A Visit with Ole Miss Men’s Basketball Strength and Conditioning Coach John Reilly: An Inside Look at the Physicality and Mentality of the Rebels’ team
OXFORD, Miss. — With any sport, fans wait with anticipation for what a new season will hold. They look forward to watching athletes compete against rival teams and rooting for their favorite players. However, fans don’t always see what all takes place behind the scenes during preseason preparations. We recently sat down with John Reilly, the Strength and Conditioning Coach for Ole Miss Men’s Basketball, to learn more about what his players do to get ready for the season.
As a former decathlete, Coach Reilly is no stranger to the art of movement. When his days of competing were finished, Reilly saw coaching as a means of staying involved in two things he loved: competing and studying movement.
“I’d say I’ve always been fascinated by movement. It really wasn’t about the weight room, itself, you know, lifting. In general, I enjoyed every part of movement and how it makes you happy, just exploring movement and how it can really improve performance as well. I love competition. So, after I finished competing, myself, it was just a great opportunity to stay in still and do things that I enjoy doing, and that’s competing and movement. A lot of strength coaches will say because I’m a gym rat, I love the weight room. But, I love movement more than even the weight room.”
Coach John Reilly on continuing what he loves
Competing in 10 events as a decathlete allowed Reilly to understand the nuances of movement and how specific exercises and stretches can impact a player’s agility and performance. That experience has afforded Reilly insight other strength coaches may not have.
“It allowed me to learn jumping mechanics, sprinting mechanics, throwing mechanics, and these things really transfer into a lot of different sports, and then even for the game of basketball, it being such a rotational sport,” Reilly explained. “People think of just going up and down, just linear. Still, there are lateral and rotational movements, and many people forget about how rotational, pretty much a lot of change-of-direction sports are, and how you have to have mobile ankles, hips, and thoracic spine. I like to focus on those things, and my days of being a track and field athlete helped me be a better coach,” he noted.
Coach Reilly’s bond with Head Coach Chris Beard
Entering their ninth season together, Ole Miss men’s basketball head coach Chris Beard and Coach Reilly have formed a bond, and both have competitive streaks within them that push them to be successful.
“Beard is a very passionate person,” Reilly told us.
“He (Beard) wants to win. He demands a lot out of the players and the staff. That’s what I love about him; he’s going to hold me accountable, but at the same time, with our relationship, I’m coming at him, too, on things I feel he can improve on. That’s just the relationship we have. You need people, especially when you’re kind of a CEO of an organization like Coach Beard is, to have people that aren’t just yes-or-no-sir kind of guys. It’s people you know who will be in your corner and willing to tell you things that you need to hear. That’s the relationship we have. I love him. A lot of people just really don’t know who the man is, and he’s a great individual. Things that he says behind closed doors are what he’s going to say in front of you, which is one of the principles of our program – a truth-telling culture. It’s one of the big things I enjoy about him.”
Coach John Reilly on Coach Beard
Reilly acknowledges the team effort of all coaches and staff in keeping Ole Miss men’s basketball on track, healthy, and productive. Together, these individuals work cooperatively to help players achieve their full potential on and off the court.
“I’ve been with Beard the most,” Reilly explained. “So, I’m kind of like a liaison within all these different disciplines. We have a dietitian who is an expert in her field as a dietitian, an athletic trainer, myself with strength and conditioning, mental performance coaches, developmental coaches, and so many other people with whom we’re all connected.”
Training and conditioning for basketball
Each sport requires certain abilities and conditioning. We asked Coach Reilly how training and conditioning for basketball athletes differs from how he would work with athletes of other sports. He explained in depth the nuances of his job and responsibility.
“It’s fascinating how the body works,” Reilly began. “You have mobile joints followed by stable joints. My wrist right here is a mobile joint, followed by my elbow, which is a stable joint. My shoulder is a mobile joint. The same thing happens with my ankle: mobile, knee, stable, hip, and then you have your lumbar, thoracic, and cervical spine. Knowing how the body functions and moves is very important when training athletes.
“Within the game of basketball, it’s a great change of direction kind of sport. I’m going to train them reactionary as well. We are going to work a lot on the thoracic spine. With this being our ninth season together, Coach Beard and I haven’t had one ACL injury; we haven’t had those major knee injuries that you may hear of other teams having. You could say it’s just luck. I believe it’s the way we train and recover. It’s not always the fastest team and the strongest team that wins; it’s the team that recovers the fastest. We have that balance between the recovery and the way we train,” Reilly concluded.
At Ole Miss, players are given a pre-assessment of sorts as a baseline for finding both their deficiencies and areas of strength. There are obviously variations between athletes, and the more Coach Reilly and other staff members can learn about an athlete’s physical characteristics, the more they can help him achieve his potential.
Coach Reilly explained the process of player assessment. “We’ll get their hip, internal, external range of motion. We’ll get an ankle range of motion. We’ll also get blood work using our doctors, letting Jordyn (Kleve), our dietician, know what kind of deficiencies they may have in their diet. Now, we can tailor their dietary needs based on that as well,” he began.
“The other thing is that they’ll end up going through a DEXA scan. We’ll know their body composition and how much body fat they have surrounding their organs. We’ll know their bone density, which is very important; looking at asymmetries, why is one quad bigger than the other? The player may say, ‘You know, I didn’t know.’ So, we tell them, ‘let’s investigate a little bit more.’ For things that maybe an athlete may usually ignore, we’re able to give them the data and start investigating a little bit,” Reilly noted.
Reilly went on to explain the importance of looking at all the resulting data to best help the players.
“I think as a strength coach, and with our dietitians and our sports performance staff, we’re all scientists at the end of the day,” he said.
“We’re looking at data. We may come to conclusions. We have a hypothesis as well, and we’re just testing them out every single day. We don’t have an answer to everything, and I would tell our players this: Nobody knows you more than you. The relationship between an athlete and the staff is critical because when they’re feeling something, we listen to them. There are things they might not know about their body and why they move a certain way, but I’m able to connect those dots together and kind of put it all together to where they’re like, ‘Man, this is fascinating. I didn’t know that.’ Now, they’re more aware of their bodies and are more in tune with why they move the way they move. They just become a better athlete because of it.”
Workout Philosophies: ‘Foot on the gas pedal’
Fans often wonder what preseason workouts are like compared to workouts during the season. Do players need to “save up” their energy for games? Do players cut back on reps or gym days?
Coach Reilly told us the philosophy of basketball that Coach Beard and the staff embrace is one of “foot on the gas pedal.”
Coach Reilly explained: “In the off-season, this is where we’re creating our exercise catalog. I guess you would say these are all the exercises that we are doing. Once we get to the in-season, I’m not introducing too many new exercises because new exercises may require new movements; new movements may get guys more sore. There are certain movements that I will probably avoid a little bit more in-season as opposed to off-season. Typically, I think many programs fall off compared to programs we have had because we just don’t take our foot off the gas pedal.”
Player toughness
A player exhibiting toughness on the field of play is something fans and reporters often comment on and ask coaches about. When asked how he works on a player’s “toughness,” Coach Reilly defined toughness as he sees it and discussed its importance.
“It’s critical. There are different forms of toughness. People may say, ‘Man, this guy is a really tough player.’ Well, how can you really measure toughness? It’s a challenge to do that,” Reilly said.
“But, at the end of the day, toughness is consistency. That’s really what it is. It’s being a disciplined individual where you can wake up every day and do the same thing. That is a challenge. You know, what is toughness? I think it parallels so much with competitiveness. What makes one person more competitive than the other? At the end of the day, I think the root of it is, I would say, caring – a person that cares. Because if you care more, guess what you’re going to do? You’re going to think of ways you can improve. You’re going to think of different strategies. You might go home and do some more research. You might go home and be like, ‘you know what? I’m not doing enough work. I’m going to get some extra work while I’m at the house.’ Successful people and people who are true winners, why are they winners? It’s because they care a little bit more than the guy next to them.”
Coach Reilly on toughness
Getting Players Uncomfortable
Coach Reilly has learned a great deal throughout his years as a strength and conditioning coach. Reilly told us he previously focused a lot on the weightlifting portion of his job. Now, Reilly focuses on the mental side of conditioning as much as the physical part.
Reilly has learned to view things from a different perspective in order to help understand situations such as where one player might be stronger than everyone else in the weight room, but not as strong on the court.
“So, that’s really been the journey throughout my career, doing exercises that really transfer onto the court,” Coach Reilly said. “I used to be so locked into the weight portion of things. Now, it’s just so much more mental. Just looking at the past years, it’s come with experience, where the mental side, I’m really just trying to get to the point where I fatigue them. Then, I really get to know who they are because so many times you can do weight room workouts and they’re comfortable. Guys are in their zone, like they’re good at this. But how do I get these guys really uncomfortable?”
So, how does Coach Reilly get players to feel uncomfortable? He related a process he uses that has proven effective.
“I’ve put them through some scenarios this off-season to where there’s accountability, scenarios where if one guy messes up, everybody suffers just like a turnover on the court. The turnover for one person is a turnover for the entire team. You start really seeing certain guys crack. It’s those things I’m able to figure out. What kind of team do we have? What kind of individual do we have? Then I can really work on things. People get so caught up and you say yes, you lift better, you know, great, great job. But am I seeing a better basketball player on the court? I think that’s the biggest and most important thing within my job. It’s the mental side. You’re saying who can handle adversity before you ever get to the adversity in the season.”
Coach Reilly on accountability
Handling adversity
So, it’s clear a big part of Coach Reilly’s job is figuring out who can handle adversity. When there are three seconds left on the clock, who can take the shot and not choke? Who can stand on the free throw line and sink the shot with the game on the line? For Reilly, it’s important to play a role in figuring that out before those scenarios happen.
“These guys are really good at hiding, you know, just players in general, of hiding their weaknesses, in a lot of ways. You can’t face your weaknesses until you reach a certain level of performance. I have to get them in an adverse situation where now it starts to manifest itself. That’s why my journey has always been; how can I expose these weaknesses? From there we can take the next step. So, these guys are realizing, ‘hey, I actually do have a problem.’ If you wait for the season, then the problems manifest themselves and you had all these months to work on it and you didn’t know that you had these problems because you didn’t work them hard enough.”
Coach Reilly on facing weaknesses
Life in Oxford: ‘I love it…It’s been amazing’
Reilly and his family are excited to be in Oxford. The simplicity of life has its benefits, and for Reilly and his family the simplicity wasn’t something they realized they needed until they made the move to Oxford.
“I love it. I didn’t know that this is what my family needed,” Coach Reilly said. “A lot of coaches have told me to simplify things. You always think, man, there’s no Costco here. There’s no Target. But then you think about how I live five minutes from the school. I’m able to attend my kids’ activities, drop them off at school when I need to help my wife out. It’s been amazing. I think our family’s closer than ever from being here in Oxford, and it’s been a blessing in disguise.”
Expectations
When we asked Coach Reilly what he wished fans knew about the behind-the-scenes aspect of the Ole Miss men’s basketball team and expectations for the upcoming season, he said, “I really don’t like to jump ahead and say, this is what they’re going to expect.”
Instead, the Rebel coach wants fans to know they’re working every day and holding each other accountable.
“You know, we’re working hard. I can tell you that,” he explained. “I guess the best example is year two at Texas Tech, we made it to the Elite Eight, year two at University of Texas, made it to the Elite Eight. This is year two for us, but we didn’t know those years that we were going to be an Elite Eight team. Actually, you know, there were times where we were just working, saying we need to make it to the tournament and give ourselves a chance. We just need to continue to be on edge and very, very uncomfortable, not expect,” Reilly continued.
“I think a little bit of fear is good for the guys, and they’re working, daily,” he added.
“The accountability that they have here is like no other. Really, I don’t think there’s another program in the country that holds their guys accountable like we do and has the numbers to back it up within the accountability to make sure that these guys are working. So, you can ask every player on this team, ‘is this the hardest you’ve ever worked?’ They will say, ‘Coach, this is not even close from the previous school to this school; it’s on another level.’ That’s where our success has been is through this kind of hard work. When you think about how hard you work and the confidence it gives you when you’re on the court, when you’re shooting that free throw, because you put in the work, it’s an amazing feeling. We’re working hard, but there’s no promises because nothing is promised.”
Coach Reilly on the Rebels’ hard work and accountability
Final thoughts
Strength and conditioning are two words that encompass a great deal more than wind sprints, weightlifting, and agility exercises. Although those things contribute greatly to the physical ability of an athlete, strength and conditioning also includes equipping players with the mental toughness, character, and determination needed to be successful.
Coach John Reilly embraces the challenge of strengthening and conditioning the whole player and has proven himself to be a coach who continues to thrive on learning more about his craft and helping players mold themselves into the best version of themselves possible, both as athletes and men.
Next Up
Ole Miss men’s basketball will host the visiting Illinois Fighting Illini in the SJB Pavilion on Sunday, October 27th at 1:00 p.m in an exhibition game to benefit CASA (Court Appointed Special Advocates) of North Mississippi.
CASA is an organization which “helps advocate for the best interests of abused and neglected children through the services of trained, court-appointed community volunteers.”
Make plans to attend and support the Rebels and a great cause!
Donna Sprabery
Donna Sprabery is a former teacher, graduation coach, and academic coach for boys basketball. She graduated from the University of West Alabama with a major in business education and from Arkansas State University with a MA in Educational Leadership. A native of Meridian, MS, Donna enjoys traveling, gardening, writing, volunteer work, and cheering on the Rebels.
