by Charlie Adams, StokeTheFireWithin.com
Herb Brooks did the ultimate recruiting when he brought together the 1980 U.S. Olympic team. All of the players were either college players, or had played college fairly recently.
As I have written about here before, Mike Eruzione was a pivotal part of the team. Years ago John Powers and Art Kominsky wrote a book entitled One Goal about how that team was brought together. Regarding Eruzione, they wrote “he had everything coaches say they want in an athlete” –
* Drive
* Resiliency
* Team loyalty
* Instinct for the big play
Those are four key factors in recruiting, especially instinct for the big play.
Leadership is critical and there are conflicting reports about how Eruzione was made captain of that team. Herb let the team vote, and Buzz Schneider was a very popular player. He would have made an excellent captain as well, and the players thought he would be voted in, but it came out as Eruzione. Some of the players thought Herb had pulled an Idi Amin. He denied it. Who knows, but Eruzione as captain was brilliant.
This week I also wanted to write about the importance of motivation in recruiting and in winning in college athletics. Herb Brooks said this: “Motivation is the energy that makes everything work. It is clearly the single most critical part of performance.”
Herb had all kinds of motivational stories and tools he used in recruiting and in the development of his teams at the University of Minnesota (3 NCAA titles in 7 seasons) and the Olympic hockey team. As a longtime motivational speaker who has done hundreds of talks in high school settings, I can tell you that young people respond to powerful motivational stories.
When Herb told the team just before the historic game vs the Soviets that they were born to be hockey players and meant to be there, he delivered one of the greatest messages in sports history. Mark Johnson scored with :01 to go at the end of the 1st period to tie it at 1 because of that speech. He never let up because his coach had basically told him that it had been written in some book centuries ago that they were destined to be there.
Mike Lightfoot is a hall of fame NAIA basketball coach at Bethel College in Mishawaka, IN. Go in his office and you will find shelves of motivational materials he has used for decades. His teams have won multiple national championships and he has developed many fine young men. Having brought in my workshop on lessons we can learn from the Miracle on Ice boys, one of the things he has told his team over and over is that “legs feed the wolf.”
Herb used to always say that in getting his teams to optimum conditioning.
Next week I will write about the best books out there on how the Miracle on Ice came to be — books that every college coach should have on their shelves.
Motivational Speaker Charlie Adams delivers his More Than a Miracle program to college coaches and athletes. He explains how the 1980 Miracle on Ice was not so much a miracle as it was work ethic, remarkable vision and leadership, commitment to change, commitment to team, and perseverance.
Charlie can be reached at StokeTheFireWithin.com and at charlie@stokethefirewithin.com