All We Need
My sons’ school just won the Alabama State 1A High School Basketball Championship (in overtime)! That’s no mean feat: As the second smallest 1A school in the state with only 63 students in secondary classes, a fifth of the student body had to play to make up the team. The win is sweet, but the victory didn’t actually come this month, or really even this season; it was in process years before that.
My oldest son, a senior, wasn’t able to drive four years ago when Coach Graves took over the program, so I’d stay and watch the practices back then. Coach would come over and talk with me sometimes and discuss his background and philosophies. In his youth he’d played on a state championship team with Anniston and was understandably proud of it. The excitement and energy in his voice as he related the achievement led me to think he was one of their star players. I was surprised when he told me he contributed off the bench. Apparently in his younger years he was a standout, but as he got into high school other players overtook his talent. It took me a long time to understand what was going on there – how he could be so pumped when he wasn’t a star or even a starter. Many people would’ve seen coming off the bench as a drawback, but from that vantage point he saw all the roles that were needed to win a championship, and that it went beyond having just two or three stars. Turns out, while he was winning that championship, he was also building the foundation for his next one.
Over several seasons, I began to understand. Each year Coach developed the team more, and everyone learned their role and how they contributed to winning. It might be scoring points and playing stifling defense. It might be taking charges, or neutralizing the other team’s big man. Some players who never touched the floor in a game contributed by playing tough in practice to press the starters, or by pushing the team in conditioning or setting the tone and focus of drills. They all had a role, and Coach demanded dedication and excellence equally from them all. You don’t play for him if you play just for yourself, and you don’t play for him if you aren’t committed to excellence. As a result, I never noticed even a hint of hierarchy among the players. They all seemed to respect and depend on what each person brought to the team. Each game this year before they ran onto the court, a player would yell out “We all we got.” The team would respond “We all we need!” And they meant it.
Another thing I learned from Coach was that everybody knows what the stars did. Fans and the newspapers always make sure they get the praise and feedback they deserve. So he went out of his way to recognize critical contributions that no one else saw. He’d let you know what you as a fan didn’t notice – selfless acts of excellence that would never make the highlight reel, but that made a championship squad. We beat a lot of superior players this year simply because we never faced a better team.
And this same philosophy applies equally at our facility. Every role here is important, and we can’t win at the highest levels unless we all excel. We should be the best facility in our industry, and we will be if each of us brings our best every day in our roles. And just so you know… We’re all we’ve got.
