Latest / JM3 Lacrosse Podcast / JM3 Lacrosse Podcast Season 7, Ep. 7 - Loyola Offensive Coordinator Justin Ward

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JM3 Lacrosse Podcast Season 7, Ep. 7 - Loyola Offensive Coordinator Justin Ward · JM3 Lacrosse Podcast

• Sara Munro: This is the JM three Lacrosse Podcast conversations about playing, coaching, and learning the game differently. From player development and skill acquisition to the ideas shaping the future of lacrosse. This is JM three. Jamie Munro: How's it going, everybody? Welcome back to the JM3 Lacrosse podcast. Excited to have Loyola offensive coordinator Justin Ward on the show. Second time back. Went back and listened to our episode from three or four years ago. And very excited to catch up with Justin. great first season at Loyola last year. after a great run at Army for eight or nine years. Justin, really fired up to have you on the show again. Justin Ward: Jamie, thanks for having me. we're we were joking before just going back and listening to our our first one. I'm excited to see how much of the stuff we will kinda double click on and how much stuff is new. but regardless, I'm always honored to talk X's and O's with you and talk about lacrosse. Jamie Munro: Thanks, man. Well, in listening to that podcast, I gotta bring up a quote from Coach A that you mentioned. The difference between who you are now and who you will be are the books you read, the podcast you listen to, and the people you meet. I love that quote. I've forgotten about it. And I think that would be an unbelievable place to start. Justin Ward: Yeah. again, well documented in the last one, how much Koachabarisi has impacted my life, continues to impact my life. but that quote really kinda reveals, you know, one of his, you know, core tenets as a human is just the the radical curiosity. you know, and I've had many other influences on my life that have kind of breathed that into me. But just that that burning desire to one try to surround yourself with great people. another quote that ties into it is you know, better to be interested than interesting. so that that curious point of view on the world and you know, everybody we meet can hopefully add something to our our life or as coaches. it's pretty profound. So yeah, just trying to Meet as many people as you can from a lacrosse standpoint, I think of the coaches convention coming up in December. always make it a huge priority to try to get together with one or two guys and you know, talk shop, get the you know, get the film out, get the the the pads of paper out and start drawing some stuff up and and see what sticks for me and and how I can then hopefully bring it to my team and my organization and and help us be successful. But yeah, an absolute Day one quote from Coach A, we were in the office for like six days to that point and he hit me with that and it like, Whoa and then you get around a leader where he lives it every single day. It it certainly you know it is a truth. Jamie Munro: Yeah. So cool. Well give me a couple of examples. What are some of the books, podcasts, conversations you've been having lately that are exciting for you right now? Justin Ward: Yeah, so at the convention last year, Jim Mitchell gave a great presentation around principles of play and constraints led approach, as did you. and in Jim's he had a like a a reference page at the end and he had listed, you know, some of the things that he had read and digested around C L A and and one of the books was small advantage, big advantage. I have it right here and Usually in the month of August when summer recruiting slows down, I I typically try to get a week of, you know, I have a young family, so kids and and there's a lot going on, but I usually try to get away a couple hours a day and really reflect and see what I can add to my my bucket. and we had just bought a house this summer, so we do a lot of yard work and my month of August, so my my world was a little unpredictable, but finally last week I was able to get to this book, Small Advantage, Big Advantage. And it's a lot of what you talk to your guests about. it's a lot of what you teach. and just really simplified the way that I already started to believe in things. last time I was on, we started talking about dominoes, and that was kind of the first time that had kind of, come onto the scene. But the book was really rooted in, you know, how do you go from neutral to getting a small advantage? what are the small advantages and then how does a good offensive basketball team turn the small advantage into a big advantage. and it's just so interesting how that's already things that we're talking about as a team, in terms of things that we value, but it's just a very simple way to look at how you need to play offense. You just need one small advantage that hopefully kicks, some things into motion, whether that is an effective long dodge an effective pick, really hard ball movement that really changes, makes an approach late. and now you get somebody to slide from an area where they're not used to or they fail to slide because they're not ready, or you just change a matchup and now it turns into a big advantage. And it might be five or six small advantages in a row, but eventually if you're skilled, you communicate, you have great spacing and you love to share the ball as an offense, You should hopefully be able to find that big advantage. And the big advantage, you're just looking for one great shot per possession. And hopefully it's the one that you can put in the back of the net. So Saba, small advantage, big advantage. I just read the book last Friday on our road trip to Delaware. It's like fifty four pages. So it's not a long read. so it it was just pretty enlightening. And there's also some drills in there that they use from a basketball point of view that hopefully we can we can study and see if they apply to us for the springtime. Jamie Munro: Yeah, it's so cool. honestly, thinking about creating advantages in the offense is what it's all about. And there's so many ways to do it. And with how different all your players are and what they're, you know, given skill sets and elements of physicality, you know, you can allow your players to figure out how to create advantages in so many different ways. why don't you rattle off a few of the different ways that you're thinking about creating advantages in your offense beyond the The obvious, you know, long dodge matchup. Justin Ward: Yeah, so you said it, long dodging. Hopefully you've got some guys that have good speed and they and they understand angles and they can get to the area of the field. We call it the paint, you know, the area in front of the goal that should hopefully trigger a slide. or at least half of a slide or a fake slide. some other ways that that we try to focus a lot on creating advantages, number one would be, you know, effective pick play. so trying to get two guys to the ball and then if you get two guys to the ball you're typically looking to throw back towards the picker. Another way is in the pick play, you can change a matchup. So there's a small advantage in which you then throw back. see a lot in the NBA. It's a lot of, hey, let's get the ball to our best player, let's set a ball screen, let's see what kind of matchup we can create. something we've been exploring this fall is a lot more bringing the pick together to simply flip the field. so there's a form of misdirection. you know, we've got some terms that our guys are starting to get comfortable with that allow us to flip the field pretty quickly, and now you've overloaded. the defense to one side. another small advantage that I referenced in our last conversation is in quick dodging or an approach dodge off of ball movement, the dodger's intentionality in catching the ball while moving. So I think in the previous call we had talked about starting your dodge before you catch it. Jamie Munro: Yeah. Justin Ward: So before you catch that ball, are you moving into the pass two to three yards? Or maybe if you're a more one-handed player and you're on your side to catch it in a drift. So now you're moving away from the ball, but you're moving away from your man. the teams I think that struggle to create leverage and quick dodges are teams the receiver of the ball is catching it on his heels. so now you're allowing a at our level, very athletic defensemen or shortsticks to square you up and and get that first point of contact. And they win that first point of contact. And now if you don't, you if you're not able to re-dodge off of it, It can really stymie what you're trying to do. so go and catch, more of a go and catch mentality instead of catch and go. we want to be a moving target as we catch the ball. And then one of the things that maybe it's just the second year in the system and what we emphasize and and what we bring a lot of attention to in the film room, we've had a lot of success this fall screening. I think a lot of Americans we think of screening as like, I'm gonna set a cross screen and my teammate's gonna cut to the ball and he's gonna catch and he's gonna score. but screening off the ball to switch a matchup, screening Jamie Munro: Mm-hmm. Justin Ward: off the ball to, open a perimeter teammate for a time and room shot, like might be found like a mumbo or a downscreen. but really where it's come to life, what we've been trying to emphasize is screening defenders that are on their way to approach the ball. So if if I am on the right handed wing and you are on the let's say the back of the crease, the ball's on the left hand side of the field, and my man is beginning to work out towards the wing, but he has to go by you to get to the wing, we're really challenging our guys, like, hey, how can we I don't say interfere, but how can we screen that man and now his approach turns into a circular or arced approach? Which now if I'm attacking the pass or catching it in a drift, I just went from small advantage to big advantage because now that approach is completely offline. the other thing you'll get when you do that is if you're screening and that guy starts flying out to the to the dodger or shooter, now the screener becomes open. So Jamie Munro: Yeah. Justin Ward: that's where I've really enjoyed being in principle based offense the last four or five years. I think it was ever since twenty twenty three. Because that that concept doesn't always show itself in a more pattern based, rigid, you know, two, three, one motion offense or an umbrella offense with a pop guy. it can, but it to me it has presented itself much more in our off ball play than maybe some other offenses that I've coached. Jamie Munro: So are you generally getting that look, sealing the drift and then slipping it if they fight through it? Is that how you're getting it or are Justin Ward: Yes. Jamie Munro: you getting it in some other ways too? Justin Ward: it is at its best when the ball goes to the middle of the field. but it doesn't always have to be like a perimeter, like I would call that a flare screen. You see it a lot in basketball. You got a great shooter, you know, he starts working to the inside and at the top of the key and then he flares or he banks towards the wing to shoot it. that's something that we certainly will execute just through the course, or it could be more of a set piece if there's a shooter that we really want to get their hands free. But you'd find it a lot even in like an alley dodge. If if we're moving one of our players to the backside wing and one of their defenders is now trying to either maintain the matchup and get back out to that man, another offensive player, if they have to go by you to get to your teammate that we're trying to quick dodge with, screen And it may not be like a a full two second run block type screen. But now they're thinking about getting around it or now they're thinking about switching it. And now you might get two guys stepping to that man. So we can find it when we dodge a high wing and we go under and we're looking to use X to flip the field. Or on a sweep, it it might actually be faster. It may, you know, sweep and if you get a good piece of that guy, it could be a pass to a shot, or they scramble over your screen and they slide at the same time. Now the screener's open. So you can get some high to low look to the inside that That we have found this fall. Jamie Munro: Have you messed around with trying to get that with it on a drift towards X? Or do you feel like it's too easy for them to kinda switch that and pick up the guy who would who would slip to the middle? Justin Ward: Is the screen happening on the dodge side or on the like when the guy Jamie Munro: Backside. Justin Ward: so you have a wing dodge taking place. There's a there's a teammate there's a teammate at X. We Jamie Munro: Yeah, it might be too hard to do it. You almost have to just dive out. Yeah. Justin Ward: we would more so we have an action that that we could exchange the man at X and the man in the crease. So there could be some natural interference. The only Jamie Munro: Yep. Yeah. Justin Ward: thing I you you may lose is you may lose your forward outlet unless you're playing with two guys behind the goal to start with. most of what we do there's typically one guy behind the goal. So if you're gonna screen for him, either drifting or sneak into the backpipe, I haven't done it, but I'm open to trying Jamie Munro: I was Justin Ward: anything, especially in the fall. Jamie Munro: I was thinking about it in the context of like if you're looking for a drift and they're and they're letting themselves get hung up and then you can steal the approach as he's trying to get out as he's gonna meet me. You know what I mean? Justin Ward: The recovery. I see what you're saying. Yeah. Jamie Munro: almost like a back pedal pick up the hash but off of a drift. Where you get in the way of that guy and if they switch it, they'll probably both go to the ball and then you could slip right through it. Otherwise you might have a backpedal right up the hash, 'cause the guy's staying in front. Sometimes they don't go behind the or afraid of the drift, so they'd rather just get hung up. Justin Ward: Right. Jamie Munro: And then figuring out a way to do that that way is just popping it popped into my head, which would be an interesting look. Justin Ward: would be interesting. We might have to try that at practice today. Jamie Munro: you know when you're talking about dodging in receiving the ball and like starting your dodge before you get it, one concept I haven't really figured out how to do yet, but I've been thinking a little bit about that Alex Rama talks a lot about in basketball is a blast cut. Have you he have you heard that terminology? A blast cut is a cut with a double gap where it's like a topside hard cut to receive the ball to catch it and turn a corner immediately downhill to the rim. So it's kind of the opposite direction of what a drift would be. It's it's more towards the ball rather than away from it. And with a double gap, you can get a step. without the ball, catch it and turn the corner. In women's lacrosse, this actually happens all the time. My daughter just graduated from Northwestern and Maddie Taylor naturally does blast cuts all the time against zones where she just starts cutting and people hit her and she just catches it on the perimeter and just turns the corner right through the gap rather than waiting to catch it and attack where the defense has time. And in basketball it's a really good way to get a step on people. if you look it up on Transforming basketball, you'll probably find it, but it's just another way of looking at it. I'm not sure how applicable it is in men's. I would think it could be, but in any case, it just popped into my head when you were talking about that, because that's been a topic racing through my brain for the last couple of months. you know, you were talking about alley dodges and small advantages versus big advantages. And I know on the last call we talked a lot about redodging, but certainly if you just Alley dodge and draw slide. it can be good, but generally they'll slide to you and peel off. And yeah, matchups have changed and you can probably get it backside and they might have to collapse in, and you might have a little bit of a bigger advantage with an approach on the backside. But a lot of times I feel like it doesn't actually do that much because they can recover so quickly. They can peel off of you and be back in to the to somebody on the crease, within less than two seconds. And I've been thinking a lot about the ability to not let that guy slide. Either by bouncing out or bearing out or just by taking an angle that's a little bit wider. And reattacking it later, which everybody knows is a redodge. But what I'm sort of getting at with this though is the difference between getting two on you versus drawing a slide and allowing them to peel off of you, where you do have two players wrapped up in that for a couple of seconds, but with a really good defense, you might not really have that much. Whereas if you can get two on you, now the defense really does have to collapse. And when they can't really peel off of you once you reattack late, the middle on the ball can't peel off you the way he can on the initial alley dodge. And I just think it's an interesting concept that I wanted to hash out with you for a minute. Justin Ward: Yeah, I've got a story on this actually. So last year, I'm very fortunate here at Loyal. Obviously, Charlie Toomey is our head coach and leader of the program. Matt Dwan is our defensive coordinator. but I'm very fortunate every day to work with Sean Cottle. so Sean is is Dave Cottle's son. big coach Cottle was here for many, many years and and really helped lead this program very quickly from the transition in nineteen eighty three to division one. when he came into town a couple years later. so I work every day with Sean and again I'd be failed to i if I didn't mention guys like Rick Lewis who I work with at Army, Connor Kubukowski. I worked alongside Matt Rikowski. So I've everywhere I've been, I've been able to have an extra offensive guy here on the staff. and Sean, maybe our sixth or seventh game, and to this point we had seen teams that had really tried to cut the field, slide hard. They were a timing-based defense. I think this is where you're going with this. And so this this team we were playing more more so in the middle of the year. So, you know, a couple games in, you know, we could say, hey guys, we need to re-dodge, we need to re-dodge. But we felt like we needed to make it stickier. And Sean just, you know, kind of came up with the expression, we needed to massage the dodge. in the spirit of slowing down, controlling both our man as well as the slider. And It was a it was, fortunately we had a whole week to work on it. And so we kinda tinkered with some of our drills a little bit, around timing and we were able to leverage our scout team a little bit. And wouldn't you know it, it was like one of the very best coaching cues we had given to the team the entire year. and it just so worked out. We had a couple guys that maybe weren't necessarily burners, but they had really good understanding for, you know, how to capture the slider. and just for some reason that turn like massage, It just worked with our guys. And so everybody else was able to play off of the speed of the dodge, but we were just telling the guys hey, our first dodge, we don't need this to be a shot out of a cannon. the more we can try to live, throttling between, gears, we can engage our man on the ball and we can engage the slider, but never be at full speed. And that was a huge point of emphasis for us in that game and what it allowed is it gets really hard defensively to know what the next Domino is. If your dodger's not in a full sprint and he's able to throttle, start fast, slow down again, it's re-dodging. but for some reason, the way we just it massage, it worked for those guys offensively that we had a really successful day off of the dodge, taking a sliding team and we were able to kind of use it to our advantage, more so than we had in previous games when we played teams like that. so that's just a story that double clicks on what you're saying. and it was it was a good day for us. We we we got to a good number that allowed us to win the game. Jamie Munro: Yeah, I think it's so important. And one of the things I've been thinking about a lot over the course of years is how to create an external focus of attention. Meaning an internal focus has to do with the dodge, what you're doing. An external focus has to do with what the defense is doing. And you're talking about that because you're talking about not, controlling your guy and not letting them slide with the big picture intention of either get a great shot or get two on you. And trying to get people to understand that when you draw a quick slide and recover, you're really not getting two on you. And it's not like the worst thing in the world to just bang the ball and get it backside. But at some point you got to, if you're gonna get that big advantage, you got to get two on you or get to that spot yourself to get the shot that you're looking for. have you been thinking much from a CLA perspective or an ecological dynamics perspective of external focus of attention. Is that something that you've taken a dive into? Justin Ward: off the top of my head I can't say that we have been overly committed to it. a lot of the we we we d yeah w Jamie Munro: You do it. You definitely do it because you're talking about defense all the time. But yeah. Justin Ward: Upon reflection, I'm I'm sure we'd be able to, like for example, so if we're talking about drifting, here's one that pops into my head. One of the coaching cues will give our attackmen at X. if the ball is on the wing and it's being dodged, most disciplined defenders, if they're like hedging off of X and trying to get back, they never want to really show their numbers. Like they should have a shoulder towards the ball and a shoulder towards their man. Jamie Munro: Mm-hmm. Justin Ward: So that they're kind of standing sideways. Everybody has like their own terminology for that. But for our ex attackman, we would say if you ever see the back of his numbers, you got to take off. You got to drift. So that would be an example of an external cue that I would give an ex attackman that Jamie Munro: It's so good. It's so good. Justin Ward: if you see the back of his numbers, it means that he has committed his front numbers to the ball, which hopefully may mean his hips are starting to turn, which will now make it harder for him to go the other direction. so that would be like one quick example that I could think Jamie Munro: Yeah, yeah. Justin Ward: of off the top of my with our ex attack or whoever's playing behind the goal. that if you see the back of the numbers, you better take off in a drift. Jamie Munro: I think all coaches use external cues like that, but I think sometimes I find myself slipping back into talking about a move or something that would be more of an internal focus of attention, which distracts the athletes from the external focus of attention. And that's why I was bringing it up because one of the five design principles, in the CLA is having an external focus of attention. And I think we're also accustomed to teaching things that are real and they do happen and they are true, but trying to figure out a way to get the athletes to do those things without focusing on themselves. Because if they are, there's no way that they can focus on what's actually happening around them as it relates to their teammates and the defense and the space and all of those things, which really are what, what great players do. Justin Ward: Right. I would imagine that most of the internal cues we give are probably more around mechanics, shooting Jamie Munro: Yes. Justin Ward: the ball, split dodging, whether it's on the run. But a lot of the the great processors, the really smart players that can make these decisions very quickly or anticipate, they're typically probably working off of some of those external clu a lot of things off the ball are gonna be external. You're reading your man most of the time. So whether you're drifting or you're saying, hey, Coach Chamatti when I was here, if you ever see the laces, again when I was playing, they didn't have laces on their helmets anymore. We were in, you know, cascades. Jamie Munro: Yeah. Justin Ward: But when you see the laces or the back of the helmet, that's an external cue that tells you you should backdoor or clear through or seat cut or drift. so like that'd be like another one. If you see the laces, that was always a big one for Coach Chamatti. If you see laces, you better cut. Jamie Munro: Last thing on the alley dodge and the redodge. do you put an emphasis on getting your stick to the middle I'm sure you do that all the time to score, but do you ever think about that in terms of when you get two on you to kick it to X with your stick to the inside? Justin Ward: We probably don't emphasize that as much as I'm more focused on the dodger's line. So if we're on the mid wing, we try to focus a lot about drawing our line to the far pipe. So if I'm wing dodging, I'm going underneath. the average player will draw the line under, but they don't realize it's actually like towards the girls crease or the apex of the goal, like where the where where the metal bars meet. That kind of a path is going to take you into a very low angle shot, whether you know it or not. but the really good wing dodgers are the ones that can take that angle and whether they're shuffling into their dodge or they use change of posture to get their guy to relax for a second, and then they draw a very severe line to the far pipe or to the top of the crease. Now when the defender engages and cross checks and tries to widen you, you actually still have some angle. that you can survive with. I've always felt like that angle of approach will trigger the slide. more so than I've thought about baiting or hey, if I can keep my stick to the inside, a guy is more likely to slide. I've coached a couple of guys that have done that. We have one here named Miles Halter, who can be a little unorthodox on the wing, Reese Burick, who I coached at Army. would would do a nice job as a lefty of keeping a stick to the inside, but it's not as much a focus for us as much as the the physical path that we're on we're hopeful that Jamie Munro: Yeah. Justin Ward: will trigger trigger a slide. Jamie Munro: Well, I totally agree with you. The physical path is critical. And a lot of times when your sticks to the inside, it actually accentuates your critical path. But it also is a tell to the defense that you're shooting. And as soon as it goes to the outside, it very well be a shot that they're not as afraid to give up. And when it goes to the inside, all of a sudden they commit. I started noticing Canadians doing that all the time. That's basically because they're so one-handed, but they just get underneath you and I remember there's a clip that I show people when I'm talking about this of Jeff Teat basically dancing around, getting underneath, keeping his stick to the inside. And he literally had five defenders in the space of the crease in front of the crease as he kicked it to X. And the guy had multiple looks of guys standing at eight and a half yards for step downs. and and I also started to realize that when people would put the stick to their outside, the defense would begin to recover immediately and that you wouldn't get as full of a collapse. just an interesting concept that I wonder if you'd thought about. But yeah, maybe try it. Let me know what think. Justin Ward: Definitely. Jamie Munro: you're talking a ton about CLA constraints-led approach. how deeply have you been diving into the theory of ecollateral dynamics or in in constraints? And you know, give me an update on where you're at with that. Justin Ward: Yeah, I would say I'm somewhere in the middle. when I was at Army, you know, we had a very nice plethora drill bank, coach A and just his style of organization, and we would always talk about, you know, CLA in terms of how you adjust it. You know, it's it's just a different kind of drill. You know, you put a spin on it. for us, I would say that A great example we kinda clicked on this already. If we're doing something that is more mechanical, which the the reality is like we have guys that need to continue to learn how to shoot the ball with time and room. We have guys that need to learn how to shoot the ball on the run. And so there's a time for what I would call block teaching. Block teaching, like Steph Curry under the basket shooting one handed shots. For 30 minutes, that's block repetition that you're trying to rehearse and execute and get to a point where you're building a ton of confidence. Where I've then taken CLA is now how can we take those skills and build in the decision-making part of it, which is everything that that we've talked about. So like a great example is if we were gonna do a a one-on-one segment in practice. And it's a quick dodge and it's tighter to the goal. And maybe it's a it's a drill where the offense and defensive player exchange and you throw the ball into play and the offensive player has somewhat of an advantage because they're so tight to the goal. One of the things that we've done that I absolutely love, and we do it for unsettled drills too, is we make a small box in front of the crease, maybe a four by four or five by five box. And we put another offensive player and another defensive player in the box. And so it's a one on one, but at any point the defensive player in the box leaves the box, the other offensive player is unlocked. So for example, if we're doing one on ones, it's it's the one on one and we we just put a plus one on it. So anytime we say plus one on a drill, they understand the box is there. We need another defender, another offensive player. And so right there, You know, we love doing that against teams that are quick sliding teams or teams that love to slide to the back of the helmet. And so we'll say, Hey guys, we're gonna take our one on one drill and we're going to go one on one plus one. And it's amazing how on a Tuesday, when you do that drill, though we're not really talking about our opponent on Tuesday, we're drilling The mechanical part of quick dodging, attacking the pass, when you're split dodging, shoulder to shoulder in your split dodge, you're focused on drawing your line to the far pipe if it's on the wing, some of those internal mechanical things. And now you build in this second layer of processing. It it has really advanced, our really good players, and it has helped those slow processors begin to understand. How to make decisions faster. we could take a three on two advantage drill from the end line, three offensive lines, two two defensive guys. And we could do the same plus one idea. So three v two plus one. Roll the ground ball out to the end line, the offensive guys pick it up, the defenders get to the goal line and they get ready to scrape in slow play. But now at any point when the when the third defensive player in the box leaves, it's now a four on three. Jamie Munro: Mm. Justin Ward: So you're constantly reacting to, you know, a drill is essentially two or three different drills. and I've just I've kind of been living in that space that's been a really good segment for us in addition to space restrictions or constraints. So in that 3v2 endline drill plus one, that's one concept right there. But then we could say offensively you can't go above 10 yards. And now you're restricting how much space they actually have to use. when we're teaching a lot of picking or screening. we love this two V two with a feeder drill. at Army we called it Picasso. here we call it Picasso. and Jamie Munro: Yeah. Justin Ward: we stole that drill from you. but now, you know, you go to the middle of the field, you've got a constraint there. You could put nubs in the defender's hands, you can make all the defenders have to switch every pick. and we could plus one. So we could put the box in the middle with an extra defender. And now a two on two where you get two to the ball and you throw it back to the picker, now it could become a three on three. And now they're rotating out of the inside, or if he stays in, you got to be ready to shoot it. so it's been very good for us. And it's you know, typically all the drills that we do, there's a way in which we could do it offense versus offense. So instead Jamie Munro: Mm. Justin Ward: of doing ten minutes of time and room shooting or ten minutes of you know skeleton quick dodging, we could just have the offense serve the offense. And we could take all these same drills. it's what Jim Mitchell in his presentation at the convention was talking a lot about this. I know you've talked a lot about this. Is we've been doing a lot more CLA work during practice. And my expectation to the guys is the block shooting, that's all before and after practice. When we're all together and we have we have everybody on the field at once, that's when we want to be doing as much processing and decision making as we possibly can. Jamie Munro: with the block shooting, you're trying to get more velocity mostly, or is it obviously you want to be accurate too, but is it is it a velocity thing? Justin Ward: Variety so so I guess another way of like C L A you could put targets in the goal. Like there's a task. I guess there's a task associated to that. Jamie Munro: goalie. Justin Ward: or or a goalie. we could put a goal in front of the goal and make our guys shoot the ball to the far pipe and really focus on their stick path and and painting the far post. A lot of coaches would say that. But yeah, more so than not, when we're thinking block, we're thinking more mechanical, those internal cues. You know, some guys know how to shoot the ball, some guys just you know, like I was not a great shooter outside of ten yards. Once I got to college and Coach Shimati, taught me, five or six of the same drills that I do today that just have helped me in my and again, that's what a lot of p coaches do that were players, is they they like to do the drills that, you know, they saw a tangible difference in. bring those to life. But yeah, by block we're talking more, isolating maybe it's one or two segments of the time and chain. the last step, the catch and load. there's a lot of different things that we can get into that are more like our vitamins. We want to take our vitamins every day. that could be four minutes worth of time, five minutes worth of time. We have pretty good culture pre practice when we get out to the field here that You know, the guys have a have an agenda in terms of we got one or two cages out and one goal might be doing this, one goal might be doing this, and before we stretch, you know, they're getting those block reps of mechanical work. Jamie Munro: Are you measuring it do you get a radar gun out and see if there's improvements on shot speed? Justin Ward: Not typically. I know Yale used to do that when Jack Runkel was at Yale. shout out Runks. they used to do a lot around they would video record guys at the very beginning of the fall and then they would video record guys at the very end of the post fall and they would try to overlap the images to see how their mechanics have changed. how their stick path has changed, how the distance of their hands away from the center their body has changed. and then obviously they they may get the radar gun out. I have not broken the gun out to gauge the improvements mechanically. Jamie Munro: One year I did that at Denver. it was back in the days when you only had four players at a time for your individuals, which was kind of a gift because you got to work with like four players at a time for two hours a week. and also about thirty hours of sessions. but we busted out the radar gun and everybody's shot got, somewhere between five and seven miles per hour faster, literally just by measuring it, which was v which was really interesting. mechanics exist, there's no question about it. You know, I've sort of said a lot of times in this podcast, it just like you said, I I I wouldn't spend time during a practice session doing that because there's too many important things to do as it relates to decision making. And actually finding, you know, a shot inside 10 yards is way harder to do than, you know, but have you explored differential learning at all as far as doing non-CLA stuff there's more variability rather than the same shot over and over? That's something that Alex Sorama talks a lot about. And it's not CLA, but it does kind of fit a little bit more into, from a variability perspective, into an ecological approach to skill work, where at the end of the day, You need to be able to figure out a way to use these mechanics. But you need to do them in so many different ways because it's how it's going to happen in real life. And I know there's a few programs that are messing around with that. I work with Michael Sowers and Brian Kelly from the PL Canons and those guys have been starting to explore their individual work from more of a Differential learning perspective where they're trying to create as much variability in their shooting rather than taking the same shot. which I think it's really interesting. and there's a lot studies behind that. So just a couple of thoughts on that. I want to I want to switch gears though. how would you define skill in IQ? Justin Ward: I've heard you talk about this in the past. Skill Skill to me is a lot more around accuracy and pace and the ability to exchange the ball and get the ball into the net than skill being two handed abilities. I've coached plenty of players that are a two handed lacrosse player, but every other pass is in the box to their teammate, where I've then coached Some one-handed players that have the ability to always put the ball on their on their teammate's stick. So I know if that answers your question around skill, but I do think people go like, like he's a really skilled kid. And I Jamie Munro: Mm-hmm. Justin Ward: just because you put the stick in both hands and you can pass and throw with both hands, it doesn't make you a skilled player. I really believe that. or if just because you put it in your left hand, you're a g and and it comes out of your stick hard, you might still shoot the ball at seven percent with your offhand. so like that kind of visual of skill, but if you're a if you're a player that consistently can change hands and throw the ball right on the money every single time, under pressure, no contest. or if you're just a one handed player, again, often found in Canada, If you're a Canadian that has elite skills, it means that you can play one handed, but you have all of the answers in terms of how you need to get the ball to the next person or get the ball in the goal, regardless of angle, pressure, etc. IQ for me is is really just more around processing speed. You know, Coach Shimati has the expression like an attackman's brain. You have an attackman's brain versus a midfielder's brain, the attackman typically. are the guys that are processing a lot more information, you're closer to the goal. you're making more decisions, in my opinion. where, you know, a midfielder, they're a little easier to, I guess you could say, train with hey, dodge to this area, trigger a slide, throw forward, throw backwards based on where they're supporting from or based on what you're comfortable with. The best middies I've always coached, you know, Jake Moore at Army was an elite shooter of the lacrosse ball. But most of the other guys I've all coached, my favorite MIDI's are always my smartest MIDI's. Jamie Munro: Mm-hmm. Justin Ward: Evan Plunkett, who I had the fortune to coach at Army for three years, was an unbelievable processor of information. And he was also very fast. So he was doing it at a very fast level. Bobby Abshar, another Army MIDI, was a great processor. Peter Conley at Georgetown was a great processor. A young man here a junior captain, Connor Wilbur, maybe one of the smartest midfielders I've had the chance to coach. And he just he has an ability to be two passes ahead at all times. Craig Burr is another guy, Georgetown, who's a great decision maker. so it's the the guys, whether it's the external cues that you're talking about or they just have that sense in soccer, you talk about scanning. You know, when you're away from the ball and you are anticipating the ball is going to come your way, your ability to take a a look. at what is happening on the backside before the ball actually comes to you, the guys that can think so much more outside of just what the lacrosse ball is doing, those are the guys that I I would tend to find have high IQ. Jamie Munro: Totally. And then how much do you feel like skill and IQ are linked versus separate? Justin Ward: I would say they're extremely connected. I would say like most of those high IQ guys that I mentioned also happen to be skilled players. very rarely, I guess, have I coached a very skilled, excellent processing or excellent skills, whether it's one-handed or two-handed, it doesn't matter. That fails to be a high IQ player. I think where that comes from or the disconnect might go from being a really skilled player to not having great IQ or being slow would be when there's a ton of friction. When there when there's a lot of friction. sometimes that could be athletically not being able to escape and get away from the friction or pressure. You see that a lot with like really young attackmen, I'm talking like seventh graders, the guys that just haven't sprouted yet and they're playing against the eighth, you know, the the the kids that look like tenth graders in seventh grade. Jamie Munro: Mm-hmm. Justin Ward: and there's just so much ball pressure and there's so much, friction that that young person just can't escape. I've spent the fall working with some middle schoolers. And that's typically what you see. You see the guys that have the stick in their hand all the time. They're on the wall. They got right left hand. They look great when you do the the skill work. and then when you get into some of the even work or even some of the unsettled work, if they're a defenseman that can really fly around and put pressure they don't quite have the solutions yet as to how to anticipate to get away from pressure or how to clear their hands to get away from pressure as much. Jamie Munro: Yeah, I think you said it they are linked or connected. It doesn't really matter how good your skills are if you don't have great IQ. And the Justin Ward: Correct. Jamie Munro: the IQ kind of tells you what skills you're going to use, which is really Justin Ward: Yes. Jamie Munro: why all of the stuff in context matters so much. and it's just a really interesting concept. And when you think about what IQ is, I've been thinking a lot about this and how to articulate what it really is. And you talk a lot about processing. But it's basically the perception of opportunities. And the best players just see opportunities all over the place that they can do something. And in every second of a possession, there's opportunities to do something to help your team score. Whether you have the ball, whether you're adjacent to the ball, whether you're backside, and on defense for that matter, you know, opportunities to try to stop the other team from scoring. And that's where the CLA comes in, is that you're building using constraints to basically create opportunities that you want them to see. and to be able to act on. There's a really cool word called skilled intentionality, which I have a hard time remembering how to exactly define. But basically it's an ability to be aware of the opportunities that are arising around you and to act on the ones that you think. are great and not act on the ones that aren't as good. And that's really what we're all looking for. and I just find it like really interesting to think about what IQ really is. And it's basically your ability to recognize opportunities and act on them. Sometimes it's confidence if you don't act on it, but oftentimes it's just like you're not seeing that you had the angle or you weren't able to set, I mean everything's a setup. and so you're seeing a potential opportunity about to arise. and the guys that run into trouble just go, regardless of what the opportunity is. And the guys that are your smartest players can kind of see that. Justin Ward: I don't have an example of this, but we use scorebreak here as like our film cutting software, which is you know terrific software that we leverage and I've leveraged, you know, in my coaching career ever since it came out. And one of the one of the habits you can have as a coach is like if someone makes a mistake, you know, you say, poor decision, drew the double team, throw the ball in front. keep the music play. Instead, I try to catch myself and it's easier because it's not real time, but I would avoid saying that and I would ask the question, what did you see? Jamie Munro: Yeah. Justin Ward: And it's amazing when you ask a lacrosse player, great player or someone who's just improving, or an amateur player, and you just ask the question, What did you see, or where were you looking? It's not A negative question, it's me just trying to figure out what did he see? And if he can say, hey, coach, I saw them collapsing down, they were sliding, they didn't have custody of the skip lane, I tried to throw the ball there. If I know that, now I say, okay, like this is a skill thing. We need to work on this pass and practice more before we try to throw that pass in the scrimmage or a game. But if the answer is, you know. I was looking at the slider. That can tell me a lot around are they seeing all five defenders outside of the guy on the ball? Are they seeing Jamie Munro: Yeah, exactly. Justin Ward: all of the support? Are they seeing the whole picture? Do they have tunnel vision? And so it's a question that I try to use a lot of the time. it's typically around mistakes or turnovers. but that question like, what did you see? Or where are your eyes looking? can typically tell me a lot around an offensive player's point of view as they're playing. Jamie Munro: Totally. Which segues into this topic I've been thinking a lot about lately, which is how does intention impact perception? So what I mean by that is What are you looking for? And let's talk about intention related to principles of play of whatever it is that you guys are trying to do on offense. there's so many things to look at, but but if you don't have the intention of let's say getting to the middle or getting to on you, then all of a sudden you won't even try to do that. And you're not even looking for that opportunity. And it sounds so basic and simple, but all that intention then leads to the attention of the specifics of what to look for, like that player guarding the guy at X or the slider coming to you or not coming to you, or what really the two-man game of how they're actually covering it and how you're setting your pick. And it's just a really interesting concept, I think, that I've just been so interested in. Cause I think so many players And it's not their fault. it's not ripping on players they just haven't been educated on intention or attention. and therefore it's like getting in the car and driving someplace you've never been, without plugging it into maps. You're driving around, you know, but like where are you going? I actually had this conversation with Michael Sowers before his first box game last year, where I was like, Michael, we work on a ton of things. deception and two-man game and reading picks and all of the backhand pumps and the hessies and all this stuff. But I was like, let's just talk big picture. To be great in box across, you have to get to the middle without being hit. That needs to be your intention. Or get two on you. I was like, sometimes I think you're just beating your guy. And he's like, so true. Because he's so athletic, his whole life he's been able to beat his guy, but box is a little different. You don't have the space. and literally by changing his intention instead of trying to do all these different moves and beat his guy, it was how do I get to the middle without being hit? He scored four goals in the first half of his first game, literally just getting to the middle without being hit, because he wasn't trying to do it, became an external focus of attention. and all of the moves he has and amazing skills are gonna come out, but you have to have intention. because it tells you what to look for. Anyways, I find it really interesting Justin Ward: Right. Yeah. Yeah, as an offensive coach. think this is in line with what you're talking about. we want to engineer an offense that creates uncontested shots in the paint with their momentum going to the goal. so here at Loyal we grade shot selection. Threes are the best, you have threes, twos and ones. Threes are the best, twos are in the middle and ones are the worst ones we want to avoid. But but we have descriptions for what those are. Three rate is in the paint, uncontested momentum going to the goal. A two-rate is typically in the paint, but contested to some degree. and then a one-rate is usually something that's outside of the paint, momentum going away from the goal, heavily contested in the paint. Maybe someone jams it into you and you're like triple-teamed and you shovel one. You know, that's still a one-rate shot. It's not a high-quality shot. As a coach, it's my job, our job, to help our guys understand. We're engineering our offense for this quality shot. So anything short of this, we have to have the discipline and patience to keep playing offense until we get to the very best shot. And so, you know, we have we have very good players, but one of the things I'm I'm very proud of is last year in my first year here and just in installing philosophy and terminology and scheme is we were one of the most efficient offenses in the country, in terms of shot selection or shooting percentage, turnover rate, goals per game. if I were to just show up and we just put the the tactical part in and we didn't emphasize these are the shots that we are hunting, I don't know if that's gonna be the same situation. Jamie Munro: that is the perfect example of intention guiding their perception. Because they're looking Justin Ward: And and Jamie Munro: to try to get that shot. And it's I mean Justin Ward: Right. And and Jamie Munro: it's the simplest best example you can give. Justin Ward: and with it, we could go game to game last year and we could change what offense we were in or what kind of game it was going to be. Like there's some teams that have really athletic teams that we may need to be behind the goal a lot more and invert. That's a reality in field lacrosse. You may play some teams that are very slide conscious and our perimeter spacing is more important. So I may bend more towards a pattern based motion offense instead of what may appear to be more setless and not pairs or picking oriented, but the the formation is a little more setless. who we play, we we may adjust and we may just do what we do, but the shots that we're trying to create are the shots we're trying to create. Like there's a there's a great I heard this on a basketball podcast and I I tell the story to our group every semester we talk about the the the Apple store. When you go into the Apple store, imagine going into the store And there is a shot clock in the store that is counting down from 60 seconds. If I walk in that store and a clerk walks up to me, I don't even know what the newest iPhone is. Was it like an iPhone 18, iPhone 19, whatever? I don't even know what it is. Let's let's say it's an eighteen. And four Jamie Munro: seventeen eighteen combined show. Pro Max. Justin Ward: seconds in, they they offer you an iPhone ten. Are you gonna take it? No, you're not gonna take it. You're gonna keep shopping. You're gonna keep walking around, you're gonna go to the next place, or iPhone 14, are you gonna take it? Probably not. You keep walking 10 seconds later, boom, there's the iPhone 18. I'm taking it. Compared to you walk in 10 minutes later, and four seconds in, someone says iPhone 18. You say, heck yeah, I'm gonna take that. That's your transition. So trying trying to err like we need fundamentals, we need you know certain mechanics, we need concepts, but at the end of the day, we're trying to create the very best shot possible. So that's the intention. How we Jamie Munro: Yes. Justin Ward: get there, and the discipline that we have and the patience that we have that selfishness that we have, that that's going to help us get to the next shot. and in my opinion, that's that's what offense is all about. Defense a little bit harder, but in in that regard, but you know, offensively, that's we want to generate the very best shots Jamie Munro: It's so true. Justin Ward: possible. Jamie Munro: It's the greatest analogy. don't jump on the cracked iPhone five right out of the gate. If ever. Justin Ward: Correct. That's the fifteen yarder in transition from a from, a face-off guy. No offense, no offense to our face-off guys. Jamie Munro: So true. And then you talk about the different, defenses you're gonna face and the the different sets you're gonna use. If it's fast sliding, maybe you're gonna, have some spacing templates that allow you to kind of capitalize on that, right? and if it's slower sliding, maybe you know, you're going to have to create more off ball advantages, just more probing and and beating people in that way. but The intention of getting that great shot is always there. But then you can educate their attention to what are we looking for in these situations? And that's the external focus of our attention. Justin Ward: So true. So true. Jamie Munro: and it guides your perception. And I think that's the biggest thing because perception is when you talk about processing. in ecological dynamics terms, They don't believe in the cognitive philosophy of actually all this processing going on because it actually just happens instantaneously with this perception, action, coupling. But it's we're talking about the same thing really, just semantics. it's perception. it's basically what's happening and what are the opportunities that are being presented to me right now. you look at the best players and they just make it look easy because there's opportunities all over the place. That they can act on and other players just don't see them. And mostly they don't see them, not because they couldn't, but because they just haven't been in enough situations before where they know what to look for. so yeah. on the topic of perception and opportunities, how much do you think about talk about constrained deception? Justin Ward: in terms of the deception we're using as a player. Jamie Munro: Yep. Deception as opposed to predictability. Justin Ward: I one of the things I take a lot of pride in is is coaching, dodging attackmen. it was kind of my role as a player, I played behind the goal a lot. and we talked about this again in the last conversation, but you know, there are super explosive, really athletic ex attackmen that can really run by their guy. then there's another group of guys, I'd fall into this bucket that deception is where you're gonna get the most value or bang for your buck in terms of like what I would call optimal speed. So, you know, as an X attack but I pick the ball up off the end line, again back to engine what's my intention? My intention is to hopefully get to the island and clear my hands to shoot a high percentage shot, or by getting to the island, I'm gonna trigger a reaction from the defense. A full slide, a half a slide, Bad double by the defense where now I can capitalize on that. I draw a foul. there's a lot of great reasons to get to the island and the island being five and five or four and four up above the goal line. In in my world, there's a lot of combinations of it, but when we're teaching our attackmen how to dodge, there's a change of posture, a change of angle, a change of direction, and a change of speed. So we use P A D S pads So when the guys are dodging off the end line or it's fun because we're gonna get into this postfall period here in about a week and we're gonna really get to work with the attackman once a week for an hour on dodging and shooting and off ball play. But I really lean on that acronym of pads because within posture there's a lot of ways to change your posture. and there's a lot of deception in posture. there's Jamie Munro: Hundred percent. Justin Ward: you talk a lot about, you know, if you're on the wing You can be baiting and putting your stick to the inside. That's part of your posture. as an attackman, dodging from X, a running back-quarterback relationship where you're two handed and your front shoulders down and you look like a running back hitting the hole versus stepping away and looking like a passer, that has a significant impact on the defense. So there's Jamie Munro: Big time. Justin Ward: deception. And if you're really good at it, you're using it to set up what you want. So if I know I want to turn the corner on somebody. I'm probably gonna drive to the goal line. And if I haven't beat him by this point, I'm probably gonna change my angle and bounce and look like a quarterback and try to get everybody to retreat. And then I'm gonna put my outside foot in the ground. I'm gonna change my speed. I'm gonna change my posture. I'm gonna try to turn the corner and score. it's very easy for me to Jamie Munro: How about the echo? Justin Ward: bouncing is probably the more common one and except for the one I leaned on the most where I'm taking a very aggressive line to my spot. Where I'm creating contact. And again, I'm trying to start, I'm trying to take the fight to my man. I'm trying to be the one that initiates the contact. And then by bouncing or changing my angle off of the line that I was initially on, I'm hopefully releasing some pressure and changing the space. That typically leads the defenseman to now have to go re-engage. And it's when they re-engage, you may get them to throw the unnecessary check. They get off balance. They don't adjust top side and they stay low side or they overcorrect top side and now you can go underneath. that's a very big one. another step that I teach is like what I'll call a vacate step where it's kind of like a bounce, but I'm not really breaking speed as much, as much as I'm just coming up the hash and I'm taking a forty-five degree step off of my line to then turn the corner and try to get up the field. So it's not as much of a change of speed. Jamie Munro: Yeah, yeah. Justin Ward: as much as I'm just kind of getting off of my line slightly to release Jamie Munro: That's sick. Justin Ward: the pressure. I I have a great clip I'll send it to you. the attackman who played at Penn a number of years ago, Matthias. Matthias. Simon? Simon Matthias. Jamie Munro: facts. Stand Justin Ward: he has like an all time clip in I think it was the quarter final game against Yale, that I try to use with our attackman every year. I'll send it to you. but I called it a vacate step 'cause he was Jamie Munro: That's such a cool Justin Ward: vacating away from his guy, but it was one Jamie Munro: Yeah. Justin Ward: step. It's not as deliberate as maybe a bounce may seem. but yeah, you go down Posture. Jamie Munro: it doesn't change speed. I call that a belly out same thing. You what do you call it again? Justin Ward: Vacate stuff. Jamie Munro: Vacate step. One thing, and it can be one step. It can also be three steps or two or three steps where you just belly out. But the key is by not changing speed, you can get a guy to naturally follow you out and just turn Justin Ward: Yes. Jamie Munro: corner on him. And then the defense, I love this with MIDI's too. when they're going down and they belly out without changing speed, they can oftentimes catch sliders very, very unexpectedly. all of a sudden you're right on top of the net before they're ready because your speed is different than your typical bounce out, which means break down, bounce out, resquare usually, you know, there's like choppiness to your steps there. Whereas that's really Justin Ward: Right. Jamie Munro: interesting. Justin Ward: Another angle or another example of change of angle is like a trip dodge. Yeah, you're running on the same line. You see it a lot more above the goal. you know, someone's going down the alley, kid Bobby Abshire, who had coached the army, just had like a great knack for this going left handed, is he'd be Jamie Munro: Mm-hmm. Justin Ward: he's a righty, but he'd be going to his left hand and he's running, let's say he's parallel to the hash mark, and his guy was overstepping into his space. Jamie Munro: Mm-hmm. Justin Ward: He'd just stick his right foot out. There's a great clip against UMass in twenty twenty, COVID. He trip dodged this kid, face plant, pull up right handy right handed and and hammered one from eleven. but it's again that change of angle, kinda the same idea. direction, yeah, it's Jamie Munro: Yeah, that's sick. By the way, you know who made up the do you know who made up the tribute? Justin Ward: I don't was it you? Jamie Munro: Nope. Andy Towers. Justin Ward: Into towers. Jamie Munro: He made it up in the late 80s, early nineties. And I used to teach it all the time. I taught my son how to do it when he was six or seven years old. and actually we called it a fake pop out because I couldn't like, hey, Colin, do your Justin Ward: Yeah. Jamie Munro: trip move because like you can't really do that when you're like coaching somebody. So we called it the fake pop out. But I had to actually ban it because it's like all he did for a while there. How do you teach that though? How do you get people to actually do it? I've I've found that for one thing, defenders don't usually love being tripped. so it's kind of hard to work on it. And I find that some kids just do it really well. And so many people just never do and can't. But it's such a cheat code if you can do it. And it's not illegal. It's like you're just popping out, you're kicking your foot and falling over. Justin Ward: It's similar to the Dodgers that you've coached. I've coached a couple that have a good feel for this, is when they are sweeping, their man is on the same line as them, but they know they can catch them on one foot, and it's like a a blowback. Not like a Miles Jones, like I'm gonna run you over kind of a thing, but it's like a version of a chicken wing where They're running on the same path. Like he he's going towards the goal, but there isn't a ton of friction yet. And Jamie Munro: Mm-hmm. Justin Ward: the ability to know when your guy is going to be on one foot in his run crossing over, and you have the timing to drop your shoulder and with your elbow, your bottom hands on your stick, with your elbow, launch them. send them backwards. this kid Ryan Salew, shout out Ryan Salew. I coached an army, had a great feel for that. We have a MIDI here, Miles Halter. You guys really good feel for when you're on the same line as your man and there isn't a ton of friction, that ability to kind of catch them by surprise, either with a trip dodge, or if you can very sudden engage when they're not ready or they're on one foot. It's such a timing thing. I don't, I'm probably not doing a great job of explaining it. but it's not, it's it's a change of angle in which you're creating contact at a point where they're probably not ready for it or they're just trying to match feet. Jamie Munro: Yeah. Yeah, it's really interesting. that's cool. So overall, all of those things require a ton of different deception. So it's happening a lot. How about Justin Ward: Hundred percent. Jamie Munro: in your two-man game and your picking and your setup? Justin Ward: Yeah, so one of the things that we try to focus on, I think there's a lot of deception that goes into the front of the pick. we would teach our dodgers, hey, prior to the pick arriving, we want to work away. if we can have this thing look like a one on one and the pick just arrives, that's typically going to lead to at least a lot more effective sticking your picks and getting your angle that you want. where, you know, if if you just catch the ball and you just look right at the pick. so working away naturally gets the dodger's eyes away from the pick. And then we really incentivize the picker. we say arrived detached. I know you would talk about more of a triple A rating. but in that it's still pads. It's a change of posture. You know, it's it's looking disinterested, looking over to the other side of the field, boom, you Jamie Munro: So pads you apply to everything in your whole game? Justin Ward: dodging, picking and screening. It's you know, if you're gonna have deception, you wanna change your posture. Dodger, that's running back quarterback as a picker, maybe that's just like, hey, I got one hand on my stick, I'm not that interested. Boom. I go and I explode to get to my spot. Yeah. Jamie Munro: The old I'm not doing anything. The old I'm not doing anything posture. Justin Ward: Yep. You know, change of angle. a lot of coaches would probably talk about like V cutting in to set your pick. You know, we talk more about working inside out. We want to try to get behind the on-ball defenseman as much as we can, which means we need to work to the inside of the field as much as we can. the change of direction part is all great players play on arcs, you know, so you don't want to just run in a straight line towards the pick that you're trying to set, just like a dodger doesn't want to run in a straight line towards where they're trying to go. And then the change of speed part, you know, you have a real nice change of speed prior to setting a pick or coming out of a cut that's gonna go set up a pick. you're typically going to gain a little bit of an advantage. which like when you play the teams that really like to move the picker or like not let the picker move, once they get to that spot, that's where like all of those skills are more important. Like you gotta make sure you show up at the very last moment, detached, so that it's harder for the off bulk defender. To communicate to the on-ball defender. And hopefully the on-ball defender has been engaged in a one-on-one for five seconds. And now this pick is just arriving. So I think there's a lot of deception. I wouldn't call this deception, but when the ball carrier has the ball, we always want to have we want to have two hands on our stick. And when we have two hands on our stick and we're engaging the pick, we don't want to be looking at our man anymore. We want to be looking at the off ball defender. a lot of the freshmen for some reason When they come in, it's like one of the first points we have to make in picking is when you're attacking a pick, you gotta feel your man and you gotta find the off-ball defender. His posture Jamie Munro: Some Justin Ward: is gonna tell you everything around this pick. If he is underneath of the pick and he's tight to the pick, they're trying to get the guy through the pick. If he is, you know, one by one above it, he's probably gonna get ready to switch. Or he may step and slap or stack and whack. And in a slip or a step and slap, we want to be more ready to slip those picks. Cause that's again, you're gonna get two guys to the ball momentarily. Now we got to be ready to throw the ball backwards. So I don't know if that's gonna be part of deception, but it's intent to your point. It's it's intent where where are you looking as you engage Jamie Munro: Definitely intentionating. Yes. Justin Ward: a pick? It should hopefully give you not that every pick is gonna work out exactly how you want it, but it should give you the clues. Jamie Munro: Hundred percent. Justin Ward: as to what you should do with with the ball when you come off the pick. Jamie Munro: The intention is creating advantage in this two man game. The attention then goes to all of those Justin Ward: Yes. Jamie Munro: details of your triple A or de rive detached, the angle that Justin Ward: Exactly. Jamie Munro: you're gonna pick at based on the coverage that you're seeing, the ball carrier, being able to feel his guy, set his guy up to use this pick or reject, and then to see what that picker's guy is doing. But yeah, that's all such great stuff. and yeah, I feel like every time I watch a high level lacrosse game. when a goal scored, something deceptive happened to create it. Cause the defenses are too good. it could have been a subtle hezzy or hitch or something that somebody did. And I think the best players tend to be the most deceptive players. And when you can add that to your repertoire, it just opens you up big time. Justin Ward: Agreed. Jamie Munro: last question for you because it's almost November in recruiting time. in the recruiting process, what are you looking for as it relates to all of these abilities to have high level skill and high level IQ? Justin Ward: Sure. It's a loaded question. we we would like to try to build, at least from the offensive side of the ball, we'd like to be able to build a class where obviously they're all good players or going to be good college players, but I would like to have a balance of skill set. I wouldn't want to have six guys that are all left-handed attackmen. So in terms of building the class, you want to have a guy or two who can handle the ball behind the goal. You want to have couple of guys that are really effective dodgers. You'd like to have everybody be able to put the ball in the goal. Some guys that's different, some guys that's perimeter, some guys that's more interior. but you know for us as a program, we we'd like to find guys that are very adaptable. the midi that is comfortable back behind the goal or the attackman that is comfortable up above the goal In a club game, if your roster allows, if you're an attackman, I'd love to see you come out of the box and not feel pigeonholed to being an attackman because my coach says I was an attackman. because once you get to college, we're gonna be the ones that gauge where you fit best and where we think your ceiling is the highest or what the depth chart looks like around you and where we think you're gonna have the greatest impact. two, we already talked about just skill and IQ. part of that is adaptability. but you know a Loyola offense hopefully should have really skilled, smart players. but part of that is geography where we are. We're in Baltimore. There's a lot of very skilled players in the city of Baltimore. again, the two hour radius that we have around us is is Jamie Munro: Loaded. Justin Ward: flush flush with very highly skilled players. But you know, then we have also, you know, great pipelines of players from non traditional areas in the Midwest and the South and north of the border and and things of that nature. So skill and IQ are hopefully things that we can identify quickly as coaches, we should be able to identify that. and then just general athleticism. that there's we've we have got to get to a point we have a standard of a of like the floor of athleticism here. You know, being really skilled and smart just isn't going to be enough if we want to be the program that is consistently competing to be in the top twenty, consistently competing for Patriot League Championship. And, we play a phenomenal non conference schedule. we open with Georgetown, Maryland, and Johns Hopkins. and that's something that we at Loyal has all have always done and we're gonna continue to do. And in order to beat great defenses like that, we need guys that can that can create rotation and create leverage. And unfortunately we can't just pick our way through every game or can't invert our way through every game anymore. defenses are too good. So balanced skill set athletically, skill and IQ and then the adaptability part, if we can if we could sustain a season where we can just play in more C L A type environments and six offensive players and concepts, I do think that makes you harder to defend because game by game you can make your adjustments as you go. you can focus on new things throughout the season and keep getting better. And you know, to some degree a a pattern based motion offense does have a certain ceiling. just based on you play sixteen games at fourteen regular season games in a year, deep really good coaches and really good defenses, they recognize patterns very quickly. So the more unpredictable you can be and more deceptive Jamie Munro: For sure. That kind of comes back to the Justin Ward: you can be, the better. Jamie Munro: Exactly. The deception of how you run your offense by being more unpredictable. well, Justin, so awesome to talk across with you again. look forward to doing it again sometime. Let's catch up offline and dig in on some of these things. But thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Good luck this season. Have fun in the November recruiting period and I'll see ya at IMLCA. Justin Ward: Thanks for having me, Jamie. I appreciate it. Sara Munro: Thanks for listening to the JM three lacrosse podcast. 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