A Coach's Diary

I was blessed to play college basketball at a great junior college where we finished in the top-10 in the country, and I was able to finish my college basketball career at a very competitive division 2 school. I had a great experience playing college basketball, but I do have two regrets. Those two regrets are my grades and work ethic. I tell every high school freshman that the best advice I can give you going into high school is to make all A's on your first report card. Not being more focused on and serious about my grades as a freshman and a sophomore is one of my greatest regrets. When I was a senior in high school, I was getting recruited by a few different Ivy League schools because of my academic test scores, and I even went on a couple of official recruiting visits to Ivy League schools, but when they did a deep dive into my grades, they saw that my grades as a freshman and sophomore would keep me from getting admitted. I could have gone to an Ivy League school to play spor...

Knowing what we know about Michael Jordan's competitiveness and work ethic, it is hard to believe that when he was growing up, his father said that Michael was mischievous and the laziest kid he had. Michael grew up the 4th out of 5 kids in Wilmington, North Carolina. Jordan's mother said, "You had to discipline him. He would test you to the limit. Michael was always getting into things." In The Last Dance, Michael said that when he was in the 9th grade, he got suspended three times in one year. He said that his father pulled him aside that summer and said, "You don't look like you are heading in the right direction. If you want to do all of this mischievous stuff, you can forget sports." Michael said that was all he needed to hear, and from then on he had tunnel vision and never got in trouble in school again, and that his father was a friend and a voice of reason who always drove and challenged him. We all need people in our lives like that. People who...

IMAGINATION is a God-given gift, but if it was fed dirt by the eye, it will be dirty. - D.A. Carson - Watch your thoughts because they become your words. - Watch your words because they become your actions. - Watch your actions because they become your habits. - Watch your habits because you are what you do. - What you do - everyday - becomes your destiny. God has given us all a lot of great gifts, and our  IMAGINATION  is one of the greatest gifts that He has given us. The tricky thing about our IMAGINATION is that we can use it for good just as easily as we use it for bad. Dr. Doug Gardner wrote, “One of the most overused clichés in sports is that 90% of performance is mental. The problem is that 90% of coaches and athletes spend 100% of their time working on the physical and fundamental aspects related to their sport. They often neglect and ignore the one area that ultimately separates successful athletes from those who do not reach their full potential. In realit...

One of the most influential coaches that I had in my life was my select soccer coach. I played multiple sports growing up. Basketball was my favorite sport, but soccer was my first sport. When I was 10, I knew nothing about the select soccer world, and neither did my parents when my rec soccer coach told my parents that I needed to try out with his son for a select team. He said that I had the talent and potential to take my game to the next level, and select soccer was the next step for athletes like me. The team held tryouts over the course of two weekends. After the first weekend, he had extended offers to about 75% of the athletes he wanted for his team. He told me that I had talent and potential but I was raw. I had never had any kind of skills training for soccer, so he was. I only played soccer because it was fun. I never saw professional soccer on TV, I didn't know anything about professional soccer, and I didn't know anything about select soccer. I thought soccer was a...

Every player that Michael Jordan has ever played with talks about his competitiveness and his drive to be great, and they talk about how he pushes his teammates to be great as well. In his book, Driven From Within , he said: "A leader has to be willing to sacrifice to help everyone else get to where a team needs to go. No one could take days off with the Bulls because I never took a day off. The leader sets the standard, and everyone has to live up to that standard." Michael Jordan said that he has taken that same approach at Brand Jordan. He said, "It all goes back to me, Tinker and Mark Smith. If we all agree to the standard, who is going to try to change that? We've built the standards. We're leading, not following. Whoever comes in has to live up to the same standard. They have to be as dedicated as I am. They have to put in the same effort. They have to have the same understanding of what we are about. If you don't have the same vision, then you're ...

Consider it pure joy whenever you face trials because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. - James 1:2-4 I have been the best player on some teams, and I have come off the bench on others. I have been the star on the court, and I have been the star towel-waver cheering on my teammates. I have been a great teammate, and I have been an excuse-making bad teammate. What I have learned in my many experiences is that every experience gives me a chance to learn something new, and that I can be happy and have joy in any situation. When I was in college, I lost my starting spot and I was upset about it. I spent the next few practices pouting, but I learned some valuable lessons. First, I learned that nothing was given and that anything can be taken away. Second, I learned how important it is to work harder and compete harder than the person next to you. Finally, I learned how...

Have you ever been so afraid of something that you don’t do it at all or you don’t do your best? In a big game in the biggest tournament of the year, I was fouled with no time left, we were down by one point, and I had two free throws and the chance to win the game. It was my first time shooting free throws in a big moment like that, and I was very nervous. My heart was beating through my chest, and I could not stop my legs from shaking. I missed both shots, we lost, and I thought it was all my fault. I led my team in scoring, rebounding, and assists, but being in that moment was the scariest thing that I had been a part of, and I let that fear hold me back from being my best. If I could do it all over again, I would not focus on the fear - I would focus on love. Writer and speaker Jon Gordon says fear can sabotage you and keep you from living the life you want, but love casts out fear. He says that if you love something, you won’t fear it.  Athletes grow up dreaming about making g...