Episode #25: Jeff Culver

Jeff Culver is entering his 13th Season as the Head Men's Basketball Coach at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs (UCCS).  He led the UCCS to its first RMAC Championship in program history.  He's coached the only NBA Draft Pick  and the only All-Americans in program history.  Culver was the only four-year head coach to offer Derrick White (NBA Champion, Olympic Gold Medalist) a scholarship out of high school, and Derrick would become a two-time All-American and the 29th pick by the San Antonio Spurs in the 2017 NBA Draft.

Before UCCS, Culver spent 7 years at Johnson & Wales, where he worked concurrently as the Director of Athletics and Head Men's Basketball Coach.  He led the Wildcasts to three A.I.I. Championships and three appearances in the NAIA Division II National Tournament while earning A.I.I. Coach of the Year three times.

We had a great conversation about the state of the game, the impact of the portal, and the best path for young athletes to continue playing at the college level.  Enjoy!

Learn more about Jeff Culver here:  https://gomountainlions.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster/coaches/jeff-culver/703

Transcript

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On this episode of the significant coaching podcast, I sat down with Jeff Colver head men's basketball coach at the university of Colorado, Colorado Springs, one of the top D two coaches in the country. After a five and 21 record in his first season, Culver orchestrated the greatest turnaround in NCAA division two history. The next year with a 2,109 record a trip to the arm, ACC tournament championship game, and the first birth and NCAA division two national tournament. History for his lions. He's continued to guide the lions to additional great seasons as he begins his 13th season. We had a great conversation about the state of the game, and it was great fun hearing his story about being the only four year coach in the country to recruit Derek white. Derek has said one of the best summers and athlete could ask for as he was the starting point guard for the Boston Celtics NBA championship. Then signed a nine figure contract and just to put a cherry on top, he made the us Olympic team. At the time of the recording, Derek and our us men's team were on their way to what looks like another gold medal. I really enjoyed hearing coach Culver's stories about the beginnings of Derek's career and the celebration of what Derek's hard work and commitment has done for him. Coach Culver and I had our first conversation over 10 years ago. Not too long after he took the job at Colorado Springs. I loved his passion for teaching back then and respect and admire everything he's accomplished. Since I'm thankful to call him a friend. I know you'll be as impressed as I am. Enjoy. Coach, you know, all of us, we go decades sometimes coaching great kids and looking for that special talent. What does it mean to you to have really developed a young man that's gone on to make the NBA has just won an NBA championship? What does that do for your soul and your spirit to see a kid that you really brought up from the high school level and see him play at such a high level now? Yeah, it feels great. Every kid that comes through the program, you're trying to get the most out of them, as a young man, not only basketball. So to have someone come through and be such a great kid and he's the coach and just get so significantly better each year in the program. And then continue that, trajectory moving forward and have success at this level. It's just been special to watch it. We got a lot of guys doing a lot of great things after they graduate. In the basketball world, obviously that's the pinnacle, right? Getting an NBA championship. So Pretty cool. It's been great for everyone of us to come along for the ride, in the U. C. S. Family. That's fantastic. I'm really happy for all of you and really excited for Derek. I remember must have been his freshman year. I think I came down and saw you and watched one of your games and If you've coached and played at the division one level long enough, it doesn't take long to know when a kid has that special something, they, they just get everywhere faster. Do you remember seeing him in high school and remembering how you evaluated him? First time I saw him was at Cherry Creek for a holiday tournament. And, I don't think there was one thing that stood out. It was just a handful of things with him. He had, he was out there making winning plays both ends of the floor, and something that we always liked about Derek that I think has him stand apart. It's his ability to make plays on and off the ball, not only offensively, but defensively. And and for our system and playing emotion and everything, that's critical to be able to know what to do when the ball is not in your hands. And Derek was such a good player. Offensively both on and off the ball, but then defensively as well, just great instinct. So you saw some of that, at the high school level everything was obviously a little bit watered down. His body's still growing. He's, he's still figuring it out but you saw that he was a winner. You saw that he had some of the basic skills down and you saw that the body was still growing and you just saw that his instinct. His basketball cue was really good. I guess that would be the one thing that stood out was just his overall basketball cue ability to make plays. That's great. That's really great. I work with, as I work with high school kids all the time. And I have so many kids just like you here all the time that their dream is to play division one, just like I'm sure yours was and mine was. What do you see today? In these kids in, in terms of their ability compared to their work ethic, is can you make yourself into a scholarship player and play at UCCS? Can you make yourself into that guy that can play at Bolder or does that really have to be innate? Does some of those things you have to be born with. I think that's a good question. And I think, I kind of land on both sides a bit because I've seen guys that maybe don't have the innate skills or talent level or size for position. But, the work ethic is there. It helps if you have a jump shot, let's face it like you could be the hardest worker. But if you're lacking some of those. Division one level size skills, whatever you got to be able to shoot the ball On top of working your tail off, but I have seen guys jump levels just based on work ethic I mean we've taken guys that are you know Maybe a lower level lower d2 or d3 or whatever it may be or lower nai But they've earned themselves a division two scholarship because of their work ethic And because you'll see that in the weight room then, and typically you're going to have a more mature physical kid, at least those are the type of kids to that are going to, get their paperwork turned in on time. They're going to show up to practice early. They're going to stay late. And there's something to that. They're going to They're going to get something out of that, that can be a separator and then, ultimately, they're, a kid like that is going to reach a ceiling. And where that ceiling is obviously depends on kid to kid, but I do think, that some division one levels where. Guys just have worked hard enough to overcome, maybe a lack of size or lack of athleticism or lack of whatever it is that was, that they were born with and they've figured it out. It's funny because the truly great ones are where you get both because you're seeing a lot of kids at the, in the NBA as well and littered throughout division one and even division two, where they have the opposite, right? Where they have the potential and they may have the. The body type and the size and whatever it is checks the boxes and everyone's going out potential, right? If you watch the draft last night and they're talking about, we want teenagers and and they're worried. About a 23 year old Dalton neck, and I remember those same worries about Derek coming out in the draft that it was a downsize Downside to his game that he was a senior and fifth year senior and he's matured Where's his ceiling at and everything like that? So but you do see some of these guys that have the potential And then it never pans out. You see it all the time. And where they lack that work ethic and then the truly great ones are the ones that get both right. Where they have, they got the work ethic, they're willing to put in all the extra hours. And they have the size for position and they have the length. They have, all of the other God given abilities as well. Yeah. I just read somewhere that there were nine division three kids this year that have gotten into the portal and have signed division one. Division three to division one, which I was just, I was amazed by. And then you watch university of Connecticut baseball this year had a great run. I think they made it to the elite eight of the college world series. And of their 40, some kids on their roster, nine were division three transfers, and seven of those kids were playing big time minutes. So I think it says a lot. About what you can do. If you've got some size, you've got some speed, you've got some ability, but if you've got that work ethic and you're willing to put the time in what it can do for your future and you're the prime example of that as a college coach, tell me if I'm wrong, but I think you were the only coach that offered Derek. Derek White, a scholarship out of high school, weren't you? Yeah, I think there was a junior college as well, but yeah, no one else. And a lot of it is, it was just that the body's still developing. He's too skinny. What position is he? I think too often coaches fall into that too, doesn't shoot it well enough to be a two. His handles aren't tight enough to be a one, he's not big enough to be a wing. And I remember telling Derek, on his visit and his family, I'm not sure where we're going to play you. But we do think you, you got a chance to be, to play at this level. And I think I think that's sometimes people fall through the cracks for that reason too, and I think sometimes coaches want to be able to put them in a box, and I just, I don't know. I think more and more people are thinking differently, hopefully, positionless basketball and everything. And but I'm your case with the number division threes to division one. To be honest with you, I think that's great. I think that's the benefit of the portal. I think there's a lot of talk about the negative aspects of the portal, but the opportunity for guys to level up or level down to get to a spot that could be a good fit. Inherently at its core, the portal is doing that and allows for that to happen. Now, don't get me wrong. There's plenty of things about what's going on with the portal and unlimited transfers that are setting kids up for, failure as well. But, when Derek came through, and everybody's writing the stories out, there wasn't a whole lot of division two to division one success stories, and you had Duncan Robinson through. And there wasn't a lot of division three to division one success stories. I think it's cool. I, you see some misses too, right? There's some guys that are going now, they're just chasing that biggest and I out check. So even more are they landing at a appropriate level that they're actually going to be able to play and put up some numbers and set themselves up for success. Post college basketball but but I do think at least that opportunity is being given a lot more. And I think coaches are realizing like, Hey, just cause this kid's a vision, division three kid or division two kid doesn't mean he can't play, but we've got data that suggests otherwise. So I think that's pretty cool that at least these these kids, if they're earning it, and putting the work and earning it, that they're getting those opportunities. I was one of those coaches, and I probably still am to some extent, that really saw NIL and the portal. I saw it was so much negativity because I've always been a big believer that kids will do much better if they can be at a place for a long term and be with the same coaches, be with the same kids, learn a system be able to really grow from longterm teaching and care about that college experience. I've had coaches like you that are starting to turn my mind a little bit. to the value of the portal because of those things you just mentioned, the value of that NIL. How are you using the portal in the NIL a little bit differently than maybe you thought you would five years ago? I guess first I'll talk to NIL. We're not using the NIL yet. That's something that I think, it's obviously creeping into division two. And I think there's a lot of, I talked to a lot of division two coaches that are, some are trying to get it going, get their administration on board with it. Quite frankly it's a funding issue. And we have a lot of great boosters alums that are doing some great things for our program, but we're still trying to get to a level where we feel like. We've got all of our needs taken care of, all of our baseline needs, our scholarship levels, our recruiting budgets, our travel. Budgets, all of those budgets we're trying to really enhance assistant coaches. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah get our assistant coaches Yeah you know until we have that at an appropriate level or at least what I deem to be an appropriate let's contend at the national level then it doesn't make sense to Try to get a collective that's going to further enhance the athletic scholarships when we have so many other holes to fill still, I think that you'll see that a lot of, and that's why, the have nots are really having a difficult time with this and then a lot of low level division ones that don't have it yet or are trying to, or it's at a low enough level where it's, it's relatively insignificant, but But the portal has changed things for sure. We, we've always relied on high school kids and we want to develop them, we want to make sure that we can keep them. And we're not going to try to run up a development team against a team of grown men transfers, that's not going to work out. So I, but to me, there's like anything in life, I think there's some balance to achieve somewhere like this year. For instance, we've got a class of five for this class of 24. Two of'em are high school kids. Three of them are poor kids. And now what we were able to get with the portal this year, which was important to us is that out of the three portal kids, we've got two of them have three years left to play. One of them still has four years left to play. That's fantastic. That's rare. So back to your point about, being able to, these kids are set for success when they stay in one spot and they develop and, we want that as well, it's, I think the danger of the portal lies where, It's unlimited right now. So four years, four different schools, like number one, are you really able to settle in anywhere and fall into a system and really get up to speed? And then are you going to graduate on time? Like not everyone's going for it. Not everyone's getting drafted like Derek, and like Dalton. And so I think that, I'm curious to see what happens with that too. When guys are exhausting their eligibility, it's They're not getting jacked by the NBA and guess what? They still got 30 hours to complete, to get a degree, so I think they can be tough, but we're using it. It's changed the timeline for recruiting quite a bit too. We used to get our work done early and maybe have one scholarship late. And now, we're irresponsible if we don't hold at least a couple of spots late, to see what's going on the portal and like for this class, we're. Watching we're recruiting 25, but we're really not diving in until Later, we just come back from the academic showcases in june And that's almost like the new start time for the next class, you know The live period now in may and that helps but even then we're still You know, we still got kids on campus for 24 it's changed the whole timeline. I think that for high school kids it's important for them and the families to really grasp that, and I think some are struggling with that and they get nervous, right? When Yeah. They don't get their offers early and they're wondering where their recruitment is gonna be. But just the whole timeline shift with the portal now has been very significant. Couple quick questions to what you, the points you just made, which were excellent coach, those three kids you brought in the portal, how many of them, if you sat down with them and had this conversation, honestly, and said, give me the truth. Did you over pursue your ability? What would they say? Did you go for something that maybe was more than you were really capable of? Two of them were D2 transcripts, so probably not, that was just a different fit type of thing. But maybe, maybe with the, I think, And I don't want to just place the blame on the kid though, because you know how that goes we're talking about 17 or 18 year old kid coming out of high school very impressionable, right? And to a number of different ways with social media and everything But you're looking at who's surrounding them and telling them You know what level they should play at or where they should go or who should be recruiting them You What's mom and dad saying to them? What's their high school coach saying? What's their club coach? What's their trainer saying to them? There's so many different I think for us when we recruit these guys out of high school it's I feel like every year there's there seems to be more and more people involved, you know In these circles that as a coach, you got to try to grasp because, if it's the uncle, if it's the local priest, if it's the, whoever it is we got to have talks with them, to let them know why we think that we could be a good fit for them. But these kids are listening to a lot of people and quite frankly, They don't have a lot of time to just listen to their selves and they're not developed yet to emotionally or mentally to be able to make a decision like that rationally, in my opinion, like it's tough to, it's tough to weigh that, all those different decisions. I've, I got a daughter that's a junior in high school. She's not going to be playing sports in college, but we're going through the college decision process right now. And. It's mind blowing all the different avenues and she's looking at what school looks cool on tick tock right now, and so we're trying to reign that in, but I think there's so many different influences when a kid is looking at where to go in college and it's tough to be, cause. It for us, right? So if we've got a mid-major, division one recruiting the same kid that we're recruiting and they're obviously telling this kid, Hey, you're gonna, you got a chance to play here. We love you, you're gonna be great. Would a kid not listen to that? Do we blame, the misevaluation, on higher level coaches or. So I think there's just so many factors involved there, and that's back to my thought on the benefit of the portal, definitely don't want a kid to that's has so many different influences on that decision is not quite ready to make that decision. makes a decision, it ends up being a bad decision or the wrong decision, I think it's a good thing for that kid to be able to transfer and get to an appropriate level. And and then that goes both ways too, right? Where, the kids are transferring up because they have a little bit of success. The kids are transferring down because they're not playing. There's so many different reasons these kids are in the portal. Think that I'm hoping that we can continue to enhance it and refine maybe some rules around. I don't love the unlimited transfer thing. I, guys, do this every year when, depending on which way the wind blows, I think is setting them up for failure long term. But otherwise, I do think, there's some benefits in those cases. At some point, we have to get back to understanding that the brain is still developing, their future is still developing, we have to help them be in a situation where they can learn how to deal with conflict, they can learn how to deal with failure, they can learn how to deal with disappointment. And if you're constantly jumping to the next best thing, you're never learning that skill set that you're going to need for life. So that's my biggest concern with it. And that's why, for us when we get these high school kids is It's huge for us to educate them their parents on making a good decision, so when you do go choose UCCS, let's say you're something bad is going to happen. Your girlfriend's going to break up with you. I'm going to yell at you one day. You're going to have a bad practice. You're going to, struggle in a class. And yes, exactly to your point. It's our job, in my opinion, to surround these guys these young men with the resources, with the love, with the caring, what, like we try to get our staff meeting with them regularly. We want to get ahead of any of these failures. Everyone's going to fail. That's great. That's what we want. Because now we've got them in our system, in our program, in our family, and we're able to help them push through that. And so I think all the more reason to surround these kids, and put your arm around them when they get to campus and help them throughout the process. So that They can, develop the tools necessary to be able to push through so they're not just saying forget this, I'm going to some other school because they're gonna be the same problems there. Or maybe different levels, but similar levels, and so I think that much more, focus we're putting on when we get these young guys of really just, just helping them, supporting them through this thing so that they can make it through those tough times. So they're not, so the first thing in their head isn't, Oh, I got to transfer out here. Oh let's push through this. Let's learn from it. Let's get better from it. Let's enjoy the process. I love that coach. I think that's so important. I think kids struggle understanding that the difference between their present reality and what their potential is could be as great as the Grand Canyon. Yes, we recruited you because we see that potential. But where you are right now, You don't know where to be two passes away from the ball. You're not consistently closing out with everything you've got. So we can't have you on the floor when you don't block out consistently, when you're not running your route properly, when you're not picking your man up earlier and pressuring the ball, you've got to learn to do that. And that's a work ethic growth. That's a, that's an understanding of the X's and O's and how you want to play. So I love that you guys are making that a point of emphasis. I know you're only bringing in a couple of high school kids every year. And I would be too, I'd be in the same boat. And I remember when I was at Maryville, we transitioned into the great lakes valley division two and every game we were playing against the division one transfer, Western Kentucky had a six 11 center out of Iowa Southern Indiana had a six five shooting guard that was freshman of the year in the big 10 the year before, so I know what you're facing every year. What do you tell these families if you're on a stage and there's 300 families and they all have these big dreams? How do we talk to these parents and these kids? To understand what they're up against being 18 going up against kids that are 23 24 You have to pick some of those kids that are 18 Or you're not going to be able to compete in the rmax. So how do we? How do we educate those parents before they get into that decision making position? First thing we always recommend any chance we do to get in front of the parents is we ask, we beg them to attend a practice, attend a game. And, we've got a division, we're in town, we've got air force, Colorado college, right? So we've got division three, division two and division one, go watch them all play, go watch them all practice, and sit low, sit as low as you can. So you can see the sides, and everything. And I think really it's a lot of it is that they just don't know because, so many times. These parents will maybe they're watching March Madness or the NBA and they're like, okay, they'll be rational to that to that level. Okay, maybe Timmy can't play in the league yet. Maybe my son is not quite good enough to pull it, to start for you, but so I think they see that because they're watching those games, but that's all the way, but they think. He can't go to the league and he can't play for UConn, but that means he definitely, should be able to play division two or division three or low level division one or whatever. I don't think they really understand the levels. And and I don't think they understand that within each level there's grown men, and I look at we won. Five games, Derek's freshman year and we had Alex Welsh and who was another impact freshman for us. And we had a young roster. We had some some older guys, some returners, but The balance of our power was young guys and they're going against seniors, And and they're going for every shot fake and they're getting their butts knocked on the ground when they you know Drive to the paint and it's not getting called and so it takes a while for these guys to develop and that's where we look for balance of classes, like we want to be able to have Some good young talent, but we also need to be able to have some grown men, some experience. And but I do think that to be able to really conceptualize that you need to see it, because they, I think people tell them, I think, but until you see it, sometimes that's the right seeing is believing for some folks. And I think that I think a lot of parents and quite frankly, a lot of young kids Need to you know, we run elite camps. I think those are great because you know We're going to get after a little bit with these kids Like we're not just trying to showcase them and let them play live like we want to work with them a little bit and we want to see them get coached and we want to hit them with the pad a little bit and I think that's another great Equalizer as well as going to some of these league camps and these different levels and seeing you know Because now all of a sudden maybe you're getting some out of state guys. I think you know Colorado for us we get some some kids that don't leave the state enough, And I think these parents need to realize that the kids need to realize it that there's a lot of good basketball going around the country and there's a big difference between being 18 and being 23, especially when you're getting in the college weight room for three or four years. I agree. I agree. Coach, I want for you and I'd have a conversation and not really talk hoops and X's and O's. I'd be failing myself and anybody that's listening. Cause I, I love the way you coach and I love how you teach on the floor. I want to talk a little. I want to merge the two conversations. You don't have the NIL money right now, which most division twos do not, but you're still trying to get that division one kid. And we've seen this for forever, for as long as basketball has been around. There's always been these powerhouse conferences, powerhouse teams and what's come out of it is really the greatness of basketball. We get to see a Pete Kirill who doesn't have all the athletes develops a system where. He doesn't have to have kids that play above the rim. He can beat teams with cutting and backdoors. I remember what Joe Scott did at Air Force. I'm sure you did, too, in the national tournament, the Loyola Maramount years. What do you, and I'll stage this. I know UConn had, what, three kids go in the first round last night, two in the top 10, but what Danny Hurley's doing with offense and defense. To me has gotten me excited about being on the floor coach again, just the movement and the kids reading the defense and reacting and the vision. What are you finding yourself doing and how are you growing as an X's and O's coach, knowing that you're probably going to be going up against teams with more athleticism than you have and more size and more and more skill. What are you finding yourself doing with that? Yeah, we've you know, we've developed quite a bit over the years, with the direction that we're heading. There's some staples that have remained constant for us. Passed on good to get great 1001 decisions with the ball. We really try to recruit unselfish guys. We run a motion offense and what we've, how we've morphed that a lot over the years is we've run what I call a high post motions, an opener delay set. So we're recruiting some more skilled bigs that can turn a face a little bit. We've had luck with bigger guards. We tend to post our guards or wings. More so than our bigs. And so we're motivated a lot by, what we see going on at Feba and you see a lot of a lot of it creep into high levels of Division one college basketball. Obviously some of the NBA as well, NBA rules are so different. So it's, you know what I like to steal from a lot of teams. The handful of teams in the NBA, but we're really trying to watch some people basketball. We've had a number of guys, sign to play overseas as well. And I'm trying, we've had, number of conversations with club coaches that will comment on how similar our, style is. And so it helps these kids to, when they're going overseas to play, we've got a few over in Europe now and we've had, we've actually had 11 over the last seven years of side pro deals. So that's remarkable. Wow. We're heavily influenced by that. And, I think that's right. That a lot with a lot of these skilled bigs that can turn a face, get into DHOs chase scenarios on the perimeter, be a hub, and Will Becker, who's our, an athletic sort of rim running shop lock and five has done a great job of morphing into that hub position to where, He's not going to shoot the lights out, but man, he's really got great tendencies to get that ball reversed to get to some screening situations, to get some good actions on the perimeter. And it really frees things up. It really opens up the paint, and I think, I think a lot of that for us over the years had been, with pigs, it's tough to recruit big speaks are always getting recruited, typically above where they should land. And are we going to get a dominant big that we want to throw the ball into on the blocks, maybe not. Are we going to get that athletic six, 10. Dunker spot guy, maybe but we definitely have been able to get that hub spot, That that guy that can play at the top, open it up for our other players, for curl cuts, back doors, punch opportunities, and we've had some great success with that. So we're constantly evolving with it though. Like I, like we've got, we're going on a foreign tour this summer and I'm so excited because we get two weeks of practices with these guys in the summer. So 10 practice dates and we're meeting now on. We got a few new guys that we think will be part of the rotation. And so we're trying to figure out we're not going to just go out and want to run the same stuff, like how do we want to tweak it maybe a little bit based on personnel and try to stay nimble on our feet to take advantage of the skill sets that we'll have on the roster this year, and we're more up into that open, that delay stuff we're doing some different things defensively. You know this year for us ball screen defense I think we'll be able to enhance because I think we've got some more switchable pieces. It gives you some different options so but yeah, I think for us year to year Especially when you're getting a few transfers in right like we want to make sure we're looking at how are we using their skill sets? Do we want to add some different actions, and within our motion where do we want these guys to get touches? And then I think a lot, another thing too that I've been diving into this last year and a half or so, a lot more is, it's just different lineups, right? Like lineup plus minuses. And I joke with my staff. I grew up a hockey fan too. I've been growing up in Michigan. And so my dad played hockey, until he was 60, I think. But you have different lines and specialized lines, and we certainly have had that, we'll have a small ball lineup that can do some things. And we'll maybe a pressing lineup and, but trying to look into some other ways to enhance that, because I think we'll have some good depth. Those are things we're trying to continue to develop. That's really fun. What's it take for a new kid coming into your program? Let's say they're 18 years old. What is the learning curve on average to really learn your system and get comfortable and figure out their role? What does that learning curve look like? It's typically that following spring. Coming out of that first season. And so this is whether they redshirt it or not, that's the other piece. We've made a living off of redshirt guys too. And I don't know, we're questioning that. Our ability to do that so much with in the portal age, I guess that's a different, again, extended conversation on the portal, how much time, energy do you want to spend with a red shirt year to make sure you can keep these guys. But regardless of registering or not, we typically have seen it on the turn side of that first season. So you start getting into February, March. And it's fun to see because, a lot of times you got these guys on that third team and all of a sudden they're winning a lot of the games in practice, and they're just playing a little bit closer to how we feel they'll play. Like we, I think the key too, is keeping them motivated when it gets ugly. Cause we, we tell them it's going to be ugly early, stop worrying about playing your game and just worry about defending and rebounding, Everything else will catch up. But I think sometimes guys get frustrated'cause it does take a little bit, especially for high school and even for transfers, right? If you've been to one or two other spots and learned a different system Yep. You, there's still gonna be a transition. Now ideally you're a little older and as a transfer maybe you can adapt better, but it's still gonna be a transition and that's why, again, we come back to this class. We've got three transfers with multiple years, cause you get these two year transfers and it's tough for them because maybe after that first year, they're like, okay, I get it, and they go with that second year and they feel good. You got one year out of them, right? No. So that's something that we have to get better as a staff, in my opinion. The onboarding, process for these guys. Like it's tough for us not being able to have them in the summer. What can we do to get them better acclimated, especially if it's a short term transfer, you get a one year guy or a two year guy, like you really want, obviously a one year guy, especially, but you want them to pick it up as, as quickly as possible. And when you run it a motion offense. That can take some time, shot selection and where and when are you going to get your shots? How's that ball supposed to move? It can take a while. I always use the analogy with boxing. A young boxer doesn't realize their potential. Until they've been punched in the face enough to realize I can handle being punched in the face. And I can go, it's like the bad guys in movies that somebody throws just a murderous punch at them and they know that was just a little kiss, older guys have learned that they've learned to get knocked down and say, that's all right, knock me down. I know how to get back up. Yeah, it takes time. The other side of what you're doing, and you touched on it a little bit. How do you get those young guys to acclimate to your culture? How do you get them to buy into your brotherhood? Because they're coming into a group of guys, nine, ten guys that have been there. They're comfortable. They know where the cafeteria is. They've got friends already. They know what professors to take and which ones not to take. How do you acclimate young guys when they come into your program? How do you help them get integrated into that culture? The best way is to have strong returners. That's the number one thing is You know the your upperclassmen or doesn't even have to be upperclassmen. But your returners, you know Your returners should have a firm grasp of what's expected. Your returners should have a firm grasp of What kind of culture we have, what kind of culture we want what went wrong or what went well this last year and how are we trying to learn from that as a group and be better this year? And then what is your role going to be with these newcomers to get them up to speed? And so we really like to challenge our returners on that be a part, be a, be an instrumental piece of that process. And that's, all the some of it's on court stuff. A lot of that's off court stuff. It's in the locker room. It's inviting them over to the house or to the apartment. It's just spending time. It's putting your eye around them. It's giving them a nudge. It's telling them Hey, we got to leave this party, now it's making good decisions on and off the court. And so as best as we can prepare our returners that's going to be chief, chief number one factor of onboarding the new guys and then, from there we Put our staff on a number of different things and we meet regularly with our new guys and we're checking in on them with, on everything, how's roommate situation, how are the classes going, how's basketball going? Like all these things, and we're just having conversations. And so some of it is gonna be. By error, like they're going to learn a lot early on. I think holding them accountable early in the process is huge. We're going through right now. It's paperwork. We got to have these guys fill out in the summertime, between compliance and sports medicine. And now we're, we're trying to get on this foreign tour. And so we're, we got all this stuff. And so to teach them. Little things about how to respond, and what's an appropriate time manner to respond and how do you get your stuff done, because you're leaving the nest, and and so I think that can be a shock sometimes, especially for the high school kids to really get up to speed with just being accountable and doing things on your own. personal responsibility, creative problem solving, these are things that are really at the core of learning early on. And so all that blends into the whole culture building because it's, it all matters, everything they do matters and everything they do is directly related to our culture. And the more that we're able To help them with that early on, better off. What could it be down the road? I saw a great quote the other day. It was from Winston Churchill. It was the difference between mere management and leadership is communication. And I always think about me as a young coach. And I see this a lot at the high school level where coaches will talk to their upperclassmen got to be a better leader got to be a better leader. But then they never give them the tools. To be the better leader, and it sounds like you guys really make that a centerpiece of what you do. How much of that leadership conversation is coming within the flow of practices where you're talking to the upperclassmen about, Hey, this is what we need from you. And how much of it is coming in individual conversations with them where you pull them aside, or maybe they're in your office for a meeting, or you're asking them to stay after practice. And you're saying, Hey, this is what we I want you to try this with this group of guys or this individual. I think they need this from you. How much of that is going on? Yeah, it's both. In practice, for sure. We try to find moments to get aside, like maybe grab a senior in a slow moving practice and just ask them or challenge them, is this a type of practice you want, to have for your senior year? It's, the more we can enable these guys and empower them to have voices. And sometimes they're hesitant, right? They're like, they don't really know. I'm like, Hey, I'm giving you this opportunity. We're giving, and sometimes we'll mandate it right in practice. Hey, you're running this drill or, Hey, you're running this practice or whatever the case may be. And sometimes I try to back off from, hopping on a kid or a young kid and instead I'll pull over, one of our veterans and say, Hey, you need to go let you know, this freshman know that this is what we do, and so just trying to find ways to empower their voices. And just, we're trying to let that sink into these guys to grasp this is your team. It's not my team. You know what I mean? There's no individual in here that's more important than another. So what are we trying to do here? And you guys are here for just, you only got another year or another two years or whatever it is what do you want this to look like? And we've got a lot of competitive guys that want to win. Want to, win championships. And challenging them and empowering them, I think is huge. And then sometimes those conversations definitely have to happen off the floor. Some guys in the heat of the moment, it's tough to get through to them, but, you can have more more thorough conversation. At over lunch or after practice, or when you bring them back after they shower or something like that to where, and that's where you have a lot of light bulb moments too, because in the heat of the moment, they're not, they think I'm crazy or they think something's wrong and then you have that conversation. They're like, okay, coach, that totally makes sense, but then it's not going to happen right away. We got, worked with a lot of young coaches that. They're so frustrated. Hey, we told them to do this and they're not doing it. I'm like welcome to parenting, so it's, we got to keep at it. Like I could show Walker is a big mentor of mine and he's always challenged, us as basketball coaches. If anything going wrong on the court, it's your fault, as a coach, what are you going to allow? What are you going to enable? What there's all Just to tell a kid to do something. It doesn't mean you always say he's going to do it How did we tell him to do it? Did we show him how to do it? Are we conscious of how he learns, did we give him an opportunity? For trial and error, did we like We have to be more creative as coaches to not get to the point where we just blame the kid he just, I've tried and he can't get it. Let's keep trying. Let's be creative. Back to creative problem solving, I think is number one trait as a coach as well to be able to sort through this and get through to these kids. But I think it can be frustrating, at times, but we're really just teaching here, and I think keeping that in mind, the big picture of what we're doing over this process, like it's more than just basketball. And these kids are young and they're still figuring it out. We talked about the portal and kids jumping from school to school. I think it's just as important that a guy like you has been at, Colorado Springs for such a long time. Now you've got a foundation. Now you've been able to learn and grow and develop a staff and have consistency. Every time you go to a new school, all that changes. You may think I'm going to bring my system and bring my culture. But it doesn't happen overnight. So the fact that you've been there and you've been able to grow this program, I think is really impressive. And it's fun to hear coach. Coach, I know you're fighting off a cold, so I'm not going to keep you in much longer. But I do have, I like to finish with. Giving you the opportunity to give a piece of advice to recruits and young gals and guys that are trying to play at the college level. I like to finish every podcast with that. What do you tell these kids that are going through the process now? They're 16, 17. They've got huge dreams. They've got huge aspirations. What advice do you give them to help them pursue playing for somebody like you or playing at UC Colorado Springs? How should they go about it? It's a good question. I think Advice I give out a lot is for kids to cast a big net first and foremost. I think sometimes kids will say I want to play in this conference I want to play for the school and they don't understand how selective it is, they may be good enough But you know for any given class we may have two to four spots available and what is the likelihood of us to need that position? And to especially now to be able to afford to bring a high school kid in at that position. So I may have a spot at the point guard spot, but we need a transfer. We need someone that can play ready. Cause something happened with our other point guard. He hit the portal or he got hurt or whatever. I would need a starting point guard. So I think understanding how selective it is and casting a big net and whatever level you think you're at it's okay to, include higher or that level but don't be afraid to cast a bigger net to some lower levels as well. And I think that, standing out with an email, having a nicely written, contact email is good. You got to be persistent with it, getting to elite camps. Is good. I always joke about elite camps. I always feel like guys go, talk about the appropriate level, like more often than not, you'll have guys at an elite camp that probably should be playing at a level below. Yeah, that's cool. And so I think a lot of times, they want to go to the top division one elite camp or all the division one elite camps. And I'm looking at these elite camps and it's filled with D2 or D3 kids, and so that's not going to help you, now sometimes the division ones will open it up for D2 or D3 coaches to come and recruit at their elite camps. And that might help you but I think being honest and casting a big net is huge. And then. And then I, I think having some patience especially knowing that the timeline with the portal has changed. You got high school kids still getting recruited into the summer after they've graduated. I think, I think keeping in mind prep school, junior college, all these things are the table as well. I just feel like. So often the kid will have it, their mind may not, but what they do or don't want. If you want to play college basketball, you may need to be a little bit more flexible, and and then on top of all the advice we give them about just working their tail off, right? And getting on a weight program early and keeping your grades up and responding to coaches. I think that's the other thing too. I think sometimes kids get overwhelmed or, they'll be they'll not be great at responding. And then that coach gets the next job, and maybe a school that you really want to go to and oops, but I think for a number of reasons, it's good to respond and to keep those communication patterns open, because especially with the portal, so many times these high school kids, it's a good chance they're going to end up at an inappropriate level, and so you want to keep all options open, don't burn any bridges. Fantastic coach. It's great advice. And anybody that hears it, hopefully they absorb that because it's really the pinnacle of what you're doing. And if kids will listen and families will listen, there's a place for a talented kid. There's a place for a kid with good grades that wants to work hard. It may not be division one and division two. It may not be any eye, but you can have a great career somewhere if you're patient and you're willing to look. Look everywhere. So I love it. Your your time today is, I'm extremely appreciative. I love what you're doing. I haven't been down and watched a game in a practice a couple of years. If you'll have me, I may sneak down and watch you guys play. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. Open door, just let me know. I'd love to, I'd love to come down and watch. It's been a while, but thanks for all you're doing. Good luck. Where are you going overseas? Where are you headed? Australia, New Zealand. Oh, fantastic. Two weeks out there in early August. So we're excited about it. I'm definitely going to touch base in September. I want to hear how that goes. That's my wife and my, dream vacation that we want to go to Australia, New Zealand. Spend a couple weeks. I want to get back from you. Good luck this year. Thanks for your time. And I appreciate you coach. Appreciate it. Well, that's a wrap for this episode of the significant coaching podcast that is available. Audio only wherever you get your favorite podcasts. I'd like to thank my great guests, coach Jeff Colver. He's another humble, good guy in the game. He gets his teams ready to battle each year in the very competitive Rocky mountain athletic conference. I hope you enjoyed our conversation and the many golden nuggets he threw my way. I'm Matt Rogers. Thanks for listening. Have a significant week. Goodbye until next time.