Celtic's Preparation

[D Parker <danp@town.ipswich.ma.us>]

>Coaching: Another total failure in the second game of a back to back.
>This seems to be a real problem for the Celts and Pitino.  I really
>think that if the Celts don't have a practice to spend getting ready
>for a specific opponent they have very little chance of playing
>reasonably well, much less winning.

It strikes me as a weakness of Pitino's (and other coaches)
micro-management style, where the players have loads of tiny bits of
information poured into them before each games, which in theory should
make them better prepared but doesn't always work out that way.  If a
player spends too much time on the court thinking about which side of the
floor Ron Harper shoots better from rather than playing solid positional
defense his game suffers.

I prefer the Celtics "old school" style of having a minimal set of plays,
each with a few options, but being able to run them to perfection.  Not
only is it less information for the players to remember, not only do they
run the plays smoother, but with a general set of rules to guide them, it
prepares them for almost any basketball situation they find themselves in,
which makes preparation for the second game of a back-to-back situation
much easier.  A few general guidelines for "playing tough defense" would
come in more handy than "force Jason Williams right where he shoots 5.2%
less than on the left side of the court", which is useless against
everyone except Jason Williams.

I think that's one of the reason's Bird has had so much success in
Indiana.  Speaking of Bird, wouldn't it be awfully fun to have him
coaching this team now?

Dan