Estimated read time: 3 minutes
Hey Coach,
Story time.
A few months ago I watched a coach give feedback during a stoppage. Player made the wrong read on a drive. Coach walked over and said: "You gotta pass there. If the help comes over, it’s not your shot."
Player nodded. Same situation came up two minutes later. Same mistake.
The coach wasn't wrong. The instruction was accurate. The problem was the delivery. It didn't create behavior change, because it didn't ask the player to recall anything.
Last week on The Hours, we shared some teaching tools for coaches - not WHAT to coach, HOW to coach.
Here are two actions that lead directly to behavior change:
1. Ask "What did you see?"
Before you tell a player what to do, ask what they saw. When a player recalls a visual pattern — what they actually saw in that moment — they connect your feedback to a real memory on the court. When you say "pass it there next time," there's no anchor. When you ask what they saw and they describe it themselves, now your coaching lives inside that memory. Just making a statement doesn't take them back to the moment where they actually need to make a different decision.
Asking what they saw trains their MIND and their VISION for similar scenarios.
2. Connect before you correct.
If a player's effort is low and you want to address it, don't open with the correction. Open with the connection. Something as simple as: "Man, I'm tired today too. I can feel it in you. But this is our only practice this week and I know you can push through." That's not soft. That's smart. Players who feel seen are players who respond — and the correction lands because the connection was made first.
Coaches inside SAVI Basketball are using teaching tools every week. Here's what one of them had to say:
Coach Faniel
That shift — from telling to asking, from correcting to connecting — is exactly what we mean when we say coaching basketball isn't enough. You have to teach it.
Pick one of these moves and use it in your next practice. Just one. Watch what happens when you ask a player what they saw instead of telling them what they missed.
Reply and let me know how it goes.
Stay SAVI,
Tyler
P.S. Join SAVI Basketball (FREE for a week) to get practical frameworks you can apply today. Enhance your teaching and transform your program!
