A Coach's Diary

The game is supposed to be played a certain way, and its impossible to play that way, at the highest level, every second of everyday of every practice and game.  But, the pursuit of finding out how long you can sustain playing at the highest level is the difference maker. Just when it starts to fall, I tell the girls that this is about the time that a normal team starts to fall, and we aren't a normal team ... so let's go. - Geno Auriemma When your team experiences playing at a higher level, you have raised the bar for your team and the challenge is to consistently sustain that level of play and to never drop below that new bar that you have set for yourself.  The challenge, the purpose, the pursuit of excellence is about identifying what excellence looks like, experiencing it by performing on a level of excellence, and challenging yourself to sustain it as often and for as long as you can. 

It’s not even about winning or losing.  It’s about getting the best out of every player.  Being a woman does not change their job description.  You never go after somebody’s heart or their core; you go after what they did.  You coach actions.

Geno Auriemma and the UConn women’s basketball team is the subject of a 6 episode, weekly HBO special following their 2016-2017 season.   I have just watched the first episode, and it gave good insight into the mindset of the most successful coach in women’s college basketball history and what it takes to be a part of the game’s greatest program.   It had interviews from girls who helped build the program and from girls currently in the program.  Every girl that spoke, from legend Rebecca Lobo to freshman Crystal Dangerfield, mentioned how mentally tough that you have to be to play for Coach Auriemma.  They mention that his number one goal seems to be to get them to reach their full potential in the 4 years that he is with them.   Below I have some of the more memorable quotes from that first episode. The coolest thing about this is how all of the players seem so happy to be a part of the whole ‘UConn’ thing.   They all seem genuinely ha...

This is a great video on how you have to adapt as a leader in terms of how you drive performance.   As a coach, you want to drive your kids as hard as you can to get the most out of them everyday and to help them reach their full potential as athletes and people.   The trip is trying to get to know and understand your players as individuals, learning what they are capable of handling, and learning the best ways to affect their performance.   Every person is built different, every person has a different threshold, and every person can handle different levels and pressure.   You have to know how much a player can handle and what is the best way to get the most out of that player, which sometimes isn’t driving them as hard as you would like.   Sometimes that means meeting them halfway so that you can keep them motivated growing. He takes Brianna Stewart for example: if he meets her halfway, she might become half the player she is capable of.   Howev...

I ran across a really cool article at Business Insider about an NFL prospect out of UCONN who less that 2 years ago was interning in Connecticut political offices and just recently had one of the best NFL combines of the year. Byron Jones, a cornerback out of UCONN,  was a normal college kid positioning himself for life after graduation.  He worked for a Connecticut state representative as a college sophomore during Spring Break, and he parlayed that into a summer internship with another Connecticut congressman a few months later.   While he was preparing more for a career in politics than a career in the NFL, Jones had a work ethic and leadership skills that are marketable in any career field.  State representative Joe Aresimowicz, whom Jones worked for during his sophomore year Spring Break, had this to say about Jones: "He has this incredible work ethic. He also has this grasp of how to get people to work together, that was on display almost immediately....

I was watching the second installment of the Geno Project on ESPN last night, and Geno made a quick comment on The Law of Sacrifice from John Maxwell's book, The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership.  He didn't address the book or the law directly, but his statement about the leadership growth from a freshman to a senior in his program and the amount of responsibility that comes with it alludes to it. As a freshmen, Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis had one job: to come in a score.  Now, as a senior, she is counted on to do so many things on top of that.  Its not easy to do, but it is part of the growth of becoming a leader - the added responsibility of having to do your job on top of helping others be successful at their job as well.