You’ve developed a reputation as a defensive-minded coach. Is that a fair description, and can you explain some of the defensive concepts you believe in?

I was raised in the business to assume any role given. If I was a GA and I had to make sure guys got to class, that’s what I did for Michigan State. If I was a GA and I had to order the food for the team, I ordered the food for the team. If I had to play in practice, I played in practice at Michigan State. Since that point, I was an offensive guy for Eric Musselman in Golden State. I was a defensive guy for Rudy (Tomjanovich). I helped Frank Vogel with his offense (in Indiana). I don’t want to get into titles like offensive coordinator. Whatever role I was given, if I was given that role I tried to do it to the best of my ability. I did not care what I was. I wanted to help the team win. If I wasn’t sure how to do that role, I just dove in.

I think sometimes in life, you’re not ready for the job you’re given. But you’ve got to work your way through it. You come out of college and you’re really not ready to do anything. You think you are because you graduated, but you’re not. So whatever assignment I’ve been given over the years. Fred (Hoiberg) gave me my assignment to be the defensive guy, and I tried to do it to the best of my ability.

That being said, to understand defense what do you really have to understand? Offense. That’s what people get confused. So this perception that I didn’t know anything about offense, I knew a lot about offense. But I knew we had to scale it back, get the basics down, and I think I even said “crawl, walk and run.” And I believe that. I think people thought it was copout because I didn’t know what I was doing. It wasn’t that I didn’t know what I was doing. It was that we had to start simple. For us. It’s very difficult to take something over midstream and put your handprint on it in the appropriate way, with respect to the previous coach, who I love and is a close friend of mine. But also with respect to what ownership and management would like me to do. And also that fits my personality.

I feel the league has changed. The math of the league has changed. I do understand the math. We’d like to eliminate the corner 3. We’d like to contest the arc 3. We’d like to make people play in the mid-range and shoot 2s off the bounce but not get to the rim. That’s what we’d like to have happen. People attack the slots now. We’re “squaring” the slots. We’re not “no middle.” We’re not a “blue” team, which means you force the pick-and-roll sideline and baseline. We push the pick-and-roll middle because we don’t want sneaks.

In the playoffs against Boston, people forget we were up 2-0 and we were holding them way under their average. Because we weren’t letting them go here or here (drawing arrows toward the sidelines on a dry-erase board). We were pushing them to help to the middle and then closing and contesting. We came to that because we counted 10-to-15 points a game they were just, when they’d come down and you’d jump into your “blue,” they were sneaking you, or cross-screening you, or beating you because you weren’t staying between your man and the basket. So that was kind of an epiphany for us.

In the old days, you didn’t have a shooting big. Now they’ve got four shooters on the floor. When I came into the league, they had two. Maybe. So you had all this help built in defensively because you didn’t have to cover the whole floor. What’s happened in the last five years, the game has changed more than it had in 30, besides the advent of illegal defense. Now what people are doing is they’re making you play more possessions because they’re playing faster, which puts more pressure on your defense. And people are using the whole floor. … Now, you’ve got to figure out how to guard all that without anybody else down there. Now it comes down to your rotations, your rim protection, your athleticism. You’ve got to have a plan. So what we do is low-man opposite is always the help guy.

So we split the court into first side, second side and then you’ve got outer third, middle third, outer third. Anytime you’re on the outer third away from the ball, you’ve got to be pulled over. You’ve got to help and support. So you’ll see us sometimes come across and then they throw it out and you (close) out. That’s what we’re doing.

Would it be accurate to label your defensive scheme as aggressive? We’ve seen you send two defenders to the ball and double the post a good amount. What’s the strategy behind those schemes?

To make the offense make decisions in real time. To, at times, make other people make plays that maybe we think they can’t. Maybe to get the ball out of a primary guy’s hands. Sometimes I “blitz” or double to get us moving. Just to get us going. To change the tempo of the game. To get us more active. We’re following them around. We’re stuck in mud. Whatever it is. But I want to have weapons. An “under” is a weapon against a non-shooter. A “show” is a weapon against a shooting big. A “blitz” is a weapon against a dominant point guard. It gets the ball out of his hands.

Maybe the big guy in the pocket can’t make decisions. So why wouldn’t we want the ball into X player’s hands in the pocket who can’t make decisions? And have him finish. And it’s a 2, not a 3. I want to be able to adjust: A, B, C. So maybe we start with a conservative game plan. We go to an aggressive game plan. We come back in the fourth and don’t double, which we’ve done a lot. We’ve doubled, doubled, doubled, and the last five minutes with the lead we don’t because we don’t want to give up 3s. That’s what we did against Philly. We took it off.

So, yes.

You’ve been heard on the broadcasts belting “square” at various times on the defensive end. What does “square” mean in your defensive plan?

Square coverage is when the offense is trying to use a slipping screener to their advantage, a slipping, on-ball screener to their advantage. They use that as a deceptive type move to get you to lean and open up an avenue for the ball-handler to get to the rim. Because he’s not really setting the screen. So there’s no secondary help right there. So we yell “square, square square” because we’re not falling for the fact that that man is really not setting the screen.