ALL IN OR AVERAGE

How Hall of Fame Coach Kevin Orr Builds Culture, Connection and the Squid Defense

By Coach Kevin Furtado | Championship Vision Podcast

What separates a good basketball program from one that players remember for the rest of their lives?

For Wisconsin Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame coach Kevin Orr, the answer begins long before you start talking about offense, defense or winning championships.

It begins with relationships.

During our conversation on the Championship Vision Podcast, Orr repeatedly returned to one foundational belief:

Orr has spent more than two decades at Rice Lake High School, coaching both boys and girls basketball. His teams have won hundreds of games, captured conference and regional championships, and made back-to-back appearances in the Wisconsin Division II state championship game.

Yet when we talked about his career, the conversation quickly moved away from trophies.

It moved toward culture.

And one phrase seemed to capture Orr's entire philosophy:

ALL IN OR AVERAGE

Culture Has to Be Intentional

One of my biggest takeaways from talking with Coach Orr was this:

You can't leave culture to chance.

Orr plans culture development just like he plans the installation of an offense or defense.

He puts it on the calendar.

He teaches it.

He reinforces it.

He evaluates it.

At the beginning of the season, Rice Lake uses a Green Team activity in which the players help establish the standards for their team.

Orr doesn't simply walk into the locker room and tell his players what their standards will be.

The players help create them.

If the team chooses something like hard work, they take it another step.

What does hard work look like in practice?

What does it look like in the locker room?

What does it look like on the bus?

What does it look like when things aren't going your way?

Now “hard work” isn't just a word printed on a poster.

It becomes a behavior.

And because the players helped define it, they have ownership in it.

Orr explained that those standards have to remain in front of the team throughout the season rather than being established once and forgotten.

Are You Green, Gray or Red?

The Green Team framework gives players simple language to evaluate themselves.

GREEN players move the program forward.

They bring energy. They encourage teammates. They work. They communicate. They live the standards.

RED behaviors pull the team backward.

But the fascinating group is the one in between:

GRAY.

These aren't necessarily bad teammates.

They show up.

They participate.

They may even be talented.

But they're not completely invested.

That's where Orr asks an important question:

How do we sway the Gray?

His answer isn't simply demanding more.

It's creating an environment where Green behaviors are constantly modeled, recognized and celebrated.

A player dives on the floor?

That's Green.

A teammate celebrates someone else's success?

That's Green.

Someone brings tremendous energy to practice?

That's Green.

Orr wants the players already living in the Green to help pull others with them.

That's leadership.

What Does “All In” Really Mean?

I loved Orr's explanation of being all in, because it wasn't about demanding that every athlete devote every minute of the year to basketball.

Kids play multiple sports.

They have academics.

They have families.

They have other responsibilities.

Being all in means something deeper.

Be a great teammate.

Honor the standards.

Care about the people around you.

Contribute to something bigger than yourself.

Orr wants Rice Lake to be a place where players have an experience they'll remember—not merely another season they completed. His vision is for players at every level to believe Rice Lake is the best place to play high school basketball.

That's a powerful way to think about program building.

Make Time to Know Your Players

Here's an idea from Orr that almost every coach could implement immediately:

Have intentional one-on-one conversations with your players.

During the season, Orr and his assistants make a point of connecting individually with their athletes.

It doesn't require an hour-long meeting.

It could be five minutes before practice.

Ten minutes afterward.

A conversation on the bus.

A few minutes during the JV game.

The important thing is that it's intentional.

Ask about school.

Ask about home.

Ask how they feel about practice.

Ask what they're seeing.

Then listen.

Orr has learned that if a coach waits until the postseason exit meeting, a player may finally reveal something that bothered them for months.

By then, it's too late to fix it.

Relationships require time, and Orr deliberately builds that time into his program.

The Inspire Camp: When Basketball Becomes Bigger Than Basketball

One of my favorite parts of our conversation was Orr's Inspire Camp for athletes with special needs.

Rice Lake players are paired one-on-one with participants and spend the experience alongside them—playing, encouraging, laughing and connecting.

At the end of the camp, participants are introduced and run through a tunnel of Rice Lake players giving them high fives.

But Orr recognizes that the camp isn't only impacting the participants.

It's changing his players.

It gives them perspective.

It teaches service.

It teaches empathy.

It demonstrates that basketball can be used to bring joy to somebody else's life.

Some Rice Lake players and Inspire athletes have remained connected years later.

That's culture in action.

Letters for Moms

Another Orr tradition has nothing to do with shooting percentages or defensive rotations.

Around Valentine's Day, Orr has shortened practice and asked his players to write letters to their mothers.

Players tell their moms what they appreciate about them.

Then Orr brings the families together.

Each player reads his letter to his mom and presents her with a rose.

Simple?

Yes.

Powerful?

Absolutely.

Parents have contacted Orr afterward to tell him how meaningful the experience was.

That's when you realize something important:

Kevin Orr isn't simply building basketball players. He's using basketball to build people.

Then He Released the Squid

Once we finished talking culture, we got into something I couldn't wait to discuss:

The Squid 2-1-2 Pressure Defense.

For most of his coaching career, Orr was predominantly a man-to-man defensive coach.

Then he decided to go in a different direction.

Rice Lake competes against schools with significantly larger enrollments, and Orr wanted something that would make his program different.

He studied the 2-1-2, learned from coaches including Greg Neely and Tony Miller, and eventually decided to commit to it as Rice Lake's primary defense.

Not as a change-up.

Not for three possessions.

They went all in.

That is where culture and scheme started to connect.

Why “Squid”?

Orr and his staff wanted their defense to feel as if it had arms everywhere.

Stunts.

Deflections.

Active hands.

Traps.

Passing lanes disappearing.

Players constantly recovering and rotating.

Orr's assistant, Marty Helgerson, came up with the Squid name—the image of multiple arms and tentacles overwhelming its prey.

The staff then created video clips showing their defense producing deflections, steals and contested shots.

They weren't just teaching a defense.

They were selling an identity.

Orr said that before the season he continually told his players how excited he was about the system and how well he believed they fit it.

That's another lesson for coaches:

If you want players to believe in your system, they first have to see that you believe in it.

GO. LAVA. PRESSURE.

Squid can also change personalities through different calls.

GO — trap the ball when it crosses half court.

LAVA — trap the wing with the guard and forward.

Rice Lake could also apply full-court pressure and fall back into its 2-1-2 structure.

On a LAVA trap, the objective was to pressure the basketball while taking away reversal and the next logical pass—forcing the offense into a more difficult decision.

The offense can't simply run its normal actions comfortably.

Now it's reacting to Rice Lake.

That's pressure basketball.

The Defense Isn't Perfect—and That's the Point

I appreciated Orr's willingness to discuss what hurt Squid.

Teams attacked with 2-1-2 offensive alignments.

They overloaded the baseline.

Two effective post players could create problems with seals and passes over the top.

But Orr didn't respond by immediately abandoning the system.

He studied it.

Adjusted it.

And created drills to address the problems.

That is an important distinction.

Having an identity doesn't mean refusing to change.

It means knowing what you believe in while continually improving how you teach it.

Break It Down to Build It Up

Orr initially introduced Squid as a whole so his players could see what the defense was supposed to become.

Then the staff broke it into pieces.

Guards trained their responsibilities.

Forwards and centers trained theirs.

They worked on peels, positioning, lob passes, rotations and recoveries.

Five-on-five situations included competitive challenges such as getting three consecutive stops—a “kill.”

They also used stop-score-stop situations and even played six-on-five to stress the defense.

And when film showed a recurring problem?

They created a drill to fix it.

That's great teaching.

Culture and Defense Aren't Separate

This was my biggest takeaway from my conversation with Kevin Orr.

At first, it seemed like we were discussing two different subjects.

Culture.

And then:

The Squid Defense.

But they're connected.

Squid requires communication.

Culture requires communication.

Squid requires trust.

Great teams require trust.

Squid requires players to cover for one another.

Great teammates cover for one another.

Squid requires five players committed to doing their job.

Great programs require people committed to something bigger than themselves.

And Squid requires players to be completely invested.

There's that phrase again.

ALL IN OR AVERAGE.

You can copy Kevin Orr's defense.

You can steal his drills.

You can use his Green Team ideas.

You can create your own Inspire Camp.

But ultimately, every coach has to answer the same question:

What experience are we intentionally creating for our players?

Because years from now, our players probably won't remember every play we ran.

They may not remember every score.

But they'll remember whether they felt valued.

They'll remember their teammates.

They'll remember the standards.

They'll remember the relationships.

And they'll remember what it felt like to be part of something special.

That's program building.

That's culture.

And that's what it means to be ALL IN.

🎙️ Listen to Coach Kevin Orr's full conversation on the Championship Vision Podcast:

​Listen on Spotify — Kevin Orr | Championship Vision Podcast​

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Thanks,

Coach Kevin Furtado