A Good Loss

Before we get into my post, have to give a quick shout out to my Bears.  The Baylor Football program produced two first round picks.  Congrats to Robert Griffin III (Redskins) and Kendall Wright (Titans).  Can't wait to see them on the field!

Sic 'Em Bears!!

Now to my post...

Some people outside of coaching may think I was crazy if I said to them I'm not at all mad if I lose that game 10 out of 10 times.  To most people, you'd want to avoid losses, possibly even go on a rant about what went wrong that caused you to lose.  But any coach who has suffered a "good loss", knows exactly what I'm talking about.

While every coach would tell you his/her team could play with anyone, the truth is that there will be some teams you don't match up well with.  Whether it's due to IQ, physical traits, or for traveling teams, the environment, sometimes one team will have an advantage that the "X's and O's" can't overcome.  Usually, the only way you can compensate is to play hard from start to finish and do you best to antagonize and frustrate the other team until they grant you with additional possessions through mistakes.  A lot of times the stronger team walks in with a chip on their shoulder and you can catch them sleeping and get them in a hole early.  Or maybe they just get mad that you are even trying to compete and then look to embarrass you while directing their own 'And1' mix tape.  In any event, as coach you just want to stick around, get as many good possessions as you can so that as you go into that last stretch you still have a shot.

Sometimes though, even with constant hustle and effort, it's just not enough.  But you know your team put it all out there, and fought together to the very end.  Times like this are what made me come up with a way to describe it to my teams: 

 Sometimes you get a mark in the loss column, but you know what we didn't lose that game.  They just won. You played hard and didn't quit.  When you quit, you lose.  If they are going to win you have to make them earn it.

 People that know me have seen both scenarios - games where we lost, and games where the other team won.  If the other team won, I'm fairly upbeat and don't really mind talking about it.  If we lost, then I'm furious and only get more angry every time I have to explain the outcome to someone else. 

This last weekend, the 15U team had one of each.   The first game that we didn't win, the team played hard for 32 minutes, and fell short to a team that was bigger and stronger.  Afterwards, the other coaches and I went outside and talked about the game for hours.  No one was mad - we were all smiling and proud.  The second game, we lost, and we lost bad.  There was no flow, no rhythm, no energy.  It stunk.  After the game there was no discussion.  We all went looking for something else to do to take out minds off of what had just happened.

Hopefully this is the last time we "lose" this season.  No one wants to watch people suffer for any amount of time, let alone have to try to coach it.  I know that we're not always going to match up well, or be on the favorable side of the match up every time, but it'd be nice to see your team fight all the way to the end no matter what the score.