You've got to have expectations for how they train, how they work, how they treat others, because if you don't build those then you're really negating their ability to do what I think is getting harder and harder all the time, which is to solve your own problems. Because the way the world continues to evolve, it becomes so easy to not have to be verbal.
This is the Reform Sports Project, a podcast about restoring healthy balance and perspective in all areas of sports through education and advocacy. Hi, this is Nick Bonacor from the Reform Sports Podcast. Today, I'm speaking with Tom Crane, college basketball analyst for ESPN and former Division I head coach.
Prior to rejoining ESPN in twenty twenty two, Tom served as a head men's basketball coach at Georgia, Indiana and Marquette, winning over four hundred games throughout his twenty plus coaching career. Coach Crean and I discuss what it means to be a good teammate, teaching kids how to advocate for themselves, elves and make their own decisions, and why it's important for kids to grow out of looking at their parents for validation while playing coach Tom Creane, Man, I am
freaking fired up. I'm excited to have you coach. Thanks so much for joining.
Well, thanks for asking me that I appreciate it, and then I'm looking forward to it.
Well, I appreciate you. I know that we're we're talking about something that you're not only experienced with, but it's certainly passionate with. And where I want to start with you, coaches, is I talked to several and had several guests on you know, high level coaches like yourself, and you know, especially in the college basketball arena. And you know, I'm turning forty four soon, and you know, I grew up
in a different era. I have six kids who are growing up in this time and playing sports, and man, even as a parent, it's sometimes challenging. And I want to ask you as far as the landscape of coaching is concerned. You know, it seems like the word discipline and accountability at times gets a bad rap. I feel
like people tied discipline with like extreme cases. And you know, but then I look at some of the most successful coaches, whether it be in college basketball or any sport for that matter, and it seems like there's always accountability there's always energy, there's always passion. How does discipline, accountability and those things get misconstrued with kind of people talk about abuse. I mean to me, it seems like it's pretty easy
to separate, but at times there's a fine line. And can you kind of get into that a little bit where we went wrong and how that took place?
Yeah, absolutely, because I think discipline is like sacrifice. Those words so many times are looked at as four letter words, you're not the good ones, and it's and they're so far from that. I mean, there's no question that you take those words and right away, and so many people there's a negative connotation that just it almost puts a period at the end of the sentence before you can ever get anywhere else, or an exclamation point, And there's
so many different ways to get it across. And I think it's like anything else in this world, You've got to continue to find words that register. You got to find phrases after you teach something. It's so much about reminders. And I think when you look at discipline, when you look at sacrifice, when you look at accountability, I think you got to look at standards. Hey, it's a really
cool word right. Standards is a cool word, but it's not something it just comes to mind that people just automatically. It just registers on what that means. So you have to give people, give young people what those standards are. And so much of it is the discipline that you need to be successful. It is like you mentioned your energy, it's your enthusiasm, it's your attention to the things that
the details in what you're doing. Okay, that inches matter, you know, feet matter, whatever it is, you know, body angles, all those different things matter, and those become part of the standards. And then I think the other thing. It's so big. And this is one thing that's really hard for coaches at times, it's hard for parents that it's
okay to have expectations. And it's not expectations of Okay, you've got to score twenty, you've got to hit x amount of home runs, you've got to be able to pass for X amount of yards, you've got to get x amount of touches or targets or catches. No, no, it's not that. It's the expectation for how you should
handle things. And to me, the personal part of it starts so much, okay, with how you are as a teammate, and the expectation that you have or your child or your player as a teammate, as somebody then that is coachable, as somebody that has the right type of body language, the right type of eye contact, you know, all those things. Those become expectations that can then lead into Okay, here's the amount of work that you have to put in.
Here's the amount of time you have to spend on this, here's the type of things you have to work on, and the standards become. Okay, if you're going to get better and be a complete basketball player, you can't only work on what you're good at. You've got to do x amounts maybe with your left hand if you're a right handed player, or you've got to do x amount shooting free throws, or you've got to do x amount when it comes to one on one defense, whatever it is,
whatever sport is. And you help chet those standards because you have expectations of your child or your player to do certain things well and right and consistently, and that in time turns into being where the production comes from. And I think so many times people see expectations as X amount of wins, the X amount of results for their individual sport, and that, to me is not what
it is. It's all the things that lead into that that then give you a fighting chance or a better chance to achieve those results of those individual accolades that people like to see you get in your own life.
I love that word standards, and it's funny. I've never really dug into that word, but you know words are so powerful. And to take it a step further, sure, there's certain standards that you have when you get to college. You know, when you're becoming a college athlete, then there's certain stands a high school. Is there such thing as age appropriate? And I love you to get into that because you know, my oldest is eighteen. He's getting ready
to go wrestle in college. And I also have a five year old almost five year old, and I got four others in between. And I don't parent my eighteen year old the same as I do my five year old. Right now, I have standards for all of them, but how much does age? Because I want you know, parents who may not have a college or or you know, high level playing sport experience themselves, are really walking around
this culture. Coach, like, what do I do you know what, I got this at this ex pro who's running this club, who's telling me I got to specialize all year long at nine in order for my kid to have a shot. And then I got this other guy telling me it's okay, play everything. And you know, people are confused, their kids are gonna miss out, they're afraid.
How do they.
Manage being pushed and pulled? And also I would love for you to not only speak to the parents of how they navigate that, but also to the coaches what is age appropriate? Is there a difference how you should coach your seventeen U Premier team versus your seven U Miss Machene pitch team. For lack of a better express.
Absolutely, absolutely there's a difference. And that's where standards are different. Fundamental standards are different, All those things are different. Here's three things that I think are relevant to age, and especially when when you just said between eighteen and five, and I think obviously it's different how you get them across. But I think these three things are absolutely crucial no
matter what age. And first and foremost, okay, from the side of being on a team or learning skills, you've got to be a teammate you've got to keep teaching ways to be a better teammate, and so many times being a better teammate, especially when they're younger, is how you react. And that's where number two comes in, which is incredibly important. What leads into the coachability part of it,
and that's your body language. There have got to be standards and expectations for young people three team teen, high teen, college age, whatever it is, especially in pro level, but there's got to be You've got to have expectations in demands. You've got to be able to make those corrections, make those renders, make those adjustments, show it. And so many times there's parents they're filming every move their kids make,
which is not totally wrong. I'm not saying that's negative at all, But when's the last time somebody filmed them having an interaction with a referee or a teammate or on the bench, or showing frustration at a call or a non call or something with the homeplate, umpire or
the referee. Showing those things, you know, the visual tool and coaching, and I've coached in college for so long that the visual tool of showing somebody not only what they're doing well, not only what they're doing right when it comes to the actual game, but showing them on a bench, showing their reaction to a teammate, showing their reaction to a referee, and at times it's private and at times it's in front of everybody else because you really have to and this is a strong word, but
it's a very important word. You have to be able to pierce people and children and your players at times with them really getting the message. And I don't mean piercing in a negative, physical nasty at all, but you've got to be able to get their attention. They got to absorb it, right, because the only way they're going to apply it is if they've absorbed it. And what you and I absorb as adults, or what you and I absorb as coaches, is a lot different than what
our players absorb. And that's where the age part gets so crazy, right, because eighteen to five is a huge difference, which you still have to get their attention. So I think when you look at being a teammate and all the different ways you can build that, when you look at your body language, which leads to your coachability, because eye contact, how you listen, how you respond, how you talk.
That's all part of the body language. And then third, and this is where I think when it's parents, if they're doing it themselves, but when they are studying people that are going to be with their children, okay, are they helping build them athletically? And in so many cases the younger they are, it's flexibility, it's stuability, right, it's making sure they're able to function in so many different
ways athletically. It could be sprints, it could be all these different things that are so important to help your kids build their athleticism. The strength is a different component, and I think so many times people see strength and conditioning,
is it all encompassing things? No, it's really not training ripe speed training, endurance training, flexibility, building your hands, building your feet, ankle and foot stability all right, and being able to make sure that as you go up the ladder that your feet and your ankles are in the
shape and that you're building those type of things. And that's why for me, I've never been caught up with our own children, especially my son who played more sports, or in recruiting, to have to find a specialist, to have to find somebody that will year round with a sport because I think that can create a lot if you want to do it, it's great, but at some point in time throughout that you've got to put the
fact are they truly having fun with this training? Are they truly having fun with the games, or is it becoming something that becomes so stressful because that's all they're doing that they're not really challenging their mind. And a good book to read on that is Ranged by David Epstein. It's really really good. It's out in paperback now. There's so many books that hit that, but books for me and I know you didn't ask this, but I think
this is really good for parents. Read a book called The Talent Code by Daniel Coyle that teaches you so much about out people that are in all these different places that they might have been specialists, they might not have been, but they had the right training. There's a book called The gold Mine by Rasmus Ankerson who's from
the Netherlands. I believe, or I believe it's another those but it's a great book where these people they went and they dove into why people were successful from certain areas, how they trained, and what you find out is it's a lot about what we're talking about. It's okay to have expectations for your kids. It's okay to have standards for your kids. It's how you go about it that's the trick, and that's the key.
David Epstein's fun I had him as a guest on last year. Couldn't agree with you more with regard to range. He really breaks it down, gives so many examples. It's a great episode. I hope everyone, if they haven't listened yet, check it out. But what did you first become a college head coach?
What year was it? It was nineteen ninety nine. I got my job at Marquette on my thirty third birthday. I was coaching at Michigan State. We're getting ready to go to the Final four. I accept their job on a Wednesday night. We announced it the following Tuesday, and I got it on my thirty third birthday. My wife and I were sitting there and it was incredible. Meeting Web of Bay Athletic director and flown up to East Lansing.
Bill Kurt's been from thirty three on. So nineteen ninety nine two thousand was my first year at Marquette.
You also coached many above average players, but one in particular d Wade, Dwayne Wade. And also, did you coach Jimmy Butler too?
No, I left. Buzz Williams was my assistant, got the job, and he recruited and signed Jimmy Butler. I had left to go to Indiana. Oh, miss Jimmy by a year.
Fair enough? Well, I guess Ryle I wanted to ask that question. My sophomore year at college playing baseball was nineteen ninety nine. And you know, but since the late nineties, early two thousands till now, I believe that there's been a dramatic shift. I mean, coach, we often hear and I'm sure you see it as well. People especially on social media, will say kids are soft these days. You know,
kids are kids, aren't coacha. But whatever the case is, Well, I stand back, I'm a parent, and I'm like, you know, kids only know what they're taught, you know. To me, it's sure if some people may think they're soft, well, a lot of times they're cuddled. You know, they're not allowed to fail, they're not allowed to struggle, they're not
put in positions where they have to overcome adversity. How much have you seen from your experience of your first year of being a college head coach in ninety nine at thirty three, you know, till the last time you coached in college, and even now where you've seen the landscape shift maybe with the kids that you're bringing in, and has there been an issue with resiliency as a direct result of maybe them being coddled too much versus the kids you got early on.
I think there's some of that, absolutely. I definitely think there's some of that. I don't think there's as much sometimes as people think. I mean, there is issues, but the reasons so many times, and I go back to this, the word expectations. I think too many times parents coaches when they're younger, they don't have enough expectations for those
things we're talking about. The expectations become results. The expectations become points, they become home runs, they become hits, they become goals, they become all wins, right, and you want
to teach them to win. I'm not saying that at all, But I'm also saying that you've got to have expectations for how they train, how they work, how they treat others, because if you don't build those then you're really really negating their ability to do what I think is getting harder and harder all the time, which is to solve your own problems. Because the way the world continues to evolve, and it becomes so easy, okay, to not have to be verbal in this world, it becomes so easy to
not have to talk. It becomes so easy to become isolated that you've got to teach them to be able to make decisions, to have a feel for what makes a decision. I see this in recruiting. I think this is definitely happening more and more. That's why there's so many different voices in kids' lives. And now with the name, image and likeness situation where you can have agents. I know of story where a coach may call a young person a player that's transferring, and they don't even want
to discuss it. Call my agent, Call my agent, call my parents, and down the road. Then you've got kids that aren't truly having to make decisions for what they want. And I think that starts at a young age. And I think there's way too much acceptance of it's not going well for me, Okay, So I'm going to find a way to blame. I'm going to find a way to be critical. I'm gonna find a way to be negative. I'm going to find a way to take that from me.
And I think when parents allow that to happen, and it's always somebody else's fault, it's somebody else's on the team, it's the coach isn't doing them right or playing them right. When you allow that to happen, it just keeps manifesting
itself down the road. There are two places, all right, where a kid is going to look when he's playing on a field, when he's playing on a floor, okay, when he's playing in a stadium, when he's playing on a court, he's going to be looking at his coach or coach is for how they're reacting, and they're going
to be looking at their parents. And the more that they can find a place, okay, where they can feel like a victim in the situation, where they can feel like, oh man, I'm being wronged and my parents agree with me. Or it's not going right for me and my parents agree with me. Or I'm not getting the ball enough and I can tell my parents agree with me. Those
are bad things. Those are hard to grow out. If I was coaching at Indiana, we had a player that had an issue because because you've got to be able to grow out of looking at your family, looking at your mom and dad as you go down the line in sports, you've got to be able to grow out of that. But if you become somebody, okay, that goes through a period of time where you feel better because you look over because they're commiserating with you, all right,
or they're helping validate you know. It's one thing to clap, it's one thing to give at the boys and keep going and all those kinds of things. Those things are good, but when they look over and see that negative body language, it might feel them in a negative way, but it's
certainly going to bring stress to them. And I had an NBA team in to tell and we're talking about a player, and he said, tell so and so to quit looking at his dad every time he makes a play in a game or every time somebody goes wrong, because his dad won't be sitting anywhere near the court of the NBA. And it was like it was a really good point because as you go up the ladder, they notice those things. The college coaches that the professional scouts,
they notice those type of things. So if you allow that to manifest itself and they see you in the stands complaining and ripping somebody and ripping the refs constantly and yelling at the coach, it just brings stress and it becomes something that they don't have the tools so many times when they're younger to be able to get out of because as you and I both know, then a lot of times that carries into the car ride, and then that becomes even worse because now you're trapped.
Now the kid is trapped, there's nowhere to go, and that's where it becomes so hard and his parents we've got to guard against that constantly. Constantly, we have to guard against that and help them grow because they are going to get wrong, they are going to go through hard times, they are going to have bad games, they are going to play with selfish teammates, they are going to get messed around by a coach here and again.
But they've got to be able to deal with it to have any success moving forward.
When we come back, Coach Creede and I discuss why he believes most parents are only as happy as their unhappiest child as we go into break, I wanted to share another update with you from our friends at Team Snap. As most people involved in youth sports know, running a tournament can be often a stressful and chaotic time, and industry leading amateur sports team and club management platform, Team
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up difficult conversation. I love how you brought up the car ride and you just because that is like such a I mean, think about there's no one there, right, there's no one, you know, it's your your one on one. Everyone's in the moment. You got emotions, you know. I remember as a young player. You know, you're sitting there and maybe you didn't have a great game, and you could just I love my God rest his soul, my father.
But it was like you wouldn't get mad, but I could just tell God what happened, you know, And I don't want to explain to shut up dad. You know in my head I didn't have it bad. But any type of negativity, you just don't want to hear it from your parents. At least I didn't. I was lucky though, I had a great you know, great parents who didn't really give it to me. But my dad was a competitor and a coach in his own right. But how do you harness that energy, coach, because I mean, listen,
you're a parent, you're also a coach. You know, you're coach for a living I heard a great example. I forget which guest said it to me, but talked about literally had a visualization of he coaches his kids, you know, in the youth game or whatever. And then it's almost like he gave an analogy. When I have my hat on, I'm coach, but when I get in the car, I take my hat off, I'm dad. And I thought that was a great, a great way for a young kid to be able to understand, right and to set that boundary.
How do you navigate that? Because parents, you know, we get excited, right, we're passionate.
How do you navigate that energy? That's hard because I've made many mistakes and I'm going to tell you this is not about do it just as I've done it type of thing. I've made those mistakes, and I think because we're invested, you have passion. There's an old saying that Doc Rivers said to me one time. I don't know if he coined it, but he's the one I heard it from that a parent is only as happy as their unhappy as child. And that is a very
true statement. I mean, it's any parent understands that completely. And it's hard. It's very hard. You're invested, you're passionate. You want to see them do well. You want to share in their joy, you want to take their pain away, all those different things. And I think the things that I have learned over a period of time that are so important is you have to be able to read your kid. You have to be able to read when is that time to bring it up? Because anybody says, well,
don't bring it up. No, I don't agree with that whatsoever. I mean, that's part of You've got to have conversations if you feel that they're warranted. That's part of parenting, that's part of helping them learn. So it's not about that. It's really about processing your thoughts okay, and not letting emotion and being emotional right take over from the beginning it's almost okay, fine. It's like you try to get
your players to know there are three things. You go into a press conference, you meet with a reporter, you know, you've got to have a couple of things you can go back to, right, And it might be two for some,
it might be three for another. You know, we always try to say, okay, let's make sure when you get stuck, okay, when you get into a situation, have a couple of things that you can go back to that make sure you never leave talking to the press, talking to somebody without praising at least two teammates and a coach, right and so like, I would always try to get players to focus on that rather than the emotional response they
might give, so that they don't get stuck. And it doesn't always work, but you try to give them that platform and that organization in their mind. Not the same for us as parents. You get a couple of thoughts, you're going to wait for the right time, and then you do the hardest thing, which is you just breathe. You take deep breaths, You get your you help your child settle in. Maybe you talk about something else, but you breathe, you process, and you just wait for the
right time, and you do everything you can do. Okay, because I know some of my worst moments as a coach, and when I went right into the locker room after a tough game and start going right. You got to be able to process it. There's a reason that a lot of great coaches say the best three words you can use after a game when you're not feeling right is bring it in right, bring it in, and then deal with it tomorrow. Well, a lot of times in that car ride you're going to deal with it, but
you can't deal with it immediately. Wait for the timing, have your thoughts in process, and then let them talk. The best thing to try to do is a parent to get that level of engagement going with your kid is once it's settled in. Now again, they can't the kid is not doesn't get to sit there and fight it off and not talk at all. Right that You've
got to teach them to process their feelings. But you can't just give them questions that can be answered with a yes or no. You can't give them questions that are just one two three word answers. You want to try to formulate questions in your head or things that you want to ask or things that you want to cover that will register with them. And go back to that word absorb. You want them to absorb what they're hearing so that they can apply it and then you
kind of take it from there. And I think those are some of the most They're hard to do, but I think those are some of the best ways to do it.
Coach Crean, this is freaking awesome. I can't think, you know, where can people get up with you? Follow because you put out some amazing content.
Man, I think my Twitter is at Tom Crean. So I didn't do I didn't pay for the blue check, but I still let me see what I have here. Yeah, at Tom Crean. And and I'm on Instagram. I don't do a lot with Insta, but that's where it's at for the most part. ESPN. This year again for the college basketball season, I'll be doing that. But I try to think of things that I would want to hear, that I would want to know, and I try to put those out there. And so I really appreciate it.
Nick having a chance to be on with you.
I appreciate you, coach. That's Tom Cream, ESPN College Basketball Analyst. Thanks for listening to the Reform Sports Podcast. If you've enjoyed this episode, we would appreciate it if you took a moment to rate and review our podcast. As we work to grow our community of supporters and advocates for more reform sports content, please subscribe to our newsletter and blog at Reformsports Project dot com. You can also follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn.