John Wooden
  • If you truly do your best, and only you will really know, then you are successful and the actual score is immaterial whether it was favorable or unfavorable.  However, when you fail to do your best, you have failed, even though the score might have been to your liking.  This does not mean that you should not coach to win.  You must teach your players to play to win and do everything in your power that is ethical and honest to win.  I do not want players who do not have a keen desire to win and do not play hard and aggressively to accomplish that objective.  However, I want to be able to feel and want my players sincerely to feel that doing the best that you are capable of doing is victory in itself and less than that is defeat.
  • The coach must never forget that he is a leader and not merely a person with authority.
  • It’s not what you do, but how well you execute it.
  • No system will be successful unless the players are well grounded in the fundamentals and execute them properly and so quickly that they seem to be done instinctively.
  • Quick execution of the basic fundamentals.
  • He who hesitates is lost.
  • Not seeking perfection but committing to excellence.
  • What is definition of excellence?
  • There is no pillow as soft as a clear conscience.
  • Our team is like an automobile…The not on the wheel is just as important as the engine in some respects.
  • Controlled Quickness
  • Don't mistake activity for achievement


Jim Calhoun
  • I want my kids to know they’re part of a family.  I want them to know that I’m the one in charge of the family.  Okay, the father.  I want them to know that I love them, but I don’t necessarily love what they do.  This is an old-time family.  I’m in charge of the clicker.
  • My advice is that there is no career path that you do the best you can at what you’re doing and someone will notice.
  • I learned a lesson.  I had made a blanket statement, which was wrong.  You can’t operate with blankets when you’re dealing with a tem of individuals, different styles.  You’d better have a quilt instead of a blanket, because every piece is different. 
  • The more rules you have, the more rules kids will break.
  • If your “A” game isn’t there you always can have your “A” effort.  –Richard Hamilton

John Maxwell
  • Our attitude may not be the asset that makes us great leaders, but without good ones we will never reach our full potential.
  • Leadership has less to do with position than it does disposition.
  • The pessimist complains about the wind.
  • The optimist expects it to change.
  • The leader adjusts the sails.
  • We cannot choose how many years we will live, but we can choose how much life those years will have.
  • The Greeks decided it was impossible for a person to run a mile in four minutes or less.  And for over a thousand years everyone believed it.  Or bone structure is all wrong.  Wind resistance is too great.  We have inadequate lung power. There were a million reasons. Then one man, one single human being, proved that the doctors, the trainers, the athletes, and the millions of runners before him, who tried and failed, were all wrong.  And, miracle of miracles, the year after Roger Bannister broke the four-minute mile, thirty-seven other runners broke the four-minute mile.  The year after that three hundred runners broke the four-minute mile.
  • Until Roger Bannister came along, we all believed the experts.  And “the experts” continue to keep others from reaching their potential.
  • Practicing psychologists list five areas needing significant appraisal when employees are being considered for executive promotion: ambition; attitudes toward policy; attitudes toward colleagues; supervisory skills; and attitudes toward excessive demands on time and energy.  A candidate who is our of balance in one or more of these areas would be likely to project a negative attitude and, therefore, prove to be a poor leader.
  • The winners in life think constantly in terms of I can, I will, and I am.  Losers, on the other hand, concentrate their waking thoughts on what they should have done or what they didn’t do.

Mike Krzyzewski
  • We have only one rule here: Don’t do anything that’s detrimental to yourself.  Because if it’s detrimental to you, it’ll be detrimental to our program and to Duke University.
  • Too many rules get in the way of leadership.  They just put you in a box and, sooner or later, a rule-happy leader will wind up in a situation where he wants to use some discretion but is forced to go along with some decree that he himself has concocted.
  • The upperclassmen will spend time letting the freshmen know what is expected.  That, in turn, fosters additional leadership.
  • We emphasize at our initial meeting that the new guys are not just joining a basketball team, but a basketball family.  We then hand out laminated cards that include the home business phone numbers of every member of the team--including players, assistant coaches, and so on.  We tell them to carry the card around and whenever they’re in harm’s way, make a call.  If it’s two o’clock in the morning and you’re in trouble, someone on this card will help.
  • During the recruiting process, I’ve made a handshake deal with every one of our players.  To each kid, I say: “I’m going to give you my best.  I’m going to give you 100%.  In return, I expect you to graduate.  You’ll be coming to Duke for more that just basketball. If you don’t understand that, then don’t come to Duke.  I want you to be passionate about basketball, but I also want you to obtain a great education.”
  • Mutual commitment helps overcome the fear of failure—especially when people are part of a team sharing and achieving goals. 
  • Visualize a wagon wheel as a complete team.  A leader might be the hub of the wheel at the center.  Now suppose the spokes are the connecting relationships the leader is building with people on the outer rim of the wheel.  If the hub is removed, then the entire wheel collapses.  In a situation like that, if a team loses the leader, the entire team collapses.
  • That’s why we try to recruit kids who already show that type of respect.  During early meetings, for instance, I’ll watch the kids when their parents speak.  I’ll study their facial expressions and watch their reactions. IF a young man rolls his eyes when his mother asks me a question, I’m not sure I’m going to offer him a scholarship.  I look for kids who respect their parents because I believe they will have a greater chance of respecting what I say.
  • (Talking about being at West Point and having to be out of the room and in formation in a certain amount of time)  The sergeant would say “Listen up mister.  If one of you is late, all of you are late.  Do you understand that?  It’s not about you getting out here on time; it’s about you and your roommates getting out here on time.  If you guys work together, you might make it.  So learn to help another out.”  Guess what?  Eventually the guys in my room worked together.  Eventually we wouldn’t leave our room unless we left together.  Because we practiced on working together, we eventually did the impossible—we made it out there in full dress uniform in two minutes.
  • Everything we do has our own personal signature on it.  So we want to do it as well as we possibly can.
  • Two are better than one if two act as one.  And if you believe that two acting as one are better than one, just imagine what an entire team acting as one can do.
  • A machine gun is on the hill. You and your men are pinned down below.  You have to take out the machine gun.  But if you charge up the hill by yourself and say “I want to win”, the machine gun will probably mow you down.  Do you die, but you say “well it was okay because I tried to win” Baloney, you’re dead and we’re no worse off as a group then we were before. 
  • In any classroom, if the students can predict what the teacher is going to do all the time, they start memorizing and stop thinking.  Too many rules and too much predictability absolutely kill creativity.
  • Leaders should be reliable without being predictable.  They should be consistent without being anticipated.  Instead of providing a spawning ground for creativity, a leader may be so structured, so ruled, so totally predictable that he completely erases any enjoyment on the part of team.
  • Don’t worry about losing, think about winning. 
  • The worse he crisis is, the more people tend to act as individuals rather than as member of a team. 
  • Sow confidence, hide weakness.
  • Whether you completely believe it or not, you mist have the expression on your face and the words in your moth that the team is going to win.
  • In a crisis, it appears to most people that there are no opportunities.  But a leader’s job is to create opportunities.  A leader has to find a way to win—and believe he can win.
  • We don’t have an elite group of basketball players playing for the rest of the students.  We have students, who happen to be basketball players, representing the rest of the student body at Duke University.
  • We cannot win another national championship on our reputation.  We have to go out and earn everything we get.  We ware not defending anything.  We are pursuing a national championship.  Pursuing!
  • Often, there’s a tendency for a coach to get stuck in his own little world and think that he’s doing just fine.  Well, maybe he’s not.  Maybe he’s doing worse than okay.  Maybe he’s doing better than okay. But how will he ever know unless he checks out what is going on elsewhere in other similar programs.
  • Because leaders are always encountering new situations, they have to learn how to meet new challenges, to adapt, to confront, to master, to win.
  • Every leader has to put his own signature on his leadership style.
  • Leadership is all about change.
  • Leaders take people to places they’ve never been before.
  • A person really doesn’t become hole until he becomes a part of something that’s bigger than himself.
  • Please, God, help me do my best, help me be myself, and help me lead with my heart.
  • I think the more I allowed my players to be instinctive, the better we became.  To try not to over coach them.  To let them get a feel for the game.  That doesn’t mean not giving them structure or having discipline.  But not to overburden them with “my” stuff, to take a look at what they have to offer.

Peter Lowe
  • Don’t double-check what doesn’t need double-checking.
  • If you ask an assistant to do something, you shouldn’t have to constantly double-check to make sure that it was done.  If you do, get a new assistant.
  • Selling is a service.  Superstar salespeople view selling not as something they do “to” their prospect, but something they do “for” them.
  • The essence of selling is simply this: find out what somebody needs and provide it…Selling is all about thinking of the other person’s needs rather than of your own desires.
  • Addressing people by name is a compliment.
  • Send thank-yous.

Harvey Mackay
  • When you are excited about the product you offer, when you use it yourself, when you are firmly convinced that its possession will help the owner, your enthusiasm will be contagious.
  • The primary reason a customer buys from a particular salesperson is that they trust and respect him.
  • “The single most important difference between champion achievers and average people is their ability to handle failure and rejection.”  Analyze why you failed, then upgrade your skills in that area.
  • Don’t network haphazardly.  Set goals to meet key people.  Imagine yourself talking to them.  Plan in advance what questions to ask them.
  • When there is an important individual you want to network with be prepared to say something insightful to them that shows you’re aware of their achievements.
  • Phone calls are one way to maintain contact but I like letter writing better.  It’s tangible and non-intrusive.
  • Be generous in giving.  Everyone deserves a present.
  • File, respond to, or trash mail as you open it. 
  • Some of the greatest ideas and solutions occur to you when you are relaxed and refreshed.
  • Consolidate errands.
  • Listen to teaching tapes in the car. 
  • Read just the first sentence of newspaper paragraphs.
  • Schmooze at lunch or during breaks.  Tackle your work the rest of the time.
  • Buy a few dozen birthday, anniversary, get well, thank you, and congratulations cards and file them according to occasion.
  • Learn to say “NO”
  • Clump annual checkups, dentist, and renewals together in your birthday month.
  • Shoot your TV.
  • A good candidate in the wrong position is a bad employee.

Don Shula
  • Being conviction-driven means doing the right things for the right reasons.  Beliefs and convictions provide the boundaries and direction that people want and need in order to perform well.
  • “EGO” is defined as “Edging Goo Out”
  • People with humility don’t think less of themselves…they just think about themselves less.
  • To me character is just as important as ability.  Character has to do with how people are put together.  It’s the correlation between what they believe and how they act.
  • I want our players to be so familiar with their assignments that when the game starts, they don’t have to worry about what they’re supposed to be doing.  They can simply turn themselves loose physically to do whatever it takes to win.
  • To me a game doesn’t end when the clock finally runs out.  It ends on Monday, after we’ve analyzed every play and learned all we can from it.
  • Affirming/redirecting is where we outstrip the competition.  I think every mistake should be noticed and connected on the spot.  There’s no such thing as a small error or flaw that can be overlooked.
  • Failure is successfully finding out what you don’t want to repeat.
  • The Miami Herald’s Dave Barry once labeled this as a nightmare scenario: You’re in the express checkout lane, limit 10 items.  You have eleven items, running the cash register is Don Schula.
  • It’s likely that will get the wrong message if they’re punished when they’re learning something.  When a learner makes a mistake, be sure the person knows that the behavior is incorrect, but take the blame upon yourself.  (Maybe I didn’t make it clear enough.
  • Use a reprimand only when an individual or team has already proven that they can do what you want done, but are now falling short of it.
  • Make sure that the person you are confronting knows that you are upset because you expect more from him or her.
  • Learning is defined as a change in behavior.  You haven’t learned a thing until you can take action and use it.
  • Next Saturday’s game is not going to be won on last Saturday’s performance.

James Michener—The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his information and his recreation, his love and his religion.  He hardly knows which is which.  He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing.  To him he’s always doing both.

Mean Joe Greene—“When it comes to a head coaching job, if it happens, it happens.  The important thing is that I enjoy what I’m doing.  When I stop enjoying it, I’ll move on to something else.”

Confucius—“Choose work you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.”

Ara Parseghian--I demand your loyalty because there’s going to be people after us.  And I would clench a fist and say ‘We have to be that tight, all of us together.’

Anson Dorrance—Potential means you’re not worth a damn right now.

Bobby Knight—I’ve got two kids, Smith and Jones, and I bench Jones and start Smith.  Almost without exception, is the story going to be benching Jones or starting Smith?

Pat Summitt—I think as a coach, I need to understand it’s more than X’s and O’s.  It’s about caring about individuals.  It’s helping with time management or helping them with a family crisis.

Tommy Lasorda—There are three types of baseball players—Those who make it happen, those who watch it happen, and those who wonder what happened.

Dan Gable—I just don’t know how you can actually make good decisions, ones that are going to help that young person, without knowing him, without communication, without having a relationship.  And I think vice versa, as well.

Bill Walsh—So often in sports people say this guy is only good enough to get you beat.  This guy, you’ll always want to replace.  Well, my position was don’t worry about that kind of language.  What can this person do to help us win a football game?

Joe Paterno—25 years from now my players may be at a reunion and say ‘Boy, you remember what an SOB that Paterno was?  The shouting, and the urging, and the cajoling and the nit-picking about all the little things.’  You may come back and gripe about that, but you’re never going to come back here and say, ‘You know, I just wish Joe knew how good we wanted to be; that if he’d just pushed us a little more, we could have gone all the way.’  We’re never gong to sell you short.  We’re going to make you be as good as you can be, and if you’re willing to go along with us, we’re going to have some fun.

Zig Ziglar says, “You cannot consistently perform in a manner that is inconsistent with the way you see yourself.”

Andrew Carnegie--no man will make a great leader who wants to do it all himself or to get all the credit for doing it.

Abe Lincoln—If I ad six hours to chop down a tree, I’d spend the first four hours sharpening the saw.

Ralph Waldo Emerson—Unless you try to do something beyond what you have already mastered, you will never grow.

Frederick Wilcox—Progress always involves risk; you can’t steal second base and keep your foot on first.

Thomas Watson, Sr. (founder of IBM)
(1) You don’t succeed without taking risks
(2) The more risks you take, the more failures you will probably have
(3) Every mistake or failure is an opportunity to learn

Red Auerbach—Don’t’ talk too much in the lockerroom.  Don’t’ over coach.  Communicate, but don’t over coach.

Alonzo Amos Stagg—A reporter once asked him after a particularly great season if this was in face, his greatest season?  “I won’t know for another 20 years.”

Miscellaneous Thoughts & Quotes
  • To win and to understand how to win, you’ve got to know how to prevent losing.  And what’s going to cause us to lose are these things: poor ball-handling, bad blockout, shot selection, quickness of execution, or effectiveness of execution…we try and eliminate those things…if you eliminate the reasons why you lose, then you’ve only got one thing left to do.  And that’s win.
  • Managing is like holding a dove in your hand.  Squeeze too hard and you kill it; not hard enough, and it flies away.
  • Simplify whatever system we’re running that year to take into account their talents.
  • I always tell our coaches in recruiting, I don’t want to have to go out and use my imagination.  I want to go out and wee what a player is willing to commit to do on the floor.
  • I like flexibility of making decisions.  Basically with my team I tell them that my one rule is don’t’ do anything that would embarrass you or our basketball program.  Then I’m the judge at what those things might be, and it gives me great flexibility…Sometimes rules can get in the way but standards should never get in your way.
  • We have rarely, if ever, faced total failure, just because of great preparation.
  • I don’t set goals…The only thing I say to our squad all the time is that our worst enemy is time.  We’re going to run out of time, so we can’t waste it.  Everything we do, we’ve got to do it full speed and we’ve got to work every minute to get better.
  • Life is a series of problems to be solved.  With the right conditioning, athletes can learn how to transfer the same learning process that provides them with court sense to life off the court. 
  • Creative thinking is usually used to do one of two things:  (1) Make small changes in the existing way of doing something.  (2) Solve problems where straight thinking does not work. 
  • A mature player:  (1) Is open-minded  (2) Knows how to listen (3) Is able to handle order and organization  (4) Can accept criticism
  • Champions in any field have made a habit of doing what others find boring or uncomfortable. 
  • Values are life fundamentals.  They are the things you always fall back on.
  • The key to developing people is to catch them doing something right

COACHING QUOTES & THOUGHTS