My guess is the improvement is mostly due to Lickliter not sending many players to the glass very often on the offensive end so they could instead get back on defense and limit transition and slow the tempo.
That's definitely a large part of it. Lickliter's slow offense and focus on getting back on D rather than crashing the boards limited the number of possessions on both ends of the floor. Fewer possessions per game = fewer rebounding opportunities. Likewise, Fran's style of pushing the ball on both ends is going to create more possessions per game. So Lickliter's teams weren't as unskilled at rebounding as their rebounds per game would suggest, and Fran's teams probably won't be quite as good at rebounding as their rebounds per game would suggest. The only true measure of rebounding effort is rebounds per possession, and most people don't care enough about stats to break it down that much.
edit: actually the REAL stat should be rebounds per missed shot attempts. And if you want to break it down even further, break down offensive boards per missed shots (minus those that are blocked), and defensive boards per opponents' missed shots (minus blocks).
That's definitely a large part of it. Lickliter's slow offense and focus on getting back on D rather than crashing the boards limited the number of possessions on both ends of the floor. Fewer possessions per game = fewer rebounding opportunities. Likewise, Fran's style of pushing the ball on both ends is going to create more possessions per game. So Lickliter's teams weren't as unskilled at rebounding as their rebounds per game would suggest, and Fran's teams probably won't be quite as good at rebounding as their rebounds per game would suggest. The only true measure of rebounding effort is rebounds per possession, and most people don't care enough about stats to break it down that much.
edit: actually the REAL stat should be rebounds per missed shot attempts. And if you want to break it down even further, break down offensive boards per missed shots (minus those that are blocked), and defensive boards per opponents' missed shots (minus blocks).
Great point ddiction. I always like to look at rebounding margin. It seems Tom Davis teams consistently were one of the top teams in the country at rebounding margin. If you have 60 total rebounds in a game and you get 35 to the opponents 25, that is what matters.