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Serving a Team in a Very Successful Season

The eleventh season of my service of a college football team was one I will never forget. It was the fourth season with that particular coaching staff, having been 1 and 10, 2 and 10, and 4 and 8 in the previous seasons. Suddenly in mid-November we were 10 and 0, nationally ranked, and surely headed to the NCAA Division I-AA playoffs for the first time in twenty-one years.

 

After an exciting, last second, loss on the road, I was in my seat on the bus waiting to go to the airport for the flight home. I sat there stunned, not knowing how to process all this. The head coach looked across the aisle at me and said, “Hey, are you okay?” I said, “Coach, I had forgotten what it feels like to lose.” Ten weeks of winning had erased my memory of years of painful loss. Success has the power to do that.

 

Winning teams feel like they’re invincible.

·      They tell themselves, “We win even when we don’t play well.”

·      They think “We must be really good.”

·      They marvel at themselves, “We win even when our best players are not at 100%!”

·      Momentum is a real and wonderful for these teams.

 

Winning teams are vulnerable to debilitating hubris.

·      They find themselves full of entitlement to privilege and position.

·      They take on elitist attitudes toward others, obviously lesser than they.

·      Their sudden elevation to celebrity serves them poorly.

·      Their locker room can easily become stratified, separating the stars from the role players.

·      They are perfectly positioned for a humiliating defeat. (The Football Salukis, nursing our wounds from the end of our winning streak, played the University of Delaware in the first round of the playoffs. We were crushed 48-7. Ouch.)

 

We, the Character Coaches, maintain perspective.

·      We love extravagantly. Our loyalty is valued, even when wildly successful. We seek out those not in the spotlight, the walk on player, the support staff, and others.

·      We serve selflessly. Our consistency in service is noticed when the prevailing culture becomes entitlement and privilege.

·      We encourage. In winning streaks, encouragement by asking good questions makes a difference. Ask about matters away from sport – family, class, relationships, teammates, and faith.

 

This season of success will not last forever, though we wish it would. Maintain perspective. Help them see over, through, and beyond the present swell of awesomeness. Success is secondary to who they are as men and women.

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