3 W's of Relationships

In most cases, players have to walk together and work together before they can win together.

Walking relationship - Initiate a walking relationship with your teammates.

This is generally done off the court. What do you know about your teammates? Their families? Their likes and dislikes? Their struggles? The benefits of walking with your teammates include the biblical admonition of "bearing one another's burdens." For you to know how to encourage your teammates, you need to walk with them. Criticism requires no relationship with the one you are targeting, but if you walk with someone, you will be inclined to encourage him rather than criticize him. In addition, those who walk with someone else will also be inclined to pray for him.

Working relationship - Cultivate a working relationship with your teammates.

A walking relationship with teammates facilitates a working relationship with them. This dynamic generally happens in practices, in the weight room, on the track, and wherever else you work together. How much more inclined are we to work hard with our teammates when we first walk with them? Working together builds unity, establishes trust, and defers our own interests to those of the successes of our team. Do you like to go to work? If you say "yes," you like the players around you and are willing to be patient with their weaknesses and embrace their strengths for the benefit of team success.

Winning relationship - establish a winning relationship with your teammates.

Contrary to "bottom line" enthusiasts, the scoreboard is not the end-all in athletics. We are obligated in obedience to "run, that we may obtain"[the prize]; however, many "wins" exist apart from the final score.

Team goals that preclude a winning score are often "small wins" that, in time, accumulate and ultimately translate into wins on the scoreboard. These "small wins" share a common characteristic: teammates. A winning relationship with fellow teammates happens because the walking and the working relationships have already been established and are continually being enriched.

Now that we are in the off-season (on-season), individual workouts take center stage. As you hone your skills, eliminate weaknesses, and strengthen your body during these months, consider what steps you will take to walk and work with your teammates. Have you thought about initiating those first two w’s – walking and working - with your teammates? Imagine what could happen if a team was already walking and working together going into next season! “Small wins” would undoubtedly produce wins on the scoreboard. More importantly, the team would be able to fulfill its true mission better than ever before: to use the platform of athletics in ministry opportunities all around us. And it would be a true team effort!

This article was written by former BJU Bruins Assistant Coach, Larry Hunt.

The Other Team...

GUEST BLOG 
by Paul Whitt











“But time is short, and the road is long, in the blinking of an eye, ah that moment's gone . And when it's done, win or lose, you always did your best, cuz inside you knew... (that) ONE SHINING MOMENT, YOU REACHED DEEP INSIDE. ONE SHINING MOMENT, YOU KNEW YOU WERE ALIVE…”

Words & Music: David Barrett Hodges Song Supply/ASCAP

For the last 25+ years, college basketball fans have enjoyed this addictive song as it’s attached to the most memorable visual moments from March Madness and the Final Four. It inevitably includes shots of highlight dunks, the raw emotion of the competition, highlights from the year’s “Cinderella,” and typically the most captivating buzzer beaters from the tournament. It helps any fan of the game relive the previous three weeks in about 200 seconds. In the end, you’re left with the images of the winning team in their championship t-shirts and hats, celebrating with the trophy and cutting down the nets.

But what about the team that is on the other bench during the “one shining moment?”

A magical and memorable season for our small rural high school ended last Friday night when the visiting team knocked down a 3-pointer with no time remaining, giving them a 51-50 win and a place in the regional final. Their fans rushed the floor, the hero, a senior guard who hadn't scored in either of the two games I scouted, was on the floor under a pile of teammates and coaches, and the officials frantically signaled the basket was good as they sprinted off of the floor.

And there we stood. My guys looked like the description you hear of survivors of an airline accident – walking around dazed and confused. Then reality hit as some fell to their knees at mid-court and sobbed, while others pulled their jerseys over their faces to try to hide the tears. After congratulating the other team and coaches, our lifeless players staggered to our locker room while I fell into my seat on our bench, just staring at the ground. What now? What do I say to them? I never prepare to lose.

After four or five minutes , I stood to walk in to address our guys, but was met by them returning to the floor. We have had a tradition of saluting and thanking our fans, win or lose, after every game by going to our section of the bleachers and clapping for them, and spending time talking to each one that wants to talk. The players realized that in their state of shock, they had not done that with what was our biggest assembly of fans in years. And they wanted to do the right thing. So they stood, cried, talked, hugged, and even posed for pictures for nearly half an hour.

When we finally made it to the locker room, I had three goals in mind. First, I wanted to keep it short. After millions upon millions of words I had spoken to them through the course of a season, there is not a more distracted audience than a locker room of guys who've just been surprised to find their season, and some their careers, over. Secondly, I wanted to remind them of their accomplishments through the season; accomplishments that could never be taken away. We finished 20-3, a perfect 14-0 in conference and won our conference for the first time in school history. We were ranked as high as fifth in state polls, and enjoyed a 17 –game winning streak. But we also united two communities behind a group of guys that they adopted as their own. You see, our school is so small, three seasons ago we combined with a smaller school in the area to have enough to play sports. The schools that were once bitter rivals, are now joined just to be able to compete, and some in the community weren't  quite ready for it. But that seemed to change this season, and fans from both communities stood side by side to cheer on the one team that represented them both.  And finally, I wanted to communicate my unconditional love and concern for them. A season may have just ended, and ended with a rare loss, but that doesn't change what I think of them or the fact that I love them. They are like sons to me and we all cared a lot, which is a reason it hurt so much. And in the end, I wouldn't trade any of our experiences and relationships for a chance to replay the final play.

So, the next time you see that last-second shot swish through the net, a team chase a hero around the gym before tackling him, an exuberant coach pointing to his family sitting up in the stands, and the crowd rushing the court with unbridled enthusiasm, remember, there’s always a team on the other side of someone’s “one shining moment.”

This was a post from guest blogger, Paul Whitt.  Coach Whitt is the Director of Athletics & Head Boy's Basketball Coach at Goodman/Pembine High School in Wisconsin.  You can follow Coach Whitt on Twitter by clicking HERE.

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