It is a privilege to have the opportunity to share the experiences and learning I have been lucky to be a part of as a teacher and coach. I think teaching is coaching and coaching is teaching. They really are one in the same. As I thought about a topic for this first on-line communication, I found myself reflecting on a couple of key points. What are the qualities that make for a successful program and how do we define success. At Peru State College our athletic department has a Vision Statement and a Mission Statement.
•Vision:
Peru State College Athletics will emerge as a nationally recognized program of excellence.
•Mission:
PSC athletics creates a foundation where student-athletes develop potential for successful lives.
When we talk with our student-athletes and recruits, we share the idea that the Vision is what we want our fans, competitors and the public to see. Excellence can be defined many ways, but to the Bobcats it means competing, doing things the right way on and off the field, and maximizing our talents. Winning is a piece of this vision.
The Mission is what we want our student-athletes to do as a member of the Bobcat team. We want our players to have the experiences that will provide them with the opportunities to grow into successful adults. We really feel that if we focus on the Mission that the Vision will be a natural result of the process.
When looking at our mission, two points come to mind that we feel are the foundation of our program.
EFFORT – play hard on every play. Not everyone will be an All-American but everyone can give an all-american effort. This carries over to how we practice and is reinforced every day.
ATTITUDE – have a positive outlook, place TEAM above self, and play with enthusiasm. We stress enthusiasm over emotion. Emotions can include a lot of very negative concepts. Enthusiasm, as I once heard Bobby Bowden say, translates to “being filled with the spirit”. We talk to our players about playing with a smile on their face and enjoying the great game of football.
Both of these areas are things we can control. They are choices we can make about how we are going to live, learn, practice, and play. Focus on what you can control and don’t worry about things you cannot control.
The game of football provides many opportunities for growth. Two areas that are fundamental to the sport are teamwork and trust.
Football is the ultimate team sport and it takes a unified and coordinated team effort to execute any game plan. A key component of teamwork is trust. The right guard and right tackle have to trust that each other will do their job with maximum effort when working a deuce double combo on a 3 technique. Defensively, we talk about having a three-pronged strategy to pursuit and tackling. Every play should have a contain player, a force player, and a cutback player. Each defender needs to trust the rest of the group. How many times have we seen a player try to do too much because they didn’t trust their teammate(s)? Trust must be earned and given. This is a key component of team chemistry.
Effort and attitude are the building blocks of trust. Trust in turn is the cornerstone of teamwork.
In closing, I would like to share something a lot coaches can relate to. As a head coach in high school, we had a school board member push through an evaluation process to measure “indicators of excellence.” It was really just a smoke screen to try to remove some coaches because of their won/loss record. Those of us who have coached in the public school setting where recruiting is not an option know that sometimes you do your best coaching when you have the least talent. The opinion I shared with the board member was that the true measure of success for any high extracurricular program cannot be measured until 5, 10, 15, or even 20 years down the road when the young people who were part of these life-lab experiences find the lessons learned as a part of a team to help them to succeed as an adult. Football is not a lifelong sport. Sooner or later we all stop playing. What remains after those playing days are done are the experiences that have shaped our lives and helped to make us the person that we are. The true measure of a successful program is how its players impact the world once they leave and become members of the community.