MASTERING THE MENTAL GAME

My mind is where every challenge I have ever faced has been won or lost. Train the mind and the body will follow.             - Steph Curry

 

MARCH MADNESS: HERE'S TO THE GUYS ON THE BENCH

The contribution of these guys should NEVER go unappreciated!!!

It's March Madness time again.  Through strength of season or automatic bid 64 teams will attend the Big Dance. Each team includes guys who spend most or all of each game on the bench.  I know from my work with several such players that the excitement of the season can sometimes be matched by a considerable measure of frustration.

However the contribution of these guys should NEVER go unappreciated!!!

A while back I served as sport psychology consultant to a college team in Florida. There was one guy on the team, Rob (not his real name), the kind of guy on every team, who gets into games during the last couple of minutes if the team is up by 25 points with the win in sight.  He is the proverbial fan favorite who everyone roots for to get into the box score. But when all is said and done, most people underestimate the importance of a player like Rob.

Most of these guys (and gals) are cheering their teammates on loudly from the bench. They've got a hand or a high five for each teammate who comes off the floor. In practice they give 100%, they hustle and they dive after loose balls like nobody's business, setting a standard for the starters.

Shortly before the season was over, with a couple of games left in conference play and the post-season tournament still ahead, we did a team exercise focusing on leadership. As player after player was asked to rank his teammates for the leadership they brought to the team and how they manifested it, one name was consistently mentioned alongside the top scorers - Rob. The

guy who was last on the stat sheet was - in the eyes of his teammates - among the first in terms of key leadership qualities he brought to the team in its quest for success. 

There is the flip side, of course, the marquee players who make it all about themselves. There was such a player on one college squad, his league's leading scorer at 23.2 ppg, who was named to the All-Conference First Team. But for all his individual stats, his team finished their season so poorly (13-16 overall, 7-10 in conference play) that they were the lowest seed in the conference tournament and sent packing after the first game. 

"We had a player like that some years back," said Coach Joe Niland, who during his long tenure at Spring Hill College and the University of Mobile has taken several teams to the NAIA Final Four. "He had to be the star, had to be the leading scorer. He simply didn't understand the concept of having your own needs subservient to the team. He made his whole senior year all about him. He cost us getting to the national tournament. He had been the leading scorer in his high school, the leading scorer at his junior college. Yet none of these teams ever won a championship."

"A good player helps his team to win. He might not be a big scorer, he might set picks, he might take charges, he might hustle for rebounds. Look at Bird and Magic. They made the players around them better. We had a player a couple of years ago, he didn't make All Conference Team, but all the coaches in our league told me they would take him on their team any day of the week."

So here is to all the guys going to the Big Dance who won't see action on the court, but without whom their teams might not have made it there!  Here's to everything they did all season long to make the guys who will get playing time better! Even without making it into the box score, they are champions!!

A COACH REFLECTS ON MOTIVATION, FRUSTRATION AND RESILIENCE

Manolo Povea is a veteran coach who has led teams in Spain, Portugal, South America and Asia. He recently spoke with a class of 11th and 12th grade students in his home town of Malaga, Spain, addressing topics including motivation, learning and emotions. He was good enough to share his comments with us.

EXTERNAL MOTIVATION

I consider external motivation a weak form of motivation, because it relies on others outside of ourselves, making it weak and temporary rather than enduring. Consider, for example, how it applies to free throw shooting. No bonus offered to a poor FT shooter is likely to make a difference in causing him to improve. Money (external) won't do it - whereas his personal decision (internal) may well move him to want to improve.

To me, the so-called motivational speeches that coaches give in the locker room before the game is a common example of motivation. And I suppose this is useful because it helps the team to ready for the game, like some team ritual or listening to music. I call this not motivation but energizing.  

The example I will share is my first Final as a professional coach in Portugal. I call this story "Willie's Cartoon."

The Portuguese League Cup consists of 8 teams playing a 3-game series in 3 days, with a loss taking you out of competition. Our team reached its first ever final in its history, and was to face the well known Portuguese team Benifica (famous in soccer as well as basketball). We had a thin American power forward, Mike, and the day before the game, during the film session, our other American, Willie, drew a cartoon in which Mike was face to face with a much bigger and tougher looking African player telling Mike "I will kill you tonight!" After the two of them had a good laugh I asked Willie in private if I could keep the cartoon, but did not say why. 

Later that day we won our semi-final game and advanced to the final. We were in the locker room and could hear the opposing players shouting as loud as they could, in a typical motivational performance, with the clear intention of intimidating us, the newcomers. I had long pictured this final. I knew that my player would be motivated to win, but also nervous and excited - perhaps too much so, and I was sure that more tension would not help. 

So when I finished talking to the players and everybody got up to head out to the court, I pretended to find something in my pocket by surprise.  I was in the middle of the group and all of them were looking at what was in my hands, so I showed them Willie's cartoon, where I had earlier crossed out the player's name and wrote in its place the name of one of Benefica's strongest players.

The guys all started to laugh, looking at me as if I were crazy, and they all left the locker room - at the same time as the Benifica players - shouting and with a certain aggressiveness. The situation was funny; my players were laughing in front of those "warriors" as if to say "We don't give a shit what you do - we are more confident than that!" 

I guess the Benifica players did not know what to think, but probably the fear changed sides a bit, and my guys played the game with a certain calm spirit. Still, we had to fight and play solid basketball, but we did not play nervous and we ended up winning the Final.

I use this as an example of the weakness of "motivational speeches" and how easy their effect can be overturned. Whatever is inside you - fear or courage - the INTERNAL motivation, is more powerful than any external agent. 

INTERNAL MOTIVATION

This is the motivation that is most of interest to me. This is the one that provokes real change - that takes a player from making excuses or saying "Yes, sir!"  Not because of any kind of "army" discipline, but because the player has found an internally-motivated reason to work harder, to listen, to let go of his ego and be humble, and to get better every day, every practice, no matter what happens. 

This is a change that NOBODY can block because it belongs to YOU. This is what the poet William Ernest Henley had in mind. as did Nelson Mandela who quoted Henley's Invictus (unconquered): "I am the master of my fate; I am the captain of my soul." 

This is precisely the kind of motivation common to athletes in individual sports. They are alone to face the challenges, and that is pretty tough. Whereas in the case of team sports, an athlete is never alone, not in the game and not in practice, not in victory and not in defeat. 

So as a coach, I must try to inspire my players, to find within each of them that internal motivation. This requires that I pay attention to each player as an individual, to know them deeply as a person, and to invest time in that relationship. Otherwise a coach cannot inspire, influence, or even help a player.

FRUSTRATION

To me, the main question here is: Does failure justify frustration? Because, when a player has a bad game, or isn't playing well for a period of time, feeling frustrated is the easy way.  I sometimes wonder if the younger generation try as hard as they might. So the questions after a loss or failure must be: 

• How much effort did I put into work on that shot or that move or whatever? 
• How much effort did I put into this or that subject?
• Did I pay sufficient attention?
• How many repetitions did I do in my workout?

If the answer to these questions is "not as much as I could have," then there is no clear reason to be frustrated.

Listening - Humility - Selfishness

A player who often shows frustration (in the form of anger, for example) after making a mistake or missing a shot is often taken by others for a competitive guy, because they think that his anger comes from his desire to win. However, I'd consider him a selfish player, because he puts his "ME" first ahead of the "US," even thinking he is being positive. 

Humility is necessary to llisten, and listening is necessary to improve. Selfishness doesn't let you do either of these two things. We often think of selfishness as wanting to take more shots or have more playing time. But to me selfishness is just putting your ego first. This attitude brings the player to making excuses or pinning the blame on someone else, instead of reflecting on his own actions. Such self-criticism requires humility.

Know the "HOW" to Master the "WHAT"

Finally, it's necessary to know HOW to do something you want before you can master WHAT it is you want. Once again, to know the HOW, you need to listen, to be humble, and of course selfishness can't be part of this equation.

Speaking to the class, I finished with something Bruce Lee said. I told the kids this sentence means a lot. Very often a person, let's say a student, thinks, "I need to finish high school with a certain grade point average to attend college so that I can then go on to medical school to become a doctor. But that's too much for me. I'm not that smart. So I will aim for a lower grade, which is closer to my potential, and then I'll see what the future brings."

He or she thinks they are avoiding frustration by being realistic. However, if you have a dream, the call to be let's say a doctor, and you work hard to achieve that - really, really hard, but in the end your grades aren't good enough to get into Med School, then you can look at it in one of two ways: you can get frustrated because you didn't get in, or you can be proud that you gave it your very best effort, perhaps got a higher GPA than you thought you might, and still opened the door to some other options. Maintaining high goals makes you try harder. That is being a WINNER.

RESILIENCE

I often ask myself as a coach what is the way to manage defeat? Long ago I came to realize that players mimic whatever it is their coach demonstrates. When I began my career, I took over a team mid-season that was in solid last place in the league, with numerous losses. We also lost my first game at the helm, so I spent the next day (Sunday) very upset and thinking about what to say to the team on Monday's practice ... I needed a great motivational speech, I thought ... Should I push them, talking about the mistakes made? Or perhaps a video session to analyze the game? So I prepared several things around each of these options. 

Monday morning I woke up full of energy, raring to go, ready to explain and to show every single mistake. When we met up mid-court to go over the practice plan, I saw their faces and quickly realized that they needed solutions, not analysis.  And solutions always come from the work, not the words.

So that's what I did. Without saying a word - and putting aside all my preparations - I just explained the first drill.

I could see the relief on their faces. As if they were acknowledging "Coach's resilience to get past the defeat resides inour capacity to keep working, to work hard, and to maintain focus." 

That's the way to get better, and that's the way players like to solve problems. That's also the way a team becomes tougher. The toughness ... the strength of a team depends on the resilience of its leaders, and the coach is the primary (though not only) leader.

Paradox of Self-Confidence: Firmness vs. Flexibility

As a coach, but also in general, a person needs to have confidence in himself. Sometimes, espcially when the team is in trouble or facing defeat, everybody looks to the coach, either to solve the problem or to blame. The coach needs to maintain a balance between firm adherance to his plan and some flexibility to modify as needed. That balance between firmness and flexiblity makes the difference in any situation. 

When it comes to the coach's mental state regarding solving problems, I like what author George F. Tiltonood had to say:

"Success is never final, and failure never fatal. 

It's courage that counts."

STRONGER POST PLAY: AVOID THESE MISTAKES

by George Galiotos, coach and former player

Recently I had the chance to watch a college game, where I was particularly interested in the play of the bigs, having handled post assignments for top clubs in Greece for a dozen years.

What I saw was athletic guys running up and down the court ... but failing to seal the player under the basket. Their positioning didn't allow the guards to feed the post so in this particular game I noticed 6 or 7 times a player posted up but only on one of those times did he score. The other times the ball was turned over because the player either had faulty footwork or when the player went up and under he brought the ball down low rather than keeping it up high, resulting in a turnover.

I also saw that when the big got open he didn't get the ball because he needed to be more vocal and let teammates know he was ready to get the ball. If a big is inactive just outside the paint and not asking for the ball he isn't going to get it. 

George Galiotos

I also saw that bigs were setting screens at the wrong angles so that they weren't rolling to be able to get the ball. When you set a great screen you force the defender to help the player caught in your screen and then you have the space to roll successfully and get the ball. 

On some instances I saw the big just kind of staying where he was and not even rolling or popping out after setting the screen to create space and take advantage of the screen in order to be open to take a shot. .

As far as defense goes, the guys I was watching tended to jump on every shot fake. You don't have to necessarily leave your feet to block a shot. By keeping your hands up and ready  in defensive position you can defend against a shorter player without getting out of position. Not being in position in time - when a player is late to get to where he needs to be and tries to block the shot, that is where bigs get into so much foul trouble. 

Regarding rebounding, I saw players assuming they could rely on their athleticism, making no attempt to box out their player first. I suggest you stop looking for the ball and box out your player first to slow him down. Then you can use your abilities to grab the rebounds.  

When the guard drives baseline past his defender, the big should be ready to help by closing the driving lane. You need to be low with hands up and outer foot on the baseline. to keep the opposing guard from trying to go for the reverse layup. You want to force that guard to have to change or reverse direction, make an errant pass or draw the charging foul. But if you are 3-4 feet away from the baseline, and try to block that shot, you are probably going to be the one who gets called for the foul.  

To sum up, on offense the big should not just be focused on getting up and down the court but getting down quickly for the fast break ... to seal his defender under the basket ... to set great screens and then roll quickly toward the post, getting low and in proper spot close to the basket ... and be loud and active in asking for the ball. On defense, put a higher priority on boxing out to get rebounds instead of overly relying on your athletic abilities ... play with your hands up ... don't jump up on pump fakes ... and make it a habit to be in the proper position to avoid being called for the foul.

Finally, increase your guards' trust in you by projecting the idea that this is YOUR house and nobody is going to score on you. You will be getting more touches of the ball and at the same time the defense is going to be a bit more leery of attacking you.

*George Galiotos, a 7-footer from Greece, played in the Greek league for over a dozen years, while earning a degree in physical education and sport science. He now works as a basketball coach in New York City.

THE ONE THING YOU MIGHT NOT BEING DOING ENOUGH!

IS THIS KEEPING YOU FROM COMPETING AT YOUR BEST

Dr. Randy Pausch, the American professor who wrote "The Last Lecture" as he was dealing with the cancer which took his life, said" "Never EVER underestimate the importance of having fun!"

I was recently watching the famous Chinese pianist Lang Lang on TV and noticed that during the entire performance a smile never left his face.

It is of course true that - unlike in sports - a musician has nearly complete control over the situation. But when you look at the facial expressions of so many athletes in their most demanding moments, consider what retired tennis champion Andre Agassi said in reponse to an interviewer who asked him what he would say to himself to remain competitive if he found himself in the 5th and deciding set of a match down five games to love. Agassi replied: "I would be thinking, 'THERE IS NO OTHER PLACE I WOULD RATHER BE.' "

No matter what is happening at the moment, making the mental shift in competition to having fun and treasuring the moment can make all the difference.

I was working with a college basketball player who I used to tell after games, "You don't look like you're having fun out there." Although he was a gifted athlete he was not performing to the full extent of his talents. Once he took this to heart and started having more fun it made a real difference in his game. He finished his college career as a Division 2 second team All-American.

So in your next competition, you might want to ask yourself if you are having fun. IT JUST MIGHT MAKE A WORLD OF DIFFERENCE.

MARCH MADNESS: HOW MUCH DO YOU WANT IT?

TAKE THE STAIRS!

For most of us, the motivation which pushes us toward important goals requires daily recommitment. It takes conscious effort to develop the habits that will take us from where we are to where we want to be. Looking for short-cuts is an ever-present temptation.

University of Texas Arlington men's basketball coach Scott Cross knows a bit about that. Cross has led his 2016-17 team to a 47-8 record, 14-4 in conference play. After falling in the Sun Belt Conference championship and losing out on a spot in the NCAA Tournament, the Mavericks were invited to the NIT, where they have beated BYU on the road 105-89 and taken down Akron at home 85-69, with hopes of making it to the final games in Madison Square Garden.

Two years ago, Cross happened upon a number of his players taking an elevator to go up one flight of stairs. He called them out, told them that guys who take the elevator are looking for shortcuts, and "that's not who we are."

Says Cross, "There's no reason to wait 30 seconds for an elevator when you could be moving your feet. It's the same way you have to treat the game of basketball. If you're looking for the easy way in basketball, to not sit in a defensive stance for a possession, or not block out, or not sprint back in transition defense to get the win ... it's going to catch up with you. That's the mindset and mentality I want our team to have." 

Writes Sam Vecenie of The Sporting News, who spent some time with the UTA program, "That workmanlike outlook has infiltrated the program in other places, too. Every game the coaching staff puts together a hustle points chart on the white board in the locker room and uses it as a tool to motivate the team. They assign a point value to every offensive rebound, defensive rebound, steal, block, dive, grabbed loose ball, deflection, charge, and-one and non-hustle play per game. If the team loses hustle points and then loses the game, the coaching staff implements "championship conditioning" at the next practice."

When noted sport psychologist Terry Orlick was asked some years ago by the NHL to look at factors that might best predict success in the league, he found that "desire, determination, attitude, heart and self-motivation were often the crucial ingredients that tilted the balance in favor of making it or not at the professional level." (In Pursuit of Excellence: How to Win in Sport and Life Through Mental Training)

Orlick cited the example of former hockey great Bobby Clarke and what a member of the Philadelphia Flyers front office said about him at the time:

"We drafted Bobby Clark on our second round, but there was a boy we drafted on our first round who was bigger and stronger, could skate and shoot better than Clarke, but Clarke made it and he didn't.  He wasn't willing to sacrifice that little extra you need to be a professional hockey player. In practice Clarke would be there 10 minutes longer and he would work harder. In a game he got himself mentally prepared to give extra ... the other player didn't do that. Result - one went ahead, the other fell behind."

Lance Allred, the first legally deaf player in the NBA, who recently ended an 11-year global basketball career, has written, "I never won a lot of trophies. Never won an MVP award. And I never let it break me, as I never felt entitled to it. Entitlement is a vicious disease. Instead, I woke up every morning and kept grinding, while those who were far more talented, yet more entitled than me, drifted away. Being 'right' never got me more playing time; in fact it only lessened it."

Good thoughts to reflect on next time we push that elevator button. 

MORE MARCH MADNESS: LESSONS FROM A LOSING TEAM

PITINO CITES CRITICAL YET COMMON PITFALLS IN TEAM’S NCAA DEFEAT

Rick Pitino’s Louisville Cardinals gave up a second half 9 point lead to Michigan, losing 73-69 in second round 2017 NCAA play.  Afterwards Coach Pitino reflected on the team’s second half difficulties.  “Where we have struggled is on the mental facets of the game. Michigan played great, but we beat ourselves mentally. I could say that every game we lost this season it was because of the mental parts of the game, not the physical. Our guys consistently give great effort... (One of the problems was) guys were so absorbed by the offense. Quentin (Snider) says ‘Oh God – I’m 0-for-9. I’m letting my team down.  I want to win so badly’ then runs into a screen. We’ve got to get our guys out of this mindset of scoring – and if they don’t score they’ve got to play defense.  Once we get out of that (thinking) we’ve got a great chance to come back and be an outstanding team.”

Pitino’s comments point to two key difficulties I have noticed in my 20 years working with athletes.

First, I have found that players and teams who find themselves struggling will typically double down on effort, assuming that doing more of the same, only with greater resolve, is going to make the difference.  Pitino’s point regarding making changes on the MENTAL level, not the PHYSICAL level, is so frequently missed by players, and particularly players with less experience. 

My previous post  offers examples of the importance of mental adjustments to stay competitive in pressure situations. The fact is that players ARE taught to give greater effort and to care MORE; they are RARELY taught how to make critical adjustments to their thinking that result in a more EFFORTLESS performance.

The second trap which so many players fall into is their disproportionate focus on offense. It leads to dismissing the equally important role of defense.  In the end, the game is about prevailing over an opponent with all the tools at your disposal. But far too often, players are ill-equipped to grasp this critical point because of a constant emphasis on statistics as the primary measure of a player’s effectiveness or value.

Some years ago I attended the European Men’s Basketball U20 Championships.  One of the players on the UK team was playing during the regular season for a college team in the U.S. whose coach is a friend of mine.  When I emailed my friend to tell him I had seen his guy play he wanted to know how he had played. I told him that the player had not made it into the stats but had done a lot of little things that helped his team, like setting great screens that allowed a teammate to score, or chasing down loose balls to keep a possession going.  This coach was happy to hear, because this was also the kind of player he wanted on his teams.

Snider’s offensive difficulties may have chipped away at his overall confidence and mental energy which, applied to defense and the other “little things” might have  helped alter the game’s balance. 

Furthermore, as many players know, when things aren’t going well on offense, channeling your energies into defense can often help you turn around your own sense of competitive spirit.  But unless coaches and/or the players themselves dedicate time in practice throughout the season to understanding and successfully executing this part of the game, it won’t be there for them when they need it most.

"Are You Paying Too Much Attention to Your Stats?"