secret to, if you want to be a great college coach or great college program, you have to be able to recruit some of the best players in the country. And I think, I think he's done that while being combative with some of the other.
college football programs that have such great NIL money and things like that. Ole Miss does have some good NIL money, but it might not be what some of those higher end programs have at this point. Yeah, he's a good fit in that way. He has that underdog mentality kind of built in where Ole Miss is a perfect fit. Yeah, and I think he's so open to his failures too, which I know I always am as well. I think he's...
He's failed at different places and now gotten to a point where I can only imagine how much he's learned during his time with USC and the Raiders and Alabama. I'm not even close to that point in my career, but I just know that my best growth as a coach has always come from some of my worst losses. So I think I follow him in that suit as well.
I had fall ball as something I wanted to get to early, but we also kind of in our pre-episode discussion, we're talking about MCLA and you coming from those ranks. With that imposter syndrome and all of that stuff, I'd love to dive in really quick, man. I'm super proud of a coach that coming from the MCLA, that was something as I was getting into college coaching, that was in the back of my mind.
didn't play at the blue bloods it's tough it's it's tough with yourself it's tough from an outside perception as well when you're looking to get hired and move up the ranks so would love to know your experience man and it's awesome that you've gotten to where you are yeah so so In high school, I was fortunate to have great coaches in high school from a blue collar town on Long Island. It was a town where.
Guys didn't pick up a stick until they were in eighth or ninth grade. So while you're still playing against Manhasset and Bethpage and Garden Cities and some of the best high school public programs in the country. I think you're thrown into the fire a little bit. And again, I was fortunate to have some amazing, amazing coaches. But just in high school, I just felt like I wanted something different. And I remember just seeing online.
The emergence of Michigan when they were an MCLA team and Clemson and Arizona State and all these schools that didn't have Division I lacrosse, but were clearly trying to grow their brand. as a lacrosse program and and i just thought that was at the time for me in high school i thought that was the coolest thing and so i ended up knowing a couple other guys from long island that were going down to play
MCLA at Ole Miss. And this was before there was a huge influx of Northeast kids that were going down to the Alabamas and the Ole Misses. And at the time, you were... if you met somebody from New York or New Jersey, like, Oh man, this is, this is different. And I went down there and, and.
Again, I got everything I could have expected from a lacrosse side of things. You, as a student, as a sophomore, junior, and senior, you're trying to really help your coaches run a program, build a brand, schedule, recruit. those behind the scenes things that I've been doing for 10 years as a college coach, you're doing as a 19 to 21 year old kid in college. And I just fell in love with that side of it. You know, from a lacrosse standpoint, it's obviously not.
what Division I lacrosse is, but I think it's getting to a point where MCLA has gotten better and better every year. And some of those top MCLA teams, they do treat it like Division I lacrosse when we were going to play.
¶ Recruiting and Building a Brand
Yeah, when we can go and play a Georgia Tech or a Texas, they are running that like a Division I program. And I think for anybody who's involved in lacrosse, it's... why wouldn't you root for some of those MCLA teams? And we've seen it. We've seen a Michigan, a BU, a Richmond, some of those teams make the jump that have had successful MCLA runs. It was amazing. My teammates were all from Long Island, Philly, Baltimore, some Texas. So you have that community and that camaraderie with guys.
in Mississippi um yeah where you have you know friends from the northeast so you kind of stick together a little bit uh but it it just it taught me so much and it was just a great experience in looking to build a brand and build a lacrosse program as a young student because Up to this point, the X's and O's you're always going to learn along the way, the skill work, the drills, all of that stuff. If you're invested, you're going to learn and get better at those things as a coach.
I think the most difficult thing at times is growing as a recruiter and building a brand and doing things differently. And those are things I got to learn just playing and having an admin role in the MCLA. yeah i want to unpack a little bit of of those pieces that you just mentioned the recruiting and kind of building a brand i'm gonna gonna get into the details there but when you look back now you know 10 years later 12 years later the the kind of growth you've had as a coach
Would you say like initially you felt that imposter syndrome? Was it more something that you felt or was it real? Right. Did you did you struggle to, you know, get the meetings or. you know get the jobs that you thought you might be able to get because of that background and how did you kind of overcome that to where you're at today which is awesome
Yeah, I think it was real maybe from a resume standpoint initially. I remember graduating college and emailing a bunch of schools just to have a volunteer assistant job. And I was fortunate enough to... get finally get a response this is when a lot of these jobs were posted on lax power so i was applying for everything and uh i reached out to kyle hart who's from massapiqua which is the same town as
My college coach, which is Pat Aiello, who's now in Virginia Beach. But there was a connection there, and I ended up interviewing and getting the job. So my first year out of college, I was coaching at Wheaton College. a part-time stipend. I was working an insurance job in the morning and making it to the office by one o'clock and being in the office till eight o'clock at night after we had practiced. So year one was just a great...
experience and learning all of what being a college coach entailed. Then from there, I went down to Charlotte and I was coaching high school and club program down there. And I think that experience really helped me understand that coaching is what I wanted to do full time. Because those first couple years, I was juggling different things. I had to work another job, a sales job or insurance job. When I was in North Carolina, I was teaching a little bit on the side. And so just that.
experience I had coaching down there, I had the realization that coaching is what I wanted to do full time. And so from there, put out my resume again, and now I had a little bit of coaching experience. And so I think those first few years really helped me grow and gain some of that confidence for myself as a coach. So I think having the experience of
feeling like I was getting guys better and developing guys and getting better as a coach, that imposter syndrome for myself started to decrease a little bit. I still felt like applying. I was getting turned down a decent amount just because of my playing background and my experience to that point. Then I was fortunate enough to get a graduate assistant job at a small school called Missouri Court University.
which was in Dallas, Pennsylvania. So it was a little bit different than living on Long Island or in Charlotte. But it was honestly, that was the two best years of my college. coaching career just because it was my first opportunity in doing it full time. So I was in the office every day, eight in the morning. All I was doing was recruiting, coaching, film.
And our head coach at the time was Jim Ricardo, who was an unbelievable culture setter, recruiter, X's and O's coach. So those two years were just so invaluable that by the end of that time. I just felt like, okay, I'm ready. I don't feel the imposter syndrome anymore. I can coach at a high level. And then during that time, after I had got... my master's, that sort of contract is over. So I had to find a new full-time job. And then from there, I got hired as a full-time assistant at Babson.
which was another unbelievable experience. I got to coach for Rocky Batty, and he had just gotten there. He was in his second year, so I went from... where I coached for somebody who had started the program himself and had been there for 17 years. And then now I got to Babson where Rocky had just gotten there and was starting, you know, a culture.
um of his own and i got to be a big part of that and uh sorry go ahead it's crazy that we started with lane kiffin and we're here and i do want to talk about that recruiting and brand piece I'd love to just unpack that. Those are often intertwined. You see that at the college level with building brand. That often gets you recruits. I'd love for you to unpack that, man.
I think when you're recruiting guys, you want to be yourself. You want to let them know what you're about, and you also want to find out what they want. The conversation I have with guys is, If I'm calling a recruit and I'm having a discussion with them and their families for the first time, the first question I ask is, where are you at in your process? What does your timeline look like? How has the process been going for you?
Because I want to get an understanding, are you deep in the process with other places or am I your first call? Because that's going to help me understand what your experience has been. And then, you know, the second question I ask is what's important to you? School size, location, major, lacrosse specifics. What's important to you? Because once you tell me that, I can unpack and describe how good of a fit we are.
Maybe we're not, and that's okay. Maybe you're looking for a school size of 30,000 kids, and we've got 2,000 going back to when I was at a smaller Division III school. Maybe we're just not the right fit, but maybe you're looking for... a great business program. Maybe you're looking to go to school in more of a suburban area. Maybe you're looking to
major in something more specific like a nursing program or something along those lines. So understanding what they want and then fitting it from there, I think is a really valuable way of, of recruiting because you want to do what's. best for your program and recruiting the right player, but you also want to make sure it's a good fit for them. Because if you're just selling them a bag of goods and they get there as a freshman and it's not what they want, there's a...
It's a waste of time, and you're not doing right by them, and there's a high likelihood that they might leave. And so I don't feel like that way is the right way to go. When you're talking about just kind of getting your name out there, you were recently on the FCL.
podcast or community there kind of highlighting some different practice development pieces and you know just unpacking your offensive philosophy so that was really great uh you're doing a good job of that you're already on another podcast so you're killing it but uh yeah man tell me about that brand piece yeah i think a brand when you're selling a brand or talking to or recruit about your brand is you want to
understand what your strengths are and what you guys are about. I think that everywhere I've been, I've been fortunate to work for really incredible head coaches. So I can talk a little bit about them. and what their personality is and what they're building. So I've been very fortunate in that. And then using your resources to the best of your ability, no matter where you are. Everywhere I've been, I think I've worked for head coaches that don't.
allow their resources to ever be excuses and they want to play to their strengths. And so at a place like Babson, you know, we had an unbelievable brand. from a school standpoint. And we were learning how to really grow that from the lacrosse side of things. So it's one of the best business schools in the world. It's one of the best business programs in the entire country. And so being able to... to talk to recruits about that. It really helps you lead into that lacrosse brand as well.
And so, you know, we ended up growing a team of guys who have that entrepreneurial mindset, guys who want to be some of the best business leaders in the country and want to be really successful in their own field. we can tie that into lacrosse as well. So in only our second year there, we won our first UMAC championship and went to the Enso Bay tournament. And I feel like a lot of that came from the identity that we built there.
um and then here you know i i think our brand is a lot of our brand is our our locker room and our culture and I think that everything that we want to do here, we want to be a place of wanting to and not having to. And I think that's a big part of our brand here. I think when you're showing somebody your brand, it's... especially for recruiting, it's come to campus and come see it.
I can tell you as much as you want on the phone, but if you don't come and see it yourself, you're not going to get a firm understanding of what I'm talking about. I think our brand here from the lacrosse side of things is a great culture.
place where guys want to be here don't feel like they have to be here and just a place where a lot of the leadership is we want to be player driven and I think that makes it so much easier on a coach when you have a group of guys your captains, your players that feel like they have that ability to lead themselves.
One, it makes things much easier for a coach because you know you have more hands and you know you have more help from a setting the culture standpoint, but also it gives them that sense of ownership over whatever you're doing, whether it's offense or defense. And from a brand offensively, I want our offense to be one that our guys feel like it's theirs, that they have ownership, that the ball is absolutely spinning. We want our production to be pretty spread across our top.
six to nine guys and it really has been over the last several years and so um i just want i want our guys to have a extreme sense of ownership that the offense is It's ours. It's not mine. And it's not yours. It's ours together. And I want them to enjoy playing in it. And I think they do because the ball is absolutely spinning. It's an offense that's...
I think pretty unpredictable once you get down to the weeds of it and you're playing against other teams. I don't want the defense to necessarily know what's coming next. I think that allows for an offense that's fun to play in for the guys.
I did want to touch on the piece that you guys are located on Long Island, right? That's a cool experience going to Ole Miss, being on the fringes of lacrosse adoption, basically, you know, and then coming back and coaching here on Long Island. I'm sure that's a great experience for you kind of being back home. I'm always fascinated with the piece of like in recruiting of wanting to recruit from outside your area, but also feeling like, Hey, we need to saturate this area.
and you guys obviously being on long island i would love to know the strategy there are you guys like hey we we want to have a bunch of long island guys on our roster that's kind of where what we're looking for or hey we need to bring more people from outside the area
to the school, all of that stuff. What do you guys think about that in recruiting and roster building? Yeah, I think for us, it's one of the major advantages we have is we're able to be located on Long Island where some of the best lacrosse in the country is being played. I think one of the advantages to that as well is you have guys that are able to visit. It's easy for Long Island guys to come and visit campus, and it's easy for us to go catch.
Massapequa versus Farmingdale in a playoff game and really evaluate guys and know all the coaches on Long Island. So I think we want to make sure we're recruiting Long Island, one, because the level of play here. But two is because we have a lot of eyes on it. We have our great connections to it, whether it's high school coaches or club coaches, and it's what we know the most.
We definitely have a great amount of Long Island guys, and we'll continue to recruit Long Island guys every year. And then I think we have guys from Jersey. It's been a great area for us. New Jersey, great. athletics across the board. So guys that play multiple sports, guys who are tough. Jersey's been great for us. Virginia's been good for us. We've got some great players from Virginia the last couple years. And then some outliers, guys from all over, whether it's we've got a guy from Colorado.
guy from georgia you know so some outliers there and then some great players from from canada so long island is definitely the most represented area on our roster and for all those reasons um the level of play The coaches we know are our ability to get eyes on it all the time. And then, you know, we've got some guys from all over. And I think what they're able to see is when they come up and visit.
We talk a lot about how important lacrosse is on Long Island. And growing up here and playing here, it's something that I took for granted. And then when you move a bunch as a college coach and you move around to different areas of the country and you see that it's up and coming, but it's not what I grew up with, it makes me appreciate lacrosse on Long Island just so much more.
And so we tell guys it's not only the students and families that are at these games when we're playing a home game on a Saturday at 12 o'clock. You've got just people from all over Long Island that want to see Division I lacrosse. And so it is one of, I believe, one of the best home game environments that you can possibly play in. Just being on the North Shore of Long Island, we've got a...
We really do have an unbelievably beautiful campus and a beautiful setting and a perfectly sized stadium for division one lacrosse that when guys come and see what we have to offer here from a game day environment standpoint, and they're from a Georgia or they're from... The West Coast, I think they're extremely excited by that. Again, I just took it for granted as a kid. When you realize Long Island...
Lacrosse is such a big part of the culture here. When you're on the highway and you see lacrosse bumper stickers on every other car, it's... You know, when you leave and come back and you see that, it just makes you appreciate it a lot more. And it's just a place where no matter what high school you go to on Long Island, you're going to be able to get a pair of gloves and a helmet from your athletic department.
And so that's a big thing that I didn't realize or I took for granted or is at least ignorant to that. That is not the case everywhere. And I think that's why it's so special on Long Island. It's not just private school sport. It's across the entire, all of Long Island, whether you're a public school kid, a private school kid, you have access to the sport. And that's why I think Long Island is such a special place for the sport. And I wish more people could see.
you know why that is yeah it's really a dream for all of us that are you know trying to grow the game in our respective ways to see that type of culture kind of permeate the us you know other states and things like that and there there have been a lot of guys that have gone off to you know
city the large cities dallas georgia come to mind where that stuff is kind of picking up so it's it's great to see and it's a testament to those guys and the work they put in you know last piece on this recruiting uh piece and then i want to jump in uh because we got about you know 30
40 minutes to talk on X's and O's and all that stuff. But I was listening to the Slapping Glass podcast, which is a popular basketball podcast that I would recommend to anybody out there. You can take a lot from basketball and the high-level coaches and all that stuff. But one of the things on the recruiting piece, I forgot what city the coach was in, but he was saying he keeps tabs on the guys that are from their area because they're in a hotbed.
that go off to other schools because what happens is those guys maybe they don't have a good experience maybe it's the wrong fit they want to come back home in long island that feels like there's a lot of that you got guys that go out to other schools
Do you guys get a lot of transfer interest of guys that want to come back to the island to play? We have had a couple. We've had a couple in the last several years. I think for us, Every year we'll have some great transfers, but maybe one or two guys that fit in positions of need.
¶ Fall Season and Offensive Principles
But for us, we really want to build up through recruiting. We want to build up through the draft, and then we want to be able to retain and keep those guys. And I think it's something when I'm on the phone with guys. When I'm on the phone with recruits or club coaches, talking about every year we've been here, this is our fourth year now, but every year we've been here, we've improved. And every year we've been here, we haven't.
We really haven't lost anybody to the transfer portal. And I think that's such a great sign for our program and what our guys think of our program in school because I think a lot of guys at maybe medium. size division one schools smaller division one schools sometimes it would be easier for them to say all right i produce i'm going to go in the transfer portal and see what's out there
But for us, we're retaining those guys. Those guys are staying. Those guys love it here, and they love what we're building. So I think if you're able to really recruit. through the draft and then build and retain those guys, I think it really creates such a strong culture amongst your teams. Now, we definitely know those guys from Long Island that are elsewhere.
And if it becomes a good fit, if it's the right fit, then that's something that I believe we would entertain. But we really try to build up through recruiting as much as we can. it's a great answer all right we're in 2025 fall season right now uh we don't need to get into full details i do want to touch on kind of how that's going also how you kind of build up
your offense in this kind of off-season portion, right? You're obviously focused probably more a little bit on skill development and those pieces, but would love to know how you approach the fall season and how it's going for you guys.
Yeah, so I think we're so fortunate at the Division I level to have a lot of time with the guys. I think that was the biggest difference for me in going from Division I. from division threes where you just have you have more time you have more time to install you have more time to work on skill development throughout the fall but once you get accustomed to it it never feels like there's enough time in the day and so
I think I try to be really organized with what we do. And so the first thing that I try to teach our guys on offense is what are our core principles? offensive principles, and I try to give them about 10 total principles. And I want it to seem really simple for the guys. We want to anticipate good matchups on the field. We want good ball speed. We want to make two cover one, meaning just draw a side and get the ball out of our stick. So giving them principles like that, that.
They're simple, but constantly running through the guy's head whenever we're running drills or stick work or things along those lines, where from day one, they're learning all of the core principles that we're trying to teach. And so throughout that first week, We're working a lot on skills and we're getting a lot of reps, whether it's shooting, passing, catching, scooping, but we want to try to instill some of those principles and all of those.
skilled drills that we're doing, if that makes sense. So I think when we're looking at development versus scheme in the fall, I think we want to try to fit both into our daily practice. Can the stick work drills that we're doing embody what we want to do scheme wise? And then can some of your scheme work, if you're doing six on six, can you emphasize some of the skills and development pieces that you want to teach?
For instance, if you run a lot of invert, if that's a big piece to what you do offensively, how much are you drilling that as a fundamental skill work drill on offense? Because if you're inverting with... a junior midfielder a ton in a game, are you repping that out in skills 30 to 40 minutes throughout the entire week? Because if... You know, if Johnny's inverting seven times in a game because that's what you feel like is more comfortable for your offense.
How often is Johnny dodging behind the goal in a practice setting and working on question marks and rockers and all those things that you need to develop? from a player behind the cage. So I think that's just one example I would give from using some of your scheme into some of those development pieces. That's super interesting. Cause you see like, Hey, let's go behind the cage and let's run one-on-one from X. And it's like, how many,
half of that line is probably not dodging there from in the game ever. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I think it's also like never assume the guys know anything. Never assume that they know some of the most fundamental pieces of offense. Never assume they know the correct way to grip a stick.
And I mean this at any level. And I think the more coaches I talk to and learn from, I think that's the case. And I think I have an interesting perspective where sometimes I work with maybe some of the youth programs in the area. And I'm going out there and coaching and teaching and I'm realizing we're teaching a lot of the same things to fifth graders that we are to division one guys. And I think what we're doing is we're building habits to fifth graders.
but we're breaking habits to Division I players. And I think a lot of that skill development that you're doing with guys at the college level isn't always necessarily giving them new skills, but breaking down some of their... bad habits that they've had from maybe youth up until the high school level. What are some of the most common bad habits you see when you're talking about breaking them and trying to instill better habits?
There's a couple. The first thing is their stick work from a footwork standpoint. So I tell the guys a lot of the time that... That ball that you just threw away when you drew a slide, it wasn't because of your stick. It was because of your feet. So how well can you move your feet to get away from pressure, get comfortable before we connect that next pass? And then if you're that next, if you're the...
player that's receiving the pass, are you taking a five-yard sprint in and out to get yourself open and to work really hard just to connect passes around the perimeter? So I think that's the first one, our guy's understanding of your feet. really drive your stick work, especially when you're under pressure. And then the next one is just shooting. Your placement when you shoot, your footwork when you shoot.
It's the same thing that I try to teach some of the younger guys in the area is when you're shooting, if I'm shooting heavy sidearm or heavy three quarters and my bottom end is pointed towards the corners of the field, I tell the guys, you're missing wide so much because your bottom end, which is your aim, is pointed at the parking lot. And you're realizing why you're missing wide so much is because your aim is pointed away from the cage.
We want to try to teach as much as possible that over-the-top shooting and making sure that bottom hand is always pointed at where we're shooting. And then lastly, getting your feet pointed at where you shoot as well. I've had some great takeaways from learning from some of the PLL guys, and I think some coaches don't utilize that enough. And I'm fortunate to coach with two guys that...
played at the highest level of professional lacrosse and Jordan Levine and Troy Ray. And sometimes they make things sound so simple. And so. We want to talk about like your feet when you're shooting. You want to create an imaginary line with your feet at where you want to shoot. So if I'm shooting for the far right corner, the top of my feet, I should have an imaginary line.
with where I want to shoot. And so your feet and your bottom end really are drivers in where you want to shoot and hitting the cage consistently. And then the last part of that is eliminating the wasted movements. I tell our guys all the time in shooting drills, if they catch it and they take that extra cradle before they shoot it, I tell them, get rid of the extra cradle. Because one, you don't need it. But two, at the Division I level,
really at any level, but especially ours, that extra cradle that you take is an extra half a second for a defenseman to now contest your gloves. Or it's an extra second for a goalie to now get square to you and be more ready to... to save that shot or track that shot. So all those little things we try to really talk to the guys about.
this might be more for like high school age guys i think by the college time that they've got this worked out but i'm even dealing with it with some of my guys at the high school level catching and that hand placement as they catch that same thing of like catching high on the throat all the time and then having to move your hand down
right before you pass and even some guys are moving their hand as they're passing what do you think about hand placement as they're catching passing kind of in the offense in general is it okay to catch at the throat of the stick sometimes or i want you almost to speak directly to my guys right now that are catching at the throat well i think the the biggest thing is you want to
You want to work on things that you're comfortable with. So I tell that to our guys all the time. If you're uncomfortable with catching the ball loaded, you need to get... hundreds of reps in catching the ball with your stick out here. You're catching it at the throat and a little bit closer to your collarbone because that's what you're comfortable with. Because it's easy for you to catch it here and then you bring your hands back out.
But if you want to be an effective shooter and an effective player, one, you've got to learn how to catch the ball to shoot the ball. So we want to catch it to shoot it. I heard a basketball coach use that term the other day, which is super simple.
I've used it all fall with the guys. You want to catch the shoot. And so we want to make sure that we're working on those things that we're uncomfortable with. So catching the ball loaded. I tell the guys, you want to create as big of a swing as possible. So when we watch.
great home run hitters, they don't hit home runs like this. They hit home runs with a big swing. So one, we want to be able to really create more power in our shot, which is having our hands back and loaded. And then also I think their hips. I think is really important as well. Just making sure that their hips are turned before they catch the ball.
I think that's one piece that's really important just for our offense in general. All six guys, we want their hips constantly to be on a swivel so that once they catch it, not only are their hands ready to shoot, but their hips are ready to get through the shot as well.
Yeah, I'm a defensive coach here, so I'm not familiar with that nuance. So the hips should be facing more towards where the ball is eventually going to go with their torso facing probably the catch. Is that what you're talking about? Yeah, their hips are flipped so that if I'm shooting righty, I want to be able to get my right hip facing upfield so that once I catch it, I'm able to get that full follow through. For me, we have a bunch of guys who are really good at golf.
We're fortunate we have some amazing golf courses in the area and public courses, and the Ryder Cup was just here. But I just started playing the last year and a half, and I'm – I'm awful, but I am getting better. But also as I'm learning, I'm learning that there's so many great similarities between golf and lacrosse and just the way you have to get your hips into it.
and the way you have to get your wrist into it. And I think that goes back to the catching it to shoot it part is two of the biggest body parts you're using when you're shooting are your wrists and your hips. Can I snap my top wrist and get my wrist into the shot when I'm shooting? Just like golf, when I'm making contact with the ball, I want to turn my wrist over. And then with your hips, am I getting my hips through the shot?
¶ Key Concepts in Lacrosse Offense
We have some guys that when they shoot it, their hips will kind of stop halfway instead of getting their entirety of their hips. following through so now i've gotten my entire core through the shot just like golf when you're teaching a full swing you want to make sure that your hips really turn through so
¶ Breaking Down ROA: Range, Open, Angle
Is that a foot pivot that allows the hip to come through? Or is it just they're just stopping the hip? It's just a tick? I think it's also your feet, but also your hips as well. So we'll work on drills where we're working on just a follow through. So I like to teach.
the clock if i'm you know if i'm shooting at the top of the clock i want to finish at the bottom of the clock or if i'm shooting for my right shoulder i want my hands to finish at my left heel just to make sure that my hips got through the shot You hear a lot of guys go, keep going. Yeah. And that's the same thing for on the run shooting. We want to make sure that our hips, our hips really get through that shot just to make sure that we got as much torque on it as we could.
Yeah, I've heard the concept of like you should end with almost like your back facing away, almost in like a back pedal after your shot. Shooting on the run, definitely. Anytime I'm working with guys. and we're working on the run shooting, I kind of show them you should be finishing on a backpedal because what that should mean is that your torque, your hips got to that far pipe. Okay. All right.
I've got a bunch here from the work you did with FCL this past couple weeks. The key concepts and language around the offense. And correct me if I'm wrong here, but I see ball speed, switch the field, anticipation, gap play.
make two guard one shot selection and swarm mentality if there are any extras please feel free but um yeah one that stands out to me here from a shot selection piece you've got roa range open angle can you break that down what are you looking at when you're thinking about it what shots you guys should be taking
Yeah, so I wanted to use an acronym that was short enough where guys would remember it and not too long where guys are focusing on too many different things when we're thinking about shot selection. And again, it's another term I stole from basketball. I think going...
Off this, just basketball is just such a great way. Basketball is, let's be honest, basketball is a thousand years ahead of us from a development and skill standpoint. So I think if you really want to get creative and learn something new, dive into basketball. There's so many videos. My God. And if you go on Instagram, it's all my Instagram algorithm is now. It's just basketball drills and videos. And there are some things that don't necessarily...
correlate to lacrosse. So you've got to be smart about what you're actually using and how it makes sense to running a lacrosse drill. But I think, you know, for us, when using that acronym ROA, We talk about range, open angle. So the range piece simply, is it within your range? Are you taking, we don't have a ton of guys that are able to shoot from 15 yards. I think most teams would say that.
are you taking a shot that's within your range are you more of a mid-range shooter where you're able to shoot from 10 yards and on the wing as opposed to 15 yards and on the hashes so we want to take shots that are within our range and then the open piece i don't mean I don't mean take shots that are wide open.
I mean, are you taking shots that are contested? So we don't want to necessarily take shots if we're drawing a slot and we're heavily contested. We don't want to force a shot through multiple sticks. We want to take shots that we feel like our hands are free.
¶ Gap Theory and Creating Space
we're able to get our hands back and shoot without it getting contested underneath our gloves or on our sticks. So taking shots that are open, we're not forcing shots through sticks or through bodies. And then... The last piece is Angle, and I think this is the biggest one for guys to understand. And this is where a lot of the film piece comes into play.
when you're talking about shooting angles right are we taking shots that one are we taking shots off the first dodge those necessarily we don't have great angle because we haven't made the goalie turn And so more often than that, we tell the guys, you're going to get your best shots angle-wise, do the second, third, or fourth dodge of the possession, because we've just opened up more angle because the goalie has had to turn so many times, especially if we're getting the ball through X.
So angle, are we taking shots way outside the hashes down the alley? We don't love those shots that are wide and outside. you know those hash marks we love shots that are down the middle of the field where we have the entire cage to shoot at so just using that as as an example of the the type of angles that we want to take when we're thinking about shot selection
Out of any of the other seven, I believe that I mentioned, would you break down another one that obviously all of them are important, but one that stands out to you as being important? I would say gaps. And the gap theory is, again, something else I took from basketball as a huge principle of play. Creating gaps is creating good spacing and creating good spacing for the Dodger. And I think there's so much emphasis now in the cross of...
¶ Attacking Vertical Space
two-man games and three-man games and bringing more guys to the ball. Well, what about when we have a really good matchup against a short stick on the backside and we just want to dodge that guy in space? Are we creating a good enough of a gap for that guy to win the middle of the field and dodge and score? And so for us, we talk a lot about giving the Dodger great gaps.
And so if I'm that adjacent player and I'm up on the top of the box and my teammate is dodging from the low wing, if I feel like that player is coming towards me, one thing I can't do is stand still. If I stand still, that gap is much smaller for him to dodge. But now if I fade or clear through or work out the space, now I'm simply just creating a bigger gap for the dodger. So we want to be able to create gaps.
for good matchups. And then off the ball, we want to be able to anticipate and attack some of those gaps. And what gaps in its most simplest forms, gaps are just the space in between two defenders. Those are the gaps on the field. So can we create gaps for the Dodger to attack great gaps in the field? And then off the ball, can we attack gaps that are presented to us to maybe get a good off-ball cut?
There's something on those lines. So it's something that we talk about a lot. Define vertical space in that because it says attack vertical space. So vertical, attacking vertical, this is more for zone and more for man up and even transition. So if you're playing man up or if you're playing zone offense, you're carrying a little bit more. We're not necessarily dodging a man.
Sometimes you are against a zone when you're getting the ball spinning, attacking the short stick, but more often that you're attacking, you're attacking gaps. Some coaches call them seams. Some coaches call them gaps. When we're attacking those gaps, if I'm carrying across the top, say I'm carrying from the wing to up top in man upper zone, I want to step vertical. I want to step down into those gaps as a shooter.
¶ Swarm Mentality in Lacrosse
to then make the defense rotate. Or if they don't, I'm just getting a closer shot to the goal in its simplest form. So when I say step vertical into gaps, I mean when I'm carrying and I have that gap of... two defenders and space in between those two defenders, I want to step vertical and down into those gaps to make the defense rotate. And then I'm opening up shots for my teammate.
or I'm getting the defense to rotate even more. So hopefully that makes sense. That's what I mean by stepping down and stepping vertically into the gaps because way, way too often I see. man ups and zone offenses when they carry, they're just carrying across the top and they're not stepping down into those gaps. And if I'm a good zone defense or man down defense and I play defense myself, all I'm doing, I'm just passing you off to the next guy.
And you're allowing the defense to now keep and hold their shape, which is what hopefully they would want, as opposed to stepping down vertically into those gaps, being a threat, and then starting to get them rotating.
Yeah, you can always tell the offensive player that up to this point I've called it probing But the guys that know how to probe a zone defense and kind of fit into those spots, attacking that vertical space, like you're saying, they always pop. As a defensive coach, I'm like, here's the guy that's going to stir the drink for them, at least in this action.
I've got a couple other things. I don't necessarily want to pop out of offense yet, but you've got swarm mentality. You've got riding as part of your key concepts here. I'd love to potentially jump into that really quick. Yeah. a defense a defenseman by trade and um you know i i started my coaching very coaching defense so i like to bring some of that mentality to um our offense and our attackmen one i
When I talk about the swarm, it's not just the ride, but ground ball swarms. I think this is something that isn't talked about enough. I went to the same high school as a legendary coach, Jack Kelly. He was a coach at... New York Institute of Technology for years when they were winning national championships. And he wrote a book on the fundamentals of lacrosse.
and it's on Google Reads or Google Play, something along those lines. But in that book, he talks so much about swarming ground balls, and I think it's something that isn't taught enough now. You know, when there's a ball on the ground, we want to teach one. the first two guys closest to the ground ball, we want to swarm the ground ball. And then immediately we want to make sure that we're sprinting to create two outlets, an outlet to the right and out to the left of that ground ball.
And then once we pick it up, we call it a spike. We want to move the ball. Sometimes it's once. More often than not, it's twice. Moving the ball twice and then attacking space. So we do drills where we replicate that ground ball swarm. And we see it so often, especially in early season lacrosse when it's a little bit sloppy. We've scored a lot of big goals off of those ground ball scrums. Because I tell our guys, defensemen, I was one of them. We're like...
¶ Effective Riding Techniques
golden retrievers when we see the ball we want to go attack it you want to win the ball as a defenseman so so often when there's those ground ball scrums we've organically we've brought three defensemen to the ball. We've brought in the entire defense to one side of the field on a swarm. So if we can win a tough ground ball and then move it out to space, we might have a one-on-one or a two-on-two on the other side of the field.
those naturally become such great opportunities for us. So we want to be able to practice them. So that's the first part of this one. It's a really interesting concept because as an offense, i mean i guess technically the defense could pick it up if you bring a bunch of offensive guys to the one side there could potentially be a fast break slow break scenario but like from a perspective of risk to reward the defense has more to risk by losing that swarm
you know, as you bring more guys to the ball than the offense, which is just like, well, they'll get it and then they'll clear it. Definitely, yeah. And I'm not talking about bringing three, four guys to the ground ball. We're talking about maybe the two closest attack men playing out a man ball situation on the ground ball and then making sure that we have outlets to it.
Um, I think that for us, it's something that we definitely want to, want to emphasize. And then the next piece is a swarm in the ride. I like to talk to our attackman about how to. play defensemen how do we want to break down how can we read their hands i think that's something that's
Very simple for you to teach your guys, but I think can be really impactful when riding, especially at the high school level. If you feel like some of these defensemen aren't as great stick handlers, well, if there's a lefty defenseman on... the left side of the field, and I can force him towards the sideline and make him use his right hand, it's going to be really tough for him to make a good pass against pressure. So I want to talk to our attacking about...
This is what hand he is. We're going to make him use his weak hand. Even at the highest level. a lot of these defensemen aren't necessarily comfortable using two hands against pressure. So that's the first thing we want to talk to our attacking about is how do we break down? How do we use two hands on our stick? And how do we make sure we funnel these guys to use their weak hands? Top five biggest pet peeve in all of the cross is the one-handed flyby jump in the air as the attackman riding.
Yeah. My biggest pet peeve is just attackmen getting penalties, and I've seen that too often just by the one-headed check or even guys going off sides when throwing that one-handed check. towards the midline. So I'm telling our guys now, two hands on your stick when you're riding as an attackman, and you're also going to treat the 45-yard line as the midline because I can't see you guys get penalties.
you know i'm teaching more holds these days to my short sticks and poles but uh more so than i have in the past for sure but are you teaching these guys like revos and ways to turn guys back in a certain way right because that As opposed to just saying cross check hold. Yeah. It's a very interesting concept though. If I'm.
If I'm a righty attackman on the left side of the field and I want to turn my defenseman, teaching them the V-hold I think would be something that is very interesting. So talking about it now, it's something that I think could be... could be useful especially because you're it's almost like turning you know attacking underneath and the coma slide coming yeah i think that you can definitely use that to your your advantage yeah and then you want to just keep your keep your ride simple
I think I've, and this is going back to the imposter syndrome. I felt like my first bunch of years in coaching, I had to be the guy that brought out the playbook and the guy that had all these plays and X's and O's. And now I realize that the more simple you can get, the more effective you're going to be. And so I think now, especially in the ride, there's a million ways you can teach it.
but having your guys understand the ride, understanding what they want to take away, and then how to shift is really important. And when I say shift, I mean if they're throwing an overpass from one side of the field to the other, can we shift as an entire unit? towards the ball side and really force them to throw maybe the furthest pass on the field. So I think our ride being in sync when they have to shift is important as well. And it's something that I tell our guys.
all the time like this isn't an offense defense it's not football you guys are directly correlated our offense is our first line of defense and our defense is our first line of offense i think sometimes we can get lost in an offense defense split when It's so correlated, offense and defense. And so I try to go a little bit more towards the basketball approach where your defensemen have to be connecting to the line in front of them. They have to be communicating to our middies.
that are the middle line of our ride and then our middies have to be communicating to our attackmen who are the front of our ride so what are they communicating in an ideal world yeah where to bump to So if our attackman is covering nobody because our midfielder has picked up maybe that middie that's towards the opposite box, well, that attackman needs to know that he has to bump forward and ride that defenseman in front of him because we don't want to.
defensemen or two of our guys riding one offense player that's just that becomes a wasted guy at that point so if we're able to bump somebody forward or bump somebody east west just because our teammate has read that there's somebody else for them to cover then that's something that we want to utilize just to be on the same page. Are you guys 10-man at all? We don't full-on 10-man. I think that...
You know, it's something that you certainly could utilize. I think there are ways to add pressure in your ride outside of bringing your goalie out of the cage. If you believe in it and you want a 10-man every time, then go for it. i um i've done it in the past and if it's something that you're doing um then do it all out i just feel like i'm not necessarily and you know this is a always a staff decision but i think
Sometimes if you're in and out of a 10-man, sometimes it can get a little bit tough in being comfortable with bringing your goalie completely out of the cage and having two defensemen cover three attackmen maybe. So I think that there are so many ways to add pressure.
pressure personally without having to bring your goalie out of the cage. And so again, those teams are, yeah, those, they're teams who are great at 10 manning and that's what they do. And that's their identity. I love that. You know, I think for, for ways to add pressure besides just 10 manning and having the extra guy in the middle of the field. One, you can take away their short six.
And I think that's what a lot of teams' objective would be in the ride is making sure that you take away those short six that are coming back to clearing the ball first and foremost. So identifying what are the ways they want to clear the ball and can we take that away? Maybe they always want to clear up the opposite box side. So maybe we use one of our attack men. Maybe we want to shut that opposite box defenseman off.
Don't let him be that outlet. And then we can use that backside defenseman or force him to use that backside defenseman to be the one that's clearing the ball. Maybe it's shifting up the other side. Maybe we want to shut off the backside defenseman.
because now they don't have that ability to switch fields as much so i think that's that's something you can think about as well when riding is what are they comfortable in doing and we can we take that away and it's something that's really easy for you to install all it takes is hey Johnny's our lefty attackman. You're going to be the one that's shutting off this backside defenseman. I think at Babs and I had such a great experience.
Coach Batty was there and he had played at Brown for Coach Starja. And he would always say Coach Starja said, don't do what everybody else does. And I think it just... it allowed us to be a little bit creative in what we were doing and just trying, you know, trying different things. And if it doesn't work, if it doesn't work and they score, they score a goal, um, against your ride, it's, it's, it's one goal.
So I think you want to think about ways to utilize your ride, and it doesn't always have to be a 10-man to cause pressure. You see some of these teams, and you saw it in the NCAA tournament. I think it was Cornell that did just an incredible job of just a drop-back 3-3 ride. You can force so much pressure in just dropping your guys back as long as they are really good at covering space and knowing how to shift.
you can cause so much pressure by just dropping back into a three, three ride and forcing them to throw tough passes. And that just goes back to the simple piece. Do you guys, do your guys understand? The most basic things and just your regular base 3-3 rod. And I think you saw that in the NCAA tournament when a team like Cornell is just elite at some of the most simple things.
in a ride setting so this is a lightning question it's a little bit of a delicate topic you said you were defense you coach defense early in your career now you're an offensive coach what do you like coaching more It's been a while since I coached defense. I do love coaching both. I would say, one, there's nothing like scoring goals. Certainly when you're coaching the offense, but I would say there's also nothing like making big stops from a defensive standpoint.
I think I would say offense just because it allows you to be a little bit more creative at certain times with what you're doing. Not that you can't be on defense. You certainly can be as creative as you want on defense. I just think offensively... Every single year you're working on what are your strengths as an offense personnel-wise, and then how can you revolve your offense around.
your strengths. So I think every year you have to be so creative with what you do based on what your strengths are. That's such a key difference between defense and offense because on, on defense, a lot of the times you're worried about your weakest link.
¶ Balancing Creativity and Structure in Offense
not your strength. You're like, how can I make it so we're all on the same page and we don't have that fish basically. And how do we support it? Yeah, and I think offensively throughout the year, there's so many things you need to tweak and adjust. Not that you wouldn't on defense, but I feel like the hardest defenses... I've had to coach against are the ones that they know who they are, they know what their plan is, and there's not a ton of halfway decisions. They're either intent on going.
to what they feel like they need to go to or not going. So we talk a lot about if we're scouting a team, what's their slide pace? Are they sliding early to everything and just intent on sliding and recovering? Or are they not wanting to go at all? I think sometimes, at least for me, those are sometimes two of the most challenging defenses to go against because there's no...
There's no room for halfway decisions or second-guessing. They're either going or they're not. And I think sometimes those are the defenses that can be a little bit tougher to go against because they're not making as many mistakes. It feels like if you're trying to do both, you're not doing any almost if you're one way. Notre Dame comes to mind where they're just sliding all the time, which scares the living hell out of me, but they do it so well. Right.
Yeah. How do you mix creativity? You mentioned this early in the podcast. How do you mix creativity and allowing six guys to play together? And you mentioned ownership, which I think is a really cool piece too. but how do you mix that with intention, right? Yeah, I think there's, I heard a coach say it over the summer, and he had played for a legendary coach, and I think... with all that's out there it's easy to get lost in the next play that's out there or the next
two man game that's out there that you see on Instagram. And sometimes we lean, I think it's easy as coaches nowadays to lean towards what's really interesting. And sometimes we get away from what's important. And I think that I can get carried away with some of the creativity and things I see on Instagram or just from watching film or watching basketball. I can get carried away sometimes.
What Coach Levine is so good at and things I've learned from him is understanding how to really keep things simple and to eliminate thinking from your guys. Because when you eliminate thinking, they're kind of playing in that flow state. I think that for us, the way we want to structure it is you want your guys to be able to be creative on their own within that flow state as much as possible. So I think the way we kind of structure our offense here...
is that we talk a lot about the beginning of our offense is a little bit more structured. We structure what the space looks like. We structure what that first trigger might look like. No different than what... probably 90% of offenses do throughout the country at any level. But then you get into the weeds of, all right, now...
So we've ran that first trigger. The ball has gotten through X. The ball has gotten to the backside. And your guys are like, all right, well, what do you do now? I think that's where you have to be creative as a coach and practice in teaching your guys. Here are some of the options you guys have. And then these are the principles we want to be intent on always having, whether it's...
We call it having an ally to the dodge. So if I'm the closest guy to the dodger, I want to make sure I'm ready to give him a follow or a pick, some sort of outlet to whatever his dodge is. And then if I'm... the two guys on the backside or the three guys out on the backside playing together. I want you guys to be creative and in practice so that when we come in game, we're not really thinking.
And we have good spacing and we have good actions, but actions that make sense and aren't actions that take yourselves out of good spots. I think we can get lost in that too as coaches. Sometimes if we tell a guy, we're telling two guys, hey, we need a mandatory exchange on the backside here or we need a mandatory exchange up top on an invert or big little.
I think sometimes we exchange guys out of good spots that they're already in. So I think at times, like teaching your guys in practice, giving them the ability to be creative with the intentions on what you're... principles are if that makes sense no it does and you know what we're over time here and i did want to get to that favorite drill piece but my last question here is around kind of the difference between mixing in even work with uneven work when i was you know
First starting out, I was a big proponent of just running uneven stuff for my defense. And I think over time, I've tried to... make sure that we i mix in the three on threes the four on fours where they're getting maybe more live looks of what they'd see but in a small sided environment i'm just interested like how are you mixing in uneven versus even work in your practices
Yeah, I think about this all the time. And I feel like it's something we struggle with as coaches every year. And what do we do a little bit more of? And I think you got to look at what do you need to work on in practice? What can we accomplish from there? So there's benefits to both, but I think the context of, all right, why do we want to go even this week? I think it's great to go even in a small sided drill in the beginning of the fall or for high school coaches of spring, because.
You want to teach your offense in more of a small-sided setting, so three-on-threes or four-on-fours. Those are ways to figure out who can win a matchup. And then teaching your guys some of the core principles of play in a smaller sided setting. And you can do that in a two on two. You can do that in a three on three. teaching your guys spacing around the dodge, all those things. And then it also teaches them how to play against more pressure.
you're naturally going to get more pressure in a four-on-four drill than you are a three-on-two or five-on-four drill. And then it gives your defense a little bit more of a realistic scheme. What do I have to slide to and what do I not have to slide to as opposed to an uneven drill?
where you're rotating to most things. And why we want to do uneven, I think there's a couple reasons. One, say you're banged up that week and you just want to keep guys a little bit more healthy, then do a ton of more uneven drills. But I think... The uneven drills that you're doing give context. Is this a drill where we're working on? Maybe it's a three on two from the side drill. Most guys do it. It's a great drill. But are you teaching your guys the context of this drill?
Is this drill replicating? Maybe we draw a slide and removing it to the backside. And this is us working on a temporary three on two in a small space. Are we working on man up? attacking gaps in this four-on-three drill. We've got an extra guy. Don't over-dick it. Let's work for a good shot by stepping into gaps and making them rotate. Are we working on more of zone? I think that's a great...
And uneven drills are a great tool to work on how you run zone offense or zone defense. So I think there's certainly benefits to both. I think you have to look at what do we need to work on more this week.
¶ Favorite Drills and Practice Techniques
and really go from there i also think the uneven drills are a great way to create realistic high volume shots for your guys it's hard it's hard to create or really develop your guys as shooters if you're just doing it at a high rate against no defenseman and no goalie. So I think some of the best ways you can create better shooters are by doing those uneven drills because now they're doing it in the context of, I have a defenseman on my gloves.
I have a goalie getting square to me in the cage. It's not me just catching and shooting it versus no defenseman or no goalie. So I think if you're thinking this week about... Our guys just aren't shooting well this week. We need to work on some of our fundamentals. We need to work on our guys and not taking those wasted movements and placing it the right way against a goalie. I think those uneven drills are such a great way.
to develop your shooters as well. I love the point you were making earlier about making sure you're doing drills that mimic what you are as a team and what you want to do. And, you know, having this conversation, I'm like, well, yeah, if you're...
maybe not a sliding team as much i'm not saying don't do any uneven drills but it would make sense that you're not doing a full practice of uneven if that's not what you're doing in the game you're doing more one-on-one and you're playing like that so and so you would play it
more even it's interesting man it's good good great points it's been a great podcast we're going to try to do something new here i'm going to ask you what your favorite drill is let's see if we can pop it up on the screen this is again brand new for this environment. Let's see what we got. So the fan favorite is always West Jenny. I think, uh, obviously West Jenny, we do a lot of variations of it where
My favorite West Jenny variation is it's West Jenny, but you have a feeder at X and you can only throw the ball forward. So there's a fan favorite. If you don't run West Jenny and you're a high school coach. It's the most fun guys will ever have in a drill setting. There's nobody I've ever met that doesn't love the West Jenny drill. This drill is my favorite to run at any level because one of my biggest pet peeves is when guys throw through sticks. And I've ran this drill.
with division one guys i ran with high school guys and i even run it if i'm working with um you know maybe a fifth grade team so this is i love it because it is relatable to all levels And it works on your guys moving your feet as a ball carrier and moving as the outlet. So we call this 3v2 shore. So we're using a soccer circle here. And the soccer circle is cut into half. So right now you see on one side, we have the white offense versus the blue defense. So they can only use this half.
of the soccer circle so one your defensemen are working on playing the ball so this doesn't work unless your defenseman press the ball carrier so you can see we have three guys on offense and white on the side of the circle and two guys on defense So this works great for both sides of the ball. On offense, you're working on moving your feet as a ball carrier, not throwing through sticks, moving your feet as the outlet. But on defense, you're working on constantly exchanging your roll.
So right now, number 41 is on the ball. His role is obviously on ball. The off-ball guy is splitting too. He's announcing that he's splitting too, although his hips should be a little bit more sideways here so that he can see both guys. So it's a great way to work on both sides of the ball. So right now, the guys have to connect and exchange these passes.
So they're working on getting comfortable before they throw, moving your feet to exchange the ball, not throwing through sticks. And then once coach blows the whistle, now it's a full-on 4v3 going to the goal. So you're rewarding the offense. If we can connect a bunch of these passes in a small, tight space, then we're able to get that four and three down the field.
These guys, we've got two short six on defense, so they're not adding as much pressure. But the guys are still working on connecting that many passes. And then it's a four on three breaking out to the goal. And then you're working on some of your transition. your transition offense and transition defense. So this one I love, and we'll do this.
I'll do this in practice. If I feel like our guys are just throwing through sticks, this is a drill that we have to work on because it forces your guys to have to throw with their outside hand to move their feet to exchange passes.
And then again, you're rewarding them with that fast break opportunity once they connect a bunch of those passes. Yeah, I love the addition of the fast break. It makes it into, yeah, top tier drill for sure. Like this drill by itself would be great. And then you have that addition. It's fantastic. Yeah, and I think one way to reward your D guys, and this is something that we haven't done yet, but I just know for the defense, this might not be the most exciting drill.
¶ Final Thoughts
But if your defense turns it over, then you can make, just like Jenny, the last guy on offense to touch it is out. And then you can add in, all right, now it's a three on three going forward with your D guys getting that reward of, okay, we turned the ball over. Now it's a three on three.
going the other way and then allow those allows those guys to work on their transition and just have a little bit more fun with the drill yeah that's a great constraint there like additional piece man this is awesome yeah and here This is number 42. He's a Massapego kid. He's unbelievable at picking off passes, and you see it here, but it also teaches your defense.
off the ball here to immediately get their sticks up in lanes and kind of helps them work on picking off passes. So you can see right now number 42 is kind of reading, reading the eyes of the ball carrier and getting a stick up in a lane right away and ends up picking off.
off that pass so that would be a good time to add in all right that last offensive player touch it is out and now we're working on picking off a pass and going from defense to uh to offense so i think that's something i can definitely layer in in this drill moving forward
yeah i love that idea of comboing pressure i'm gonna i'm trying to like make it an emphasis for our guys to read when we have good pressure on the ball you should then press out and try to cause that turnover too that's great that's awesome man kyle it's been a great discussion Uh, hour and 17 minutes. You're now the longest running episode here on the ride. So appreciate it very much.
I'm a Long Island guy, so I'll talk a lot, especially if we're talking lacrosse. I could be on here for three more hours, so hopefully I didn't disrupt any of the... things you need to use from a podcast standpoint. Dude, not at all. I'll have to edit it a little bit longer, but I enjoy it very much when we get to have a discussion like this. Hopefully I can have you back on maybe before spring season rolls around. We can talk about some other pieces, kind of get into the weeds again.
Again, great discussion. Appreciate you, Coach Hayes. Of course. I'd love to be on again. It looks like I don't think Ole Miss has to play Auburn this year, so we won't have to have any beef once that comes around. But, yeah, I really appreciate your time, and I'm happy to come on at any time.
Awesome, man. Good luck the rest of the season on the football side, too. I know you guys are having a solid season, so hopefully it ends in a playoff appearance. I hope so. I hope so. All right, man. All right, Zach. Thank you.