MESSAGE #139 - SUCCESS LEAVES CLUES (Part II)

“I have a road map. If you follow it, you’ll be successful.”

-- Coach Bob Hurley

The world’s greatest basketball coach isn’t making millions of dollars working for a big university or NBA franchise with an impressive 15,000 seat arena. The world’s greatest basketball coach is making a mere $6,800 a year coaching at a small parochial high school that doesn’t even have its own gym!

The world’s greatest basketball coach could easily command a fee of $15,000 to $20,000 per speaking engagement. But, in March of 2005, the world’s greatest basketball coach came to Montclair State University to speak to the students in my sport psychology class for free.

It was one of the greatest moments in my 28 year career at M.S.U.!

Who is the world’s greatest basketball coach?

Bob Hurley of St. Anthony High School in Jersey City. Want his credentials? Since taking over as head boys basketball coach in 1972, he has led his teams to over 900 victories, 22 state titles and two national championships, plus, five of his players became first-round NBA draft picks. Every single one of his players, except for one, has attended college and over 100 have received college scholarships. This means, on average, every single year three seniors have received scholarships for basketball.

Success leaves clues.

If you watch successful people closely, listen to them, and study them -- you will discover these clues.

Here are just some of the clues Coach Hurley left behind when he spoke to my class . . .

CLUE #1: A BIG HEART. If you want to play for Hurley you’d better have a big heart -- not physiologically but emotionally. The coach said, “I don’t think you’re ever going to be good at something if it’s only like, not love. If you’re going to be really good at something, you have to love it, not just like it. ‘Like’ is OK for intramurals. If you want to be great, you have to give up things, you have to put things aside and focus on putting a lot of time in.”

CLUE #2: NO GOLF CLUBS. When asked how he’s managed to be so successful, Coach Hurley said, “I don’t have any hobbies.” When the coach goes on vacation, he goes somewhere to coach basketball,

CLUE #3: AN INSATIABLE APPETITE. One of Coach Hurley’s former players told me that at basketball clinics the big-time coaches come in, do their sessions, get their paychecks and leave. Not Coach Hurley. He comes early, stays to the end, and attends as many sessions as he can. With all his experience and success, he’s still insatiably hungry for more knowledge.

CLUE #4: BOXES FULL OF NOTES. The coach is an obsessive note-taker. In the Hurley household, you’ll find a closet filled with boxes of notes about basketball drills, strategy, etc. He embodies the old saying, “The weakest ink is better than the strongest memory.”

CLUE #5: A FIST. One of the coach’s most compelling illustrations was when he raised his right hand in the air and closed his fingers together into a fist. Coach Hurley sees his job as turning five weak little fingers into one strong fist. Every season he takes five individual players and makes them into one cohesive team unit. Hurley said, “It’s not about individual stuff. It’s team. It’s team. It’s team.” His teams demonstrate that T.E.A.M. = T.E.A.M. Together Everyone Achieves More if there’s a Total Effort from All Members.

CLUE #6. WANT MORE CLUES??? Read The Miracle of St. Anthony: A Season with Coach Bob Hurley and Basketball’s Most Improbable Dynasty written by Adrian Wojnarowski and published by Gotham Books.

Thank you Coach . . .

Rob Gilbert