Lessons from the Legends (Part 2)!

Another one of the former coaches I learned a great deal from, and of course, another coach that is retired. Maybe part of the criteria for being "a legend", is they (coaches) have to be retired. You may or may not be

familiar with the coach who is the topic of this blog. Pete Carill coached at Princeton University for many years. I am sure most of you realize what a difficult task it is to coach at an Ivy League school where athletic scholarships are not used to attract players.

Words of Wisdom from Coach Pete Carill:

- There is a tendency for players to believe that because the coach is talking to someone else, they don't have to listen. If they're all listening, the coach won't have to repeat the same thing to the guys who weren't involved.

Some understand what the game is really about!

- There is a difference between teaching and coaching. When you are instructing your team about the actual game, you are teaching them, transmitting knowledge and information to them.

- I can check the level of your honesty and commitment by the quality of your effort on the court. You cannot separate sports from your life, no matter how hard you try. Your personality shows up on the court: greed, indifference, whatever, it all shows up. You cannot hide it.

- If a guy cannot pass, the ball stops moving. If he cannot shoot, he will always be open. If he cannot dribble, he cuts his value to the team by one third. Furthermore, if he cannot dribble, the defense will attack him.

- Kids are not learning the basic skills of the game because it takes too much time to teach them, because coaches and players alike want immediate results, and because the number of coaches who can and will teach your kids is declining. It is hard to teach things that take time to learn. The players themselves, when they're young, are impatient, and they don't want to take the time to develop other skills if they see right away that what pleases their coach, what produces immediate results like winning and success, is performing one particular function. So they don't learn the skills, and it becomes hard for them to adjust and improve.

- I always spent a good half-hour every day on basics. And one thing I noticed: Sometimes in an effort to shorten our practices, we cut out the basics. If we did that for a long period of time, the guys began to slip. The basics remain the key to success on every level of the game, and you can teach them.

- There's a difference between the guys who play to win and those who play not to lose. A big difference. When you play to win, you do all of the extra things that maybe aren't visible, but the results are that you come out on top. Playing to win (means) subordinating (your) needs to those of the team. Remember, some guys walk out of a losing game having scored 25 points and are perfectly content. If you have guys like that on your team, you're not going to win too many games. You cannot ever forget the human equation in sports.

- The essence of character is what I call mental and physical courage. Everybody has the potential for courage, but some people -- because they have had to demonstrate it all their lives -- are good at it, whereas others are not until the need suddenly arises and they have to learn to react. Basketball brings out the need for courage.

- Defense is the heart of our game. Good defense is recognizable even when you're losing. The object of my defensive strategy is to contest every pass and shot, to force the opponent to move the ball under continuous pressure. I want the other team to play offense longer than they're used to. Defense is not a variable. It's a constant. Defense has to be deeply embedded in your attitude. It's something you can do well every time .. both the individual and the team. Skill is a variable. Work is not a variable. It's an attitude. Defense is head, heart, and legs.

- A good high school coach is the salt of the earth. And when his teams are well coached, a college coach is the direct beneficiary of all his work, When players who have had good high school coaching walk on the floor in

college, there isn't much that a coach has to do. I cannot emphasize enough what it means to start with that great coach at the sixth or seventh grade who tries to get kids to do things better. Grade school coaches are the unsung heroes of this country and they're disappearing because it takes a lot of work and constant attention. Sometimes it is too much of a sacrifice.

- When you're fundamentally unsound, you inhibit the way your team can play. Poor fundamentals restrict the things a coach can teach.

- When you demand a lot my experience has been that you get more. If you insist on less, you get that, too. Self esteem comes from accomplishment, not the other way around. The more you demand , the more they give, the stronger the sense of satisfaction.