No Gilas, but Walberg looks forward to teaching DDM to Pinoy coaches

MANILA, Philippines – “I know your national team runs the dribble drive motion offense.”

That’s what Vance Walberg, the renowned basketball head coach who has mentored American high school, college, and professional teams, and who created the system which has become the latest strategic rage, said of Gilas Pilipinas.

Walberg, who will be in Manila for a series of clinics from June 18-19 to teach the offense first hand to Filipino coaches and basketball players, was hoping to see and possibly work with the national team.

Except that Gilas will be training abroad at that time to prepare for the Olympic Basketball Qualifiers this coming July 5-10 at the Mall of Asia Arena in Pasay City.

The clinics, organized by Splash Hoops International, have moved from the Gatorade Hoops Center to the Kerry Sports Arena at Shangri La at the Fort.

The 59-year old American coach developed the offense while he was coaching Clovis West high school in Fresno, California, and later still as Fresno City College where he won multiple titles.

The offensive system gained more traction when John Calipari famously ran it first with the University of Memphis and then with the University of Kentucky where he won a national championship.

The DDM essentially is about proper spacing on the court where a player attacks the basket and will react based on what the defense gives him. The option is to either finish strong or to pass out to an open player or to drop a pass to a teammate who comes in to take advantage of the collapsing defense. 

In the NBA, the DDM has caught on with the Miami Heat, Memphis Grizzlies, and Denver Nuggets to name a few teams.

“There have been a lot of changes to the DDM since my days in Clovis West days but the main concepts have stayed the same. I have added a lot of little things to improve the offense and its efficiency,” Walberg told Rappler in an online interview.

“Coach Calipari had success with it at both Memphis and Kentucky but I would say very few teams understand the concepts and especially how to implement them.”

According to Splash Hoops International’s Ariel Vanguardia who is the head coach of the Kuala Lumpur Dragons in the Asean Basketball League and is an assistant with Blackwater in the PBA said that aside from the two-day clinic at Kerry Sports, Walberg will be giving special tutorials to certain basketball teams which he refused to divulge pending negotiation.

“I think the move to the Kerry Sports Arena at the Shangri La is better because it uses NBA-grade maplewood flooring with multi-level seating for the participants,” pointed out Vanguardia. “The individual tutorials are once in a lifetime and can really help some teams that are interested in learning first hand instead of sending their coaches abroad that is more costly.”

Vanguardia said that the two-day session will cost PHP 5,000 per person with the team tutorials priced at $2,000 (PHP 93,131) with additional details to be released later. More details on the activities and sessions will be provided in the weeks to come. – Rappler.com