Last season Chad Warner led the Shorter University Hawks (Rome, GA) to the NAIA Final Four with a record of 34-3 while grabbing the NAIA National Coach of the Year Award. He runs the Read & React Offense, but you probably guessed that already. Below is part one of a four part interview that Rick Torbett did with Chad. We thought some of his insights were definitely worth sharing.
This 11-minute video covers a lot of ground some of which I hope will help convince those of you who are trying to decide if the Read & React is right for you to take the leap. But, for those of you that are already running the Read & React, there’s plenty here for you as well.
At 2:32 Coach Warner brings up one of the main benefits of buying into the Read & React; you can now put your five best players on the floor at the same time (regardless of traditional numeric position). Of course, your line up still has to accommodate for defensive match ups, but no longer must you have your fifth best player on the bench because he happens to be your second best post player. You can play who you want when it’s most beneficial for the team… and the system will adjust. That’s important. The Read & React adjusts to your personnel, you don’t have to adjust them to the system.
Along the same lines, the Read & React lets you put your own ‘fingerprints’ onto the system as Chad mentions at 3:47. You are still the coach and just like the Read & React can adapt to your players, it can adapt to your coaching personality as well; formation preferences, tempo preferences, and most other preferences you can think of. No two teams run the Read & React exactly alike.
The Read & React is a redefinition of motion offense (7:02). In short, Rick moved the decision making from the point of the pass (where is sits in traditional motion) to the lane after a player has cut (or driven and kicked). Once a player’s feet are in the lane, they have the freedom to make many of the same decisions they could in a motion offense. It is a system that maintains accountability while allowing for freedom.
Finally, Coach Warner closes at 9:09 discussing when the offense clicked for him. And, yes, it had something to do with being 4th in the nation in 3-point percentage.
Have you had similar experiences with the Read & React? Tell us your thoughts in the comments section.
By the way, Chad mentioned the Dribble Drive (gasp!) – you can get a complete breakdown of how the Read & React is different from the Dribble Drive Attack here.
Go to google search tool and type in shorter college basketball, then click on videos you will see some games. Here is a link you can try http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=br_d1bYE3I0. Coach Warner spoke at a Coaching clinic at CSU this past weekend and I can tell you that everything I learned was good very helpful to me teaching the R&R this upcoming season. The biggest thing I can take from him is that you as a coach must learn how to teach R&R to your players and have them buy into the system.
Where can we get game footage of shorter University?