These Three Things

I coach mostly soccer and basketball right now. I have found that these three rules or expectations are a great place to start with my teams and my individual athletes.

The first two are measurable, while the third is something that we will work on for the rest of our careers. If you can be great at these three things, you can play for and have success with almost any team and at almost any level.

Everybody wants to score, and everybody wants their kids to score. When we score, we smile, we are happy, and we feel valued. A lot of that is just the nature of sports. We celebrate every point, and we celebrate the person who scores.

There is nothing wrong with wanting to score and celebrating the shooter, but there is so much more to athletic success.

I try to get my girls and my teams to focus on these three. If we do these three things right, we will win most games. If an individual does these three things, they will be recognized as one of the best players in the court or field.

We celebrate effort. We celebrate falling down and getting up. We celebrate boxing out and shielding our girl. We celebrate getting back after we get beat. We celebrate getting our ball back.

We praise winning 1 on 1 battles on offense and defense. We praise winning the rebound. We praise receiving that ball rolling across the middle of the field.

And we celebrate winning plays, especially good passes. We want you to know the right play is the most important plays. The right plays lead to points, no matter who scores it. The right play is being able to finish and putting the ball in the net.

To do these things consistently, we have to work on being stronger, faster, smarter, and better athletes. We have to be more skilled, more efficient, and smarter. We also have to understand how to play team ball, recognize space, advantages, and know what a good play is a better play, and the best play.

Finally, you have to celebrate every good play, especially the non-scoring plays.

You get more of what you celebrate. What plays do you praise and celebrate?