BASKETBALL AI
Hey crew, welcome to this edition of the Basketball AI newsletter.
2025 brought fast paced advances and increased use of AI to all levels of basketball. What will 2026 bring?
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In this issue:
How AI is Transforming Basketball from the NBA to High School Gyms
Inside the Raptors’ AI Shooting Lab
Orreco.ai Expands Into High School Hoops
Sierra Canyon High School Adopts KlutchShots AI Highlights System
AI Driven Evolution of NBA Analytics Departments
Let’s dive in.
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS
AI USE AT ALL LEVELS
How AI is Transforming Basketball from the NBA to High School Gyms
Image Source: Manus / Basketball AI
Overview: By late 2025 conversation around AI in basketball shifted from "theoretical data" to "real time coaching intelligence." High profile coaches are increasingly vocal about how AI tools are fundamentally changing strategy on the court.
NBA: From Stats to Robotics
Steve Kerr (Golden State Warriors): Kerr noted AI and robotics are reshaping training protocols. The Warriors use AI powered robots to simulate specific defensive movements and facial recognition AI analysis of game footage to learn opponent patterns to build game plans in minutes rather than hours.
Joe Mazzulla (Boston Celtics): Known for his "Joe Math" philosophy, Mazzulla continues to advocate for a "self-correcting system" where players trust AI driven analytics. He emphasized that while AI provides the numbers, the coach's role is to prepare players to "withstand the uncertainty" those numbers predict.
College: Scouting and Rotation Optimization
Dawn Staley (South Carolina): Staley values the use of AI driven systems like ShotTracker for player development, stating that "tracking our numbers is probably the single most important thing that has increased our numbers in games."
Duke & Houston: Staffs at these "blue blood" programs use AI to optimize player rotations and to calculate the exact combinations of players that produce the highest defensive efficiency against specific opponents.
Baylor & Arizona: Coaches use AI powered video tools that automatically tag "pick-and-roll coverage" and "shooting tendencies," allowing them to spend less time on manual film breakdown and more on teaching.
High School: Assistant in a Box
Automated Film Breakdown: Tools like SportsVisio and Ballogy are becoming standard for high school programs. Interviews with high school coaches highlight that AI can now turn a smartphone recording of a game into a full box score and player highlight reels within 24 hours.
Career Advancement: Coaches are using AI for their own careers. The launch of "Mock Interview GPT" in early 2025 has been widely discussed on coaching forums like HoopDirt. High school coaches use it to simulate interviews with athletic directors to practice responses to philosophy and situational questions.
Why it Matters: The gap between the pros and the amateurs is shrinking. The "smartest team on the floor" isn't just the one that practices the hardest it’s the one that leverages data the fastest. AI is being used to bridge the gap between "gut feeling" and objective performance. Coaches are moving away from being "data collectors" and becoming "data interpreters."
USE CASE / NBA PLAYER DEVELOPMENT
Inside the Raptors’ AI Shooting Lab
Image source: fansided.com / Gemini Nano Banana
Overview: At the Toronto Raptors OVO Athletic Centre a quiet revolution is taking place. By integrating advanced computer vision and cloud computing, the Raptors have turned their practice facility into a high-tech "Shooting Lab. This shift represents a move away from subjective coaching observations toward "surgical precision" in player development.
The Details: The Raptors’ ecosystem uses a multi-layered approach to track performance:
Noah Basketball's Shot-Tracking System (Noahlytics): Mounted sensors track every shot’s arc, depth and left-right deviation. The system provides instant verbal feedback telling a player "Arc too flat" while they are still in their shooting motion.
Bio-mechanical Tracking: In collaboration with MLSE Labs and Amazon Web Services (AWS), the team uses high speed cameras to track 29 points on a player's body 60 times per second. This measures everything from elbow velocity to stance width identifying mechanical flaws invisible to the human eye.
Real-Time Visualization: A 120-foot multimedia video board allows coaches to conduct "instant film sessions" on the court. Players can see their bio-mechanical data superimposed over their highlights seconds after taking a shot.
Why it Matters: This is a paradigm shift that focuses on two key areas:
Hyper Personalization: AI allows for training regimens to be tailored to a player’s unique physical profile, accelerating skill acquisition far faster than traditional methods.
Career Longevity: The same data used to fix a jumper can predict injuries. By identifying subtle patterns of bio-mechanical strain, the Raptors can intervene before a player suffers a season-ending injury.
For the basketball world this signals the arrival of the "Digital Twin" era where every movement is analyzed, simulated and optimized to push the boundaries of athletic performance.
COLLEGE AND HIGH SCHOOL / HEALTH AND INJURY PREVENTION
Orreco.ai Expands Into High School Hoops
Image Source: Orreco.ai
Overview: Orreco.ai has expanded its solutions that accelerate recovery, optimizes performance and prolongs careers from professional leagues like the NBA and Premier League into the high performance high school and prep school markets. This expansion is driven by their 2025 pivot toward "scalable AI" and the launch of student specific platforms.
The Details: Orreco’s primary entry point into American high schools is through elite "basketball pathways" and sports centric prep academies such as:
NBPA Top 100 Camp: As the official analytics partner of the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA), Orreco provides performance data for the top 100 high school basketball recruits in the U.S. during their annual showcases.
Wasserman Athlete Collective: Through a partnership with the Wasserman agency, high school aged elite prospects use Orreco's biomarker and cycle syncing tools.
High Performance Pilot Programs: Orreco conducted pilot research and deployments across three high schools to test the @thlete 2.0 app interface for students.
With a $4 million investment round led by Mark Cuban in December 2025, Orreco has prioritized the following tools for the high school market.
@thlete 2.0 for Students: A simplified version of their pro-grade app designed for teenage athletes to manage recovery, sleep, and nutrition.
Motion Signal AI: Computer vision data is used to help high school coaches identify injury risks from game footage without requiring expensive wearable GPS hardware.
Why it Matters: The resource gap between top tier high schools and small college programs is closing. Orreco is leveling the technological playing field. Smaller programs no longer need a 10-person medical staff to monitor "Load Management." With agentic AI, a single assistant coach can receive automated alerts identifying which players need a "light" practice day. Smaller programs can affordably maximize keeping their best players on the court.
HIGH SCHOOL / HIGHLIGHTS
Sierra Canyon High School Adopts KlutchShots AI Highlights System
Image source: klutchshots.ai
Overview: Sierra Canyon became one of the first high profile high schools in the US to adopt KlutchShots AI powered instant highlight system. The technology uses everyday smartphones and an Apple Watch to automatically capture, edit and produce social media ready highlights in real time eliminating the need for professional camera crews or tedious post game editing.
Details:
The core functionality of KlutchShots Ai is simplicity and speed. A parent or staff member records the game with an iPhone. When a big play occurs a double tap on the phone or a tap on an Apple Watch instantly clips the previous 5-20 seconds of video. The AI then automatically:
Reframes horizontal footage into vertical 9:16 format (optimized for TikTok, Reels, etc.).
Tracks the action and intelligently zooms to keep the player centered.
Crowd Captures and syncs clips from multiple users recording the same game to provide multi-angle highlights.
Delivers high quality professional looking highlights within seconds.
Why it Matters: Elite professional teams use AI for advanced strategy. KlutchShots brings AI driven content creation and personal branding to the high school level instantly and affordably. For Sierra Canyon’s athletes, this means immediate access to college recruiting footage and high quality social media content, effectively streamlining the path from amateur athlete to collegiate prospect.
With current NIL deals taking into consideration an athletes’ social media value, this is can help athletes’ grow their brand value.
NBA ANALYTICS DEPARTMENT STRUCTURE
AI Driven Evolution of NBA Analytics Departments
Image source: Funnyball - Substack
Overview: In 2025, the structure of NBA analytics departments evolved from small "think tanks" into sprawling multi-disciplinary divisions that are as large as some teams' entire scouting departments. While the specific titles vary, the Thunder, Celtics, and Nuggets represent three main "architectures" of modern NBA data usage.
Oklahoma City Thunder: The "Intelligence Agency" Model. The Thunder operate the league's largest and most secretive analytics department. They treat data like a global intelligence agency with a heavy emphasis on Identification and Intelligence.
Focus: Talent Acquisition
Philosophy: Find the undervalued asset anywhere on Earth.
Key Leadership: Vince Rozman (VP of Identification & Intelligence) and Jesse Gould (VP of Strategy & Analysis).
The Structure:
Data Engineering Hub: A massive backend team (led by Colin Bowers) that builds proprietary databases. They don't just use NBA data; they scrape international leagues and amateur circuits.
The "Design" Wing: VP of Strategy & Design (Wynn Sullivan), leads a group that focuses on how to visualize data so players and coaches can digest it instantly on iPads during games.
Integration: Analytics staffers like Bailey Joseph (Director of Data Science) are embedded directly into the scouting process meaning a scout and an analyst must "co-sign" every draft prospect.
Boston Celtics: The "Cloud-Native" Tech Model. The Celtics' structure is designed for speed and real time iteration. They focus heavily on the infrastructure that allows data to flow from the cameras to the coach’s clipboard in seconds.
Focus: Tactical Efficiency
Philosophy: Process data faster than the opponent can adjust.
Key Leadership: Mike Zarren (VP/General Counsel and analytics pioneer) and Jay Wessland (Chief Technical Officer).
The Structure:
The Technical Core: They function more like a Silicon Valley startup. They fully migrated to a serverless AWS architecture, reducing data processing time by over 70%.
Internal Consulting: The department (including Andrew Sherwin, Director of Business Intelligence) acts as an internal firm. Coaching staff "submit" questions (e.g., "How does our defensive rating change when we switch the 1-4 screen?") and the data team provides a report before the next morning's shoot around.
Coaching Analysts: They have specific roles like Analytics Coach, bridging the gap between the "basement" (data) and the "bench" (tactics).
Denver Nuggets: The "Performance & Strategy" Hybrid. The Nuggets utilize a more integrated approach where analytics and Sports Science are blended into a single "high-performance" unit.
Focus: Roster Synergy
Philosophy: Optimize the environment around our superstar
Key Leadership: Tommy Balcetis (Assistant GM, former VP of Basketball Strategy & Analytics) and Steve Short (VP of Sports Performance).
The Structure:
The Strategy Bridge: Because Assistant GM (Balcetis) came from the analytics side, the data team has a "seat at the table" for all trade and cap decisions.
Health First Analytics: A large portion of the data staff, led by Matt Tuttle (Director of Sports Science), works exclusively on player health. They use tracking data to monitor "asymmetry" in a player's stride to predict injuries before they happen.
On Court Implementation: They employ Senior Analysts like Layne Vashro who focus on "Lineup Optimization" using math to determine the exact four players that maximize Nikola Jokić's efficiency at any given moment.
Why it Matters: NBA analytics have moved toward a sophisticated new era of AI driven spatial tracking and preventative health modeling. Teams no longer just look at where a shot is taken but are analyzing the "invisible" physics and bio-mechanics of every play. To manage all that data and to make sense of it all, a well thought out organizational structure is required.
In the next Basketball AI issue we’ll explore how a few top college basketball programs are structuring their analytics department.
QUICK HITS
🛠 Tools Spotlight:
Tools mentioned in this edition:
ShotTracker - AI driven video, stats and analytics tools.
Sportsvisio - AI powered stat tracking and highlights.
Mock Interview GPT - AI mock interview assistant.
Ballogy - AI powered skill tracking and development app.
NBA on AWS. AWS is a new technology partner of the NBA.
Noah Basketball - Analyzes real time data using computer vision technology to improve shooting accuracy and consistency.
MLSE Labs - Full stack technology team that develops digital solutions.
Sportradar - Sports technology.
Orreco.ai - Agentic AI for pro sports.
KlutchShots AI - AI powered highlights fast and easy. Record best plays in high resolution framed for social media.
📰 Everything else in Basketball AI:
Expert Insight: "AI isn't just a coaching tool anymore; it’s the third person in the broadcast booth. We are finally seeing the 'invisible' parts of basketball made visible through data." — Sports Analytics Report, Jan 2026.
Orreco.ai Integrates Sportradar NBA Tracking Data - Orreco.ai announced an agreement with Sportradar to leverage real time player tracking and event data to help teams optimize training loads, accelerate recovery and support longterm physical wellbeing for athletes.
📆 Upcoming Conferences, Events and Guides:
December 16, 2025 Last issue of Basketball AI
February 22-24, 2026 National Sports Forum (NSF)
March 6-7, 2026 MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference (SSAC)
April 10-11, 2026 Connecticut Sports Analytics Symposium (CSAS)
That’s a wrap for this edition. The next newsletter will be published Tuesday January 20, 2026.
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Until next time, Terry