The Journey Begins

Just about four years ago to the day, I stood in front of my new team. I had just been named the new head coach for a team that had been through three coaches in the last three years. It was pretty rough. I felt a great deal of distrust in that room and I knew that had good reason for it. This group had been through a lot. They were pretty dysfunctional, however, they shared one thing – they were hungry. Starved really for someone to care for them and help them become a team. My message then was “Let’s get back to the podium”. It seemed like a long shot but slowly but surely they bought into the idea and it became our vision.

Tonight I stood in front of many of the same athletes and addressed them for the first time this year. In the audience tonight were 11 out of 13 of the players that were part of our historic medal run in 2008. While many of the players are the same, this is a different group. We know what it means to be a family and we believe that we can beat any team on any given night. These are two huge factors as we look at these next 14 months.

Over the past two years, we found out that it is more difficult to stay on top than it is to get there. We are not going to surprise anyone anymore. Every team we play is going to be prepared to play their best game against us because we are now one of the best teams in the world. Perhaps we have slipped a bit. We are currently ranked fourth in the world and last summer we were roughed up pretty badly by Croatia and Serbia.

My message to the team tonight was that I am honored to be their coach and I look at it as a privilege to be part of Team USA. Yes there is sacrifice but I believe in their ability as individuals and as a team. We have the opportunity to make a run at the gold medal in 2012. What is it going to take? Commitment by all and a willingness to let Robert and I coach them and ultimately push them to become better.

We have made the decision to have all the athletes stay at home for this next year. This means that none of our players will be going overseas next year to play professionally. It means that we will have a great amount of time together over the next fourteen months. This will not be easy and then again it is not suppose to be. We are in it together and we will ride the difficult times and the good times together. Through it all we will become closer and respect and understand each other better. We now have 20 athletes in our camp and we will eventually have to cut this number down to 13. That is the number that will make the Olympic team.

It is an exciting time. Looking ahead to London, it is somewhat overwhelming. There is a huge task ahead with much work to be done. It will be difficult to keep everything in life balanced. I am concerned about being able to do this - balancing family, my office and coaching. We all (including myself) need to stay in the moment and focus on doing our best and giving our best one day at a time. If we can do this and challenge each other in the process to become better we can make this dream happen.

William Arthur Ward once wrote that “The price of excellence is discipline. The cost of mediocrity is disappointment.”

We must be disciplined in this task. This will be one of the biggest keys to our success.


The journey has officially begun…

See you at the pool.
Coach