For school admins who work in secondary schools, this time of year is very busy. We have lots of ball games and events to supervise and for myself, I have a senior son playing basketball. I’m not complaining by any means. I love to watch the games and root for my kid and my students.
What I also find myself doing is watching and learning from coaches. A lot of different styles and philosophies walk through the doors and sometimes I am fascinated and sometimes I wonder how did that clown get a coaching job. There was a time when I was one of those clowns trying to get it all figured out. When I wrote Nine Ways to Make Awesome Kids, I devoted a chapter to coaching leadership and shared a story of the time I forgot a player. I’m not proud of it, but it is a good lesson. Here is that part of the chapter.
I was lucky enough to be hired as an assistant girls basketball coach in a neighboring school district when I was teaching. I say lucky because I had no reason being there. My skills at coaching softball were adequate, but basketball was not something I felt I could coach well. I was paired with a very knowledgeable head coach and my plan was to use my rapport with kids and what I would learn from her to get to the same adequacy level in basketball. Halfway through the season, this plan was working and I managed not to embarrass myself on a regular basis, just every once in a while.
What you should know about this particular group of kids is that the program was rebuilding and only twelve girls showed up to play. Seven of them were freshmen and only one senior. This is not a recipe for success at the high school level and it was quite a challenge for scheduling. Nevertheless, we kept a full junior varsity schedule and played a full varsity schedule with this small but dedicated group of young ladies. We even snuck in a couple of freshman games. We wanted to make sure this group of girls stayed together until the end, so we made sure to have opportunities for them to play together.
We chose two interesting opponents for these games. One was with a school much larger than us who we managed to beat. The other had a long winning tradition and we were very outmatched in talent and in numbers. Our kids were a little intimidated. The game was a back and forth affair with our girls stepping up to the challenge. It was probably the most aggressive I had been as a basketball coach to that point. With only seven girls, we had to play clean and be efficient with our possessions. With the game coming down to the wire, we were able to pull out a win. It felt like a big deal. So much so that their coach even chewed on me for bringing three varsity started to a freshman game. We could not help this with only seven freshman in the program. Their coach did not want to hear it and walked off from me. Coaching drama aside, our players and parents were riding on cloud nine. It was a glimpse into what this group of girls could be and it was exciting.
I always sat in the front of the bus so the girls could sing loudly and act silly on the rides home. This particular trip was different. Once we were on the road for a bit, the girls were all quiet except for one. I could hear her crying and it sounded as if she was talking to someone on the phone. Without making a scene, I tried to listen in and see who it was that was upset. Once I figured it out, I realized that out of my seven players tonight she did not play a single minute. I never put her in.
She was on the phone with her mom and when I stepped off the bus, mom let me have it. I deserved every second of it. No amount or style of apology was good enough for the conversation and I am completely to blame. I had no good excuse for this. This kid was a model teammate. While she was not as talented as the others, she was a hard worker and bought in to everything we were doing with the program. I didn’t keep her from playing, I just forgot about her. I was so busy trying to win a tough game (and help my credibility) that I forgot why we scheduled those freshmen games in the first place. It was for the development of that class of girls. I had failed the team and especially this kid miserably.
My job was to help make this group better. And by not playing this young lady, I did not help her get better as an individual player. I was more concerned about my interests. This is the opposite of a servant leader and I learned a valuable coaching lesson that night. I spent the rest of the season trying to repair what I had done to this kid. She returned the next season, but I did not. My first responsibility to my school district was softball and even though basketball is a winter sport, it was getting in the way of our activities. I resigned from that position, but I gained so much in that one season. Coaches, if you are a true servant leader, you will learn as much from your players as they learn from you. Read that again, twice. Remember, it’s not about you, it’s about the future you create for your players. They may not all become Division One athletes, but they all can become servant leaders just like you.
You can purchase Nine Ways on Amazon and Barnes & Noble online.
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