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I've been at different stops now where I've been at a Division 2 low major, mid major, high major and meeting different administration.

And some people have already have moved on and become Division 1 ads when they are associate ads.

Keeping those friendships genuine and asking those guys, what are you looking for?

What are some things that are really, really important here over the last two to three years more than they were 10 years ago.

Just little things like that.

Tramell Barnes is a men's basketball assistant coach at South Dakota State University under head coach Eric Henderson.

This is Barnes second stint as an assistant with the Jackrabbits, having also served under Henderson from 2019 to 2021.

Barnes spent three seasons from 2021 to 2024 at the University of Utah on the coaching staff led by Craig Smith.

He served as the director of player personnel and assistant coach for the Utes.

Barnes had previously worked with Smith during the 2018-19 season at Utah State where he served as director of basketball operations and player development.

The NABC recognized Barnes for his efforts and named him to the 2019 Under Armour 30 Under 30 team.

Tramiel began his coaching career at Southwest Minnesota State in 2013 after a four year collegiate career capped by two seasons with the Mustangs.

He spent six seasons on the SMSU coaching staff.

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Be sure to have your notebook handy as you listen to this episode with Tramell Barnes, men's basketball assistant coach at South Dakota State 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 Tramell Barnes, men's basketball assistant coach at South Dakota State University.

Tramell, welcome to the Hoop Head spot.

Mike, appreciate it, man.

Thanks for having me on.

Excited to be here and excited to chat with you for a little bit.

Thrilled to have you on.

Looking forward to diving into all the things you've been able to do in your career.

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

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

What made you fall in love with it?

Yeah, no doubt, man.

Gosh, it started really, really young for me.

You know, I came from a family that loves sports.

You know, my mom played basketball and went actually junior college and played junior college basketball and then played at North Dakota State for two years and then really kind of developed the love with my grandpa though.

So it's kind of a funny story.

I think I was like five or six and we were in our living room and I used to shoot Kleenexes into the, into our lamp and he was annoyed of taking out Kleenexes non stop because that was my hoop.

And I came home from school one day and he had a cement hoop put up for me during the day.

So I think I was probably 7 or 8 when that happened.

And yeah, have just had a big passion for sports in general, but specifically basketball.

And like I said, my family's been really, really influential on that and I've been lucky as far as, you know, being introduced to the game at a young, young age.

So as you grow up in the game and you start to take a little bit more seriously as a player, what do you remember about how you went about improving your game and getting better?

Obviously, as time goes on, you have the way that kids grow up in the game today and so much of it is training, there's much less pickup basketball than there used to be.

But just what was it like for you?

How'd you go about improving as a middle school, high school player?

You know, I.

So I actually kind of grew up in a small town in Minnesota and everyone played every sport, you know what I mean?

So whether it was football season, basketball season, go, whatever it might be, we all played every sport.

But I.

I was lucky enough to have a community that really had a passion for athletics.

And I got into kind of a friend group as well.

And like I said, growing up really early in, in life, I was able to continue to develop that love for basketball.

And, you know, we were on traveling teams.

And from starting in third grade, I think I had kind of Armada video.

Minnesota, that's where I kind of grew up.

Had travel ball.

And we know my group, it's kind of crazy.

From third grade to my senior year, we had 14 players starting in third grade and our senior, my senior year, high school, we had 12 of the same guys.

That's awesome.

So kind of unique.

We had 12 seniors on my high school team, and we grew up playing from third, most of us from third grade on the way up.

So really, really fortunate.

That's kind of a unique thing, I guess, having that many seniors on a team.

And I group that play played together from third to 12th grade and we had some.

A lot of success and I think that was part of it just because we had played together for so long.

Yeah, that's amazing.

That almost never happens.

Well, it almost never happens, period.

But it certainly almost never happens now with the way that kids move around to schools and different things and just to be able to have that group that is your core that, you know, hey, these are the guys that I'm going to play with.

I always say that, like I was in maybe fifth grade, I think, and this was before the heyday of travel basketball and just was playing in like the rec league for the city, and they took all the players from the rec league at the city and we went and played in this tournament in another town.

And I still have that team photo.

And not everyone in that photo turned out to be a high school basketball player, but almost all the kids on that team ended up being, if not basketball players on the team.

They ended up being like the football players and the baseball players.

And so it's interesting to go back and look at those pictures and just see.

I always tell people, I felt like I kind of knew who the people were going to be that I was going to play with.

And today it's just not like that for you.

It's even like you double down on my experience to have those kids all be, you know, I'll be connected all through time.

Are you still, are you still friends in touch with a lot of those guys?

I am.

It's Funny you say that because last night, my alma mater amount of video, they made it to the state tournament in Minnesota.

So I got to watch them play the first round game and I ran into a bunch of guys, probably six to seven of those guys that are either living in this Twin Cities or living close to it.

So it was kind of a cool experience and kind of surreal, I guess, just to kind of relive kind of seeing those guys in our hometown because we've only made.

They've only made to state like three times in the history of the school.

So it's kind of cool to see that happen again.

There a coach, whether it was your high school coach or maybe somebody who coached you when you were younger that you feel really had an influence on you, that is maybe still something, somebody that you carry with you as a coach today.

Yeah, man.

My high school coach was the first one that really introduced me to like, really have a real, real love for the game.

It's funny, actually called me today.

Like I, I talked to him pretty frequently.

But it's one of those things where, you know, I grew up kind of with my grandma and my grandpa had passed away pretty early.

So I was always like, kind of grew up in like, I was like the ball boy and the bat boy just for like male role model Stu.

And for some reason Coach Roloff and I just had a real connection, whether I was from.

I think it was like I was like in third grade when I started doing the ball, the bat boy and ball boy stuff or second grade.

And yeah, he ended up being my coach and we're super close to this day still.

And he's like a father to me, you know what I mean?

So it's one of those things when I got into coaching, I didn't know I wanted to get into coaching right away and probably until like my junior year of college or so.

But he, I wanted to be like him, if that makes sense, and just impact people and have a passion for hoops.

And he's just a great guy too.

You know what I mean?

A heck of a guy.

So I was really, really fortunate that way.

There's some part of his personality or the way that his team's played that influences you.

You know what I would say?

He was, he was hard on us and it was one of those things that took a little bit of use, time to get used to.

But as like from my freshman year to my senior year, we kind of softened him up a little bit.

It helps win, win in a lot of games.

You didn't have to yell much.

But it's one of those things where I've been super fortunate.

Obviously.

Coach Roloff is a huge.

A mentor to me.

I've been fortunate enough to have so many good coaches around and know whether it was Coach Meyer at Northern State, Biggs, who I played for in South Southwest Minnesota State, multiple guys I've worked for now in the profession.

I mean, I've been really, really lucky to have good people around me and then also just like, consider them like really, really close friends, you know what I mean?

And it's not always like this in that business where you're working for someone you like.

You know what I mean?

Like, so absolutely super, super for show with that.

Yeah.

It's nice to be able to have people in your past, Right.

That you can reach out to when you come into a situation where maybe you just want to bounce some ideas or some thoughts off of somebody.

And it's great to be able to pick up the phone and somebody that you know pretty well that you can trust and say, hey, here's what I'm looking at.

What do you think I should do?

Or what do you think of this is the decision that I'm considering.

I would think that that's a tremendous resource for you.

And not like you said, not everybody has that.

Yeah, for sure.

All right, tell me a little bit about your college decision.

What made you make the decision that you did?

And just talk.

Walk me through sort of your.

Your recruiting experience.

Yeah, you know, I, like I said, I grew up in a smaller two way school, so kind of middle of the road in Minnesota.

And you know, I had, for the most part, Minnesota is a unique state where at the time There was only one Division 1 school, the U of M University of Minnesota.

Now St.

Thomas is Division 1, which just went from D3 to D1 here in the last year.

But it's just littered with Division 2 schools.

So there's like, I think there's eight or nine Division 2 schools in Minnesota itself.

So my recruitment was just a lot of those division twos.

And you know, I.

I think kind of going through the process, I played AU and AU and I'm kind of dating myself, I guess.

But I'm 30, I'm 35 now, whatever.

So I graduated in 2008, but it was very different from what it is now.

Like there was like three really good metro teams and I was from out outer metro and then there was like two outer metro teams.

So, like it was.

If you were playing a It was really hard to, like, get on a AU team.

Yeah.

So I was fortunate enough to play for Minnesota glory back then, and like I said, there was, like, five teams in the whole state, and now there's, like, five teams each program.

But was really, really fortunate for that.

And Coach Paxton was my coach and kind of helped me through it.

And I grew up, you know, 30 or 45 minutes from southwest Minnesota State, and Brad Bigler was a assistant at the time, and Greg Steaming was the head coach and had some other St.

Cloud State and Northern.

I ended up actually going to Northern State first.

So Coach Don Meyer was there, and Randy Baruth, who's actually now the head coach at Saginaw valley in Michigan.

D2 school there recruited me.

And at the end of the day, like, it was a really hard decision.

It came down to Northern and Southwest, and Southwest was kind of home, which I really knew.

And then Northern was just a couple hours away.

But Coach Meyer was just so consistent.

He was just really, really consistent and had a great way about him.

And it almost got to the point where, like, I couldn't say no.

You know what I mean?

Like, we're.

So I decided to go to Northern State and had a great experience there.

You know, it's kind of had a unique experience with Coach Myers.

I'm not sure if you're familiar with him, but he had a car accident my freshman year and ended up losing his leg and had cancer and stuff like that.

So it was a unique year.

But he coached us all the way through my freshman and sophomore year, and then my sophomore year retired.

But I'm going, I guess, going back to my recruiting process.

It was similar till today.

You know what I mean?

Now it's a little bit different where today, you know, now there's like, the transfer portal and all that stuff where, like, a lot of recruitment can happen still in the spring.

I ended up actually committing very early.

I committed in June of my.

Going into my senior year.

So it was right in the middle of the summer, and I had visited.

I had known Southwest.

I had almost a full ride there.

Northern gave me a full ride.

And it was one of those things, like I said, where I went on another visit.

I visited Northern, like, two or three times, and I went.

On my last visit, it got to the point where, like, Coach asked if I was all in.

I was all in just because I couldn't say no to the guy, just because he was so consistent, and he was a really good coach, really good program there, the community there.

So I, You Know, that's.

That was kind of my recruiting process.

And now being, you know, in my 11th year college coaching, it's like every recruiting process is so different, you know what I mean?

And there's no one, no one or two that are the exact same.

So, you know, mine was a little bit different where I, you know, had a couple options and like I said, I.

I was a fine player.

Like, I was a good role player in college and had a great experience.

But today, now with money involved and all that stuff, it's just a whole nother beast.

Yeah, it really is.

It's amazing.

I don't think any of us, if you go back, and I'm sure that you've thought about this, and I know I've thought about it, that my time as a player, and again, I'm much older than you, but going back to when I played, the idea of the amount of money that's being thrown around again at the highest levels, we're talking about the amount of money that's being thrown around there and just the transfer portal and just how different the NCAA is in terms of what they, what they enforce, what they, what they're looking to accomplish.

It's.

It's completely, completely different from certainly from what I played, whatever 35 years ago and, and certainly much different from even when you played.

I don't think anybody could have foreseen five years ago where we are now.

It's kind of incredible.

Yeah, it really is.

You know, and it's.

It's interesting and it will be interesting how it continues to go.

You know what I mean?

If they, you know, change some things to help clean some things up or how it kind of looks, but it's just kind of the landscape of college basketball now, so you kind of gotta adapt or die, really.

So.

Absolutely.

I mean, I think that's the thing that when you start talking about being a coach at the college level, right.

You have the way that it used to be, and clearly there are a lot of coaches who are, whether you want to call it sentimental or whether you can call it partial to the way that it used to be, but the reality is all you have to do is look at any court decision involving players and the ncaa and you have a pretty good understanding that the way that it was five or 10 years ago is never coming back now.

It's.

I think that what we have now is going to be tweaked and played with and tried to figure out how we can make it better, but I don't think we're ever going back to what it was like in the year 2000, that just isn't going to happen.

So along those lines, when you think about it from your perspective, and I thought you made a great point that you have to be adaptable, right?

Like the system is what it is.

We can all sit around and say, oh, I wish it was like it was 20 years ago, or man, this isn't the system that I would design.

But the reality is the system is what it is.

And so everybody has to adapt to fit in with that.

But if you were looking at it, what would you think would be one change to the system that we have right now that you think could potentially make it better?

What's something that you would like to see that would maybe just at least put some degree of, I don't know if control is the right word.

But what's just, what's something that you might try to do differently with where we are in the moment?

You know, I, I, when I think about that, I think one thing I think that could really clean it up is like, and I think the transfer portal is great.

And I think, you know, because not every situation is perfect.

Some situations change, coaches leave, you know, things are different.

Players, you know, sign after maybe that you have signed.

Kids are better than they thought.

You know what I mean?

Like, things change, you know, So I think the transfer portal is really good.

But I do think we need to regulate like how many times you can transfer.

I know we tried to do that with the one time transfer rule and it got, you know, obviously there were some, the court's decision to kind of take that away, but right now it's kind of just the wild, wild west, really.

And you know, being able to transfer non stop whenever you want makes things that, to me, that's the root of it.

You know what I mean?

Like, if you could only transfer once, and I wish the one time transfer rule would just stick.

And I know the tough thing with that is there's a lot of gray area with that as well, you know, like ever, like I said, every situation's different.

This coach left, you know, my, you know, family has some health issue, like whatever that may be.

So I know there's some gray areas, but I do wish they could regulate that because like, I actually, I transferred when I was at Northern State to Southwest.

My, after Coach Meyer left, I got a little bit closer to home and I transferred and I had to sit out of here, you know what I mean?

That was the whole, that was how things worked.

Like, if you transferred, you had to sit out.

So I'm not saying they have to go back to that rule or whatnot, but I really do wish they could regulate something where it's like, if you transfer, you decide to leave and you do it more than once.

You know, there's like, different stipulations that they could follow and try to, you know, and they tried to do that, obviously, and it didn't go through.

You know, it got changed.

But I think that would solve a lot of issues.

Yeah, I agree with you.

I.

I always say to people when they ask me or I have a conversation that fundamentally, I am 100% in agreement that players should be able to transfer.

Right.

Because I think back to, like, you described, where here you are, you transferred, and now you have to sit out a year, and that's a tough year when you've got a practice and you're not getting a chance to play that.

That's a tough year on players.

And yet, at the same time, coaches.

Again, I'm going back to the old system.

A coach can leave and coach the very next year.

And here's a kid who maybe signed a letter of intent with that school or a kid who came there expressly to play for that coach.

Now that coach is gone, and the kid is the one kind of stuck holding the bag.

And so I always felt like that was unfair.

So I'm fundamentally in favor of kids being able to transfer.

And I think the same way with kids being able to be paid.

When you're a basketball player at Ohio State and you go into the bookstore and your jersey is for sale, and you're.

It doesn't have your name on it, but it has your number.

And you see that Jersey selling for 50 or 60 bucks, and there's part of you looking around going, well, I should have a piece of that.

Completely understandable.

And I'm 100 in agreement.

And yet the way that it's kind of gone where we've just opened it up this wide, wide, wide open with, as you said, no stipulations as to, hey, let's allow this, but let's control it in some way.

And I know, again, like you said, the NCAA has attempted to do that, and the courts have put a little bit of a damper on what the NCAA has tried to do.

It'll be interesting five or 10 years from now, Tramell, to see where this thing settles out from both sides of it, right?

From.

From the coaching, the NCAA side and then where the courts eventually settle and what Players think about the system and how they go about trying to make it work to their advantage.

There's, there's all these things that everybody's still.

I feel like it's still so early in the process for everyone that we're all still trying to figure it out.

Yeah, no, I, I would agree 100% with that.

All right, so you mentioned earlier that coaching really hadn't been on your radar until you get to your junior year at Southwest.

Going into school, what did you think you wanted to do for a career?

Were you a typical 18 year old kid that you're like, yeah, I got, I gotta pick a major.

I have no idea what I really want to do.

Yeah, where were you at?

What was your mindset?

You know, right away I was like, maybe I'll be a teacher.

Like, I went into like my family, my grandma worked in the school system and stuff like that.

So I was thinking maybe I'll be like a history teacher or something like that.

I've always had a passion for history.

But I realized quickly, I was like, nah, I don't want to do that my freshman year.

And then I went into business actually.

So I was kind of in a business major and business and sports, sports management kind of emphasis and was kind of thinking about that.

Like I, like I said, I've always had a passion for sports.

So I was like, hey, maybe I can do something in professional sports ranks or administration.

With college, I didn't really know exactly what I wanted to do.

And it, like I said, it was my red shirt junior year when I red shirted at Southwest, you know, I had to do like, you're just sitting there, you're practicing every day, but you're sitting there watching the games.

And my, my coach, Brad Bigler was really, really influential and just kind of asked me, was kind of, you know, feeling out my passion and stuff.

And he's like, you know what, man?

You'd make a, you'd make a solid coach.

Like, you should try to, you should.

If you think about that, like, if that's something you want to do and it's all done and I could potentially have a GA spot open for you when you're done.

So just like he didn't make me like say yes right away.

But that kind of got my wheels spinning.

That was like the first time where it's like, hey, I like have a real passion for this and love all the integral parts of hoops, you know, the X's and O's, the relationships, all that stuff with.

So just you know, like I said, I was really fortunate and was able to kind of walk into that GA after I was done.

That changed the way that you looked at the game as a player.

Did you start thinking the game more as a coach maybe than you had before?

And looking at, well, okay, we're doing this drill in practice, and now it's not just about how am I using this drill to make myself better as a player, but what's the purpose of this drill as it relates to our team?

And looking at how you played offense, how you proud your team played defense, did you start to look at it more from a coaching perspective?

Yeah, I did.

You know, and I think, like I said, I've had really good coaches growing up, and Biggs is like a master technician and simplifies things.

So I always had a passion that way.

And even, like, my red shirt year when I couldn't play, I was watching film, I was studying, and that's when I really kind of started deep diving into the games.

And it was hard not being able to play.

But feeling like you were helping your teammates and had some younger guys that were there really helped me kind of be able to teach the game as well, trying to, you know, help those guys that were actually on the floor playing during games that I couldn't play.

What's your favorite experience that you ever had as a player?

Any level?

It's a great question.

Oh, gosh.

My favorite experience was probably my first year playing at Southwest.

We won the conference championship tournament.

That was pretty fun.

It was just a big, like, our team, we.

We didn't have a standout guy.

I mean, our.

I think our highest point score that year was like 13 points a game or 12 points a game.

And it was just kind of 12, 10, nine.

It was one of those teams, nine, eight, eight, like, where everyone just kind of stood out.

And that was a fun year.

Had to beat some good teams to win that and ended up winning the league and playing in postseason.

Like, that was my first taste of, like, college postseason, if that makes sense.

No, it does.

That was.

That was that.

Just looking back, that was a pretty special, special year and special team.

Just.

We were really, really close, and there wasn't one guy that, you know, it's a different guy every night that kind of stood up and stepped up.

So that would.

I'd probably say that.

All right, tell me about the transition from being a player in the program at Southwest to being a graduate assistant, what that's like to go from one side of the office door to the other side of the office door, maybe.

What were some things that surprised you that you didn't necessarily know went on with the coaches while you were playing?

Yeah, you know, like I said, I was really, really fortunate to be able to just step into a role and a system that I knew already, you know what I mean?

So my transition was maybe a little bit easier than some guys that are, you know, transition to a brand new coach you're working for, brand new system, you're learning all the terminology, you know.

So for me, it was really easy that way.

Obviously, it was a little different.

Like, you go from having, like, your best friends, your teammates, you know, and now you have to separate it.

Right.

You know what I'm saying?

Like, Saturday nights are different.

But it was one of those things where I was really fortunate.

You know, I.

Like I said Brad Bigler was the head coach, he's still the head coach at Southwest.

And he kind of just threw me into the fire right away.

Like, I was doing scouts right away.

I was like.

And I didn't know what the heck.

I was, like, looking back on it, like, I had no clue what I was doing.

And, you know, credit to our system.

Chad Welk was one of our other assistants.

He kind of was helping me with, you know, putting together a scout and, you know, all that stuff.

And I had kind of seen how we did it.

So, like I said, the transition was easier for me as a player.

For three years there, like, I knew what it looked like, but really, like, breaking stuff down, looking back at it, getting thrown into the fire was one of the best things that happened to me because I had to learn.

And then I kind of taught myself.

And then Bigs and Welk and some of those guys would kind of would guide me if I.

If I felt like I needed to be guided in a certain way, if that makes sense.

Well, it does, absolutely.

I mean, I think part of it, right, is you get in there and you start looking around and you try to figure out, well, hey, I thought I maybe knew a lot, but maybe I don't know as much as I thought.

And so then you dive in, right?

You're trying to figure it out yourself.

And then it's nice to have people that are behind you or willing to.

That are willing to support.

So along those lines, when you think about that first year or two, what area do you feel like you had the largest leap in terms of growth as a coach?

Like, you probably came in with some ideas of, hey, I hear a lot of guys say I was Pretty good with player development because I had just been a player and I knew what I needed to do to get better and I was able to translate some of that knowledge.

But what was something that you feel like I came in and maybe I was here and now all of a sudden, boom.

As I work for a year or two and I really start to put them time in that you really grew in one area.

Yeah.

You know, as a player, and I kind of didn't answer your first question as well as I maybe should have.

Like, as a player, you don't really realize how much goes into like your co.

How much work your coaches put in.

You know what I mean?

That was really eye opening to me.

Like, oh, got like this is taking forever.

Like that edit took me like six hours, you know what I mean?

Whatever.

For sure.

It's like.

And the guy see 20 minutes of that.

You know what I mean?

Like you don't really always realize that, you know, I think just being able, like I'd say I grew the most with like game planning, you know, Like I agree with you, like the player development stuff.

I was a player there, I knew our system.

Now I, I've learned, I, I continue to try to learn non stop, you know what I mean?

And, and I've learned a lot of different things.

But I kind of knew how Biggs wanted the player development to look like because I had just came through that.

But like I said, I was kind of thrown into the fire.

So like game planning, I mean looking back at it now, it's almost laughable.

Like not saying like it was like necessarily bad plans by any means, but like just like the routine.

I didn't always have like a routine like I do now as I've been in coaching for a while and like it's a little more sporadic of like, oh, this, this.

And like how I break things down.

I really grew and I got to give credit to like Chad Welk and Brad Bigler.

A lot of credit to helping me kind of get me through that without like just telling me what to do.

Like, let me.

Letting me find my own way.

But then if like I, hey, maybe if you have you tried looking, thinking about this way to do this?

Oh yeah, that makes sense.

And then you know, just kind of continuing to build and add those building blocks to the fundamentals of that.

That's an underrated ability.

Right.

Of a head coach.

I think when you start talking about somebody who is giving coach Barnes responsibility and yet in the back of Coach Bigler's mind, he probably knows Coach Barnes's scouting report or Coach Barnes's game plan, it's probably gonna have some.

It's probably gonna have some holes.

He's probably gonna need some help.

And yet, as a head coach, to help your assistants grow, that's part of the job.

That's part of what you have to do.

But I think you also have to be secure enough in yourself as a head coach and confident enough that, hey, I, I can, I can help this guy through it.

But, yeah, that's a hard thing to be able to do, to delegate.

I think as you get more experience, it becomes easier to delegate.

I think in my experience at least.

And just with guys that I've talked to over the course of the time with the pod and coaches that I've been around, a lot of guys will tell me, you know, when I was young, I wanted to micromanage everything because I thought I knew what was best.

And even if I had somebody who was really good in an area, I still wanted to oversee it.

And then as I grew and I got older and I got more experienced, I realized that part of what I have to do is let that piece of it not completely go, because you still, as you said, have to have oversight, but at the same time, you want to be able to tap into the talents that your staff has, which may not always be exactly like yours, but I just think that's an underrated skill of a head coach, is the ability to allow someone underneath them to have that again, I wouldn't say complete autonomy, but the autonomy to go out and do some things and make some mistakes, knowing that part of my job as a head coach is to help that player, help that coach grow.

Yeah.

You know, and looking back at It As a 22 year old, I've been, you know, I've never been afraid to ask for help, you know what I mean?

Where if I felt like I had questions and stuff and, you know, Biggs was awesome to be about that and just kind of explain why he.

Why we would do this, why we did that.

And I kind of had a feeling as a player, you know, obviously playing for him for three years, like, like, I knew how we wanted.

I knew how we wanted to guard stuff.

I knew, you know what I mean, how we did in the past anyway.

But it's one of those things where it's just like the process of like getting everything organized all the time as like a 22 year old, like one game I.

You maybe do it this way, and then the next game you're like, hey, let me.

Like, I'm thinking this seems different here.

Like, I got to focus more on this.

Like, so it was just, it was a process to learn a little bit, but it was looking back on it, like, I'm super, super fortunate that I was, you know, at 22, just thrown into the woods or thrown into the fire and kind of able to figure it out, but also have that guidance where there was a confidence that he instilled in me that, you know, I was doing the right thing.

And then if he felt like some stuff needed to be tweaked, we would talk about it.

How far along in your career were you where you felt like you did have a handle on?

Here's my system for if I'm going to go out and scout a team, I know what my process is.

I know how I want to do that.

If I have to put together a game plan for this opponent, I know the steps that I need to take in order to put forth a game plan that my head coach is going to understand and be able to convey to the players.

Where were you in your career when you felt like, again, obviously, as you said, you're learning, right?

You're constantly learning and evolving and tweaking.

But when did you feel pretty confident that your process was where it needed to be?

I would say probably my third year.

Yes, as our first two, My first two years, like I said, I was a GA for a year right out of college.

Welk left and then I got put on right as the head assistant.

So I was 23 years old in my second year of coaching and a full time assistant there at a Division 2.

So I would say we were, we had solid years.

Those first two years we were a little over 500, so it wasn't great.

But I would really say that third year, after my first year being the head assistant, like almost doing pretty much every scout, I really, through that second year, I really kind of got a rhythm.

And then by my third year I was like, okay, I feel pretty confident in this process.

And that process is tweaked.

You know what I mean?

Like the process is tweaked over the years and you know, going to different levels now, like Division two, like been at a lot of different levels, whether it's Division 2, Low Major, Mid major, high major, you know, it's.

And some of it's resources based.

Like in Division 2, we didn't have sports code, we didn't have all that stuff.

Like I was straight, you know, screen copying my stuff and like putting it into some, like, free download movie file, you know what I mean?

Like, it was just one of those things where.

So just refining that process a little bit.

But I'd say by my third year, I felt pretty confident that this is kind of my routine and it's.

It's grown over the years as well.

Yeah, absolutely.

Tell me about the opportunity at the first opportunity at South Dakota State.

Yeah.

So, you know, that was My First Division 1 assistant job the first time here.

And I was actually.

So I went from southwest to assistant.

I was there for five years.

Then I went to the University or Utah State in Logan, Utah, as the ops guy.

So.

Gotcha.

Yep.

So I was at Utah State for one year as an ops guy.

Had a really good year there as a.

As a program.

It was a great year.

And then was fortunate when Hendo got the job here.

When TJ Altzelberger had left and went to unlv, Hendo got the job here.

And I didn't really know Hendo super well, but, you know, coaching such a small community, it's one of those things where, you know, I talked to him a couple weeks, and it worked out where I was able to, you know, kind of get on his staff for the first time.

And, you know, we've.

It's kind of crazy now coming back for the second time.

It's still the same staff here.

So they've had.

They've been together for seven years, I think.

I was with them the first two years, but it was fun, man.

It was.

It was good.

It was different.

And I've been fortunate enough, like I said, to learn from different coaches and all really, really good coaches, but all do things a little bit different.

And, you know, Hendo's one of the best I've been around.

He's.

He's awesome that way.

And we had some.

Some fun years that first couple years, you know, and as I went to South Dakota State, leaving Utah State, it's like we, you know, we had Sam Merrill on that Utah State team.

We had Namish Keita.

So we had two guys that are currently in the NBA and won the league, went to the NCAA tournament our first year, and, you know, decided to take a leap of faith to come to South Dakota State.

Eric Hendo's first year as a head coach and not knowing, like, how we'd be.

I didn't, you know, I didn't.

I just always have just kind of trusted my gut that way and, you know, really trusted Hendo from day one.

So coming in as a completely new staff, Right.

And sort of turning the program around, making it, making it yours.

Right.

Making it what the vision of your staff, what your head coach is all about.

Tell me about that process coming in brand new versus now coming back where the program is already established.

What's.

How, how's that a different feel for you as an assistant?

You know, our first year there was just a lot.

There was, how do I say this?

There was, you know, we were trying to.

Hendo.

Hendo was trying to figure out exactly how he wanted his teams to play a little bit.

And we were trying to figure out our team because we had lost, you know, Mike Dom had lost.

I think we had lost like 4,000 points from the year before.

Mike Dom, David Jenkins, Skyler Flatten, to name a few.

I'm missing some guys.

Reed.

So we had, so we had a completely new team and they had a head.

Had a lot of success with TJ and Scott Nagy before that even.

So like our program has a rich tradition of success.

So there was just a lot of unknowns and exactly how we wanted to play, you know, offensively, how he wanted to play defensively.

So that was a little bit different where this time I feel like Hendo's, you know, he's been a head coach for six years now.

He knows, you know, who he is, you know, and I, you know, I haven't had the, I haven't been the opportunities to be a head coach, so.

And battle through some of that stuff of learning process, you know what I mean?

There's always going to be a learning curve with that stuff and talking to a lot of guys.

So this, this transition's been super, super easy for me and the staff, I mean the staff here is awesome with Brian Peterson, Rob Clinkfoos.

I mean Clink's been here for 18 years at South Dakota State, so that, that would be the biggest thing.

I think they've kind of just ironed out exactly who they are, their identity.

Where like that first year we didn't know offensively exactly how we wanted to play and we kind of morphed into a three out, two in and like not like not a ton of teams play that way.

And Doug Wilson was our starting forward that ended up winning player of the year.

And so it was just trying to figure that team out and figure out how we wanted to play.

I'd say was the biggest transition to where now we've kind of.

We have our niche.

Hendo knows how he wants to do this, this and this and it's just kind of Ironed out.

So recruiting process a lot easier too, right?

When you know, this is the way we want to play, this is the type of player we're looking for.

Whereas that first year, right, you come in, you inherit a roster and then you're trying to recruit guys and you're still like, well, what style are we going to play?

And then maybe even you might have a vision of this is the way we want to play.

But then you look at your roster and you're like, well, maybe this roster can't play that way.

So we got to tweak it.

Whereas now, once you've had things established for as long as Coach Henderson has, now that gives you an opportunity to just sort of hit the ground running every year because you have all those pieces in place.

Yep, exactly.

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Tell me about the culture and what you remember about the process.

First of all, there at South Dakota State, but maybe just speaking more generally because obviously you've worked for a lot of different head coaches.

What are some things that you've seen that have worked in terms of building the right culture around a team?

Yeah, you know, like I said, I've worked for amazing people.

You know, I can't say one negative thing about any of the guys that I've worked for.

Whether, you know, it's Biggs, Craig, Smith, Hendo, like all those guys are amazing coaches, but more so amazing people.

You know, I.

And I Think, like, culture can be thrown away, thrown around a ton, and it's a buzzword and all that stuff, but, like, all three of those guys, they are who they are, you know what I mean?

And when I say that, it's like there's no front ever.

There's no phoniness.

They're.

They're upfront, they're honest, and I think that's why they make them such great people.

You know what I mean?

Like, they're.

They're not trying to be someone else.

They're not trying to please people this way for that.

They're just.

They are who they are.

And that's what makes all those guys, I think, amazing coaches and amazing people, you know, And I've been fortunate enough to learn from those guys about that.

And, you know, whether it's, you know, how honest, like, Hendo is one of the, like, the.

The most honest people, the, like, the most genuine person you'll ever meet.

You know what I mean?

I mean, well, how many Division 1 head coaches, when you get to a hotel and on the road, is the first one off the bus and he's pulling the bags from underneath the bus, you know what I mean?

Like, that's the type of guy he is, though, and he's always been that guy.

So I would say.

I would say that, like, just they are who they are, and it's surrounding yourself with good people.

I think that's one thing, you know, Craig always talked about, like, he wants, obviously, good coaches, but good people.

And you are who you surround yourself with.

You know what I mean?

And I think that's.

That's really, really big when it comes down to, you know, the culture piece of it and the connectivity piece of your program, and it starts at the top, and it's got to go all the way down to the bottom.

Well, that speaks to, I think, something that when you look at, and I don't care whether it's a basketball program, but any organization, right?

When you talk about the quality and caliber of people that you bring in, it makes it a lot easier to build a great culture, to have a great culture when you're not trying to spend all your time pounding that square peg into a round hole, right?

You already have the round pegs that, you know, fit into that hole, and that makes it much, much easier then to be able to build a culture where everybody is pulling in the same direction.

Players, coaches, there's mutual respect all the way around.

And as you said, when somebody's authentic, when somebody is genuine, when somebody is who they say they are.

It makes it a lot easier for every single person in that program to be able to buy in, right, From a player that you're recruiting to a coach that's considering coming on the staff.

And then just, I'm sure for you, when you're sitting in the coach's office and you're working with the staff, when you know that everybody in that room trusts one another implicitly, it just makes it, I'm sure, so much easier to be able to have a united front.

When you walk out of that coach's office, everybody's on the same page, selling the same thing to players, to the community, to the school, to the administration, everything.

It just feels like that it all starts with, as you said, that authenticity and just bringing good people in.

Yeah, no, no doubt.

And, you know, everywhere I've been, you have different slogans and stuff.

And, like, you know, I think, you know, here we, like, we have a big circle, and every single game, Hendo talks about it.

It's all sprinkled all over a thing.

Having two feet in.

And, like, the words honesty come to mind.

That's in our circle.

Respect, selflessness, communication, compete.

Those are just some of the things like we live by and we try to tell our guys.

And it's bigger than basketball.

You know what I mean?

It's like, there's going to be times in life where, like, you're going to have some difficult things happen.

You know what I mean?

There's going to be times in life you make a mistake, but, like, you got to be honest.

Like, when you make a mistake, it's better to be honest up front right away than try to backpedal, backpedal, because at the end of the day, the truth is the truth and the truth will be told.

So it's one of those things that, you know, everywhere I've been, we've had different Logan slogans and different things like that, but it's one of those things, like, you got to live it.

Like, it's one thing to have it on the wall, but if you're, you know, not, you know, talking the talk, walk the walk, that type of deal, none of it matters.

You know what I mean?

And that starts from the top to the bottom.

Absolutely.

I mean, that's a great point.

And it's one that I often ask when coaches will talk about things with their culture, where they'll say, okay, this is the slogan, or, these are our four pillars, or these are the things.

And it's always, it's easy to write those down.

Right.

And put them on a poster and stick them up on the wall.

It's a little bit harder sometimes to be able to make those concrete so that everybody in the program understands what that means.

So we could talk about.

Right, like you just did.

Honesty.

Well, honesty means let's be honest right from the start so that we don't have to get to the truth a half hour later or two days later or whatever it is.

And now we've wasted all this time and energy and resources trying to get to the truth.

Whereas if we had just spoken honestly with each other right from the get go, we're, we're.

We're nine steps ahead of where we would be if.

If we were kind of trying to deflect the truth.

And so I like the idea of taking, taking those words and making them especially for players.

Right.

Because players can hear those things and coaches may understand them, but unless the coach can communicate to the players, well, what is that?

What does that look like?

Right?

So if one of your, if one of your core pillars is communication, well, what is.

What does that look like?

So if a player asks you, hey, what is.

What's good commanding, what's community good communication look like, Coach Barnes, what do you tell them?

What's something that is something that is important to you guys?

And then how do you take that and make it.

Make it real, make it into action that the players can actually take?

Yeah, you know, it's.

It's as simple as, like, hey, you know what?

Like we're, I'm.

We kind of have a rule like we always want to be like 10 minutes early to everything, and it's communication.

It's as simple as this.

Like, hey, you know what?

Maybe it's a.

To a professor, like, hey, I'm going to be gone.

We're going on a road trip or planet Alabama.

I'm missing these next two days.

But like having the communication early enough where it's not after the fact.

Right.

You know what I mean?

Or the communication of, hey, coach, I'm not feeling good.

I'm going to be there like right on time or I might be late, but it's beforehand, not after the fact.

You know what I mean?

So, like it's all before and just working ahead and staying ahead that way.

Like, that's just a simple example, I guess, with communication that we like, try to teach our guys.

And also like just the way you talk to people, you know, just stuff like that.

Yep.

I think a lot of those things.

Right.

Carry over not Just on the floor, but they carry over, as you said, off the floor.

Whether you're talking to a professor or you're talking to somebody, eventually, if you're trying to get a job or you have a co worker, a boss or whatever it might be, be able to learn those skills as a part of being on a team is obviously invaluable.

I think that's one of the biggest things that coaches do.

Right.

When we talk about the impact and you think about, like we talked about off the top with the coaches that have influenced you over the course of time when you were playing and how you still carry some of those things with you that have made you the success that, that you currently are.

A lot of that goes back to what, what I learned when I was a.

I learned, I learned more than just being able to play basketball and be a part of a team.

I also learned some of these other life skills that can impact me for the remainder of my life.

And I think that's a big part of, of having a successful program.

Yeah, no, I, I agree.

And you know, it just makes you saying that it makes me just think about like my freshman year of college, like when Coach Meyer has his accident.

We, we.

So we practiced at 5:30 in the morning.

Every day Coach Meyer loses his leg, finds out he has cancer, right?

And he was there on the first day of practice at 5:00am you know what I mean?

And you like, think like you have it bad.

You know what I mean?

He can barely talk.

Like we're literally, he's whispering to us because his law, like he, he had hurt his lungs and all that diaphragm and stuff.

And it's like you realize really, like, no, like you don't have it as bad as you think you have it.

You know what I mean?

And it's, that's something very, you know, simple to think about, but it's one of those things where you don't think about it until you can kind of see it sometimes.

Talk to me a little bit about the recruiting process for you and what it looks like when you go out and look at players.

Obviously there's a requisite level of skill that a player needs to be able to have to play at the level that you're coaching at.

But what are some things that you look for in a player?

Maybe intangibles or just things that you look for in players that Coach Henderson likes, players that you like?

Yeah, I think one big thing for us, and we, we take a lot of pride in developing relationships with People and we start that process pretty early and we try to, you know, start that as early as like their sophomore, junior year high school.

So it's not like a speed dating, you know what I mean, where it's can continue to happen year after year that way.

Really, really big on relationships that way, and getting to know people and getting to know families and what make them tick.

And we found out like, if we can do that over a two to three year period than just like one summer before their senior year, you know, it really, really helps us know who they are, but also they know who we are at the end of the day.

So that's one thing I think that we would try to try to do.

And obviously like you said, you do have to have a certain level of skill, you know what I mean, to play at the Division 1 level and talent level that way.

But it's one of those things where Coach Henderson's really, really big on just his gut feeling in ourselves of just like recruiting good people and people and like we evaluate parents just as much as players.

That's one thing that we try to take a lot of pride in.

Because no matter if you're, you know, your freshman year, if you're playing 20 minutes a game or you're not, you're playing two minutes a game, like there's going to be adversity at some point.

So, you know, we want, we, we want parents to be able to be there for their child, obviously, and their sons, but we also don't want them necessarily just like coddling them at all and being able to be real with them.

Does that make sense?

So that's one thing that we look into and really dive into, you know, the parents and not saying that, I'm not trying to say that they can't coddle their son by any means, but just people that, you know, that are going to be there for their son, but also, you know, be able to give them some tough love to at times.

And.

But that's, I would say that's one thing that we really look at, you know, another thing I think that we try to evaluate, you know, is how they interact with their teammates, you know, how they interact with their coaching staff, how they interact.

And we do a lot of homework, whether it's, you know, communicating with people at their schools, their coaches, siblings, different things that way, and how they treat people, because at the end of the day, like how they treat their closest friends and their, you know, their immediate families, a reflection on how they're going to be here A lot of times, you know what I mean?

So that's important.

And you know, those are some things, I guess, that stick out the most.

But it's one of those things where we're, it happens over a two to three year period.

We try to have it now, it's not always like that, but then you also have, you know, a time frame of just seeing it for a while and getting to truly, truly know the people, the person and parents and stuff like that whether than just like recruiting them from June of their senior year to, to the fall of their, you know, the beginning of their senior year.

For you personally, a player that you're going to sign and bring into the program, typically how many times do you like to see that player play in person?

I don't know if there is a typical answer to that because obviously every recruitment, as you said earlier, is different.

But in an ideal world, how often do you, how or how many times do you like to see a kid play in person?

Because I'm sure you can pick things up in person that you don't necessarily always pick up on the tape.

Yeah, no doubt.

I, I, as many times as possible.

Obviously with NCAA rules you only see seven times a year, but you know, for sure like two to three to four high school games throughout the year and you know, it's a little bit different sometimes if they're out of region.

Now we don't recruit a ton out of region guys where maybe an outer region person's 1 to 2 times in person during the high school year where, you know, if it's a local kid, it's five, it's five to six times that way.

But you know, it's, it's one thing that like we, we try to spread things out as well.

Like we'll go to football games, like if they're a multi sport athlete, we'll, we'll go to their football game, we'll go to their weightlifting session and just see them in an open gym and then they lift, you know what I mean?

Just the different environments and seeing how they interact with teammates and different things that way, different coaches are things that we kind of look for and try to get to.

So you know, if I had to put a number on it, local kids, four to five times probably.

How do you utilize watching a kid in a high school game versus watching them in an AAU game?

Are you using an AAU game, an AAU setting more to evaluate players who have come on your radar and are on your list and say, okay, this is a Guy we've ident.

We're going to identify this guy in AAU that, hey, we want this player.

And then once you've identified that you want the player, are you then using the high school games to make sure that the player understands and knows that you want to build that relationship and that you really want to come?

I guess the bottom line for the question is, are you evaluating players very often in their high school game, or are those most often players that you've already identified that you want to recruit?

If that question makes sense.

Yeah, I think it's a variety, to be honest.

Like.

Like I've mentioned a couple times, it's never the same every time.

You know, we obviously are always looking to continue to add people to the list, whether they're local, a little out of region.

You know, AAU is a great, great way to see a lot of.

A lot of guys in, you know, confined areas.

So that's kind of a good way to continue to evaluate guys and find more guys and making calls to AU coaches and stuff like that and kind of seeing your list that way.

But then high school is a great way to evaluate guys, too, because they sometimes.

A lot of times guys play different.

You know what I mean?

Like, in a.

That's something you look at, too.

Like in AAU, there's nine to 10 guys.

They're all the best players on their high school team.

There's alphas that, you know, where they're an Alpha on their team, but maybe another guy's kind of taking a back seat to this guy, you know what I mean?

And.

But with his high school team, he's the alpha, you know, and you don't get to see that side of him always in aau.

So we do like to watch high school stuff just to be able to see, like, you know, whether they're in a.

You.

It's like, oh, he's.

He's a good role player.

You know, he's, you know, hustle, plays hard, whatever that may be.

Well, then it's like, okay, you see a whole nother level to.

To their leadership sometimes when they're just with their high school teams.

Yeah, well, you can also.

Right.

I think one of the things that's always interesting to me is when you think about players moving up a level, right, from high school to college, not every high school kid who's the star on their high school team is going to get to be a star at the college level.

Right.

Most guys are going to come in and they're going to be role Players, maybe if you're lucky as a college program, you have one star and if you're really good, maybe you get two.

But for the most part there's still only one ball.

And you've got guys that have to be able to fill a role.

And so to be able to see, as you said, that player, okay, in this high school team, he's the star.

We see what he does when he ball dominant and does things and is sort of the straw that stirs the drink.

But now all of a sudden he goes to an AAU program where maybe he's the fourth option.

Well, he might end up being the fourth option in college.

How does that player play?

Does he still compete?

Right.

Does he still play hard defensively?

Is he hanging his head because he's not getting as many shots or the ball doesn't find him when he's open every single time the way it might when he's in high school?

I think to me, when you start trying to project and evaluate, where is this player going to be when they become part of our program?

I think as you said, seeing them in those different environments and in different roles is really valuable.

And that also go back to, you can even think about that from a two sport athlete or a multi sport athlete perspective, right?

The kid who's the star in basketball, maybe on the baseball team or the football team, he's just another guy who fills a role.

What's, what's he like in that environment?

What does that coach, what does this football coach or his baseball coach think about him?

Where he's not the best player?

How does he react to that?

And so I think again, you're just looking for every bit of information that you can get to try to make the best evaluation on a kid that you can.

Yeah, you know, recruiting, I mean, it's a, it's a science.

I mean at the end of the day it's, it's very unique with roster construction.

Right.

Like sometimes you think like, hey, this kid's going to be really, really good.

Like he's got a chance to be really good.

And then you got other guys.

Like when I was at Southwest Ryan, we recruited a kid named Ryan Brueggeman.

He is on a $500 scholarship his freshman year and like halfway through his red shirt year, we're like, he's our best player.

Like he's our literally our best player.

He's red shirting.

And he ended up being the all time leading score, steals, assists, broke every record.

But you know, like going into it, it's like, yeah, we will take him.

We'll take him.

He's a tough kid, he plays hard.

And then like, so it's, it's hard to know exactly, but it's one of those things where you just rely and trust on kind of your key fundamental things of what you look for in guys.

And, you know, sometimes you get lucky with guys and some, you know, some careers are not as fortunate for other guys.

You know what I mean?

So when you're constructing your roster, it's one of those things where you just really lean on kind of your principles and what you're looking for and then just developing guys.

And each guy's development takes a little bit of different time.

It's an inexact science, let's put it that way.

Right?

T.R.

Yeah.

Yes, that's a perfect word.

I'm stealing that.

All right, all right.

For you and your career, as you think about the different stops that you've had along the way, and there may be a time where you're looking to be able to become a head coach and run your own program.

As you are going through your career as an assistant coach, what are some things that you're doing behind the scenes to prepare yourself for an eventual opportunity that you may get to be a head coach?

What's some advice you might give to somebody who's starting out as a young assistant?

What should they be doing to sort of collect and gather their thoughts, their ideas, things that they're using from the coaching staffs that they've worked with?

What's been your system for preparing, whether you think about just preparing for an interview, preparing for eventually having that chance?

What are some things that you've done over the course of your career as an assistant that you feel are going to help prepare you to become a head coach?

Yeah, you know, that's.

That's a great, great question.

You know, I.

One thing I did learn early on in my career from coach Don Meyer was like, taking notes.

We would take notes non stop.

That was like a huge thing for him.

And I've just like carried that on as far as I go.

Like, I have a folder of a bunch of things of, like, I love different, you know, podcasts.

Like, I listen to slapping glass all the time.

Just like different things like that, where I'm always consistently learning and I have a Word document where I just start typing stuff that I like and I have a folder and I throw it in there.

You know what I mean?

Now, you can't use everything from everybody, but, you know, if you can steal one to two things, you know, from there, from.

From him, from here, from there, whether it's at the Final four conventions, wherever that may be, your pod, your podcast tonight, you know what I mean?

Like, if you can steal a couple things and just like carry it, take notes and put it away so you have it, you can always go back and look at it.

And that's something that I've done for a while now, you know, like I said I.

I would.

My.

My goal is to become a head coach one day.

And, you know, whether that's a year from now, five years from now, 10 years from now, it's one of those things where you keep learning, you keep adapting, you know, and you just keep growing at the end of the day.

So I think that was.

That's one thing I've taken a lot of pride.

And like, it's really hit me here over the last couple years more now, where it's like, really kind of narrowing in on, like, different things, like, kind of like your head, like a.

Like a booklet and things like that, and like, how you'd run your program.

You know what I mean?

Like, I've said all show I've been fortunate enough to, like, be around amazing people in my career in round basketball, but, like, I can't steal everything that they use.

I still have to do what I like, you know what I mean?

Like, well, it's true to me.

Yeah, for sure.

Absolutely.

And I.

I share a lot of similarities to guys I've worked for, you know, and sometimes it's taking stuff that you love, and then sometimes it's taking stuff that, you know, like.

Like, it's okay, it's okay, but it's not for me, you know, and being able to balance that and know kind of who you are as a person and how you would want to run your program.

But, you know, over the years and now going into my 11th year as a coach and college coaching, it's like one of those things where it's like, really, these last couple years, I would say, like, really trying to develop that, so, like, if that opportunity arises, you're ready.

You know what I mean?

And like, having a plan and not just like, being like, oh, I gotta.

Okay, what?

How am I gonna attack this?

Instead of, like, just trying to be as ready as you can be.

Like, you're probably never for sure, always 100 ready when it comes to that.

But now, you know, I've.

I've been over these last two to three years just really trying to narrow in on that, like, you know, if those opportunities do arise, how do I want it to look, you know, and then having stuff ready.

So, like, if things move quickly, as you know, in this profession, like, you're not just caught with your pants down.

You're.

You're, you're going and you're.

You're moving.

Having thought through some answers to interview questions.

When you start thinking about what the interview process looked like, have you.

Have you worked through, whether mentally or actually on paper or on a computer file, typed out some answers to.

To some interview questions that you probably get thrown at you as a head coach?

Yeah, you know, I think I have.

I've thought about it, you know, and like, it's.

There's just so much like, you think, like, until you really sit down and look at it and you put something down on paper, it's just like staff construction and then like, scheme community support.

You know what I mean?

Like, professional development that way, you know, obviously, fundraising, like now, today, in today's society, fundraising might be one of the more important things you do as a head coach.

You know what I mean?

Like, being able to raise funds for your program, your budget, nil.

Like, just different things like that.

But, yeah, it's.

It's something that I've thought about and continue to adapt and continue to think about and just being able to, you know, pick other people's brains.

Pick.

You know, I've kind of, like, I've said I've been at different stops now where I've been at a Division 2 low major, mid major, high major, and meeting different administration.

And, you know, some people have, you know, already have moved on and become Division 1 ads when they're Associate ads, you know, and I'm keeping those friendships, you know what I mean?

Genuine and stuff like that, and asking those guys, like, what are you looking for?

Like, what are some things that are really, really important here over the last two to three years more than they were 10 years ago?

Just little things like that.

Absolutely.

But, yeah, to answer your question, yeah.

What's something that, as an assistant coach, and we already talked about one of them, which is the ability to give your assistant coaches some leeway to be able to.

To do things right, to.

To release some control as a head coach.

But what's something else that you've learned as an assistant coach that you love about a head coach that you would want to continue to do when you became a head coach to support your assistants?

Yep.

Gosh, that's a good question.

That's a good question.

I would say, you know, I've worked for.

Everyone I've worked for has had an amazing balance of work and family.

And we all work really, really hard.

And you know, I think, like, something that I've enjoyed and believe me, we put in a lot of hours.

Like, there's many nights here up till midnight, 1 2am doing stuff.

But like, being able to go home for dinner with your family and still have trust that you're going to get stuff done at home or come back to the office, whatever that may be, that's something to me.

And now I just had my first son here.

Gosh, he's almost 10.

He's 10 months old.

So it's even more.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Thank you.

So it's even hit home a little bit more.

But everyone I've worked for has had a real balance of being able to, like, we're going to work really, really hard, but also, like, there's, there's a bigger picture to this deal.

Like, we also are going to give time for family.

You know, you're not going to have to come.

Like, yeah, you know, like, it's just you.

Like, we, we practice in the morning, so we're all here at 6am you know what I mean?

And then.

But we're not staying here till 8pm, you know what I mean?

So it's just like where you're not seeing family throughout the whole day.

So I think that's something that, you know, if I'm fortunate enough to become a head coach, like, I want to continue and you got to be able to trust people that they know the work's getting done, but also having that balance.

And I've been, like I said, I've been super, super fortunate to be around people that, that have had that, because I don't think it's like that always, but that's right.

Yeah, it's definitely difficult.

And I think that as an assistant coach, you're not always in control of that schedule.

Right.

The head coach ultimately sets the schedule.

And so if you want to continue to be, remain to, to remain employed, then you have to do what your head coach, what your boss asks you to do.

And yet I completely understand the point that you just made that when you have a head coach who a understands the amount of work that it takes, but also understands the fact that there is a life outside of basketball that's important and being able to strike that balance, I can, I can see completely where that is a key.

Especially again, as an assistant coach where you are, you are at the you know, you are at the beck and call of your, of your head coach.

If they want you, if they need you for something, you have to answer the bell.

So to know that there's somebody there that, that understands that, hey, I got a son at home.

Hey, I've got a family at home that needs me just the same way that the basketball program needs me.

And as you said, it doesn't, I'm sure it doesn't happen everywhere like that.

And you and I both know that in the coaching profession, there's, there's no limit to the amount of time that you can put in and the amount of things that you can do.

And so you have to.

I think one of the things that I've talked to coaches about, Tramell, is just the, the, the danger, especially with how easy it is on the technology side.

Right.

To watch film compared to probably what it was even when you started.

Yep.

I mean, you can, you could be watching film 247 at a certain point.

It probably gets through it.

It probably gets to be overkill.

But it's so available.

It's not the old days of the old FedEx VHS tape drop offs.

Back when, back, back when I was playing, when the graduate assistants were driving to the, you know, driving to the post office to, to mail and pick up, you pick up videos, so it's a little bit easier to watch tape now.

No doubt, no doubt.

All right, I want to ask you a final two part question.

So part one.

When you think about the next year or two, what do you see as being your biggest challenge?

And then when you think about what you get to do each and every day, what brings you the most joy about your job?

So the biggest challenge followed by the biggest joy.

Gosh, you got, you got great questions.

You have great questions.

I'm trying, I'm trying over here, man.

Biggest challenge.

Biggest challenge, I would say with the landscape of college basketball today, the biggest challenge is having a.

Connectivity with, within your team, you know, with, with people transferring in and out.

You got guys leaving, you got guys coming.

So it's not like it was before, where it was like, hey, you know what?

Like, you had your freshmen that were new, but you had your sophomores, juniors and seniors to teach it, like, teach the young pups how to do it.

So I, I think that's one thing.

And we've been pretty fortunate here at South Dakota State.

You know, we've had guys transfer.

We had guys, you know, then, and it's, it's been great, you know, like, we've had really good teams.

And usually when you have good teams, you have good players.

So, you know, we've had guys been able to transfer up, but it's also a challenge of just like, being able now to, like, have to bring in, okay, maybe we need to bring in a junior, you know, that's transferring from somewhere else, but also, like, teaching them kind of how we ride the ship and how things are done here.

I think over the last couple years, that's probably been the biggest challenge that way.

And then most excited for, I would say, just continuing to grow and learn and, you know, meet new people.

It's crazy what you can do, whether it's basketball related, you know, just traveling, whatever it may be, but it's one of those things where it's like you just can.

You can learn so much from a stranger.

You know what I mean?

Whether it's.

You take one or two things here and there, you know, I try to live my life that way and treat people the right way.

And I think that's.

That's the biggest thing is, like, never stop learning.

Always just trying to, you know, super fortunate that, you know, Joel Wallace connected us.

You know what I mean?

Like, you just never know.

Exactly.

Right?

You never know that.

And that's something that I try to live my life by and something that, you know, keeps.

It keeps life exciting.

This podcast has been a testament to that statement that you just made, right?

Learning from strangers.

So, guys, come on.

In a lot of cases, complete strangers, a lot of cases, guys that I've never talked to before.

And I always say that there's not very many people in your life that you sit down and have an hour and 10 or hour and 15 minute conversation with.

That is very, very rare in our personal lives.

And so for me, I always feel like I walk away from every conversation that I have.

One having learned something about the coaching profession or just about people and the psychology of coaching, but then also just being able to get to know an individual on a level that in any other venue, I rarely get to sit down and have.

I mean, I barely can have a conversation with my wife, with chasing my kids around to different things and going to this game and that game and doing podcasts till midnight, you know, twice a week, and all the.

All the other things that we're doing.

And so, yeah, I agree.

The ability to be able to connect with people through basketball and to be able to learn from them and continually grow, man, I think that was really, really well said.

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

How can people connect with you, find out more about you, your program.

Let's start with whatever you feel comfortable sharing.

Email, social media, website.

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

Yeah, I mean I can be connected.

I might sell.

I mean I can.

Yummy.

Just like my cells.

320-226-3857 so 320-226-3857.

You know our website has our emails and stuff like that on there.

So feel free to, you know, if anyone wants to reach out.

I'm, you know, always looking forward to meet new people and maybe even trying to connect at the final four or whatever that may be.

Or just like you said, maybe you got 30 minutes, let's chat and just connect.

You know what I mean?

So feel free to, you know, my, all my information.

I think my social media is maybe on our South Dakota State website too and reach out.

I'm not, I'm not a huge social media guy now.

I do go on it just for serve for basketball and stuff like that.

But, but yeah, so cell phone, call, text, whatever, I'm always available.

We'll put all that stuff in the show notes so people can access it there.

Tramel, can't thank you enough for taking the time out of your schedule tonight to join 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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