David Arsenault Sr- Threes & Layups

For most of my years coaching girls basketball at Galesburg HS, we were an uptempo team that looked to fastbreak and to pressure full-court. The ultimate in uptempo basketball has been Grinnell College and Coach David Arsenault Sr. I have been intrigued with the Grinnell System for decades. While I was into uptempo, I hesitated to make the plunge into the "System." I finally instituted a version of the Grinnell System for about 5 season starting in 2009. 

In my 50 years of coaching high school basketball, I never found any group more willing to share ideas and answer questions than the coaches working the "System." Perhaps it was in part because if you were running the "System," you had to stick together because many thought you were crazy and what you were doing was not sound.

Coach Arsenault Sr was extremely patient and helpful to me, and to hundreds of other coaches. For me, running the "System" was a great experience. 

I learned that when you do something different in sports, you are going to have critics. Change seems to be something that people in general don't like, and coaches in particular don't like change. 

Shooting threes or layups has been part of the Grinnell System from its inception. People thought it was crazy to do this when Grinnell was doing this decades ago. One year before Knox College played Grinnell, the local paper had a headline, "The Circus Is Coming To Town."  

Basketball is different today than it was 20 years ago. Today most college and pro teams put an emphasis on shooting threes or layups, and have limited the mid-range two point shot. Alabama offensively has completely boughten into the Grinnell "layups or threes only" philosophy. 

As I watched a pro game, I thought I would like to get Coach Arsenault's perspective on how the game has changed, and maybe his role in the change. 

Massey- In retirement, I have enjoyed reading about the history of basketball. I find it interesting that for over 100 years, coaches seem to be one of the biggest groups to resist changes to the game of basketball. If you go back to the early 1900’s, when the first coach began to teach dribbling as a way to speed the game up, there were many coaches who thought he was ruining the game. 

Throughout the 1930’s to the 1980’s, the common strategy was that if a coach got a lead was to basically institute some form of “stop playing,” and going into long delays. It seems coaches have always wanted to “control” the game. When you instituted the “Grinnell System,” would it be fair to say that you faced coaches who viewed it that you were ruining the game or making a mockery of the game?

Coach Arsenault Sr.- There is no question that opposing coaches felt like I was bastardizing the game. Many officials as well. The MWC coaches got so paranoid they had conference calls amongst themselves to strategize how to play against us. The basketball pundits out there were also generally negative to most of our record-breaking. Even some within our small Grinnell community were non-supportive. I tried my best to block out the negativity and keep our players, who were truly enjoying themselves, as insulated as possible.

Massey- You were into analytics before most coaches could spell analytics. You took analytics and created a vision of what you thought basketball could become. Your approach and your vision has impacted the game. Your analytics led you to the "threes and layups" philosophy? 

Coach Arseneault Sr- I do have a quick analytical thought for you. The reason we went to threes and layups was not because I was concerned about the percentages of our mid-range shooters. It was because we calculated that we could offensive rebound twice as many missed three’s!

Massey- Over the last five years, I have thought more and more about how it seems that you either changed the game of basketball or at least envisioned a better way to play basketball before others did. I listened to a podcast where they were crunching NBA numbers. The percent of FGA in the NBA that have been 3’s kept increasing over the last 25 years and appeared to level off at 39-40% around 2020. This season thru about 1/4 of the season, 42.3% of shot attempts have been threes- so it is going up again. The Celtics are taking 56% of their shots from threes. Further the eFG% on 3’s is 51% and the eFG% on 2’s is 54%. The commentators felt that was because teams were recognizing more and more to take only shots at basket and not long 2’s (unless superstars). 

Of all the components of the “system,” the 3’s or layups approach seems to have taken over basketball at all levels. I assume what you are seeing in college and NBA basketball has to make you smile? 

Coach Arsenault Sr- As I already mentioned to you a big part of our going layups and three’s was based on data that we offensive-rebounded missed three’s almost twice as much as missed twos. I wasn’t thinking that what we were doing was ‘playing a better version of basketball’. 

I was more trying to give our players something positive to talk about when we lost. I was surprised as anyone that we were able to fairly consistently win with most of our unconventional strategies. 

While I'm still not sure what we do is playing a better version of basketball I am convinced that our style better allows us to maximize participation and compete versus what I'd consider generally better and bigger athletes in our conference.

Massey- Several reflections on Coach Arsenault's thoughts, and on my experience having played an uptempo/pressing style most of my career, as well as having run the System.

1- If you are going to be effective as a coach, you need to develop a strategy that matches your players. Coach Arsenault came up with a specific plan to meet the players he could recruit to Grinnell College. 

2- As coaches, we are resistant to change. Sometimes we need to be willing to take risks in what we do.

3- Teams with a strong team bond and team spirit are both more successful and more fun for the players. Teams who play more players on a regular basis tend to have stronger team bond and team spirit. They are "tougher together." 

4- Few coaches today are like the coaches of the '30's and '40's who held the ball once they got a lead. We would see that as being a horrible choice. While not going to that extreme, there is often a tendency for coaches to control the pace. Players enjoy playing uptempo. Players who enjoy what they are doing tend to be more successful. 

5- Coaches grow thru networking and sharing. 

Again, thanks to Coach Arsenault for his thoughts. He has had a positive impact on a lot of coaches. And I would say that he has had a positive impact on the game of basketball. 

When we were running the System, I posted a blog that addressed some of the critics of our uptempo approach. You might enjoy reading it.

Bastardizing The Game of Basketball