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In high school, I put my starting five against my next five.

99% of the time the starting five is going to dominate practice.

In college, that's not the case.

Your whole roster is good.

My third team could beat my first team on any given day in a practice.

So I think the competitiveness of practice in college is at such a higher level that it makes it so fun and it's so intense.

And I enjoy practice so much more at the college level because it is so competitive.

So much more than the high school because of just every player is good there.

Mike Grossidonia is the men's basketball head coach at St. John Fisher University.

Now in his ninth season, the Cardinals have won the Empire 8 championship and appeared in the NCAA Division 3 men's basketball tournament twice.

Under his direction, Fisher has won at least 15 games and posted a winning record in all but one of Grossedonia's eight seasons.

He previously served as Fisher's top assistant under Rob kornaker during the 2016-17 season before becoming the program's head coach.

Before entering the collegiate coaching ranks, Grossedonia transformed the Aquinas High School basketball program into a high school powerhouse.

Aquinas captured a New York Class AA state title for the first time in school history in 2016, made four state Final Four trips and won six Section 5 titles under Grossidonia, who went 194 and 38 over 10 seasons in charge of the Little Irish.

He earned all Greater Rochester Coach of the Year honors twice and Class AA Coach of the Year honors once at Aquinas.

Grossidonia coach Jalen Pickett, the 32nd overall pick by the Indiana Pacers in the 2023 NBA Draft.

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Have a notebook by your side as you listen to this episode with Mike Grossidonia, men's basketball head coach at St. John Fisher University.

Hello and welcome to the Hoop Heads podcast.

It's Mike Cleansing here without my co host Jason Suckel tonight, but I am pleased to be joined by Mike Crossedonia, head men's basketball coach at St. John Fisher.

Mike, welcome to the Hoop Heads pod.

Hey Mike, thanks for having me.

Excited to be here.

Thrilled to have you on.

Looking forward to diving into all of the interesting things that you've been able to do in your career thus far.

Let's start by going back in time to when you were a kid.

Tell me about your first experiences with the game of basketball.

What made you fall in love with it?

Yeah, I mean I, I was actually a really, a baseball guy.

Really enjoyed the, the game of baseball and I know a lot of kids think it's boring nowadays, but the, the intricacies I really liked and you know, so really, so really like baseball a lot.

Started basketball when I was probably a, a third or fourth grader.

I think I won some free throw shooting competition and, and that really got me on my path of, of really getting involved in it more and played it all the way up through the middle school and high school years.

And you know, I really learned a lot.

I had really good coaches in high school.

You know, my JV coach was a really good guy, Steve Deroy.

He's actually one of my great mentors as a coach.

Jimmy Johnson, who I'm sure a lot of people know, he was the J Mac story.

He was my head coach as well at the varsity level.

So had some really good coaches.

You know, I was a pretty good player.

I wouldn't say I was the best player, but I was tough and got after it defensively and I did play with some good players.

I probably should have passed the ball to more.

You know, as a player, I like to get my shots up.

I played, I played with Demond Stewart, who was a Division 1 basketball player at Niagara.

He was younger than me, but I probably should have passed it to him more.

But no Mike.

I had a good high school career.

I was an all county, you know, kid, a second team AGR player.

Really had a great experience at Greece Olympia High School where I went to high school and I said I had two really good coaches at the JVM varsity level that were really good mentors for me and really through them and actually my football coach I got into, I really was interested in coaching from there, although I didn't really know I wanted to do it then, but I knew like I wanted to be involved with sports a little bit.

But with that being said, I went to play college basketball after my, my senior year of high school and I went up to SUNY Potsdam and played played as a freshman and then just didn't really vibe up there for me.

Went back to kind of where I live and SUNY Brockport was going to play there.

After actually practiced all spring with the team kind of mid semester I transferred.

So I practiced all spring getting ready to play my kind of my junior year coming back and then I don't know, I just, just didn't want to do the grind anymore I guess and I really got into coaching right there.

I was 19 years old, went back to my old high school and like I said those coaches that were there, they kind of let me come on as a volunteer assistant to start and really that's kind of what started my coaching career is, you know, while I was in college.

Started at a young age and really just fell in love with basketball, you know, because it's basketball all the time.

You know, it's the practices are basketball.

You know, in baseball you're not always playing baseball, in football you're not always playing football.

So really just fell in love with being in the gym every day.

And plus where I live in the upstate New York it's cold outside, which I'm not a huge fan of.

So being inside a gym and being able to practice and get shots up and compete at a high level on the court where it's warm also was better for me moving forward.

So that's kind of my basketball journey of as a player played in a bunch of men's leagues as I got older and really enjoyed those.

Still, still play a little bit Even I'm approaching 50 years old here.

We play some, some noon hoops at the college with some of the other coaches on staff.

But I do love the game and I think it's, it's been a great journey for me as a player.

Now turn into a coach.

It's Good stuff that you're still playing.

I retired at 42 and I tore my ACL.

That was the end of my career.

And then I haven't.

I still pick up a ball with my own kids, but.

But it's.

Hey, usually, you know, it's the.

The old man injuries.

You're either.

You either get to get to tear your ACL or you get to tear your Achilles.

One of the two, probably, if you, you know, depending on how long you go.

So I got.

I'm not.

I'm knocking.

I'm knocking on wood for you, Mike, that you stay.

That you stay healthy.

No, you don't want.

You don't want that.

You.

You definitely.

You definitely don't.

So when you think back to.

You mentioned the influence of your high school basketball coaches, when you think about some of the lessons that they taught you, maybe not just as a player, but when you think back now and kind of look at yourself and your coaching style, your philosophy, what are one or two things that you feel like you took from those guys that is still influencing you today when you look back on that experience?

Yeah, I think my, my JV coach and actually, you know, Steve Deroy was.

Was his name, and he actually became the best man at my wedding.

We became really, really good friends, and I coached on his staff When I went back to Olympia and he became a varsity coach, he actually passed away when he was 50 years old.

So I always try to talk about him because he was such a great mentor for me.

But really the thing I learned from Steve was just his work ethic.

He was always prepared, always had his players prepared for games with scouting reports and information.

And, you know, I really.

That was the one thing I really took pride in as a young coach was I was doing scouting reports when I took over the JV program at Olympia, you know, and really no one was doing that in our area back then.

I was going to JV games and I don't know if this was legal.

I was filming them and showing our guys film up in.

With a camera in the stands.

People probably thought I was.

I was crazy.

But, you know, that's.

That's really the one thing from him I learned is like having your.

Having your guys prepared, having a great work ethic.

And really, the second thing about him is he really just truly cared about his players off the court.

You know, he would go pick guys up, he would loan them money, you know, you know, if they needed it.

You know, just depending on who the kid was.

And that really like he.

I knew he cared about me, but just seeing him kind of with other kids and coaches and guys that really needed kind of, you know, maybe a father figure type.

He was that guy.

And I really tried to take those two things from him as a coach as I've gotten older.

And you know, I think now, especially at the college level, when kids are away from home and far away from families, I think it's even more important that you bring kind of that caring piece and let them know that you care about them.

You know, it's not always about basketball.

It's about, you know, their lives and how they're doing and all those types of things.

And you know, I always tell recruits now like, you know, my greatest achievement as a coach is when I get invited to a wedding after they graduate, you know, and I think that's the relationships I try to build.

And I've learned that from Steve through all the years that, that I was around him.

God rest in peace.

And you know, Jimmy Johnson was a, was a, was my first varsity coach or my only varsity coach as a basketball player.

And you know, he had the same kind of preparation and always had you prepare, but he was, he was a lot of off the court, like, you know, always keeping you invested in everything that was going on in your life.

It wasn't just about, it was.

Basketball was important obviously, but, you know, what goals did you set for yourself academically, basketball wise?

It was a lot of stuff like that.

It wasn't always just on the court with him.

It was try to be a good person, try to treat other people with respect.

He also was a very competitive guy, so I used to try to challenge him one on one all the time.

And I, um, I think he was my middle school phys ed teacher too.

So he used to, he used to make these T shirts that were, go.

That were.

I beat coach Johnson one on one.

And once you beat him, you got one of those.

So nice.

Once we got to about eighth or ninth grade, we used to take, we used to kick his butt all the time.

So he stopped playing us.

But no, he was, he was really, he was really instrumental in me really staying involved in the game of basketball at a young age because he was my phys ed teacher in middle school and, but like I said, he was, he was great at, he was a goal setter.

Really made you think about what you wanted to accomplish on and off the court each year, each year in each season.

And I think those things sometimes go by the wayside because you're so invested on what happens on the court and game by game, you don't think about the small, short term goals that you want to create and then the long term goals you want to create, knowing that you can modify those at any time.

You know, if something changes throughout the course of the season, you just adjust them and try to make new goals.

So I really picked that up from him, and those guys were really good influences on me and my, you know, becoming a high school coach and a college coach.

I want to jump back to the transition into coaching in just a second, but I touch on something that you just talked about there in terms of the relationships, right.

And how those guys that coached you at the high school level, they had an impact on you because of the relationship.

And yeah, they coached you in basketball, and the basketball piece of it obviously was important, but clearly what really impacted you is the time that they took getting to know you and having a relationship with you inside and outside of the game.

So when you think about your career, both first as a high school coach and then now as a college coach, what are some things that you do from an intentional level to really make sure that you're investing in building those kinds of relationships each and every day with your guys?

Yeah, that's a great question.

You know, I think the, I think that all starts especially at the college level, at the recruiting process.

You know, it's, you know, I try to be as honest and upfront as I can.

I want them to know it's not just about the player.

It's about your family.

You know, we try to communicate with the, with the family as much as we do with the player.

You know, obviously when they come on visits, we, we try to do a really good job of, of making them feel just as involved in that process as the player is.

You know, and I think it's an everyday thing.

It's, you know, when they come into practice every day, it's not just, hey, go stretch, and we're practicing.

It's, you know, you try to target, you know, and I don't know if target's a great word, but you try to approach four to five guys, you know, a day, and hey, how's, how's, how's your family doing?

I know you're far away from home.

Anything going on?

You know, those type of questions.

How's classes going?

What are your plans this weekend when we're off?

You know, like, I think you just try to get more invested in their outside lives and, you know, how's your, how's your significant other Doing, you know, you guys doing anything this weekend, you know, and just try to stay connected with them in that way.

And they know like they can come and I have an open door policy.

They know they can come and talk to me anytime.

Good or bad questions, answers.

We also do the one on one meetings.

And yeah, basketball is a piece of it, but it's also, you know, the same type of questions.

How are you doing in classes?

How are you doing in the dorms?

How's your roommate?

You know, those are always the fun questions.

How's your roommate?

You don't know, you just met him.

Right.

So, yeah, I think those small.

Right, right.

Those small interactions, I think carry weight, you know, and I think back, like you said, I think back to, you know, just the conversations I had with, with my coaches that really didn't talk about basketball much.

It was, you know, how are you doing?

How's life, how's your girlfriend doing?

You know, things like that, that, you know, you don't really think about those things when you're a kid, but when you get asked to, asked about that stuff, I think it means a little bit more.

It's not just basketball.

It's not just win, win, win, win, compete.

It's.

We really do truly care about you.

You're part of a family.

You know, this is how we treat family and this is how we want to have conversations and, and connect and, and create lifelong relationships.

Honestly, that's, that's really what, you know, we all want to win, we're all competitive.

You know, we all want to win championships, but at the end of the day, it's really, you know, it's about those lifelong relationships and keeping those connections throughout the time they're there and especially when they leave.

Yeah, I always feel like when I look back at my time as a player and then my time as a high school coach, you always, I'm always struck by the idea that what was most important to me in the moment, right, as a player or as a coach, I was always really concerned about what's my performance, how am I preparing my team if I'm a coach, to win or lose that next game, as a player, what do I need to do to have myself ready to go to contribute to our team being successful?

And some of those, again, small little interactions, right, the human connection or just the feel or the connection with your teammates.

Like all that stuff was there, but it sometimes got superseded by how important my performance was as a player or what my team's performance looked like as a coach.

And Then you think back now with sort of the ability to have a longer term perspective, stepping away from.

And you look back on it, you're like, I got a really hard time remembering this game or that game.

And obviously there are games that stick out in your mind for sure.

But what you really remember is what was my experience like with my teammates?

What was my experience like with my coaches, with my players?

And those are the memories and the things that, like you said, getting invited to a wedding or just within the last, like six weeks.

I had a kid who played for me in high school that he got inducted into his college hall of fame.

He played at a Division 2 school and his, his entire team got elected into their hall of Fame.

And he had called me up and invited me to go to the ceremony and because of some family things I had, I couldn't make it to the ceremony.

But then he and I afterwards, like a week later, ended up connecting and having dinner and sitting down and I get to hang out with his kids.

And just, I mean, those kinds of things, again, are invaluable.

But sometimes in the moment, right, we just, the wins and losses and the prep for the next game and all that kind of stuff, we get, I don't want to say caught up in it because as you said, it's really important.

We're all competitive and we want to win.

But it's interesting how time gives you a different perspective on how those things that seem little in the moment are actually probably the big things.

Yeah, I mean, 100%, you know, I think, like you said, you know, I think as a young coach too, you know, when I first started out, like, that's what it was about, right?

Like how, how can I win, how can I win championships and how can I make these guys compete at a high level?

And, you know, those things are still there.

But I think that's just a small piece now.

It really is.

It's.

It's more about those relationships and especially at the college level, I think it's really even more deeper because of the distance that guys might be away from home, first time on their own a little bit.

So I really, you know, you always get caught up a little bit still, you know, it's still, you know, we're all competitive people and you know, but I do think, like, know having those connections and having those, knowing that guys that come in my office anytime, like, and they're not intimidated to have a conversation, I think that's super important to me.

You know, I don't care if it's about playing time or something in the classroom, or maybe you made a mistake on campus and did something stupid in the dorms, like whatever it is, like knowing that, yeah, you might have done something wrong and you may have some discipline, but having that trust factor between me and my players, I think means more to me than, than a lot of things that, that happen on the court.

Because at the end of the day, it's, it's four years of a whole life.

Right.

So it's, it's not, it's important, but it's not the end game.

Right.

So I think that's a big piece of it.

All right, take me back to that first experience.

When you're in college still, you go back to your high school, you get an opportunity to volunteer, be a part of that staff and work with guys that you previously played for.

How quickly into that experience did you know for sure?

You're like, yeah, this is where I want to spend the rest of my life is as a coach at, at whatever level.

And I don't know what your thought process was at the time.

I'm assuming maybe you were thinking high school coach at that point because that's obviously where you ended up first.

But just kind of walk me through that first experience of what it was like and what you loved about it.

Yeah.

So, you know, like I mentioned earlier, I. I really always love sports.

I was a die hard watch it all the time, go in my front yard on my own and mimic a basketball game in my driveway one on zero.

But pretended I was every college and NBA player that I could be.

And same thing with baseball.

And I was, I was a New York Yankee.

I was playing shortstop and second base all in my front yard by myself, just pretending like it was a major league game.

So I just knew I love sports and I just wanted to be involved.

And I loved really.

My three sports are basketball, baseball and football.

So actually when I went back as a volunteer coach that first year, the next year, all these openings kind of came open at all the same time.

It was kind of crazy.

So I actually got hired to be the freshman basketball coach, the JV baseball coach, and I was a varsity assistant football coach.

All as a 19, 20 year old kid who had basically no idea what I was doing, by the way, other than what I've learned from the coaches that coach me.

You know, I wasn't too much into football.

Like I liked football.

I was more of like a secondary coach signaling the defense.

I really wasn't a play caller or anything like that.

So I did that for a few years, but really, basketball and baseball were more my cup of tea.

And I did the freshman for, I think, three years.

And then I took over the JV job for a couple.

And then baseball, I was right into JV baseball.

It was kind of crazy.

I did that for about four or five years.

But, yeah, going.

It was.

It was funny because you go from, you know, being.

I just graduated a couple years ago from high school, and now the guys that coach me, I'm working with, and we're.

Now we're friends, you know, it's.

It's different.

And the learning.

The learning curve was.

I just remember my first freshman practice.

And, you know, at varsity, we always pressed.

We did the Rick Patino, the black press, the white press, you know, 2, 2, 1, 1, 2, 1, 1 on the ball, and I was the point guard in it.

So I was the one kind of controlling it all in high school.

And I was the guy scrambling over, trapping guys.

So I'm like, oh, I'm doing that for sure.

First.

First practice, we're in there, and I'm going to teach it all.

And it's like, I have no idea what I'm doing.

Like, I'm trying to teach this.

I got guys in the wrong spots.

I'm not.

I'm not even sure what my role was when I played, other than I ran around and trapped everybody.

And I'm really just sitting there, like, kind of like I have no idea what I'm talking about right now.

And then Steve Deroy walked in, my varsity.

The varsity coach at the time.

I'm like, hey, can you just remind me of how we do this?

And it was kind of one of those moments where you're like, oh, I. I got to make sure I'm a little more prepared next time I come into practice.

But.

But no, it was.

It was a great.

It was a great few years there at Greece Olympia.

And I really learned a lot from those guys being on the staff at all the different sports.

But once I got into the basketball piece, I really knew that's the route I wanted to take.

Baseball was good, but I mentioned earlier, I didn't really like being outside in the cold when it was March and April up in here in upstate New York.

Football was fun, but it really wasn't my passion.

But basketball was really the game I loved.

And, you know, once I got the JV job there, I really, like I told you I was doing scouting reports and all these different types of fulfillment practices.

Like I said, probably totally illegal back then, but I didn't really pay attention to rules, I guess.

But I really, I really knew that's.

That's kind of the route I wanted to take was be a, be a varsity basketball coach.

And I was going to Brockport to be a phys ed teacher.

I figured that that's what I wanted to be in the sports kind of background.

And, you know, I wanted to be.

That was kind of my dream, like phys ed teacher, varsity basketball coach.

And.

No.

So that's the route I kind of took, you know, not, not a.

It was an interesting path because after those two years of jv, actually moved to Buffalo and became an administrative assistant with Mike McDonald at Kenesha's College.

He was the head coach there.

So I did one year of college, kind of in between everything.

I moved out there because my wife went to UB and got a job.

So that was an unbelievable experience, like, you know, doing those type of things that was, that was eye opening, like really learning and how hard those guys play at that next level compared to what I was doing at the high school level, you know, so lived in Buffalo a couple years, got a job out there, did some coaching after Kenesius.

And then that's what kind of brought me back to Rochester.

And you know, to make a long story short, you know, I ended up getting a freshman basketball job at Aquinas is where I got involved at Aquinas.

And I.

And I got the job in terrible circumstances.

The coach there at the time ended up getting colon cancer.

I took over the varsity.

I was actually coaching freshman and varsity basketball at the same time as I took over in the middle of the year, which was.

My wife was also.

We had a one year old and she was pregnant again.

So she was real happy that I made that decision to do both.

And then he actually came back and I was doing a freshman again.

And he got, he got sick again.

I took over again.

Same kind of thing.

And then he ended up stepping down and you know, obviously those circumstances stink, but they ended up hiring me that next year, which was like 2006, to be the next varsity coach at Aquinas.

And it's kind of where I got my start know really, really my start as a, as a varsity basketball player or coach.

How important were those reps as a freshman and JV head coach when you eventually got to be a head varsity coach?

Because a lot of times guys end up getting head coaching jobs, whether it's at the high school level or even the college level where they've been either only an assistant for their entire career or they've been a long time assistant.

And as you well know, the responsibilities of an assistant coach versus the responsibilities of a head coach are completely different.

And even though, again, you might say, well, how does being a freshman high school basketball coach compare to being a college head coach?

There still is, right, those decisions that you have to make in game or planning practice or just again, being sort of the ultimate voice for your team that you don't get to have necessarily as an assistant.

So when you look back on those first experiences as a freshman and JV high school basketball coach, how important were those reps as you moved on in your career as a head coach?

Well, I think they're invaluable.

I mean, I just think those reps, that's how you learn.

You learn by getting thrown in the fire.

And doesn't matter.

Like you said, it doesn't matter if it's freshman or jv.

You're still coaching, you're still the head coach.

You're still playing in practice, you're still teaching on the court, you're still making endgame decisions.

You're having to make the adjustments.

You're having to, you know, go from practice to practice.

What do we do?

Well, what do we got to improve on?

You know, those, you know, I can't say enough how important those reps are to really run your own team.

Right?

Like, there's a lot of assistants out there that, you know, never get that opportunity.

And when they're throwing in a fire, maybe they get a varsity job.

It's a different animal.

It really is.

And I'll even say that going from being a JV coach to a varsity coach, and now you're running the whole program, right?

You're running now you're in charge of everything.

You're in charge of the JV team, the freshman team, your modified teams, the fundraisers, organizing the stuff for the parents team dinners.

You know, the JV coach isn't doing that, right?

You're doing that as the varsity coach.

So like when I got to Aquinas, I'd never been a varsity coach.

Now I had a great mentor, Steve Deroy.

I saw everything he did with, with all that stuff.

You know, he was the first guy in our area that did a, you know, a faculty celebrate faculty night where every guy picked on the team picked a faculty member that made an impact on him while they were in high school.

He was the first guy in Rochester, New York, Section five that did that.

And it's the first thing I did when I went to Aquinas and I took over, I was like, oh, we're doing a Meet the Faculty night and we're going to do a teacher.

We called it a Teacher Appreciation Night and we did that.

And it was the first time Aquinas ever did it.

And I tell everyone I didn't, I didn't create it.

I learned from my mentor.

He did it at Olympia.

But yeah, like, every level is so different.

But I think having those reps as a freshman coach and a JV coach before you even get to that next level, you can't, you can't really imitate those anywhere.

Like, you know, I think that really, really prepared me to be a varsity coach.

And like I said, I had a great mentor and Steve Deroy and I really learned a lot about off the court stuff with him, like those teacher appreciation nights and fundraisers and all those type of things that, that are also involved with it.

Right?

When you become the man, when you become the main guy.

There'S no doubt about that.

There's a lot of things that go into it that, again, people don't always see, especially from the outside.

Whenever I think of high school coaches, I always, not so much with you guys, don't deal with it nearly as much at the college level, although probably more so than maybe you did in the past.

But I always think of parents, right?

When you think of high school coaching, you think of just how involved the parents are in a high school basketball program just from the standpoint of they're involved with their kids they want to be involved in.

Everybody has opinions.

There's just, there's a lot more of managing of, of the families and parents that you do as a high school coach.

And so that's something, again, that I don't think people, again, I don't think parents realize how much of an impact parents have on a high school basketball program just in terms of how it runs and what the coach has to do in order to be able to, to manage all that and still coach their team.

And so I do think that when you take over a high school program, there's things that if you haven't been in that position that you don't necessarily understand and to be able to have somebody that you were able to learn under and that you were able to watch and you were able to see kind of how they handled those things, that obviously gives you at least a little bit of a head start and a heads up.

But by the same token, until you're sitting in that chair, you don't really know for sure exactly what that feels like.

So you obviously at Aquinas had a tremendous amount of success.

You won a state championship, so clearly built a very, very successful program.

And so sitting here today, when you look back on your experience at Aquinus, if you had to point to one or two things that you think were really critically important to you, building a great high school basketball program, what were those things?

And, and how would you sort of frame that as some advice that you might have for somebody else who's, who's coaching at the high school level right now?

But that's a great question.

It really is.

You know, I think as, you know, as a high school coach, obviously, like, you know, I was at a private school, so I was fortunate enough to have some great athletes.

You know, I'm not going to sit here and I mean, I had Jalen Pickett, he's playing for the Denver Nuggets right now.

So like, I had some really, really talented players.

I had Division 1 football players that were just animals and athletes everywhere, like they were crazy.

But we also played teams like that too.

You know, Bishop Kearney had a bunch of Division 1 players.

McQuaid had some visual, you know, so we played, played teams like that as well.

But you know, I think when I look back on it, I really just think the commitment level that I demanded of myself, and I don't want this to sound like a selfish thing, but, you know, I think at the time I was making $4,500 and for me it was a full time job being the basketball coach, you know.

Yeah, I had a teaching job.

It was a private school, weren't paying me a ton of money either.

But I really just, I loved it so much that I had to treat it like that was my only job.

And I hope, hope none of my phys Ed students are listening right now.

But that's what it was, right?

Basketball was more important to me like, than teaching Phys Ed, you know.

You know, and it's, it sounds terrible to say because the money was the phys Ed and basketball wasn't at the time, but it's like, you know, but I was all in on it.

You know, I was planning practice, we were watching film, we were in the weight room.

Basically everything I do at the college level, I was doing at the high school level, you know, and I was fortunate.

Aquinas, they had great facilities as well.

My AD was super supportive.

Was a really good friend of mine as well, Anthony Bianchi, another Another good mentor.

He was really valuable to me when I was at Aquinas, especially as a young, a young coach there first, really helped guide me to, to mature a little bit as a young first time varsity coach.

But I just, I really think the commitment level, like, if you really want to be successful, the kids got to see it.

They got to see your commitment, your dedication, you know, and they'll follow you.

They really will.

Like, they're very impressionable.

If they see you, they see you working hard, they see you in the gym all the time.

Like, I'm not running open gyms and my assistants are there, I'm there.

You know, when we're in a weight room session, I'm not sending the strength coach.

I'm in there with them.

You know, I think that's what.

When we had summer league, I was at summer league.

I wasn't sending my assistant.

I was like, I was like, I'm telling my wife, we can't go on vacation.

No summer league ends.

I got to be there.

That's my team.

I can't make the kids go if I'm not going to be there.

Like, I really think that was the biggest thing for me was I really loved it so much and I wanted to be good.

That it was all about the commitment level for me.

Like, I had to be everywhere that I was making the guys go or that I wanted them to commit to.

Whether it was an open gym, a lift, a summer league game, you know, going to watch a football game, you know, during the football season.

Because we had so many guys on the team that played football at Aquinas.

I just think being visible was the biggest thing for me.

And I think that was the number one impact.

You know, I think that helped our program be successful because those guys knew I cared just as much as they cared.

You know, I think the other thing too is, you know, and this is just maybe coach talk, but just always trying to improve as a coach.

I really, even though I had great athletes and we won a lot of games, you know, I changed my philosophy year to year or every other year with, depending on who we had.

And I could only do that if I went to clinics, I talked to college coaches or other high school coaches.

Always just trying to build knowledge and learn.

And, you know, and I think that, I mean, I've run a hundred different types of offenses.

You know, it's quick hitters, dribble, drive, ball screen, continuity, you know, isos, you know, whatever, whatever you can think of.

We've done it the same Thing on the defensive end, I've played a matchup 3, 2.

I've played 2, 3.

I've played run and jump, man.

But, you know, you can't do that.

Especially back then, you.

You weren't Googling all that stuff like you can now, but you had to go talk to coaches, you had to watch videos and, and, and those coaching DVDs that I have thousands of that are.

Can't use them anymore.

I don't have a DVD player.

Right.

But, you know, like, I think just keep improving as a coach.

And I think that's what helped me at Aquinas, that commitment level.

Constantly trying to get smarter and, and be more aware of, of how I can affect the team with their.

What they do well and what we can do as a team really were the two things that helped our program, you know, build up.

I will say that the commitment level is something that I think is spot on when it comes to success at the high school level.

And when I look around at the most successful high school programs that I've seen here in the Cleveland area or in the state of Ohio, it's almost always led by somebody who is at that level of commitment that you just described, right?

They're at the summer league, they're at every single open gym.

They're around when there's a lift.

They're providing their players with opportunities as much as they can within the confines of the state guidelines.

And it's no secret, right, that if you want your players to make that kind of a commitment, that you as a coach have to make that type of commitment.

And sometimes you can get lucky, right, and have good talent and win despite that.

But if you want to have a program that wins year in and year out, and I think that's always the difference, right?

When I look at somebody who's a good coach and is running a great program, that happens year after year after year after year.

Maybe you have an up year and you win a state title, maybe you have a, maybe you have a down year and, you know, you're, you're, you're winning whatever, two thirds of your games.

But, but more often than not, you're, you're right there year in and year out consistently.

And that only happens with a level of commitment like you're talking about.

And I know that I've had this conversation with other high school coaches and college coaches too, for that matter, but that level of commitment, the baseline level of what you have to do as a high school coach, in terms of.

You talked about just the time and your family and your wife kind of being on board with allowing you to do those things.

The baseline level of commitment that you have to have as a high school coach right now, today compared to what it was 20 years ago or 30 years ago.

I mean it's, it's, it's crazy.

Again, just how much time for Your, for your $4,500 check or your whatever depending on what state you're in or where you're at those checks compared to the amount of time that you have to put in if you want to be successful, those checks are, are pretty small.

So I couldn't agree with you more when it comes to the, comes to the high school commitment piece of it.

And I just think that you can't, you can't be successful without that level of, without that level of commitment.

To me, it just, there's no way you can do it and have, and have a program again year in and year out.

You can win occasionally because you just get good talent in the door.

But for the most part, if you're building a great program, you got to have that level of commitment that you talked about.

Yeah, I mean you're spot on.

You know, it's definitely, you know, the high school piece is challenging.

Right.

Like you said, the family, family's at home.

You're spending, you know, you're, I'm teaching all day.

Then you got practice.

Then I'm probably going out the scout right when the season starts and you're walking in the door at 10:30, 11:00 clock at night after you watch the game and you know, and you're doing it all over the next day.

It's, it's just a, it's a cycle and, but if you love doesn't.

It doesn't seem like work.

Right.

It just seems like it's fun.

You know, it's, I always tell the recruits at Fisher like, you come here.

It's a fun full time job, right.

We're going to demand a lot of you.

You're gonna obviously go to class, then you're gonna have practice, you're gonna lift, you're gonna watch film, we're gonna have community service projects.

We're gonna do other things together.

You know, if you love it, you'll enjoy it.

If you don't love it, it's going to be hard.

That is true.

That is very true.

What's your favorite memory from the state championship?

Oh, man.

You know, it's, it's crazy because it was the third, it was the fourth, fourth time we were in the state final four, you know, and if I bore you, just cut me off.

But I think the first time we were there, I had.

We were playing Dwan Coleman and Tyler Kavanaugh from Jamesville, DeWitt, who both were high level Division 1 players, Syracuse.

Wait, where'd he go?

I think he went to Wake Forest at first, and then gw, Maybe Tyler.

We had good players too, right?

Phil Valenti went to Kenesha's college and Christian White went to Monmouth.

And they all played together in AU in the summer, which was crazy, all four of those guys, which was, you know, so now they're playing against each other and.

But one of my best players rolled his ankle in the first quarter and couldn't play.

And we ended up losing that game by like two or three.

So that was that game.

We had another one the next year that we lost in the semis and then we ended up.

Oh, no, the next year we lost in the finals to Mount Vernon and we actually had the MVP of the game.

Phil Valenti scored 36 and we lost in the state finals to Mount Vernon, who was like a 10 time champion.

It was, it was a crazy game.

We were down.

We came back, had a couple chances to win and just couldn't get it done.

Then we had a couple years off in there and then we got back the year before we won the states.

We got back to the state semis and played Brentwood out of Long island, which is I guess the biggest state school in New York State.

And really we just didn't play well.

They, they dominated throughout.

You know, they were good, they had some really good players.

But that, that next year, it was funny because all those, the kids of the year before we graduated, some.

But like, Jalen Pickett was a sophomore, so he was only going to be a junior.

You know what's funny is about that, that first year we lost in the summer, that year before we won it is we probably had 10, 11 guys that were all good players.

And honestly, it was very challenging to try to play all of them.

It really was.

It was.

We tried to really press a lot and use that as a way to exhaust guys and get guys in and out.

And you know, I just, I thought, and you look back on it, you were like, it was just hard to play that many guys in a high school basketball game.

It really was.

And then the next year we played only seven guys, basically, and it was so much easier because you were playing your main guys the whole time and you had your two subs and then your eighth and ninth guy, they were ready just in case there was foul trouble.

You needed a defensive assignment.

One guy was a shooter, so if you needed a three, you know, you could use them.

But it was very.

It was very like, it was just.

That's easier to manage that group because you knew who the guys were.

You know, it was a great.

It was a great team.

You know, like I said, we had.

I had two Division 1 football players.

Jalen Pickett's obviously in the NBA, went to CNN, Penn State.

And then my fifth kid was just a tough.

He would have been a D3, basketball or football player.

He just didn't want to play.

He was just a tough kid.

And those are my main five.

And the two guys off the bench were just great role players.

One, one could really shoot it, and one was a tough defensive kid that could guard one through five at the high school level.

But I think that the memory of that team was just.

They hated losing.

They really did.

They hated it.

Like, every practice was competitive.

Like, they didn't.

The starting five didn't want to play together in practice.

They wanted to go against each other.

Like, so I would make a practice plan and pick the teams, and they'd be like, coach, no, you got to switch the teams.

Like, we can't get better if we're just going against the next five.

Like, that was.

That was who they were.

Like, they were just, you know, and those.

Get.

The crazy thing is we.

We had six football players in that team.

They just won a state title in football the same year.

So they.

They literally won a state championship.

I think it was like that Thanksgiving weekend on a Sunday.

We had practice Monday.

Every kid was there.

Like, they didn't take a day off.

They didn't take a days off.

They were in there, and I was like, oh, you guys.

They did every sprint.

Everything that I asked them to do, they did.

Like, you know, that's how I knew that that team was special.

Like, all those kids were football players.

And they all showed up the day after they won a state title.

And they were at practice, ready to go, full go, didn't need a day off, you know, and.

But I think the memory you think of in that is.

Is beating Kevin Herder.

I mean, I don't know how I could say that any better.

Is, you know, we kind of ended his high school career.

They had just won a state title the year before in that.

At Shen, and we actually.

We should have lost the game.

We were down.

I think we were down five with under 30 seconds and we hit a three, called a timeout.

We doubled Herder so he couldn't get the ball to make free throws.

We followed another kid, he missed the front end of a one on one with like nine seconds.

And one of my football guys got the rebound, went coast to coast, laid in at the buzzer, and then we won in overtime.

But you know, that was the semi, and we're like, oh, we thought we won the super bowl.

And you're like, oh, we still gotta play the state final, what the heck?

But I think that memory is, is always a fun one.

Like, Kevin Herder was obviously a great NBA player.

He's, he was a great high school player as well.

And you know, winning that game when we thought we were kind of dead in the water, and then kind of telling that story about the football team winning and being practice the next day, like those are the things you think about with that group.

And it's no surprise that they won two state championships, football and basketball in the same year.

Yeah, that mentality to be able to just bounce back right after you win and come back and plant your feet and say, hey, we're gonna get after it and just switch gears from one sport to another and be able to do that, sounds like it was a special group of kids, which obviously if you're gonna win a state title, you know, clearly most of the time when you get to that level, you've got a special group of guys.

And it sounds like from, from day one it was pretty clear that you had a special, that you had a special group.

And obviously those memories that not everybody gets an opportunity to, to win a state title as a coach or as a player.

And so those, when I talked earlier about the, the games and the memories that are etched in your mind that, you know, some of them disappear, but I'm sure those runs to the, to the state final four obviously are ones that, that you remember a lot of specifics from those games, which is, which, which is good stuff.

So after you win that state title, you kind of have an unusual situation in terms of the relationships that allowed you to have an opportunity to go to St. John Fisher.

So just talk a little bit about how that opportunity arose and what the relationship was that enabled you to, to consider taking that position.

Yeah, so that, that previous year when, you know, we had, we lost in the state semi.

Rob Corniker, who was the Fisher coach at the time, his son played for me at Aquinas.

You know, he was, I taught him in phys Ed.

He Came to Aquinas and as an eighth grader, all the way to his junior year, he, you know, he played in our program.

And me and Rob really became really like best friends throughout those, you know, we're one of his best friends throughout those four or five years, and we were very tight.

I went to a lot of his games.

You know, once I got.

I started getting to know him a little bit and.

And yeah, I mean, it was just.

It was crazy.

We won the state title and, you know, I think I was on, you know, I was.

It was in the spring.

And his assistant, they had a full time assistant at the time.

And his assistant, Sean Coffey, was at Utica now, you know, took the Utica job.

And Rob reached out to me and he's like, listen, not sure if you're interested in this, but I have a full time assistant opening with Shawn leaving, you know, I'd love for you to be that guy.

And Rob was honest with me.

He really was.

He was like, listen, Griffin's probably not coming to Fisher and I don't want to miss his college career.

So, like, you know, I could be gone after one year, you're here and you take over.

And he said, even if Griffin does come here, you're still full time, you're still getting benefit, you know, you're still getting, you know, everything you need to pay and stuff like that.

And then I'll probably be done when he graduates anyways, and then you'll take over, you know.

So, you know, obviously there was some other factors involved with, you know, college tuition.

And I have three kids of my own, and they were all grown up and getting older.

And I think there was a lot of factors.

I'll be honest with you.

I really didn't.

I never really thought about being a college coach.

I mean, I was happy at Aquinas, obviously.

We were winning phys Ed.

Job was a good job, it was fairly easy, but, you know, no New York State retirement, you know, in the private schools for teaching.

You know, the college tuition was obviously intriguing, but I really didn't.

I really, truly didn't know if I wanted to make that jump.

I really didn't.

And I think we were on.

We were on a vacation at Cedar Point, actually, in Sandusky.

And, you know, finally Rob called me, like, hey, Mike, I mean, I got to know, like, I got to make a decision here.

And I think I said no and yes seven or eight times on the phone.

And I finally looked at my wife and she, you know, she's always been Supportive of, of me and coaching.

And she's just like, whatever you do, I'll support you.

If you want to stay, stay.

If you want to go, you know, go.

And, you know, I made the decision that if I never.

If I didn't take this opportunity, I probably would never have it again.

You know, it's not typical, you know, too much that you're a high school coach and you jump right in to be a college assistant, you know, right off the bat.

I mean, I don't see it too much like that.

I know there's some.

Some NATO stories and stuff like that, but, you know, typically you got to be a young guy right out of college, you know, paying your dues to get those positions.

And I was a 40 year old, you know, high school basketball coach that, you know, had a great opportunity and I decided to do it.

Really didn't know what I was getting into, to be honest with you.

Obviously, I knew the basketball piece and stuff and didn't realize how much admissions played a part and all these other things that I think Rob kind of hid for me so I would take the job.

But, yeah, that was kind of my journey of getting there.

And like I said, it's been not the easiest way to do it, you know, I think, you know, but my wife's been very supportive of it and, you know, I'm 100% glad I did it.

I think the toughest piece about the whole thing was knowing that I had Jalen Pickett coming back for his senior year and I had to leave him, you know, and there was another kid named Jason Hawks who was also a junior.

He was big part of that, that state title team.

And having the conversations with, you know, the thing about Jalen was his brother played for me back in like 2007 or 8.

Jalen was our ball boy since he was like a third or fourth grader.

So I was really tight with his mom, too.

And when I brought them in to have that conversation, there was just a lot of tears.

And, you know, I think that that was the toughest thing I had to do is talk to those two guys and Jalen's mob and let them know that I was leaving.

And, you know, it was pretty emotional.

You know, we built some pretty good relationships there at Aquinas and, you know, with them and, and with people that I worked with all those years and my staff and, and all that.

And it was, it was a.

It was a tough decision, but I think in the long run, it was.

It was best for me and my Family and, you know, and Rob was true on his word.

Right.

Griffin didn't come, and he left after a year, and I was named interim, and the rest is history, as they say.

And, you know, I think I'm there 10 years.

Nine.

Nine years overall as the head coach.

So that was kind of.

Kind of the strange journey that.

That.

That got me to St. John Fisher.

How did that year as an assistant compare to the year you spent at Kenesius?

When you think about those two experiences and kind of compare them back and forth and think about that, how did those two compare?

Yeah, totally different.

You know, Kenesius, I didn't do much on the floor because he already had assistance, and they had certain Division 1 rules and titles of what I could do.

I was more just sitting in the stands, watching.

I could sit on the bench during games and stuff like that, but I couldn't really coach on the floor during practice.

But I did learn a lot.

Mike McDonald, I think, is one of the premier now Division 2 coaches, is how smart he is and what he does with his programs.

Everywhere he goes, he's been successful.

So the Beeline tree, like, obviously very smart and knowledgeable and everything they do.

And we do a lot of stuff that he does, so he's been great.

But I think as an assistant at Fischer, you know, it was really hard, you know, because I wasn't a head coach, you know, a varsity head coach before I went to Kenesha.

See, I did JV and freshman, and obviously that was good.

But, you know, when you're a varsity coach for 10 years and you're running, you're in charge of everything.

It was really hard to, you know, to sit back and be the guy sitting in the chair, not up on the sidelines.

You know, practice was fine because Rob really gave me, you know, the reigns to.

To kind of do what I wanted to do.

And I think I was in charge of the offense that year, and we had a really good, big kid named Keegan Ryan, who was an All American, and we ran a lot of, like, high, low stuff for him.

And Rob kind of let me do that and coach that stuff, and really, the offense, he really handed to me.

So practice was great, you know, but in the games, it was really hard to sit there and not be the one standing up, running up and down the sideline.

And so that took me probably half a year to really.

To really figure it out, to be honest with you, is I was getting through that process of it all, and.

And then Rob, you know, let me do More and more as the year went on.

I think he knew he was going to be leaving, and really, I started running practices as the year went on, and he was still the man.

He was still the guy, and everyone knew that.

You know, I don't think anyone ever questioned that because he was such a great coach and, you know, he'll be a Hall of Famer there, you know, there someday, and.

But that was the toughest part, is sitting in that chair after being on the sidelines for 10 years and, you know, being the guy that's making all the decisions and, you know, but, you know, it was a great learning experience as well, because I got to see a really, really good college coach in action for.

For a full year firsthand, you know, right in front of me.

And I really learned a lot from him.

He was, again, he's one of my best friends, but he's also, you know, another one of my coaching mentors.

And he was.

He was very good at really getting his guys to play hard, really challenging him and making them competitive.

And, you know, that's the.

Probably one of the biggest traits I learned from him.

And you talk about a guy that cares, man, he cares about his players, that he would do anything for him.

And I couldn't ask for more than to kind of be under his wing for a year before, you know, he was.

He was nice enough to really hand me the job.

Before we dive into the details of how you've built your program, there just one comparison question.

So when you think about being the head coach at the high school level versus being a head coach at the college level, highlight for me a difference or something that makes the two jobs different.

Obviously, there are a lot of similarities, but I'm sure there's a difference or two that comes to mind when you think about being a head coach at the college level versus the high school level.

Yeah, I think the first thing I think of is practice.

You know, in high school, typically, unless you're at a prep school or something like that, like, you have your top five guys that are your best players, and you might have a couple that are your bench guys that are.

That are.

Could be basketball players, could be just good athletes, then the rest of your roster, you know, there may be young kids, there may be guys that play other sports that are just good athletes, but they're not really basketball players, or they're guys that are just great kids and want to be a part of it.

So practices sometimes aren't super competitive at times.

Like I told you, like, if I put my starting five against my next five.

99% of the time, the starting five is going to dominate practice, right?

In college, that's not the case.

Your whole roster is good, you know, so, like, my third team could beat my first team on any given day in a practice.

So, like, I think the competitiveness of practice in college is at such a higher level that it makes it so fun and it's so intense.

And I enjoy practice so much more at the college level because it is so competitive.

So much more than the high school because of just.

Every player is good there.

You know, every player is a bat.

They're there for basketball.

They're there to be a basketball player.

And they all want to be on.

They all don't want to get to the point where they're getting those minutes in the game.

So they come to practice every day and they.

They want to compete and they want to show that, you know, they belong on the court and not the bench, you know, if they're not in that rotation.

So to me, that's the number one biggest difference from high school to college is practices are so intense and so competitive that it.

It just.

It makes practice so much fun and energetic.

Where some high school practices, you can go there and can kind of be a, you know, a bad day and not.

Not as fun.

And sometimes your starters don't care as much because they know they're going to win.

So they don't really compete at the highest level.

They can sometimes, which I think is just a natural.

I remember I did that in high school, too, when kid was guarding me, I knew couldn't guard me, like, I didn't care as much.

Right?

Like, so to me, that was the.

That's the biggest difference.

You know, I think that the college game in general is just.

Everyone's good, man.

Everyone.

Coaches are great.

You know, every coach is good.

You know, they just.

Everyone's well prepared.

Everyone's recruiting to get good players.

You know, I think that you have to be ready to go every game.

And, you know, like, I don't know if you saw our score last night.

We weren't ready to go.

You know, we.

We got kind of beat up last night.

So the coaches.

Every coach is good.

Every roster is good.

There's no nights off.

Yeah, you might win big some nights, but that means you played really, really well, and maybe they didn't.

Um, it's really, really hard to win at this level.

Um, you know, so I think those are just the coaches, players.

It's hard to win at college level.

And the practices are so much more entertaining and fun just because of the competitive nature of everyone on the roster.

So good.

Um, those would be my two biggest differences between that and the high school level.

How do you balance now in a college practice, how you put together the lineups that play together while you're practicing?

In other words, right, you got your starting five, or maybe you have your guys that are in your rotation.

How do you mix those, whatever your, your guys 6 through 9?

Are you having guys 6 through 10 often play against your 1 through 5?

Are you mixing guys 6, 7, and 8 in with guys 1, 2, 3, 4, 5?

Or just how do you think about putting together the lineups during practice to make sure that you're getting the maximum out of it?

Making as competitive as you were just describing?

That's a great question.

I don't think I've ever figured it out yet.

I think we try.

We try to do all those things, and I don't, you know, the, the worst thing about college basketball?

And I'll jump back to what you're asking me, is subbing.

It's really hard because everyone's good.

Everyone has a.

Has something they do well.

And I'll be honest with you, that's.

That's probably my biggest weakness as a college coach is, is.

Is.

Is getting the guys in that we need to get in to play enough minutes.

Starting five is easy, right?

Like those guys are starting, they're going to be in and out.

It's that next, I say five to eight guys that, you know, it's hard to play.

It's hard to play 12 to 13 guys, but those are the guys.

Those guys deserve to get it, get an opportunity.

And you got to try to do that without taking the minutes away from the guys that you need to be on the court the most.

And it's not always easy, you know, but, you know, kind of back to what your practice question is.

You know, I think when we start, it's a lot of mixture, you know, I just mix guys together, see who plays well together.

Once we figure out we got a feel for it, usually a day or two before games, we try to get our starting five together, let them practice together a lot, Then we'll get our next five.

Like our six through 10, we carry about 8, 16, 18 guys usually.

So we'll have three teams in practice with some subs, you know, and then our Next, our next five.

It just depends.

Like, I might want my 10th and 11th or my 11th and 12th guy with one of those first two teams as a sub, so they're mixing in, and then the last five are kind of that.

That other group.

But we kind of play them all equally against each other just to give them different looks.

But we will intermix a little bit.

And, you know, sometimes I like putting the 8th or 9th guy with the.

I think one of my assistants is great.

He's always like, you want your point guard and your, your big man always playing together if you can, like your starters and then the guys maybe you think are going to play the most minutes, kind of put them together, you know.

So we have a couple groups like that sometimes where I might put my point guard and five man with like my six, seven, eight, nine in that group, and then my.

Maybe my two or three guys are going to play the most minutes.

If it's not those two guys, we'll put them with a group and with maybe our backup point guard and our backup five and try to mix those groups together a little bit because that usually seems to be how it might shake out in a game, you know, with the subbing and things like that, which I, like I said, I'm.

I'm still terrible at, to be honest with you.

That's the one thing I really can't figure out is how to sub and make it good for everybody.

Yeah.

And it's almost impossible, right?

You're not gonna.

You're not going to make it good for everybody because everybody wants to play 40 minutes regardless of what the situation is.

And so as a coach, like you said, I know that that's one of the things.

It's interesting that you say that, because I think about my own experience, and it goes back to what we talked about earlier in terms of the reps.

Right.

Of even when you're a freshman coach, when you're a JV coach, like, you have to make those substitution decisions.

And if that's something that you haven't done before, especially in game, I mean, you're talking about just in practice and.

But in game, it's.

You're.

You're looking.

You're like, okay, I, you know, you want to have your best guys out on the floor.

But then again, are they.

If they're a little bit fatigued, does getting them a minute or two here or there, but then if you put a sub in for only a minute or two, then is that fair to that kid that can't even get a rhythm and then you got to take them back out?

Like, there's just.

There's so many factors that again, when you're sitting in the stands and you're not coaching and seeing those kids every day in practice and knowing what their strengths and weaknesses are and what their practice habits look like, and all the things that go into making a decision about who plays well with who and.

And everything, I think that that's so often lost that I think people, again, parents especially, I'm thinking about, right, that they're always want your kid.

They always want their kid to play more minutes.

And they are always thinking, oh, this coach, he's, you know, he's.

He's sticking it to my kid, or he's doing this, or why isn't that kid playing more or this or that.

And when you're on the inside, you realize, one, that those decisions, A, are not easy and B, that you're looking at it and going a lot of times, right, you're.

You're splitting hairs between Guy 5 and Guy 6, especially if they're at.

At a similar position.

It just is.

Again, it's tough, and you have to be able to figure out how to evaluate that.

And I can completely relate to the idea that subbing players is hard because on the one hand, you're like, hey, my starters, these are my best guys.

These guys deserve to play a lot of minutes.

And then you're looking at your guys on the bench and like, these guys are working hard and they can help us win, too.

And so how do you balance all that out?

It's not, it's definitely not.

It's definitely not easy, that's for sure.

There's no question about that.

Yeah.

Yeah, very challenging.

And listen, I. I'd play everybody if it was easy.

Right.

You know, and it's, you know, that's.

Like I said, it's still, still.

It's still a work in progress.

You know, I've been doing it for nine years.

And like I said, the toughest.

Toughest thing to me at high school was when I had too many good players in a high school game.

It was tough to play.

It was tough to play 10, 11 guys in a high school game.

You know, the game's so much shorter, too, so it's still.

Still something I'm working on and trying to get better at.

And I ask coaches every summer, you know, what is your subbing philosophy?

Like, you know, you know, obviously you got to do it by your own personnel, but I think, you know, I try to learn a little bit something every year about how you can play 12 guys.

And again, not equally, but, you know, how do you get those 12 or 13 guys in where it, you know, that 12 or 13th guy, like, it's, it's meaningful minutes.

It's not just going in and coming out for 30 seconds, you know, so.

Right.

It's a work in progress as I get going.

Tell me about practice design and kind of how you put together a practice to get the most out of the time that you have on the floor with your guys.

Yeah, first of all, I think we let them stretch way too long to start practice.

But, you know, college athletes, like, they, they love stretching.

They really do.

I didn't stretch a day in my life, which I don't know if that's good or bad, but.

But no design.

You know, I'm.

You're still playing at 50.

You're still playing at 50 years old, so you're doing something right, man.

Forget the stretching.

You're.

You're.

You're fine, man.

You're still hooping at 50, so you're good.

I appreciate that.

Yeah, yeah.

But no, I. I think we try to balance it out with all the.

All the different categories of.

Of what we think is important.

You know, I'm a. I'm big on.

You know, I've seen practices where coaches don't do a lot of shooting.

I'm big on that.

I think we should shoot all the time.

I always try to.

We'll usually start practice with some kind of full court drill, some kind of passing fundamental.

We've really been.

We call it like full court V cut passing.

It's really just working on coming and meeting the ball in the air, pivoting overhead passes.

It's so funny.

Like, in college, you think kids would know all these little fundamental things that.

Because, you know, you're in college now.

Right.

But you, you really don't.

You really don't know where they're coming from, what they've been taught.

So you're really doing a lot of teaching.

You really are.

And then, because everyone's been taught something different or maybe haven't been taught something that you think may be very, you know, should be known, and they don't really know it, whether it's footwork or how they move and things like that.

So.

But we try to do stuff.

Some kind of full court passing finishing drill to get the blood flow.

And we always say at the end of the stretch, you gotta be ready to go.

Like, we've already wasted eight minutes in practice stretching, you know, so let's, let's go here.

And then I like to do some kind of Guard, forward breakdown, you know, so I'll send our post guys to one end with an assistant, our guards to another end and we give them like, you know, whatever the category is for the day.

It could be face ups for the bigs and they're working on playing off of two guards.

It could be filling and you know, some kind of finishing and then usually after that I go into some kind of shooting.

Now whatever team shooting drill we have, it could be, you know, team versus team, it could be individual based.

And.

I try to hit all those fundamental stuff and shooting right at the beginning kind of gets the blood flowing a little bit and then we get kind of the meat of stuff, you know, it could be.

We're going into and we try to have like a, a little offensive breakdown segment.

So maybe we're in the flow of our offense, but there's some actions we want to kind of show and maybe rep and then we'll go into like a, you know, full court game.

Really focused on the offense.

I really focus.

I'm a defensive guy.

I mean I can do both, but I'm really focused on the defense.

So my one assistant really is taking the offense and I really focus on the defense, you know, so we'll play some kind of.

We do like three minute games, rotate the teams, we keep the score.

Obviously we have consequences if you lose and usually everyone gets two games in those cycles.

Then we'll do some kind of defensive breakdown.

I try to do closeouts and slides every day, even if it's for two to three minutes just to rep them.

Some kind of half court defensive breakdown where it's, you know, maybe we're working on ball screens, coverages, maybe we're working on how we're going to rotate out of a slot drive and we got to help some kind of half court breakdown and then usually some kind of half court defensive competition.

I'm big on the two drills I really like the most are we call it perfect possession.

You got to exhaust the shot clock for 30 seconds, you know, so we have three teams.

So one team's got to stay on and exhaust that shot clock.

So you know, for, for coaches listening.

If you don't know, it's basically you play defense.

If you get a stop and there's still 18 seconds on the shot clock, the next team comes on and you got to play to exhaust that.

And we give them rewards too.

So if you get a deflection at the end of that segment, we take five seconds off the shot clock.

If you force a turnover, another Five seconds comes off.

If you take a charge, it's an automatic.

You exhaust a 30 second shot clock.

So we try to give them some, some rewards of things we like in practice, turnovers, deflections, charges.

We were doing like live ball steals.

We exhausted, 10 seconds off.

We always make them, if you get a live ball steel, we always go make them dunk it at the other end just to have some fun.

And I usually run down there and chest pump somebody, you know, stuff like that, you know, then we'll try to throw some press segment in there, you know, and then usually we try to play at the end, you know, could be a transition, defensive segment, could be a press.

Then we might go like some four minute games.

This feels like a four hour practice, right?

It's only two.

But we try to play at the end, you know, we'll mix in some free throws.

You know, I'm a big, like we're actually not shooting free throws right now.

So I got to figure, you know, very well right now.

So I got to figure something out.

But I really like shooting free throws because.

And I like doing it like with some conditioning in it, you know.

So for shooting one on ones, if you miss the front end, you got two down and backs.

Within the five minute segment, we do it.

If you miss the second one, you got a down and back.

If you make them both, you don't have to run.

And that's continuous for five minutes in groups of threes.

But yeah, then we'll play at the end and some kind of controlled function.

It might be, you know, four minute game.

But we're playing a score too, you know, so if the score comes first, you know, then.

But so now we're getting live situations without making them planned live situations and you know, because you know, planned live situations, sometimes guys are cheating to play and all that other stuff.

Yeah, we still do them.

We still do them because you got to have them in how to foul, you know, stuff like that.

But that's kind of, that's kind of how we run practice and, and you know, obviously mixing in drills and stuff like that every day.

How do you think about the pacing of getting your team ready?

We're early in the season right now from day one of practice, obviously now with division three the last couple years, getting your extra eight days.

But just how do you think about the pacing?

Does it vary from year to year based on your team or do you try to kind of keep the same?

All right, we got to have this in by X number of days before Our first game or just how does that flow for you?

Yeah, I think for, for me, it's year to year.

You know, we've.

We've really scaled back some of the things we've done in the past as far as offensive things were.

You know, I used to be a big ball screen, continuity, some two guard, but we've kind of gone to a more read and react type stuff.

Although we're not really reading or reacting very well at this moment, you know, so I think it's a work in progress, but, you know, just trying to be less predictable offensively.

So we've really scaled back what we do.

We have some sets in and things like that that we've run and, you know, we probably got to spend more time on an execution and stuff like that.

But I think every year is a little bit different.

Defensively, I try to stay on course.

I think there's certain things you have to cover, you know, ball screen, defense, how you rotate out of things, you know, how you want to guard the ball, where are you forcing, you know, things like that.

So defensively, I think we're more on pace than typically we're on schedule.

But offensively, I think it just varies year to year on and what you're trying to do, it always feels like there's not enough time as you.

As, you know.

Absolutely.

There's always something.

You're like, oh my gosh, we didn't go over this.

And then you're playing your first game the next day, so.

But you just got to hope that experience of players that they can handle some of that stuff when they see it and, you know, or that we just gotta hope the other team misses the shot.

There you go.

All right, Mike, final two.

Part question, part one.

When you look ahead over the next year or two, what do you see as being your biggest challenge?

And then the second part of the question, when you think about what you get to do every day as a college basketball head coach, what brings you the most joy?

So your biggest challenge and then your biggest joy.

Man, that.

That's a good one.

I mean, I always think the biggest challenge is the recruiting piece because there are so many good players out there and.

But there is a heck of a lot of schools out there that are trying to get these good players.

And, you know, it's.

It's.

I always say recruiting is a game of failure because you're recruiting.

We probably have about 40 guys on our board that we really, really like, and we hope to get four of them.

Right?

I mean, you're going to fail on 36 of them, you know, so that's.

I think that's my biggest challenge every year is, you know, trying to bring in the players that match the fit that we want, which is tough, want to compete, want to get after it every day and love basketball and want to win.

Um, so I think that's the biggest challenge that I look at is trying to bring in the players that you want that match up with the academic standards, your program.

There's obviously a financial piece with everybody.

I think that that's the biggest challenge.

And then hit the joy.

You know, I just love basketball.

I really do.

I love, I love the interaction with our guys.

I love, you know, we lost bad the other day and I went in and we had some heart to hearts.

And I love that part of it, too.

Like, I love the challenge of can you bounce back from a bad loss?

You know, can you.

Can you go away this weekend and whether you win or lose, can you come out and compete better than you did, than you did the other night?

And I just think that the everyday grind and the love of the game and, and the interaction with the players.

Listen, we brought these players in, we love them, and it's our job to help them compete and be better people.

And I think that's what I love about it.

And I've met so many great young men, you know, in these past nine to 10 years, and, you know, I wouldn't trade that for anything.

And, you know, I just hope they think the same thing about me.

And, you know, that's really.

We talked about it earlier, the relationships.

Right?

That's.

That's really the joy of it all.

And the basketball piece is fun, but the relationships is everything.

That's well said.

And it kind of dovetails with the entire conversation, right?

The.

The basketball piece and, and the relationships, and when you combine those two things and then that's when you have something special.

And so I couldn't agree with you more on that.

Before we get out, Mike, I want to give you a chance to share.

How can people connect with you, Find out more about you, your program, whether you want to share, Social media, email, website, whatever you feel comfortable with.

And then after you do that, I'll jump back in and wrap things up.

Yeah, I mean, St. John Fisher University men's basketball, you know, our website, you know, it's pretty.

It's pretty well done.

My email, my cell phone are all on there.

Feel free to reach out at any time.

You know, I have Twitter, social media, Instagram, Grossidonia.

If you look up that it's a pretty uncommon name so should be pretty easy to find me or my wife on there.

You know the same thing we have like a Twitter account for.

I think it's SJFMBB for Twitter and Instagram.

So yeah, anybody is interested and wants to have a conversation, you know, I'd love to learn from from them.

And if you have any questions for me, I'd love to, you know, have a have a conversation anytime.

And you know, just want to thank thank you Mike for having me on.

And you know, this was, this was really, really great.

It's always fun to to have a conversation about basketball and and all these other things that are involved in coaching and truly can't thank you enough for for giving me the time to to kind of hear my story.

Mike.

The feeling is mutual.

Again, can't thank you enough for taking the time out of your schedule to jump on with us.

Really appreciate it.

And to everyone out there, thanks for listening and we will catch you on our next episode.

Thanks.

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