Coach shoots from the hip

["Stephen Beauregard" <sb@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Coach shoots from the hip
Carlisle grabs Pacers' reins
By Shira Springer, Globe Staff, 10/12/2003

INDIANAPOLIS -- Rick Carlisle willingly accepts a few basic Boston basketball
truths. First and foremost, a story about the start of his head coaching
tenure with the Pacers inevitably will be about Larry Bird. At least in part.
Knowing this, Carlisle comes prepared with a few entertaining Bird anecdotes.

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So, let's begin at the Pistons' 2002 training camp, when then-Detroit coach
Carlisle asked Bird to visit.

Bird, taking a hands-on approach, worked with Ben Wallace on free throw
shooting and spent time instructing Chauncey Billups on how to post up smaller
point guards.

Carlisle asked Bird to speak to the team about "weak areas" and "what he felt
it would take for us to get to the conference finals." The players hung on
every word. At the end of his brief talk, Bird told the players it was an
"honor" to spend the day with them. The players all shook Bird's hand and
thanked him.

At this point, Carlisle turned to his assistant, Kevin O'Neill, and said,
"That seemed to go pretty well."

O'Neill raised his eyebrows and replied, "Pretty well? Hey, Rick, that's Larry
[expletive] Bird. That was unbelievable."

In the retelling, Carlisle still gets a good laugh. It's just one of many Bird
stories Carlisle can recount, but it reveals an important characteristic about
the Pacers' new head coach: He prefers to keep things simple and understated.

In the words of new Pacers point guard Kenny Anderson, Carlisle "is bland, but
not in a bad way. You know what I mean?"

"He's straightforward," said Anderson, who played for Carlisle when Carlisle
was an assistant in New Jersey and Portland. "He's into details. He's a
no-nonsense type of coach. He's going to tell you like it is. That's his
personality."

Carlisle, whose team beat the Celtics, 91-90, in exhibition action last night
in Conseco Fieldhouse, returned to Indiana and officially assumed the Pacers'
job Sept. 3, two days before he planned to sign a broadcast contract with ESPN
and 26 days before the start of training camp. For a coach whose style is
often described as "structured" and "organized," the timing was admittedly
"unusual." Carlisle would have liked a summer to build relationships with
players who were not on the Pacers when he served as an assistant for Bird
from 1997-2000. And assembling a staff just weeks before the exhibition season
was not easy.

But the transition appears to have gone smoothly, much smoother than
Carlisle's departure from Detroit after two Central Division championships.

Carlisle was dismissed as the Pistons' coach after compiling two 50-win
seasons and a trip to the Eastern Conference finals last spring. Rumors
abounded that his interpersonal skills left something to be desired.

But during his introductory press conference, Carlisle came across as affable,
even joking that contract negotiations were held up by Bird's insistence he
take a Dale Carnegie course. Judging from the shootaround yesterday morning,
Carlisle appears to have a good relationship with his players, staff, and
Bird.

It helps that Reggie Miller, Jermaine O'Neal, Austin Croshere, Jeff Foster, Al
Harrington, and Jonathan Bender were with Indiana when Carlisle was an
assistant. But the biggest advantage may be a friendship with Bird -- the
Pacers' president of basketball operations -- that dates to their playing days
in Boston.

"Larry and I both have a similar view as to how the game should be played, and
a lot of that probably goes back to our experience playing in Boston," said
Carlisle, who teamed with Bird on Celtics squads of the mid-1980s. "It's
pretty simple -- play hard, defend, and share the ball. That common view makes
it logical and workable to work together, and be able to work together well.

"We talk about the team often -- sometimes more than once a day -- how to
improve the players we have, and also possible ways to tweak the roster
through trades, free agency, and the like. The fact that Larry and I have a
friendship, and have been through a lot together over the years, is certainly
a great plus."

During the Pacers' first-round loss to the Celtics in last season's playoffs,
Indiana lacked leadership. And with the Pacers finishing second to the Celtics
in technical fouls last season, they also lacked discipline. Those are two
areas Carlisle addressed immediately. He will look to O'Neal and veterans
Miller, Anderson, and Anthony Johnson for leadership. And Carlisle has already
emphasized the importance of limiting technicals.

Carlisle's challenge is figuring out how to best use the Pacers' depth. In
Detroit, Carlisle fashioned one of the top benches in the NBA. With the
Pacers' high number of multiposition players, he hopes to take advantage of an
"inherent flexibility" with the roster. For example, O'Neal holds a size
advantage against most power forwards and an advantage against most centers.
Harrington can play big vs. small forwards and quick vs. power forwards. And
Ron Artest possesses strength and quickness at the small forward and shooting
guard spots.

"I am hopeful that we can have a regular rotation of nine, with the
possibility of playing 10," said Carlisle. "Our depth and balance has to be
one of our strengths, and after my experience in Detroit, where we had one of
the top benches, I definitely believe that there is strength in numbers."

Regardless of how the rotation sets up, the Pacers will be defensive-minded.

"I guess it's no secret that I believe in a tough-minded defensive style,"
said Carlisle. "In Detroit, we hung our hat on our defense and I believe we
have the kind of roster here in Indiana to be a very good defensive team, but
time will tell. If you defend at a high level, you can stay in games even if
your offense struggles. Last year in Detroit, we had five or six games where
we shot under 40 percent for the game, but were still able to win because we
were holding the other team in the low 30s.

"What we really want is to have it both ways -- flow on offense and a
possession mentality defensively. Those two concepts are philosophically
diametrically opposed, but our Detroit teams had success because they had the
discipline to be able to do both." "Time will tell if we can develop that kind
of discipline here in Indiana."

Time will also tell if a former NBA Coach of the Year can bring the type of
playoff success he had in Detroit to Indiana.

"Our most important goal is to develop into a team that can win in the
playoffs," said Carlisle. "To get there, we will have to develop a certain
kind of toughness, discipline, and trust. It will not be easy, but we are
committed as a franchise to getting there."

Thanks,

Steve
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