Good Coach Stories
 

All of us have had far, far too many bad coach experiences. It seems at least half the threads on this forum deal with coaches who, shall we say, just aren't up to the task. But what about positive experiences with coaches? I know we all must have had some of those also.

My daughter was in the 8th grade and her middle school team had already lost in the league tournament, but she wanted to watch the finals, so I took her. I sat behind the bench of the top team (they were undefeated, no one had come close to beating them all year, and they had a 13 year old girl who was 6 feet tall, coordinated, and could really play--I always wondered what happened to her). Their coach actually coached and was always in control.

Lo and behold, they got spanked in the championship game, losing by like 15 points to a completely inferior team that they would probably beat 99 times out of 100. Towards the end, the girls were all crying and experiencing the angst that apparently only 13 year old girls can experience. During a timeout with just a few seconds to play, the coach (who never lost his cool the entire game--I was watching him as much as the game) smiled at the girls and told them that if losing that game was the worst thing that ever happened to them, then they would have led truly blessed lives. The girls actually listened to him, regained much of their composure, and finished the game like champions. It was the single most impressive performance from a coach I have ever seen in any sport at an level. That guy knew basketball and could teach it to kids, yet still keep life in perspective.

My two regrets in this story:
1. My daughters didn't go to his school so they never got to play for him.
2. I've never officiated a game with him as a coach and likely never will since this happened 16 years ago in a state 6 time zones away.

Anybody else?

Sadly, no. Nothing of the nature you experienced. However, I have had many coaches that maintained composure. I always try to compliment them on their team's good sportsmanship and his/her sideline demeanor.
I will sometimes thank them for working with kids. Coaching, like officiating, can be a thankless job.

Have you ever thought about contacting the individual you talk about and telling him/her about your fond memory?

I actually talked with him after the game and passed on my compliments. I had seen him coach 2-3 times during that season and everything he did impressed me. Unfortunately I don't know his name, but I'll check with the school...good idea. Thanks.

Hoop-It-Up: two teams, each of which won their respective championship game, and two different types of coaches. Both coaches were also officials; on one team, the players were physical and the coach complained about calls/no calls [I eventually wised up enough to T him and that helped]. In contrast, the other team hustled while playing well within the rules, the coach rarely commented about calls and never voiced displeasure towards me; this guy was always calm to his players. It was really impressive to watch him manage his team; he would even lighten my load by making sure he filled out the rosters for his games. I came away impressed with his calm, intelligent control of his team and how his respect for the game extended to the official (Hoop-It-Up is 1-man mechanics!); hopefully I'll run across him as a officiating partner sometime!

I have great respect for the many coaches who have worked with my own children and am very happy to say that the vast majority of these coaches rarely focused their ire on the officials. I think that as an official it is always good to keep in mind that the coaches are the ones who spend countless hours with the players, preparing for the game; we are sort of like the "grandparents" who show up to adminster the game and then get to say 'goodbye'.

Varsity Girls Game. Couple of assistants were getting really chatty in the second quarter. After halftime, we came out and told the Head Coach that we were done with the ASSistants, and that he needed to take care of them or we would. About 2 minutes into the 3rd quarter, one of em pops off again, and I whack him. We shoot the FTs. As we're getting ready to administer the throw-in, head coach is up. I reminded him of the seatbelt rule, and he sat down, and didn't get up the rest of the game. I usually run across coaches that like to push the issue. This guy never did. I saw him sitting in the crowd at another game the next night, and went over and talked to him about it and thanked him for his cooperation.

Had freshman boys coach start yelling for a traveling call on the thrower during a throw-in. I just shook my head during play. Quarter break comes up, and he approaches me, "I'm sorry I was yelling, but he was traveling."

"Coach, there is no traveling during a throw-in. He has a three-foot spot, and can do anything he wants with his feet as long as at least one of them stays over that spot."

"Really? Did that change recently?"

"Nope, it's been like that as long as I remember."

"Thanks. I learned something tonight."

AAU girls last year. One guy was coaching 6th, 7th, and 8th grade teams. His teams were all vastly superior to the rest of the competition. Had him twice over the weekend, once in the 8th grade championship game. He coached, the girls played. Only questioned one call, but only briefly. It was amazing to watch.

One girl got a little hurt on one play and was crying. He subbed for her, and caught her as she aproached the bench. He place his hands on her shoulders and said, "Stop," slowly about three times until she stopped crying. It was a perfect example of coaching/mentoring. That moment alone impressed me as much as his game demeanor, which I've only seen matched by one or two coaches.

He was a former top-level D-1 player who really made it in D-1 on effort and hustle rather than natural athleticism. Junker and Trigger, I know, are familiar with him. It was Jake Sullivan.

I remember watching Jake play for ISU when I was living in Nebraska. You did not want to leave him alone anywhere across half court with his shot. Glad to hear that he is doing well now.

My contribution is the re-affirming story of two college coaches who agreed to honor a terrific young man, who endured a significant career-ending injury, prior to competing on the last day of this past basketball season.

Read on: http://www.goleafs.net/bball_mens/ne..._06/Feb_18.php (read down thru at least midway thru the story)

Interesting to hear that Jake was good on the bench. I've heard from other officials that he's a pain. I'm pretty sure one friend and very good official sat him down. Maybe he was losing. As far as my good coaches, in a summer camp I worked one of our better varsity teams in the area. Their point guard popped off a couple of times, nothing major. The second time he did, after I reported the foul I said, "coach, your point guard is questioning us repeatedly, you might want to have a word with him." The coach says, "He is? You better give me a 30 second time out." Coach then spent the next 30 seconds chewing the kids' butt. I appreciated him backing us.

Girls varsity game, 5A school (largest class) vs. 3A school. The 3A school was winning comfortably, and the 5A school was getting into serious foul trouble and only had 6 or 7 players. They start fouling out, and pretty soon are down to 3 and we go into a time out. Coming out of the time out, the 3A school's coach only sends out 3 players to match the other team. I go to the coach and remind her they have to play with 5 if they have them, but thank her for the gesture.

In regards to the original post-
 

I feel these kinds of examples (modeling losing with class & dignity) are likely much more common than you may think. It's easy to spot a loud, innapropriate and offensive coach. You can see/hear the behavior from the stands, and from out on the court.

I've always been surprised at how much talking on the court I don't hear, even though I'm standing right on the edge of the court. At least 1/2 of our games, my players will ask me, "can you hear that girl cursing and calling us names?" No, I never have, not even one time. When I call a time out and gather the team at the bench to talk to them, I'm aware that the fans in the 1st couple rows of seats can hear me when our bench is right in front of the stands- but the Refs can't. They can't hear what I'm saying. So it doesn't surprise me that your observation came from the stands.

I really like this quote- "That guy knew basketball and could teach it to kids, yet still keep life in perspective." I like it because it touches on the 3 areas that I believe a good coach must excell in. 1. Game knowledge 2. Ability to teach 3. Being a leader and modeling appropriate leadership characteristics.

I think it's also worth noting that the game belongs to the players. You can't have a game without players. The rest of us (coaches & refs) are not necessary.

Give me a minute.
 

In 2005 I worked a summer league game at a HS very close to my house. I was working with another very good official and both of us were relatively young than most officials. In this particular game one of the teams was a religious school and the other was a newly formed public school. The public school had its first year of varsity sports during the 2005-2006 school year. This game was between two varsity teams and the religious school was being coached by their varsity coach.

During the game my partner and I call about 4 or 5 fouls in a row on the religious school on the same end of the court during the same possession. Well I happen to call the last foul, all were box out type of fouls where the defender basically push out of the way the opponent and move them several feet away from the ball. Right after I call the foul the coach goes nuts on me when a timeout is called. He comes out and starts going off. He curses, he raises his voice, he is about 5 feet away just going nuts about what I called (he was really not upset with me). I start back at him and I say to him, “You are cursing at me? You have the nerve to curse at me and behave that way towards me. This is a Christian school, you need to be more of a professional, this is summer league for God sake.”

After the exchange there was silence. During the rest of the game there were no other incidents, not Ts were given and everything went smooth. After the game this coach comes to me and says, “You were right, I do need to act like a professional.”

The ironic thing is I find in the fall that I have this coach during the regular season. On top of this coach is playing one of the best programs at home with a famous coach. When we get to the game the visiting team is ranked #1 or #2 (I cannot remember) in the state. So I am thinking there is going to be a problem. I was not sure if the coach knew my name or anything about me before this game and during the summer incident. Well the regular season game goes off without a hitch. This coach who I had the run in with only argued about one call I made all night. He does get very intense and has a scowl on his face that might scare many other people under the right circumstances. I did tell my partners before the game so they would be aware if something did happen.

Fast forward to March during the State Tournament. I happen to sit with the assignor that assigns this coach’s conferences and some fellow officials at a hotel bar that everyone comes to after or in-between games from the State Tournament. Well this coach comes to the bar and sits and talks to all of us that are sitting at the table. I am sitting with the assignor of this conference in basketball and happen to be sitting with the football assignor for the same conference, who is also a former state final official. I believe there was one other person that was there but I just cannot remember because there were people all over the place. Well the all of us are talking about the season and school issues and anything about the tournament and even certain officials. This all takes place for an hour or two. The coach makes a comment about not getting upset or something along those lines and I make a joke about that and we both laugh. The entire conversation you could tell there was an “I know you” kind of look that each of us had.

When everyone gets up from the table and starts to make their way to the arena, I ran into the coach in the hall way with a friend of his that was not at the bar table. This coaches friend makes a joke about how his friend gets a little intense and asked me did I ever T him up during a game. Well then the coach and I let down the façade and talked openly about the summer incident. He admitted to being upset about they way his team played. He said to me, “You were right, it is summer league.” And we have one big huge laugh about the incident and joked about what happen on both of our parts. I retold the story to his friend and we had about a 10 minute conversation and I told him I held no animosity about the situation and he was just doing his job and things like this happen. I told him it would have been pointless to T him up and he was there to get his kids ready for the season. I also said I was there to get ready for the season and that I understood the way he acted because he was more upset about how veteran team was playing against a bunch of freshman and sophomores on the other program.

This was one of the funniest things I have ever come in contact with during my career. Usually these situations get ironed out very quickly or they fester until a much later situation where feelings are hurt and things much harsher are said.

Peace

And an hour and a half later... :D

I think there are more coaches like this than we all know about; it's just that we don't get a chance to see them outside the context of the game. I know of one coach that just seems to go nuts on the sideline, (and usually leads the league in T's), but off the court he's a decent guy. I wonder how many of these intense individuals we would actually consider "nice guys" away from the game itself. And, how do we turn them back into those "nice guys" while they're on the court? I wonder if Victor Conte is involved somehow?...

I wasn't working this game, but I was watching it on television...

State championship game, one team was undefeated and the other team had only three losses. The team with three losses ended up winning by about 15 points. The local cable network had microphones on both coaches. After a timeout with less than a minute to play, the game was no longer in doubt, the network plays the audio of what the losing coach said in the huddle. His players were visibly upset and emotional with the finality of their undefeated season ending in heartbreak.

He was still coaching them, giving them support and then right before they broke the huddle, he pulled them together and said "Hey guys, I know you're upset, but think about it this way... every team in the state except one would switch places with you if they could. Go play these last 38 seconds like it was the first 38 seconds of the season."

I thought it was a great way of putting things in perspective for a bunch of kids that may have needed it at that moment.

Maybe I had him after he got sat down. I had heard he'd needed an adjustment in a different game.

I'm guessing your coach was Zanders? Did they win state this year?

At halftime of a 9th grade conference tournament championship game (A is winning by 12 points against B), the room where my partner and I are in is within B's locker room. As we are sitting there, discussing the first half and enjoying a cold bottle of water, we can hear B's coach talking to his team. He talks about a few "mechanical" things (get the ball inside, don't take quick 3 pointers, call out screens on defense, etc.). Then, he launches into a motivational speech. It was really good. He tells his players that although they are trailing by 12, the pressure is really on the other team. Everyone expects them to win now that they have the big lead at halftime. He goes on about playing one possession at a time, having fun, etc, etc.

He builds and builds the speech until the end and he has all 12 kids shouting and banging on the lockers! They can't wait to go out that door and get some major butt! During the warmups before the half, these kids are pumped and ready to go.

However, they play lousy in the second half and lose by about 20. Great speech, though!

Adam,
Yes and yes. Hoover was pretty impressive down the stretch and at tournament time. They knocked off an excellent Urbandale team if I remember correctly. Hopefully I'll see them next season, about half my schedule is in the Metro.

I had a varsity coach this season ask a question about a call we made early in the game. It was not a complaint and she was very polite about it. I explained the call and rule to her (I can't remember the exact call but I do remember our discussion). A few minutes later I was the C right in front of her bench and she says "Tell your partners I'm sorry for giving you a hard time and questioning your call earlier". For those of you who are thinking of asking, yes, she was being very sincere. She was a very nice person and a good coach too. Her players listened, huslted like crazy, played disciplined basketball and won by a lot that night. I have never had another coach do say something like that to me.

I've had several games this year where a team was getting totally blown out, out-manned and out-played. Their coaches were wonderful with the kids, being very positive with them. The kids actually enjoyed the game. When I coached, I always told the kids that the number one goal was to have fun.

Two weeks ago I was doing a large amateur youth tournament in town. (I normally don't do these but the assigner was desperate!) A team from our state (6th grade level) was playing a team from Winnipeg. I first thought the Winnipeg team was comprised entirely of Native Americans but I found out later that they were Phillipino. I chatted with some of their parents before the game. The game was close and the Winnipeg team lost the game. During the game, parents of the other team were really into it, not abusive to us officials, but really into it as if it was the NBA Final. After the game I chatted with the Winnipeg parents and they were saying things like, "Good game! That was fun! It was fun to watch our kids play and have fun out there. Thanks for a good job." I doubt the parents of the other team would have been as gracious had they lost. I thought about the Phillipino team and parents, and concluded, "That's the way it should be! Out here for their kids and the enjoyment of sport, not worried about wins and losses. I don't know if it was a cultural difference or what, but it was really refreshing to see the entire group enjoy the day with their kids, regardless of the score.