John Wooden, the UCLA men's basketball coach who was nicknamed the "Wizard of Westwood", won 10 NCAA National Championships in a 12 year period (7 in a row). Within that period, his teams won a record 88 consecutive games in a row (the UConn women's basketball team just broke that record) and he was named National Coach of the Year 6 times.
Coach Wooden began his season with the most important lesson of the basketball season: teaching his student-athletes how to put their socks and shoes on properly. The players looked at him with disbelief. "Really, coach?" they seemed to say. Wooden explained:
"You know, basketball is a game that's played on a hardwood floor," Wooden said. "And to be good, you have to ... change your direction, change your pace. That's hard on your feet. Your feet are very important. And if you don't have every wrinkle out of your sock... (it can cause blisters)"
"Now pull it up in the back, pull it up real good, real strong. Now run your hand around the little toe area ... make sure there are no wrinkles and then pull it back up. Check the heel area. We don't want any sign of a wrinkle about it ... The wrinkle will be sure you get blisters, and those blisters are going to make you lose playing time, and if you're good enough, your loss of playing time might get the coach fired."
In talking about putting your shoes on properly:
"Now put it in wide, now pull it up. Now don't grab these lines up here, go down, eyelet by eyelet ... each one, that's it. Now pull it in there ... Tie it like this... "
"There's always a danger of becoming untied when you are playing," he said. "If they become untied, I may have to take you out of the game — practice, I may have to take you out. Miss practice, you're going to miss playing time and not only that, it will irritate me a little too."
Bill Walton remarked that this was the initial lesson for "everything we would need to know for the rest of our lives."
(the photo is from a RunnersWorld.com newsletter)
I totally agree. I teach snowboarding at a major resort. It amazes me how many people (mostly kids, but full grown adults too) complain about foot pain in the boots and when we investigate they have two or three pairs of bunched up socks, or loose fitting socks with wrinkles. Big things, like success in life, are built upon a foundation of little things. If you get the little stuff right, the big things will stack much better.
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