Drills in Depth - Xontro with Rob Graham
Developing thinking players through a disciplined, efficient coaching effort
Rob Graham, I feel lucky to say, is an old volleyball friend. I respect his energy, commitment, and competitiveness (among other traits). I’ve seen him win Colorado state high school championships and I’ve also seen him start youth volleyball leagues (through his club, Elevation). He cares deeply about improving volleyball and volleyball coaching.
What are Drills in Depth? - Read here
The Drill
Who: Rob uses this game with both high school teams and club teams of different ages. As you will see, the scoring system allows the game to be easily adapted for almost any team. (Rob told me he uses this with all age groups in his club. For the younger ages, many of the tasks include process goals. For example, “Five 3 passes with great technique”.) He typically has two assistant coaches during these games so each assistant manages one team during the game.
What: A 6v6 game with normal game flow and scoring but timed rather than playing to 25. There is an additional scoring system in place that creates another layer of complexity.
When: Rob uses this game most towards the end of a team’s competitive season and typically as the last activity in a practice.
How: Two teams of six play “regular” volleyball, meaning that all rallies begin with a serve and continue to their natural conclusion. Regular sideout scoring and rotation is used. Rather than playing to 25, Rob typically plays 1-3 rounds of this game for a total of 60 minutes. After time expires, each team adds their “regular” points on the score board (which can be greater than 25) to the points earned on their Xontro score sheet to determine the winner of the round. (If the grand totals are tied, teams play a 1-point tiebreaker with teams playing rock-scissors-paper to determine serve.) What makes Xontro special is its extra scoring system. Each team has their own score sheet, which is maintained by the team’s coach.
If you’re familiar with the dice game Yahtzee, you’ll see a resemblance in the score sheet. In fact, Rob sometimes refers to the game by that name but he is more likely to call it Xontro since that’s how he learned it and he told me that he keeps that name because he wants to pay homage to where he learned the game. (Although he also admits that he no longer remembers where he learned it or what Xontro means, if anything.1) The sheet is separated into halves (1-5 and 6-10), with the first five items being easier to score than the last five. The first five items are worth five points each and the last five are worth ten points each. Since the last five are more difficult, the team receives a bonus if they complete all five in the allotted time. This bonus, called Xontro, is worth an additional 50 points. No additional points are awarded if teams successfully perform more than the required number of any items on the list; the larger goal is for teams to be well-rounded rather than score a lot on only a few things. To keep teams aware of service errors, if a team misses a serve, Rob may add a quick time out during which the receiving team gets to add a check to one of the items on their list, making scoring points on their score sheet easier in addition to receiving a point on the scoreboard. Coaches can create the tasks on the list however they’d like and this creation process is a big part of what Rob and I discussed. There’s no reason why coaches can’t change the structure of the score sheet to better meet their needs. Coaches could use more or fewer tasks or change point values as they see fit. The score sheet only reflects what Rob prefers to do rather than the way the game must be played.
The Depth
Who: Rob endeavors to be “the most disciplined, efficient coach out there.” He has never seen himself as a gifted athlete so he has always been asking himself, “how do I gain an advantage?” over his opponents and over the game. He believes that a main goal of his coaching is to “create thinking players, people who are volleyball players” so he’s always working to find ways to get players to ask themselves and their teammates questions about themselves, their opponents, and the game. His use of Xontro is a distillation how he wants to coach throughout an entire season.
What: Reflcting his disciplined coaching nature, he is meticulous about how he selects the items on the score sheet, incorporating both items that his team needs to work on and items that represent tactics that opponents use against his teams. Showing his desire to help players think and make decisions, he collaborates with them in selecting Xontro scoring items. In another version of the sheet that he shared with me, each player on the team had an individual item, tailored to what each one is working on.
When: Rob uses Xontro as part of a feedback loop for individual and team development so there are iterations that can span across days of practice. He uses Xontro later in the season because only after plenty of practice time do he and the players have a solid handle on what they can do, what needs work, and what the game demands of them; “things on the list are things that I had to have taught them by then.” The Xontro list contains items that the current team needs to improve on rather than a generic list of items. With his varsity team, the scouting/non-starting side of the net has a list that may also include items that represent what an upcoming opponent might try to do. After playing Xontro during a practice, Rob and the team can revisit the items on the list and evaluate if items should be added, removed or tweaked before playing the game another day. More importantly to Rob, the current game becomes an opportunity to inform practice in the coming days. Rob is observing not only how the team performs items on the list but also seeing if there are skills and tactics that need to be revisited because they are interfering with the team’s ability to perform items on the list. He can then use those observations to plan future practices and future Xontro games. The feedback loop created in this game is part of Rob’s larger ethos that complex games expose areas of fundamental training needs. If it sounds like Rob’s teams are playing the same game often at this point in their season, Rob is happy to hear that. “It’s the same drill all the time in my gym,” he said, only half-joking, “what is demanded and expected changes.”
How: There are three main ideas that shape how Rob works during Xontro: noticing what players are noticing, facilitating player questioning and learning, and teaching that a core process drives learning and growth. Rob points out that he and the other coaches are primarily observing and facilitating game play. Rob expressly restricts coaches from giving most technical and tactical feedback during Xontro games, they are primarily maintaining the score sheet for their respective teams. Coaches may talk to their teams about things related to items on their list but Rob prefers “simple, open-ended questions” rather than instruction. He said that it’s “more about problem solving” than players just doing what they’re told during the game. He wants players to get better at more than just hitting the ball harder or being more accurate during these games. For him, it’s more about players asking “how can I get this to work better?” and “how can we change this pattern?” Importantly, coaches don’t talk about what the opponent is doing. Something that Rob mentioned repeatedly is how he’s observing which players are noticing what their opponents are doing and how (if it all) they communicate what they see to their teammates. What Rob does with his observations is a great example of affirmation versus praise. After a round ends he may say to one player, “I saw you talking to your middle blocker. What did you say to her?” It doesn’t matter if Rob knows what the player said or not, he’s giving the player the opportunity to talk about what they saw, did, and said. When he notices talk that is “on the edge of deeper thinking”, he will work to draw it out. He doesn’t assign value to what the player did, he doesn’t judge their observations, he listens to what they say and asks follow up questions like, “what did you see that prompted you to say that?” He may bring another player into the discussion by asking them to reflect on what the first player said. This encourages deeper thinking from more than just one player. Throughout the observing and questioning, he is staying true to a learning process that he wants the players to take to heart. He wants players to keep asking three questions: what do we currently do?, what do we need to do?, and how do we bridge the gap between those two? For Rob, Xontro is a tool to ask those questions in a competitive, engaging way.
Have questions for Rob? You can ask me here or you can email Rob directly.
I received an email from Pete Waite, former head coach at the University of Wisconsin. He told me that he invented XONTRO in 2004. He also let me know that his original version is available for purchase via the Art of Coaching Volleyball web site. (Here’s a link)