Cutting Down the Nets - This is a Learning Experience

Stan Jones had great winning seasons as the basketball coach of the small, rural high school in Underwood. He then moved up to a stronger conference and surpassed those records in small town Midway High School. He felt that it was time to move on to greater challenges so he accepted the head coaching position at suburban Brandon High School.

All the local citizens; school personnel, townspeople, and students; were friendly and cooperative and seemed to be genuinely happy to have a coach with his record come to their school. However, there was this disquieting message that was repeated over and over by almost everyone Stan met. He heard it a lot from students and his players, “It’s good to have you here, Coach, but Brandon High School has never had a winning basketball team.” What they didn’t say out loud was, “And we don’t think that we will ever have a winning team.”

What an attitude to be confronted with and coming at him from all angles. What to do? At the beginning of the first practice, Stan had his players, the Brandon Bears, sit on the floor at one of the free throw circles. As he began talking to his players about his plans for the team this season, his manager brought out a ladder and set it up next to the nearby basket. Stan took a pair of taping scissors out of his pocket and handed it to Reese, captain of the team.

“Fellows, it has been my experience that many teams upon winning tournaments do a poor job of cutting down the nets. Since we don’t want our team to be embarrassed at those happy times, we are going to practice cutting them down correctly and with the right amount of enthusiasm. Reese, you get up there and make the first cut. The rest of you guys give him the loudest support you can generate then take your turn cutting. O.K. team, let’s do it!”

Practice as if you are champions and you’ll play like champions.

Note: I heard this story a long time ago and I have no idea where I got it. So, if it was yours, give me a call and I will acknowledge you in a later blog.