Chapter 755: Chapter 7 Generosity_3
Pete Carrell, the head coach of the Princeton University Tiger Team, was invited by the Trail Blazers to participate in this training camp in the capacity of a special advisor.
At the coaches conference in Los Angeles, Carrell accepted the invitation, but his purpose was to closely observe the training of the NBA’s best team, as well as study the best player, Ah Gan.
As for what Rick Adelman said, hoping Pete Carrell would come and coach the Trail Blazers’ offense, the old man thought it was a pipe dream; after all, Princeton University is renowned for its defense, okay?
Since the NCAA began implementing a shot clock rule in the 1985-1986 season, Carrell’s Princeton University was one of the very few teams that could still hold opponents to around 50 points.
During the just concluded 1989-1990 NCAA season, Princeton University averaged 65 points per game, holding their opponent to an average of 51 points, an extremely low score.
And in the future, Princeton University will continue to push the opponent’s scoring lower, below 50 points.
In comparison, the once All-America strongest defensive team, Georgetown University, allowed an average of 57 points to their opponents during the championship 1985 season.
By the 1989-1990 season, they allowed opponents to score an average of 64 points per game; in terms of controlling opponent scoring, Georgetown was far from rivaling Princeton.
At the 1989 NCAA National Championship, Princeton University encountered the number one seed Georgetown, leading by 8 points at halftime, pushing Georgetown into a tight corner.
Georgetown had Alonzo Mourning, Dikembe Mutombo, and Charles Smith, while Princeton University’s center was 6 feet 8 inches tall, and not one person on the team could make it to the NBA.
In the end, Princeton only lost to Georgetown University by 1 point, 50:49, nearly pulling off a major upset of a number 16 seed over a number 1 seed.
This battle brought fame to Pete Carrell and Princeton University, but what everyone focused on was Princeton’s team spirit and amazing defensive scoring control ability.
Yeah, a civilian team, relying on teamwork, if your defense is not good, how could you possibly contend with super schools like Georgetown that are studded with stars?
At the time, Rick Adelman was the head coach of the Golden State Warriors, and he met Pete Carrell during a visit to New Jersey, where the two had a lot of exchanges on basketball philosophy.
However, Carrell would never have thought that Adelman would invite him to design offensive tactics for the Portland Trail Blazers, especially since the Princeton system is considered a "Civilian System."
Their defensive capabilities are strong not because of high intensity or fine details but because of a slow tempo, very slow, dragging the game into a trench warfare, beating opponents with clever passing and efficient positional offense, preventing opponents from speeding up and going fast breaks.
In this regard, the tactical philosophy of the Trail Blazers and the Princeton system are ingeniously similar, both adept at a slow pace, preferring not to counterattack themselves to prevent the opponent from fast-breaking.
But essentially, the Trail Blazers’ tactics revolve around the superstar Ah Gan; after accepting the invitation, Carrell joked, "If I had Ah Gan, I wouldn’t need any Princeton Offense!"
Jokes aside, after arriving in Honolulu, Carrell still threw himself into the coaching staff’s work.
Working with young NBA coaches like Bobby Berman and Adelman brought Carrell a lot of gains as well.
Through repeated exchanges and meetings, Carrell gradually understood and recognized the needs of the Portland Trail Blazers Team.
They hope to have a system, not to make Ah Gan become a "mediocre within the system," but to use this system to help those "mediocres" get as close to Ah Gan as possible.
The Princeton system, with a tactical philosophy similar to that of the Trail Blazers, indeed makes a good choice; it provides a complete set of supporting facilities, quickly instilling to every player.
The offensive core of the Princeton system is the center. The center is the organizer, the pivot, the core.
Just so happens, the Portland people possess the league’s best two passing centers, and if Divac hadn’t been traded away, that would have been three.
During the training, Pete Carrell witnessed Gan Guoyang’s astounding training volume and his extremely professional and disciplined work ethic.
Like the triangle offense, the Princeton equally demands every player become a "play-maker" on the court; everyone should be an initiator and organizer when they have the ball.
However, unlike Michael Jordan, Ah Gan did not resist the Princeton system. He didn’t question it, quickly accepted, and supported Carrell’s tactical explanations in meetings, and put them into practice. This touched Carrell deeply.
Gan Guoyang accepted it so quickly, partly because he was "long aware" of Princeton’s reputation and partly because he realized that passing the ball was indeed fun.
Scoring, blocking shots, and rebounds no longer stimulated Gan Guoyang much, but passing increasingly kindled his joy on the court.
In the first preseason game against the Lakers, Gan Guoyang organized the offense from the high post time and again, delivering 8 assists by halftime, shining alongside Magic Johnson.
Although the Trail Blazers ultimately lost the preseason game 114:119, the entire match began to reveal a different style of play for the Trail Blazers.
Before that, the Trail Blazers’ "reduce two, increase one" strategy included reducing passing, aiming to decrease turnovers and make more use of individual player’s one-on-one abilities.
However, by the 1990 season, the reduction of passing in "reduce two, increase one" was already in name only, as passing is indispensable in positional offense, and the tall forwards who were good at one-on-one schemes were gone too.
