Champion Behavior

The culture precedes positive results.

Champions behave like champions

before they’re champions;

they have a winning standard of performance

before they are winners.

– Bill Walsh

Leadership 101

This is not the first time I have set about teaching leadership to high school aged student athletes. Even with past experience, this is not an easy task. The teenage years are often more about fitting in than standing out, more about following than leading. And leaders, be they good or bad, positive or negative, tend to stand out. It takes a certain level of confidence to lead and developing confidence through the teenage years can be a gradual, even slow, process. Often times, in the mind of a typical student athlete, the rewards of being a leader are outweighed by the perceived risks of being a leader. How we learn to develop and teach the confidence necessary to overcome powerful emotions such as doubt, fear, trepidation and uncertainty that will determine their effectiveness and success as leaders is a process that all too often gets short shrift.  

Team sports are a natural environment for developing leadership skills. 

In having played,  coached and observed team sports over the years one thing stands out about successful teams - that being the quality of leadership. It stands to reason then a primary responsibility for a coach should be on developing quality leaders.

I think it fair to say a majority of coaches appoint team captains based on some type of arbitrary criteria grounded in both how much control they wish to relinquish to the players and the role they wish for their leaders to fill. Seniority and popularity are often determining factors when appointing captains. It is as though being a captain is about winning a popularity contest or a senior year entitlement. In truth, being a leader can place the student athlete in unpopular positions and is most definitely not an entitlement.

I recently wrote of the difference between Champions and Championships.

A similar distinction must be drawn between Leaders and Leadership.

Champions / Leaders are people and Championships / Leadership are processes.

Leaders need Leadership Opportunities from which to learn and develop leadership skills. I would suggest, if you find yourself yearning for better player leadership you should evaluate the process for developing leaders that you have in place. 

Player leadership begins with the coach. 

There are innumerable opportunities in team sports for developing leadership qualities in student athletes. The most difficult step a for coach in the process of developing leaders might well be consciously deciding to alter their coaching style to allow for student athletes to experience these opportunities. How does one learn about leading if the opportunities to lead are not adequate to provide experience in leading?

I would also suggest the quality of opportunities provided for developing leadership skills is of utmost importance. Leadership opportunities exist in any team environment. If your team is plagued by toxic or negative leadership it might be opportunities for toxic leadership have been present and seized upon.  This is where the quality of coach / player relationships comes into play.

A key aspect of leading is the ability to establish, develop and maintain relationships. This has been a primary focus in our Leadership Class sessions to date. I have asked our student athletes to summon up 20 seconds of courage when tasked with completing the interview sections in each chapter. I have asked them to step outside their comfort zones, introduce themselves to new people and conduct short interviews with these people.  We have gone from blowing off these assignments entirely to interviewing parents to interviewing people in our extended families and finally tp interviewing people who are relative if not actual strangers before the interviews begin. The confidence being gained through this process, through these opportunities is palpable. So too is the transition from leading by example to being vocal leaders. Classroom participation has steadily improved. We have even had players volunteer to LEAD classroom sessions! Progress in the Process.  

Championships or Champions?

The University of Michigan and the University of Notre Dame are the two winingest major college football programs in the history of the sport. The two schools are linked throughout their storied histories. The Wolverines taught the sport to the Irish way back in the 1887.  Notre Dame stadium is modeled after Michigan Stadium. The Wolverines colors are Maize and Blue while the Irish colors are Gold and Blue.  What does this have to do with soccer?

The two universities also share similar ideas about champions and championships that have served them well through the years.

At Michigan, "Those who stay will be Champions"

At Notre Dame, "Play like a Champion"

It is important to note that neither schools key slogan mentions championships, only Champions.

Both sayings deal with the process rather than the outcome or goal of the process.  How to become a champion must be discussed on a regular basis. The details of the process adhered to, nurtured and grown. Sometimes what was once an admired detail must be tweaked, modified or perhaps even stored away as a cherished memory of a tradition of yore replaced by a more pertinent or relevant new tradition.

At Michigan it is believed that Defense wins Championships and I will not dispute that point. However, it is the process of building a champion, a team's culture that puts players in position to compete for championships.

Just as we must win first, then play the game, 

we must become champions before 

we can win a championship.

Everyone Loves an Underdog

I have debated over titling this article with an "underdog" theme or with a "Cinderella team" theme.

A Cinderella team is one that surprises competition and fans alike by advancing further in a tournament than anyone anticipated they would or even could.  The classic example of over achieving.

Underdog teams are thought of as being inferior to its opposition usually in both God-given ability and technical excellence. Perhaps the very definition of underachieving.

I suppose it is possible a team can fit in both categories, but then again, maybe not. 

My son's team plays their first, and quite possibly only, tournament game tomorrow on the home pitch of a team that thumped them 1 - 4 just 16 days ago.  They will enter this match as underdogs hoping to exit it as a Cinderella team.

As I searched the recesses of my mind for examples of teams who had found themselves in similar situations for my son and his teammates to draw inspiration from I kept running into coaching as being a constant in such stories.  Cinderella teams tend to have great coaching that helps to propel them beyond expectations.  Underdog teams often rise above inferior coaching when a perfect storm of circumstances conspire to allow them to overachieve beyond wildest expectations.

Therefore I am pretty sure my sons team should be depicted as an underdog team going into tomorrow nights match against Celina.  Their rookie head coach and his rookie assistants have experienced a very steep learning curve this season. The team is lacking in basic fundamentals, especially from a tactical standpoint. Celina is a well coached technical team with a sound understanding of who they want to be tactically. Yeah, Shawnee is an underdog going into the match tomorrow night. 

The question is, can they become a Cinderella team by the time the match is over?

That is going to depend on the players psychological approach to the match.  If they step onto the pitch truly believing they can win, Shawnee will have a chance to do just that. 

I am reminded of the 1989 NCAA basketball champion University of Michigan Wolverines. By all accounts they were underachievers throughout the season.  When their coach decided to leave for Arizona at the conclusion of the season the legendary Bo Schembechler, then the schools athletic director, stepped in and famously said "A Michigan Man will coach this Michigan TEAM."  He fired Bill Frieder on the spot and named assistant Steve Fisher the coach of the Wolverines for the NCAA tournament.

That Michigan team went on to win 6 straight games and the 1989 NCAA National Championship.  In a sense they made the transition from Underdog to Cinderella. 

Now, that 1989 Michigan team was loaded with future NBA talent. Why they underachieved throughout the regular season is open to debate. What is not open to debate is the stunning turnaround they made in the week leading up to their first game in the tournament.

Part of the answer can be found in quotes from the various players on that Michigan team. To paraphrase the collective, "We just went out and balled. No sets. No plays. It was just us playing ball."

If Shawnee is to be successful in transitioning from Underdog to Cinderella tomorrow night I think this is the attitude they must take - they just need to go out and play soccer.  Will they find the type of bond the coaching change at Michigan forged for the Wolverines in 1989?   I don't know if such a catalyst exists for the Indians.  That's going to be their challenge.  Can they unite and find the elusive team chemistry that can carry the day tomorrow?

They have nothing to lose and so nothing to fear.

My encouragement to these young men is to step onto the pitch and stand shoulder to shoulder in battling Celina tomorrow night. Have one anothers backs as players.  Block all else out.  When you walk off the field at the end of the match, do so with heads held high with the knowledge you gave the best performance possible under the circumstances. 

Good Luck Indians!


Update:  The slipper did not fit. 

Champions have an open mindset.

I have been involved in a couple of on-going discussion with friends on email lists about what the next evolution in formations and systems of play will be. My analytical mind is always trying to anticipate what the counter moves are to how our team plays.  It's just the way I think - I want to be ahead of the game. Out of one of those conversations came this gem that I wholeheartedly agree with:

Champions have an open mindset.

 

Losers are of a fixed mindset.