Iconic UCLA basketball coach John Wooden was known for not calling timeouts to change his team’s tactics or approach during games. He felt the opponent always had to adjust to him, and that calling timeout was an admission of defeat. This is something Bill Walton said on a recent ESPN documentary. UCLA needed to play better. That, not a timeout, was Wooden’s answer to problems. He didn’t panic and wanted his players to not panic.
In that one specific aspect of coaching methodology, Lincoln Riley is like Wooden.
To be clear, Riley is not in the same universe as Wooden in terms of achievements, championships, and historic status. We’re only talking about one specific aspect of the art of coaching. In this one way, Riley and the Wizard of Westwood are similar.
Riley Files expert Kegan Reneau explains:
“When it comes to how he goes about his business, he’s typically more like, ‘Hey, our offensive line has gotta play better.’ He’s not just figuring out who could play where; he’s like, ‘No, we’re gonna give these guys time to figure it out. Then we’ve gotta make the decision. If it’s not working out, we need to figure out the solution and push forward with it.’ They typically like to do that early, the first four, five, six games of the year for the offense,” Reneau said. “The roster’s typically pretty consistent. That’s how I imagine it’s gonna be. Then (consider) how that impacts Caleb Williams. If they don’t let Caleb Williams be Caleb Williams, then they’ve failed as a coaching staff.”
They obviously didn’t fail in 2022. Riley didn’t panic with his offensive line.
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