An Interview with Coach Travis Pettey

Coach V talks with Scripps Ranch HS Coach Travis Pettey about life as an assistant coach (before he became a head coach), the trials and tribulations of trying to install complicated offenses with young athletes, and what it's like having a big man never get any calls from the officials. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:15

Today I do an interview that I did recently with Coach Travis Petty Branch High School. It's my local neighborhood high school where I currently live. And you know, kind of following on this uh trend or topic of assistant coaches that I've been talking about for the last month or so, both on the substack and here on the podcast. Um he's got a really interesting story where he he served as a varsity assistant coach and then varsity head coach in the same season um based on some kind of administrative shakeups that happened with the team. And so uh, you know, it's a good conversation, and I would like to play it for you right now. So without me rambling anymore, uh here's coach Travis Petty. All right. For for this week's uh episode, I'm excited to have um excited to have a good friend in the in the coaching community, Coach Travis Petty from Scripps Ranch High School, which is uh where where I live, which is very exciting. So uh coach, how you doing, man?

SPEAKER_00 1:29

I'm doing pretty good. Uh can't complain about yourself.

SPEAKER_01 1:33

On top of the world, my friends. Um so tell me tell me your story. Like how did you how did you end up? How did you end up coaching? Uh how did you end up coaching at Scripps?

SPEAKER_00 1:47

So I wanted to coach for about I'd say about eight years ago, I thought about coaching. I'd never coached before. Um I only played basketball to my JV year. Um, so I really didn't have any of the traditional like training in one or skills, I guess. Where a lot of these coaches came from like a college playing background and whatnot. Um, but I had a job that basically required me during the winter season, which is the high school season, like 80 hours a week. So it just wasn't possible to do. Um about four years ago, I was able to make some time and I uh I approached the the scripts coach, asking if I could help out, and I ended up being a freshman coach, which was great. And it was in the morning, so it was something I was able to do. Um, and I got in from there. It was uh it was it was an interesting first year, you know. Again, I had no back I hadn't been into basketball packs in 15 plus years. Um coaching is a lot different than and watching the NBA and and strategizing, whatnot. It's a lot more about relationships and whatnot. So I learned a lot that first year.

SPEAKER_01 2:46

Yeah, man. Uh I love that you came in as a freshman coach. Uh, I think they're the like the the backbone of the coaching community. They get just absolutely no love whatsoever. Um yeah. So what was that, what was that like, like coming in, being an assistant coach kind of early on, like stepping in, learning another coach's system. Like how much freedom did he give you to install your own stuff? Like, tell me about that process.

SPEAKER_00 3:13

So, my first year, the goal was to we wanted continuity within the whole program, which is is great. I think that's a great idea, as long as the coach knows how to coach it. Now, I tried my best. It was not an easy thing to teach kids, especially freshmen kids, I'd say half of which didn't play that high level of oriented basketball. And that's that's that's a low bar for high level, I should say. Um, so we had like a we had like a read and react kind of system, which I think is actually quite good. It was the old um St. Joseph's main system. Yeah. I'm sure you've seen it on videos. It got popular probably around the time I started coaching. Um, I think it's an awesome offense, but it's really, really hard to teach because if you have one guy who can't do it, it it blows everything up. Um, so we tried to run that. I can't tell you how many practices I ran that are just purely half court, five out of five, which is terrible. No drills. Um so yeah, I I tried, but it not very successfully.

SPEAKER_01 4:09

Yeah, that a read and react system has got to be really hard with freshmen. I think you need you kind of need a high basketball IQ to rep something like that, or at least like at least the amount of time that it would take, I think, to install something like that. Because like I feel like at freshman ball, you got to spend a decent amount of time like teaching them how to play basketball, like how to dribble pass and shoot. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:38

It should it should be noted that like at least every coach has different ideas of what their freshman team should do, but like it is purely developmental, right? So theoretically, if they can get it down to like 80% of it correct that first year, that's a pretty big win. So by the time they do get to their maybe sophomore varsity or especially junior and senior year in varsity, like now we're really running it well and and and we have time in the system, which you you definitely need.

SPEAKER_01 5:01

Yeah, it's really interesting. Um because I would I would agree with you, right? I think that the purpose of the developmental system is to get the kids ready so that someday they might play varsity basketball, right? Um But I wonder, like when you were when you were coaching the freshman team, and now that you're like running the program, do you like how much importance do you think that there is for the team actually like finding some success on the court as well and winning? Because you want to keep the kids interested in basketball also.

SPEAKER_00 5:34

Yeah, it that that's the other half of it, right? Part of it's development, the other half is just keeping numbers. You know, if the kids are passionate about the game, they'll naturally get better. The kids who don't care for the game and lose interest, they just they fall off. You know, I I look at my I was very similar in that way. I I like to say, like, I peaked relative to my peers, like sixth grade. I was all in on basketball. And then I found a computer game and I just lost my interest, and I slowly just went down and down and down every single year after that. And you see that all the time. You see kids who are maybe your third best freshman in the program, and all of a sudden by their senior year, they they don't even play anymore because they just don't care. So you're right. It with a freshman coach, you want somebody who could develop the kids, especially individually, and as a team as a team as well, uh ideally, but then you want somebody who's fun as well. Um, it can't just be like the military all the time where hey, get this this read and react system down or else you're not gonna play because then those kids are just gonna are gonna give up.

SPEAKER_01 6:25

Yeah. You know, one one of the biggest mistakes that I made, I think, uh coaching was also uh with the developmental teams carrying too many players, right? Like I think the the most success we found as a program and like the the best development for our players at the lower levels came when those teams were really small, like seven, eight guys on freshman, seven, eight guys on JV. Because then they just get they just get so many reps. It it can be hard to practice um I unless you you kind of run those two teams together in practice, but uh those game reps are so important.

SPEAKER_00 7:07

Yeah, it it all depends, right? It depends on how big your school is, too. Right. Like I like to always say, and I mention this all the time, when I coach, I coach middle school as well at Marshall, which is our feeder, and the worst kid on the team two years ago, a 15th guy was an eighth grader. And it mind you, we had a we had a sixth grader, we had seventh graders on the team, but this was an eighth grader. And by the summer of after his freshman year, he was playing low-level varsity basketball. It's just purely passion. So, like, I like to keep more guys just because you never know what you're gonna get out of these kids. Yeah, we have a I I'm not gonna say we're we're a big school because we're not anymore, but we have enough kids where our 15th guy could be somebody down the road for sure if he gets you know more interested in the game.

SPEAKER_01 7:46

Yeah, it's interesting. Um so tell me about like uh what it was like being an assistant coach. Because you had a you had a very interesting journey to your first uh your first time coaching kind of varsity basketball. It sort of was, you know, the some people have greatness thrust upon them kind of situation where you started the season as an assistant coach and you ended the season as a head coach. I I don't know how much of that I I'm not asking you to get into the nuts and bolts of that situation because I don't know how much that you want to talk about, but but tell me about that transition and what that was like um from a coaching perspective purely.

SPEAKER_00 8:32

It was actually it was weirdly enough, especially now with the actual year of varsity experience in my belt, it was seamless for me. I think I was naive about like how big of a situation actually was and the opportunity that I had. Um I remember they told me that because I wasn't the first I wasn't the first option they wanted. They asked multiple people if they wanted to coach the team and they said no. So that was like, I guess we'll we'll ask him if he wants to coach. Um and I had a game the next night after I was introduced as the coach against Mir Mesa at Mir Mesa, which is our rival.

SPEAKER_01 9:06

Right.

SPEAKER_00 9:07

Um but I I didn't feel the pressure at all. Um which it makes no sense given the the gravity and how big of a situation it was. Um but I I did I I I think I just was so I felt so strongly and confident about my ability to potentially turn the team around. I had done so much research on what our issues were over the season as an assistant. You know, that's the beauty of being assistant. You have a lot more time to look at the the smaller things rather than you know dealing with parents and all that. Um I felt really confident. And that first game, we got out to like a 16-2 lead immediately. And I thought I was like Greg Popovich. Like I I I made it. And then they slowly got back in there. I think it was like a three-point game in the fourth quarter, and I was like, oh my god, this is the worst nightmare. And then we ended up winning by 15 or something like that at the very end. But um it was easy because I won that first game, and then I think we won the next four after that, including against some pretty good teams. Um so it it was, I think we just had a lot of momentum, and I think the kids just needed change. Um, so initially they were kind of confused on what was going on with the program, but but when we started winning, and I showed them that hey, I I kind of have an idea what I'm doing, it actually was it was it was quite quite seamless. It really was.

SPEAKER_01 10:17

Well, that's awesome. Um yeah, what was that? Was that three years ago? No, it was two years ago. Two years ago. I think that so that Miramesa team, that would have been when Diego was a sophomore, right?

SPEAKER_00 10:31

Yes. So they had a lot of their current guys.

SPEAKER_01 10:34

Yeah, they were all guards. It was the whole team minus Tim. Yeah, I I remember that team because they beat us in the playoffs that year. They were very scrappy. Yeah, they were they were so fast. Yeah, I remember that team. Uh, we played them the first game of the season that year and the last game of the season. Um they were our we we opened up the season against them in a tournament and they hit, I don't know, 7,000 three pointers. I don't know. I'm having a hard time uh remembering the precise number, but it feels like 7,000 threes. And then we played them uh, you know, the last game of the season in the playoffs at their house and they they thumped us. We couldn't stop, we couldn't stop Diego from scoring. He just made the super awkward like over his shoulder falling away from the basket bank shots. Uh, if you got up in his face and if you like sagged off him a little bit, he was pulling from beyond NBA range. I don't I don't he it was ridiculous. We couldn't stop that guy from scoring.

SPEAKER_00 11:36

There's a reason he scored 2,000 points, right? He's so skilled and gifted. And you know, I think luckily in that game, we got to a big lead, and I think that really saved us in the end. And I think it was probably difficult for uh Coach John at Mir Mesa because the first time we played him and before that, we were primarily a zone team. I think we played like a 32 kind of set against them the first time, and they used to play Diego at the top, so we had length of top, so he could get shots off. And we won by, I think, 15 a home or something like that. And then second time around, I'm sure they don't know what's going on. All of a sudden they see me as the coach, and we're going purely man to man. And it just, I'm sure they're just like, What is going on? This is not the scripts that we expected to play.

SPEAKER_01 12:13

Right. What did you um when you took over the team this year? Um, I know I remember you know, you and I, you and I talked a lot kind of leading into it, but um what did you notice um kind of primarily, like what was the main difference in being uh from having been an assistant coach at the varsity level to being like the guy in charge of the program, like the head coach. Like what did you notice was the like the biggest difference?

SPEAKER_00 12:51

We'll go with uh I'll start with uh from the assistant point of view. Like the negative is obviously you might think you have a great idea, but if the head coach doesn't agree with you, it is what it is. Like the head coach has final say on everything. Um that was that was tough for me because I I you know I've I've been self-employed like basically my whole entire life and make my own decisions. So, you know, if if the head coach agreed with me, that was always tough for me, even though it's it makes complete sense and it that's the way it should go. Um, but I always struggle with that. Um on a positive standpoint, though, on the opposite side, when things go bad, people don't they don't come at you. You go at the head coach, right? Um, they might come to you if they don't think the head coach listened, they might come to you, but then you know what are you gonna say? Like there's there's not much you can say, like it's the head coach's decision, and and you support whatever they they decide to do. Um as assistant, that's your most important job is to support your head coach in whatever they need. Um, whether it's the the simplest task or or more important task, you just gotta do what they ask of you. Um I I struggled with being assistant, especially last year, you know. Um it was it was it was a it was a tough team, you know. We we'd come off a lot of issues that sophomore or I should say that sophomore year. My I call it my sophomore because my second year. Um it we came off a lot of issues, then we had we had a big run, and then they they went a different way, which I understand, you know, it was a lot of drama, so it made sense. And then um, I I think the coach last year, if he had more time, he would have done really, really well. He was a really smart guy, but yeah, it just was a bad timing for him. He started really late. Um we we were I thought we were always behind schedule. Um I remember at one point, I think we were three and three, we played some decent teams, it felt fine, but I was thinking to myself, like, I think I wrote long text and like we're in trouble. Like, we're we're just so far behind right now, it's gonna catch up to eventually, especially because we're in the Western League. You know, yeah, exactly. The public schools go to die.

SPEAKER_01 14:44

Yeah, there's no room. Yeah, there's no room for error in that league at all.

SPEAKER_00 14:51

It's literally three teams every year, and then everybody else rotates, you know, other than I guess New Mason this year is gonna stay in, but like they're losing every uh their guy. So that's that's gonna be tough for them. And no matter who you play, parents underrate like who you play big time and they overrate winning. You know, I I I I was talking to somebody earlier about like if Miami, Ohio was a high school team, their parents would be the most happy people in the world. Like, oh, we're 31 and zero, and ignore like the context of it. Like they haven't played anybody.

SPEAKER_01 15:19

Right, like Nebraska early in the season, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:22

Yeah, so like it's it's one of those situations where parents just care about winning, they don't really care who you play, and it all it all adds up, right? So if you're in the Western League, you're playing the Mission Bays, the Cathedrals, the Saints. If you can pull one win out of that for most of us public school teams, like that's a big win. But because we lost 12 games in the road, I think the end of the year last year, the parents were just were just frustrated and unfairly. You know, it's it's it's it's hard when you lose a Kai Brown and you get moved up to the Western League, right? It's it's really hard.

SPEAKER_01 15:52

Oh, yeah. No, I distinct, I distinctly remember um having that exact same conversation with parents uh the year that we got moved up to the coastal league. Um and I was I was pretty proud of our season in the Coastal League. Like we had four wins that year. Um, and there was, you know, in the Coastal League, we had four wins. There, you know, we had two open division teams and um almost a third open division team that year. Like it the context and the nuance is often lost on parents and sometimes uh sometimes administrators as well. But like our our admin are have were always really great. Like they they were sports people, they got it. Um but yeah, I I like what what was something what was something this year um in you know in your first year running a kind of a big school program like that? Like what was something that you kind of didn't anticipate? What was uh either positive or negative, like something that ended up being easier or harder than you thought it was gonna be?

SPEAKER_00 17:03

That's a good question. Um It took me or took our team a lot longer than I was hoping for to get on the same page. I feel like you know, we our our top eight at the end of the year, basically everyone played from summer, fall, all those games you play, which is like what 50 games plus with this season as well. We had our main guys for I think two games to that point. Yeah, I remember injuries, illnesses. We always had something going on, you know, guys opting out of fall league because they wanted to focus on themselves, you know, for college, which I get. Um and we never the system that I try I tried to build again. I tried to start with reading reactive beginning of the year, and it just we couldn't we couldn't get five guys on the same page. So I had to scrap that, and then you know, we're we're like, should we just go quick hitters and just try to patch it, you know, and should we do this, this, this? And we ended just with a very simple motion offense by the end. Like we started really, like I'm not gonna say really complex, but but fairly complex. And we ended like just very simple, like five out burn, and if our big guys burn, they have a mismatch post-up, just the most simple basketball ever.

SPEAKER_01 18:10

And I mean with the most athletes that you had, like that's not a bad idea.

SPEAKER_00 18:17

It's not, it's not. And and you know, we went we went more defensive at the end too, and and we started doing some more creative stuff on defense to to you know uh mask what weaknesses we had. And by the end, we kind of figured it out. It it sucks that we ended up playing Powi because I think Poway was I think Powi and us were the top two teams in the D D2. You know, who knows if that's actually true. But I really think that by the end of the season, we were the best version of ourselves. We finally figured it out uh in those last like 10 or so games, what we wanted to be. And you know, to be fair, I stopped tinkering with everything too. I thought I thought I just thought we had like a level that we had reached, and if I kept tinkering, we'd maybe we'd finally figure it out. And I was by the end, I was like, we just gotta keep it simple, we're not gonna figure it out. By now, we have limited games left. It's time to get to get right. Um and that I think that that clarity really helped the players as well. Um, so I think that's one thing I uh that now we have six-period basketball at Scrifts, and now I could put in a new system during the offseason where these kids will all understand what we're gonna do going into next year. And it's it's if I've learned anything, it's be simple. Simple is always good because the more the kids are thinking, they can't make quick decisions. And we can't tell them, hey, make a uh quick decision when they're thinking, Am I supposed to go right or left when this guy drives? Like it's just it's really, really hard. Um, and the other thing I learned this year a lot is I know I overcoached at times. I I don't want to be the guy on the sideline yelling constantly what to do and micromanaging everybody, but like I found myself this year, especially compared to my first year, uh, the two years ago that I coached, micromanaging a lot. Um I I don't know if it was the players or maybe just I felt more pressure being a full actually, you know, the the actual head coach. Um and we started so poorly, but I I found myself micromanaging too often.

SPEAKER_01 20:07

I think um, you know, having uh you know, that first year when you were when you were coaching, like having Kai cures a lot of problems, right? Like a a collegiate level point guard can mask all sorts of things and can make a can make a coach's job a heck of a lot easier, uh for sure.

SPEAKER_00 20:34

We also had no you're you're absolutely right. We also had uh another senior guard, Rowan Wimmer, who was like an extremely good leader.

SPEAKER_01 20:41

I remember him.

SPEAKER_00 20:42

And I think that team was more player-led leadership-wise. This team was more coach leadership, um, which you know, I'd rather be player led. But we just we we struggled to get everybody on the same page with the player leadership. So I had to do a lot more than I than I'd usually that I want.

SPEAKER_01 20:59

But I I think you I think you did a good job adapting. And that that was something that like um that you learned quicker than some like first year kind of head coaches, uh, is when to like when to swallow your pride and be like, okay, this I know I had a vision of where this team was gonna go before the season started. And um like now, now that I have you know 60 quarters of evidence in front of me, like I have to shift. And so you, you know, you you did shift like away from uh away from some of the offensive stuff that you were trying to do. You you did shift kind of away from it being uh kind of a player led situation to a coach led situation. Like sometimes you got to take the reins and you have to adapt. And I think that I know for for myself, my first couple of years, I was so freaking stubborn that I didn't adapt. And it's it's something that you it's it's something that you can only really learn one way. Like you only ever find out if you need to adapt um by being thrust into that situation. I thought you, I thought you guys did a good job of that. Like I saw you guys play a couple times this year, and the towards the end of the season, you guys were flowing. I mean, you you guys were dangerous. Um it helps when you have uh like effective size at the guard position and at that at that kind of four-five hybrid position that Alex played so well, right? He he was pulling guys out to the perimeter, um, but also like just throwing, he was man-sized compared to a lot of the teams you guys played, you know. Um and even at even at the at the you know, the D2, D1 level, like physicality is a is a is a big separator. And when you have somebody that's that's built like that, I mean he's he was a beast.

SPEAKER_00 23:10

I I've never asked you this, but I'm actually curious now that you say that because you had oversized kids too, especially for the levels you guys were at. Like yeah, I thought Alex got ragdolled over and over this year, and he would get nothing. It's like the old Shaq treatment. You know how they say Shaq's just so big he's not getting any any calls. I've never had a guy obviously that size before. It it didn't feel right. I just feel like the referee was right. I'm sure it's really hard to referee guy like that, but at the same time, like he was getting crushed by everyone, especially the smaller guys could do whatever they want against him.

SPEAKER_01 23:40

Yep. Uh did that happen with us? Oh my god, Marley used to get just manhandled every game. I mean, like like Marley was enormous, right? For for uh at that time, you know, D5, D4 school, you know, 6'8 to 40 plus, uh he was a monster. And there were games against you know, smaller division five teams where uh I think that if the if like the Guwahome game, there was a game where he scored he had 29 and I think he had 33 rebounds. If they had called everything that game, he would have had 50 points because they were they were climbing on him like he was a jungle gym. Uh he was so big. Uh and he would get really frustrated. Um that's the problem, right?

SPEAKER_00 24:44

Because you're you're you're fighting the referees, but you're also fighting your your your your big man because you see what's going on, but at the same time, you can't get fired up with him or else he's gonna just explode. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 24:56

And he throws one elbow and four kids go flying, you know what I mean? Yeah. Oh yeah. No, it's wild. Yeah, I'm sure. And and like, you know, it toughens them, it toughens them up a little bit. Uh it's really funny. Like, I feel I don't feel bad for him, obviously, but like sometimes those like six, six, six, seven kids at smaller high schools that just annihilate everyone, they get a they get a very interesting uh like perspective shift when they get to college and all of a sudden they're getting thrown around and they don't they don't know how to handle it. It's very interesting.

SPEAKER_00 25:37

It just levels everything.

SPEAKER_01 25:39

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. Hey, so did you think that it was because you went to Scripps Ranch High School uh and you played at Scripps Ranch High School, and now you are coaching at Scripps Ranch High School. Do you think that that is do you think that makes it easier or do you think that makes it harder?

SPEAKER_00 26:06

I think it's easier for me because I know the community. You know, um Scripps has, I mean, you live in here, Scripps has a is known for being tough with parents, you know, a little entitled. Um kids are a little spoiled. But I I grew up here, so I I I'm used to it. Uh I think I'm more immune to it than than most coaches would be if they came here. Um I think it's an advantage in that regard. I I was talking to um the loyal football coach also um lives in Scripps. I don't know if you know him. His name's Todd Roach. And he was telling me that he appreciates being able to come home and being in a different community than the one he coaches in, kind of like you did. So that kind of had it kind of sounded nice when you put it that way. I never really thought about that. Um but I mean I I I came back, I live in Scripps as well now. Um and I came back for a reason. I I I love this area.

SPEAKER_01 26:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:57

So for me, it it's an advantage for me. Um, I I know many people here have like 20 plus people that you know I either play sports with or went to high school at every playoff game. Um it's easier to get support from from the community um because I was from here. I think it'd be a lot harder if I went to some other school and and didn't know who who to even talk to to get that support. So I think it's actually a big advantage.

SPEAKER_01 27:21

That's yeah, that's really interesting. I I know um, you know, you you've uh you've been trying to you've been trying to drag me, um drag me kicking and screaming out of retirement to come and help out. But like like I know I know Scripp's parents because I I am one. And like and like my uh my my boy's in seventh grade right now. Um and he's uh you know, he's a he's a football baseball kid, but he's gonna be, I think, one of those kids that's athletic enough that if he feels like going out and playing, you know, freshman basketball, he might have a might have a shot just because he's he's kind of athletic. But like I know all of those kids, you know, like uh like the ones who are gonna make up that freshman team in two years, like the kids who won't be freshmen on JV or varsity, but would be freshmen on the freshman team. Like I know all of those kids. Uh and I like know all their parents and stuff. And like I I I want to keep I want to keep the relationship how it is.

SPEAKER_00 28:27

I want to be alike it makes a lot of sense.

SPEAKER_01 28:31

Yeah. Oh man.

SPEAKER_00 28:32

Like I I will say though, Dave, we have 15 spots on the freshman team at Script, so there's plenty of spots for him and all his friends.

SPEAKER_01 28:40

And all their friends. Yeah, we'll see. He's uh he has recently fallen in love with football. That's like the new thing. So he's on the he's on the flag team uh at Marshall and he's gonna play Pop Warner this summer. And uh I'm coaching his his like rec flag team in Rancho Bernardo, which is uh which is a whole different uh a whole different thing. Like you you've done this. So we could talk about this too. You coach middle schoolers uh like on purpose. Like you volunteer to go and say, I am gonna go and hang out with these like 12 and 13 year old boys uh and coach them. And like I'm doing the same thing right now. Uh and every day I'm like, why am I doing this? These kids, these kids are so crazy. What's up?

SPEAKER_00 29:34

I'll tell you what, I wasn't sure where you're going with that because I feel like you could the funny thing is I'm actually the opposite way. I really, really enjoy it. Um maybe it's because I've coached these guys for multiple years now, and we just had a really successful season with my third year. You know, we we have a practice squad of six uh with with the sixth graders, and then they all finally moved up now, they're eighth graders this past year, and we won the championship. So maybe that's what makes it more special for me. Yeah. Um they're crazy, they don't listen very well, but then I'm like, my varsity guys are crazy to listen as either. They're my size, they're much more, much more scary. You know, I'm not nearly as cool to them as as my middle school guys. So um I I I enjoy the middle school. And the fun thing is it's right before the high school season, too. So it's kind of like a little preview, and it gets me kind of ready for for the high school season as well. Um, and I got the time, I enjoy doing it. Um ask me again next year when we lose all of our eighth graders. We'll see if it's if that's fun.

SPEAKER_01 30:28

Yeah, I will for sure ask you again. But you have like you got a couple kids. I I know some kids in uh some kids in my boys' class that are that are pretty solid that I know are are on that team that are uh that are good little players. I know you got that that good little guard.

SPEAKER_00 30:44

Um he's very, very good. Like he's he might have been the best player his sixth grade year on the whole entire team.

SPEAKER_01 30:50

Oh man.

SPEAKER_00 30:51

Uh you can go.

SPEAKER_01 30:53

That's pretty cool. Yeah, I I don't I don't know. Like I'm I'm enjoying uh, you know, we we we've talked about this so many times. Like I I'm I've enjoyed this year being detached, um and sort of being able to kind of dip my toes in the water and like with with writing the Substack and keeping myself and working on that freaking book. That's I'm up to 161 pages now, Travis, which is what happens when you're done with the book and you ignore things right in Substack, you're coming back. What what happens is that when I'm done with the book, I'm gonna then spend you know a year editing it and making sure all the diagrams are put in there properly. And it's never gonna, it's never gonna come out. It's just gonna be a it's just gonna be a permanent monster. Um I don't know. I'm I've enjoyed it. Like I know I know that I'll be back at some point. I I don't I don't know when or where that's gonna or what that's gonna look like, but um it has been fun. Like coaching the middle schoolers in flag football has been fun. Um it's it's getting them wrangled in, it's like it's not even herding cats, it's like trying to herd kittens and get them to like build a piece of furniture from IKEA. Like it, like sometimes I'm like, I'm just gonna do it, like whatever. Um they but they're pretty good. Like it's it's it's the the classic thing, right? Like um coaching is a lot more fun when you're winning games with good athletes, and so we're we're we're blowing teams out because I have a bunch of good athletes, so it's it's actually kind of fun. Um but yeah, man, I don't know. Do you uh do you still get out and play at all?

SPEAKER_00 32:43

I have this past week since we lost. I you know, I I was more so like uh once maybe every other week before trying to get back up to two, maybe three times. But I have very different levels of games I play in. I got my old guys, I got my way too competitive guys, and like I was only playing basically old guys during the season because I was in no shape. I couldn't I couldn't compete with with the high-level guys, but now I'm I'm slowly getting in better shape. Um two or three times I think would be great. But I still coach six-period basketball, so it's not like you know, I usually do lunchtime runs, so it's not like I can do all those I like to do.

SPEAKER_01 33:18

Right.

SPEAKER_00 33:19

Um it's mainly weekend and and one day a week during during lunch.

SPEAKER_01 33:25

How are you feeling about uh how you feeling about next season? I know you guys are you're graduating uh when I when I there's gonna be big shoes to fill because I can think of you know three guys taller than six five that are gonna be leaving. Um right? Ej, Alex, Gavin, yeah. Um plus you know uh you know guards and kind of that. What of your top, you know, of your top eight rotation guys, how many of them were seniors?

SPEAKER_00 33:54

Um one. No, sorry, other way, seven. Jesus. Yeah, we we lose uh 90% of our scoring.

SPEAKER_01 34:03

Okay. That just means uh that's 90% more scoring that you're gonna you're gonna find in in exciting places.

SPEAKER_00 34:10

Theoretically, if we can get back to our scoring amount, yes. Okay, it could be that could be halved next year. No, we'll we'll be good. It it's we're losing a ton, and not just 90% of our scoring, like 100% of our height. Um we're losing a lot, but I feel like this next group they're gonna be a lot better at at some of the finer details, like just on ball defense and stuff like that. Um they're they're yeah, they're just better on ball defenders, I think, than this pass group. This pass group was was big, they're skilled, um, they're smart, but this next group is they'll get after you. And I think with that, you can get a lot of points out of strong defense and turning people over, which is something we didn't do very well this year. We didn't turn too many people over, like the point where we played zone for a decent chunk of the year. Um, that was mainly to deter field goal percentage. It wasn't to steal the ball unless you made the mistake against us. So I'm I'm optimistic. You know, it's it's it's a good group of guys, they listen really well. Um, it'll be it, it'll it'll do a lot more coaching do this this upcoming year, um, this past year where we kind of just simplified everything.

SPEAKER_01 35:16

Well, and in classic uh San Diego section uh format, right? You guys are gonna be uh rewarded um with your competitive season and graduating all your seniors by probably getting promoted up to division one. Um when is the um do you know is it like permanently on hold the the like the football thing or the southern section thing where they were gonna rank the teams at the end of the season?

SPEAKER_00 35:43

So we had a meeting maybe a week or two ago. Yeah. And it sounds like the football format in up there is still kind of in limbo. They're like they're not sure about it, because obviously there's issues with that as well, and people hate change. When they voted on when we we spoke about in the room for maybe about five minutes or maybe 10 minutes, and a lot of people just don't understand, I think. And they and because they don't understand, they don't want it. To me, it makes way more sense. Ideally, you tweak the max preps rankings a little bit to strengthen strength the schedule we've talked about before, so that you don't have like some D4 team who went 25 and 3 and gets put up to D2 or shoot, maybe even D1 and gets blasted. Yeah, yeah. Because I I don't know as a coach personally, like I'd rather play the the 25 and three team, the Miami, Ohio, I guess, for for example, than uh a team who's ranked a little higher than them in, like say Kemp or something, and is 15 and 15 or 12 and 12, whatever. Right because that team's been playing big teams the whole year, like they're they're battle tested, whereas Miami, Ohio, they're scooting by you know small quad three or whatever schools over and over. Yeah, exactly. So if they could tweak that and make it more predictive and accurate, I think that the football way is by far the better way to go. Now, of course, you got coaches, especially D4 coaches. I understand this like you build a program up, you're you're technically D4 team, and now you get moved up to D1, D2, and you don't win it, whereas D4, you'd won. And all the parents are sure, like, oh, if we're D4, we've been great, but now we're D2, D1, D2. It's like we're an average team in here theoretically. So I get that as well. But I I don't know. I I'm I'm of the opinion that I'd rather be a D1 and lose in the second round than play D4 and win it all. Um, I want to play the best if we are capable of that. If that's what we're supposed to be, I I'm happy with that.

SPEAKER_01 37:26

Yeah, I agree. Uh there's a small crazy part of me that thinks it would be fun if you just lumped everybody into one division for the playoffs and you did a 64 team tournament. Just a 64 team tournament. That would be awesome.

SPEAKER_00 37:44

The one versus 64 would be would be rough.

SPEAKER_01 37:46

Yeah, but I mean it's rough in in college too. Like, who cares? Like, not every the 64th ranked team, I don't think deserves an equal shot at winning a championship. Like, it's not equal opportunity. And it would, I think it would solve the problem of some of these teams failing their way to success, right? 2,500 student schools that are falling down to division five and winning titles. Sure. But which did not happen this year, which is nice, but it has happened in the past.

SPEAKER_00 38:12

But then you got schools who are, let's say, um, let's use our buddy Eric, for example. I think they finished like 70 something. Imagine they finished 64th.

unknown 38:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:20

And you tell them, hey, great job. You have a hundred kids at your school. Go play Francis Parker. Go play Francis Parker. Good luck. But like, I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 38:29

Like I said, there's there's part of me that like loves the chaos of it. You know what I mean? Like, what happened? Like, could you imagine if there was a 215 upset in one of those? Like, somebody comes out, like Valhalla comes out, and that little guard hits 17 threes in a game or something like that. It would be awesome.

SPEAKER_00 38:48

I think he could hit 17 threes and they'd still lose by 10.

SPEAKER_01 38:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:53

What did that say?

SPEAKER_01 38:54

Oh, I was just I was flashing a little note that said, Gotcha.

SPEAKER_00 38:58

Yeah. Sorry. It's so far away from you.

SPEAKER_01 39:00

I'm like it's actually less than that now. So I'm running out of my my free Zoom time. Dude, um hey, uh first of all, um thanks for thanks for coming on. Um thanks for the the the extended like late night text conversations um over the last you know couple of years. Um when I was thinking about leaving, when I was coaching, when we when we were playing against you guys. Um you know, it's been a lot of fun. Uh, I look forward to seeing where you go um and and supporting the team uh from from the stand side of the sidelines, not from the bench side of the sidelines. But um you'll be back.

SPEAKER_00 39:40

Assistant coach, I feel like you'll come back as an assistant coach in next two years.

SPEAKER_01 39:44

Yeah, we'll see about all that.

SPEAKER_00 39:46

I feel strong about that. All right, brother. Well, thanks for your time. Of course, Dave.

SPEAKER_01 39:50

Appreciate it. I'll talk to you later. Yeah, bye. All right, that'll do it. Uh as always, you know, thanks for listening. Thanks for taking the time out of your day to read the Substack or listen to me ramble on the podcast. It makes me feel like I'm still involved in high school basketball, and that's you know something that's very important. So, I'm just gonna go to the back.