Survive & Advance

Today is the last day of February, which can only mean one thing: March is almost here!  I figured many people will write their March Madness stories beginning tomorrow, so I wanted to get a head start and do one today.  It's the most wonderful time of the year and you will begin to hear many sayings such as, "win or go home" & "do or die."  However, my favorite is "survive and advance."

Many of you know the story of Jim Valvano's 1983 NC State team that won the NCAA National Championship in an unlikely fashion.  They kept surviving game after game after game, winning 9 consecutive to win the title.  The bizarre thing about these wins was that in 7 out of the 9 games - they were losing in the final minute!  They upset teams like Michael Jordan's UNC Tar Heels and Virginia, whom had three-time National POY, Ralph Sampson.  In the National Championship they faced tournament favorite, Houston that featured players like Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler.  Jim Valvano's Wolfpack won the game on the unlikeliest of plays - an air ball that was caught and dunked at the buzzer to finish one of the most amazing tournament runs in college basketball history.

But what was it that kept NC State in every fight?  It surely wasn't the abundance of superstars on their roster, but rather an undying love for each other and their team.  Odds couldn't have been more against the Wolfpack that season as they encountered adversity on several occasions.  At one point in the season they lost 6 of 8 games by large deficits to unranked teams.  They were also down by 6 points in the final 24 seconds of their first round tournament game vs. Pepperdine, but found a way to rally back and win in OT. To really stack the odds against them, the 17-10 Wolfpack knew that no team with 10 losses has ever won the NCAA National Championship.  Great teams find a way.  They survive and advance.

Truly great teams embrace qualities that enable them to work together as a collective group.  Here are four characteristics that I believe make a great team.

1. CULTURE - Jon Gordon writes in his book, Soup, "Culture drives behavior and behavior drives habits." The way that you do things as a team are important and no one should be allowed to come in and destroy your culture.  Setting up a system of core values will enable you to hold your team accountable for their behavior.  As the quote states, behavior will become permanent and eventually create great habits that establish a consistent, winning team.

2. ENGAGED RELATIONSHIPS - This is the foundation.  Without relationships there is no team.  You can't be only halfway committed or luke warm in your relationships.  A true team is fully engaged with each other and feels collectively responsible for the other persons actions.  If one person fails, we all fail.  If one person succeeds, we all succeed.  It's never about myself - I should always be looking out for others and building them up. 

3. OPTIMISM - We stress the power of positivity in our program daily. We truly believe that our positive attitudes will create a competitive advantage in all aspects of life.  We believe in each other.  We love each other.  We do things with energy and effort.  Being optimistic is truly a quality of a great team and we need to be continually filling our voids with positivity. 

4. TRUST - We build trust one day at a time.  Sometimes it takes years to build trust, but there is no doubt that it can only take 2 seconds to destroy it.  What trust does is that it generates commitment and ultimately enables ordinary people to become a great team.  People unite and become one unit working for the betterment of the other person.  There is a love that will never be broken.  True teams understand that anything worth achieving only matters if it is done together with love. 

Our regular season has concluded and our team has turned its attention to our tournament.  Just like NC State did in 1983, we have encountered a significant amount of adversity this season.  We have grown closer through all of it and have become stronger as individuals and as a team.  In our minds there is only one game left this season, and it's the next one.  Every practice leading up to that game will require us to embrace these four qualities of a great team.  Rise up.  Survive & Advance.

Sources:
ESPN - http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/ncaatourney03/story?id=1525209 
Soup by Jon Gordon - www.jongordon.com 

Land The Plane Safely - Part II

A couple years ago, Brendan Suhr gave us a list of his Top 10 Chuck "Dalyisms."  There were many great quotes on his list, but there was one that stuck out to me more than the others.  The quote by Coach Chuck Daly was,

"Coaching is like flying an airplane.  There is going to be a lot of turbulence, but your job is to land the plane safely."  

It's that time of the season again when teams are finding out who they really are.  When you look at teams this year like Kansas, Duke, and Arizona you see teams filled with young players that are beginning to mesh together and play their best basketball of the season.  On the other hand, you have teams like Oklahoma State that seem to be going further and further down the hill as days go by.  It is interesting to see the coaches of these teams handle success and failure in very different manners, but one thing is for sure: They all are beginning their descent towards the NCAA Tournament and their #1 goal is to "land the plane safely."

Last season (our first season with a basketball program) we finished with a record of 6-24, losing in the first round of our conference tournament.  Any time we could come out and compete last year was a victory!  This season is another chapter in our story.  Our team has had much success this year, but we have also faced adversity on many occasions.  As of today, we are 12-13 and have shown much improvement from last year, but we definitely are not satisfied with being a .500 team.  There have been many games this year that we should have won, but due to some adversity and friction within our team we were unable to pull out the W.  As a coaching staff we knew that our responsibility was to get us back onto the right track and put our guys in the best possible situation to succeed.  Our players have responded with amazing attitudes and have really bought in to what we are doing now!  They understand the importance of taking care of the "little things" both on and off the court.  With only five regular season games left before our conference tournament, our staff and players need to understand the importance of "landing the plane safely."  If we are unable to have a proper descent into the runway (positive momentum going into tournament time) then we will not be able to land the plane safely (make a run in the tournament).  Positive attitudes along with a lot of energy and effort will be the determining factor in the remainder of our flight!

You can click here to read a previous blog post that I wrote two years ago on this topic.

Coach Andrew Wingreen - @CoachWingreen

Coach Brendan Suhr - @brendansuhr