880! Coach K Makes History

Earlier this week with a win over UNCG, Duke's Coach K moved into second place on college basketball's all-time win list.

Coach K's career win 880 eclipses Dean Smith at 879 and puts the Duke coach 22 wins behind the all-time leader, Bob Knight.

Here are a few team-building nuggets from Coach K:

“Effective teamwork begins and ends with communication.”

“Communication does not always occur naturally, even among a tight-knit group of individuals. Communication must be taught and practiced in order to bring everyone together as one.”

“When you are passionate, you always have your destination in sight and you are not distracted by obstacles. Because you love what you are pursuing, things like rejection and setbacks will not hinder you in your pursuit. You believe that nothing can stop you!”

“Mutual commitment helps overcome the fear of failure—especially when people are part of a team sharing and achieving goals. It also sets the stage for open dialogue and honest conversation.”

“When a leader takes responsibility for his own actions and mistakes, he not only sets a good example, he shows a healthy respect for people on his team.”

“There are five fundamental qualities that make every team great: communication, trust, collective responsibility, caring and pride. I like to think of each as a separate finger on the fist. Any one individually is important. But all of them together are unbeatable.”

“You develop a team to achieve what one person cannot accomplish alone. All of us alone are weaker, by far, than if all of us are together.”

“Confidence shared is better than confidence only in yourself.”

Preparation Positions Your Talent

Motivational speaker and author John Maxwell has written an excellent self-help book: Talent is Never Enough.

Chapter 5 is titled Preparation Positions Your Talent. Here are a few excerpts from this chapter.

Automaker Henry Ford observed, "Before everything else, getting ready is the secret of success."

Ford understood the power of preparation and what it can do for someone:

1. Preparation Allows You to Tap into Your Talent
"I've found that every minute spent in preparation saves ten in execution."

2. Preparation Is a Process, Not an Event
Legendary UCLA basketball coach John Wooden says that the best way to improve your team is to improve yourself. He learned that lesson from his father, Joshua Wooden, who used to tell young John, "Don't try to be better than somebody else, but never cease trying to be the best you can be.'

3. Preparation Precedes Opportunity
There's an old saying: "You can claim to be surprised once; after that, you're unprepared."

4. Preparation for Tomorrow Begins with the Right Use of Today
Preparation doesn't begin with what you do. It begins with what you believe. If you believe that your success tomorrow depends on what you do today, then you will treat today differently. What you receive tomorrow depends on what you believe today. If you are preparing today, chances are, you will not be "repairing" tomorrow.

5. Preparation Requires Continually Good Perspective
Former Boston Celtics coach Tom Heinsohn observed, "The sixth man has to be so stable a player that he can instantly pick up the tempo or reverse it. He has to be able to go in and have an immediate impact. The sixth man has to have the unique ability to be in a ball game while he is sitting on the bench." What makes the sixth man capable of that? Perspective. He has to have both a coach's mind-set as he watches the game from the bench and a player's ability once he steps into it. If he does, then he is prepared to impact the game.

6. Good Preparation Leads to Action
What value has preparation it if never leads to action? Very little. As William Danforth, former chancellor of Washington University in St. Louis noted, "No plan is worth the paper it is printed on unless it starts you going."

More from Vince Lombardi

"Fundamentals win it. Football is two things; it's blocking and tackling. I don't care about formations or new strategies or tricks on defense. If you block and tackle better than the team you're playing, you'll win."

Nash's Work Ethic Racks Up A "Perfect Game"

Steve Nash was 8 of 8 from the field, including a 3-pointer, made all three of his foul shots, scored 20 points and had a season-high 17 assists to help the Suns beat Washington 125-108 on Sunday night.

This was only the second time in in the shot-clock era in the NBA that a player has turned in a perfect shooting night.

This kind of performance comes as no surprise to those who follow Nash's career. He willingly tells anyone who will listen the secret to his success: "If other players in the NBA worked as hard as I do, I'd be out of a job." Click on the link below and after a brief introduction from Spalding, you will hear Nash discuss his "Work Confidence":

http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid88172914001?bctid=1875312705

More on Visualization and Mental Preparation

In L.A. Lakers’ coach Phil Jackson's book, "Sacred Hoops," former Bulls' guard B.J. Armstrong states: "I'll be able to react to it without thinking, because I'll already have seen it in my mind."

Dr. Denis Waitley, author of Quantum Fitness, states that visualization is the ability of the mind to carry out the vivid images of performance as if they have been achieved before and are merely being repeated.

Dr. Kay Porter uses the term "Visual Athletics" and believes that cross-country runners who image a successful performance build pre-race confidence and help identify and overcome possible raceday obstacles.

Great athletes "go to the movies" (in their minds) before they actually perform in competition.
Dr. Robin S. Vealey claims that whenever you imagine performing a particular sport skill, your muscles will fire in the same sequence as an actual performance.

The mind cannot distinguish the difference between an imagined experience and a real one. It, therefore, responds to what you imagine. It becomes a "Mental Blueprint," if you will.

Increasing numbers of athletes are using visualization to help them gain a competitive edge. Sean McCann, the sports psychologist for the U.S. Olympic Committee in Colorado Springs, states that the most dramatic changes in sports psychology have occurred in the past 20 years.

The Comparison Game

In Larry Bird's autobiography entitled "Drive,"
the author recounts how Bird's high school coach always told him that no matter how hard he was working at his game, there was always someone out there who was working harder. Bird recalls that this motivated him to spend the extra time necessary to develop his skills.

Although it is true that one needs to work hard to improve, keep in mind that the most important aspect of self-improvement is not to work harder than others because merely working harder than others may still not be the best that you can do.

It is far more important to WORK AS HARD AS YOU CAN without comparing yourself to others.

The only comparison that truly matters is YOUR effort versus YOUR potential.

Are you doing the best that you can in all areas of your life? On the practice floor and in games? In the classroom and academically? In your relationships with others?

If you do ALL that YOU can do, as the old saying goes: "Even angels can do no better!"