nice topic...this will greatly help head coaches in dealing with their assistant/s...keep it up.....god bless

I think thats a good ideal. I will use them on pratice next time. Also, to have meeting and go over everthing that need to be fix. Thanks for the tip!

This is a good article. What happens though when your assistant is part of the AD's mission to have you fired as the head coach. Politics in high school sports will always baffle me. It is not how good the coach is or how he is turning a program around for the better, it is whose kid did not get enough playing time.

Like everyone in here, great topic. I really like the idea of meeting on a regular or semi-regular setup and setting clearly defined expectations and roles. As an assistant coach, seeing and hearing what the head coach wants, makes my job so much easier.

I spell out EXACTLY what is expected of the assistant coaches in our season playbook. Expectations, appropriate conduct with players, during practices and games, etc. We have a pre-season meeting and then meet daily after practice. I have had assistant coaches who were not loyal, some were lazy and basically incompetent in the past. That is why I started doing this. This article confirms that I am on the right track, so thank you for publishing it.

Thanks with the insight. As an Assistant it gives me an idea of what may be going on with my head. But do you have any suggestions for assistants where the head coach covers all practices and game coaching. I'm only able to give insight to players on the side during practices and on games.

Does anybody know if there is a certain amount of time that youth players should be on the court for? or can the starters play the whole game?

We recommend equal playing time below 5th grade. At about 6th or 7th grade, I like to play the players who work the hardest and have the best attitude. However, I will still play the other players at least 1/3 of the game.

I'm going from a head coaching at a middle school to assistant coach at a high school and enjoyed learning from this article. I'm almost afraid of the opposite happening. What are some cues that I may not be aware of that will let me know when to step it up? I was too close to the situation as head coach.

I did that many years ago. I was the asst. varsity coach. I had a lot to learn about continuity offenses so I sat back and tried to learn as much as possible.

I was good with Xs and Os and game strategy... and while it took a little while for the head coach to believe that I could help him during games, he did come around. Be patient and don't be afraid to make suggestions and don't feel bad if he doesn't listen to you for awhile. He told me, make as many suggesstions as you want, I might say no a 1,000 times, but the next one might be the one I take and hopefully it will win us a game.

Finally in one game - it was late and we had a 2 point lead, they had the ball out on the side in our end. I remembered what they had done earlier in the game, I got up and told him, we need to call a time out now.... right now. He called the time out, I told them what they were going to do, which was get someone back door vs our m2m. We never played zone but we did vs that time..... that one the game - from that point on he listened to me. At the awards night when he introduced me to all the parents he told them that I had won at least 8 games with suggesstions... I felt great that night. When I became the head coach, I remembered that and told all my assisstants the same thing.

So, pick your spots... learn as much as you can from the head guy, because before you know it... you will have your own team in his program. My own team came the next year and seriously, I wasn't ready to teach his system of man offenses..... I did a lot of mind picking in the fall since I didn't know I was getting my own team until late summer.

I don't know if any of this helps you, I hope it did.

Simple, best not have assistants and work alone. No need to make a parent an official assistant coach to give them specific tasks to deal.

What do you do as an asst when your head coach uses your offenses, your defenses and never acknowledges you or that you were even part of it ?

CAH -

That can be tough, but just be happy that he is using it and hopefully making the team better.

I know that the first year I took over the sophomore team I ran something that he liked.... he asked me how we did it, I told him and he ran it a lot. Never said anything to me, but thats ok, it made me feel good knowing that he thought enough of me to use something I did.

Sometimes as assistants we would like to see the head guy do something ( some coaches wont do that ) I always tell coaches I know..... try to make it think like it was his idea. LOL