Creating a Brand

As another winter basketball season wraps up I decided a post was long overdue. Both Hills and my 5th grade team fell short of expectations this season for various reasons, I think a major one for both came down to not being mentally tough enough to compete for long stretches as a team. As I recapped the games to friends it always seemed like I always keyed on the same three things. Then one day, just as yet another rant was about to begin, a wise young woman stopped me and asked what my philosophy was. I always wanted to make a mark on the game and in the program, but how was I looking to achieve that? I didn't have an answer. I knew I wanted to be good and had the tools to be successful but never really figured out the "how" piece of the puzzle. That day, a young lady who only spoke of basketball because I brought her to games and spent way too much time talking about it, set me straight and helped me find a new way to grow as a coach.

I brought her with me on our annual trip to Boston and she was closer than normally allowed as the gyms were smaller. She felt that a phrase I used time and time again symbolized what my "brand" could be. How I could simplify the game for my young players without limiting them or preventing them from growing. Having watched those games in Boston where those words were stressed and then some of our others after where they weren't, she felt those three simplifying words made it easy for the boys to perform. To her, the team played with more understanding of the expectations and the result was better performance. All because of three very simple, fundamental words. That simplicity - the less is more approach - would give every team I was involved with a really easy way to understand what was expected and comprehend the pillars of what my team would stand for. 

Those three simple words, as she laid them out to me, looked like the very thing I was looking for. You can't build a great thing without a strong base and I truly feels that this gives me that. Those three words - rebound, defend, and communicate - are all things that every player can control. Officials can't stop you from giving everything you've got to do those three things. Even if you have an "off" night because the ball wouldn't go in the net, you can still be a solid contributor to the team. Basketball, especially at younger levels, is primarily a game of effort. Sure talent helps, but I've seen many a talented team fail and many a "scrappy" team succeed. Even more importantly to me though is that teams who play with great effort are respected. Those teams, regardless of record, are teams that everyone takes seriously. Even as we struggled through one of our leagues, finishing with only 3 wins, when we played with effort we put even the top teams on the ropes. As I took this new approach to building my brand the last few weeks of the season, I saw them latch on. We finished our final week with a very close back and forth battle in the playoffs that we lost in the closing seconds, put together a great tournament run to advance to the championship game. We played with purpose, effort, and we did those three simple things.

Sometimes you have to go outside to get the best idea for you. This makes sense. This gives me a map - maybe not the whole map, but at least a map to the next fork. The way feels clear, and I'm glad the  next level has occurred so soon. Positive energy with a simple set of expectations. The road ahead looks good.