UNDERDOG

Hey Team

Katie is used to my ramblings, and this was originally for her, but as I finished, I thought it might be something the team would like as well.

I have been thinking a fair bit about team Red Dragon’s upcoming match up with Plattsburg and with it now coming even sooner it has pushed it to the forefront.

I know the team realizes the importance of this game but for Katie and her fellow seniors its more.

The last opportunity to get to the top of the mountain, to prove to yourselves you can be the best, the last chance to overcome, and the last time to define the memories that will be with you forever,

I wish I was a coach like Herb Brooks, or Lou Holts who could give the team one of those underdog speeches for the ages, unfortunately that is not the case.

All I have to offer is a few insights from my dad.

It was late in November, the week before the Championship game with our archrivals. In record, and virtually every other statistical category they were better than us. The local paper, the village barbershop quarterbacks, it seemed just about everybody was giving us little chance of victory. 

I wasn’t dealing with it very well, nerves, wasn’t sleeping, irritable at best. 

I can remember this like it was yesterday. It was a cold Saturday morning; dad and I were puttering with some project in the garage and I was obviously preoccupied. Dad knew what was up but still asked. I couldn’t help myself, the flood gates opened. It was a tirade of insecurity. I wasn’t sure about the coach’s game plan, about the team, about me, you name it. 

At the end when I stopped to take a breath, he looked out from underneath the hood of our latest project, and asked me one simply question, and prefaced it by saying he didn’t want any bullshit just yes or no. 

Do I think we can win? Now looking back with the experiences of age, how simple but how profound.

Of course, I said “yes,” but no doubt he sensed a bit of hesitation.  As calm as a summer pond (as he almost always was) he handed me some tool and said. “Well, you better get that straight in your mind right now because if you don’t believe you can win… right to your very core you can never win.”

Now he held out his hands, they were weathered and hardened. I had seen action this before. (It was his way of illustrating hard work, and in this case, he was referring to preparation). “From pain comes strength, if you have no pain, you have had no resistance and you have gained no ground.  If you are not prepared to out work the competition, then you can’t win.” The gist was, stop wasting time on worrying and let see a little extra work.

I think when I went off about the team, it hit a nerve with him. “If I’ve told you once,” with a hint of temper this time, “I’ve told you 1000 times, nobody wins anything alone! Work, sports, life, you are a team, and the team is you. You want to be better than just good; help make the player next to you great. Everybody works towards that, then you have a team that is great. He clinched his fist in my direction, Great teams win!

We both went back under the hood, after a few minutes of quiet, in the end he said “Steve… its all about the fight. The fight within when you want to say “uncle” and the fight outside when you get knocked down. It’s the fight to get back up and never waiver, to keep moving forward. The fight to give everything you have for every second you’re preparing or in the game.” No one will remember the win or loss, but all will remember what you did to get there. Everything or nothing, want to win… will win.

Will trumps, numbers, skill even logic.

You have to test their will, their tolerance for pain, make them have the heart to take you on till the end. Then let’s see who’s still standing.

I knew what he was saying was “good stuff,” but I was too immature, too self absorbed to really take in the entirety of the message. And frankly he passed along so much wisdom at times that I often lost the trees for the forest. 

You guys are just way better in so many ways, you already know what its takes. Can you find it in yourselves to get there is the question?

 Here was his message to me when I needed it, and now (not quite so elegantly), I pass it on to you when perhaps you could use it.

• You must know in your heart you can win.

• Your work ethic must be unmatched.

• Everybody must play for the teammate next to them, help them when they are down, all must pull together in the same direction at the same time. There can be no individuals only the team.

• Absolutely battle every single minute every second and never stop until its over.

• Don’t let them beat you… make them suffer to beat you.

  
  

I may have embellished here or there and used some poetic license on what dad was saying. Keep in mind he was not an athlete, but he was uncanny with understanding the situation and a Master of Teaching through stories.  He also knew what it takes to be successful in sport or in life.

As dad often kiddingly reminded me, I was not the sharpest knife in the drawer but even I realized, if that is not a formula for wining, I am not sure what is.

I will end with my own 2 cents. I know the odds are long and the metrics not favourable, but competition is not a math test. It’s a test of grit, of perseverance, and of passion. Win those tests and no matter the score you have won.

Mom and I believe in the team (our hockey family).

Now go beat those guys.

Good luck and as always, we will be watching.