Building a Successful Team Structure: Everything it takes from the bottom up.

The construction of a successful team program involves a lot more than just what happens after school between 3 and 5. It requires literally hundreds of hours over the course of the year for which the coach will go uncompensated.

Thousands of high school coaches do it for the love of the kids and the love of the sport. In short, for all of the highs and lows of the coaching experience, coaches derive an intense personal satisfaction from building programs for which they are often meagerly rewarded.

Over the course of my 15 years in coaching at the grade school, high school, and college levels, I have put together a catalog of ideas, activities, and promotions for building a comprehensive program. The ideas, most of which I have tried myself, can be used by any coach to improve his or her program and build school community pride.

While most coaches may find it difficult to implement all of these in one season, they should be able to find enough to improve their program, enhance team camaraderie, and build school and community support.

I have categorized the list into three areas: (1) Communication, Team Building, and Motivation, (2)Game and Season Ideas, and (3) Public Relations and Program Promotion.

Communication/Motivation

Hold pre- and post-season meetings with the players to discuss goals and expectations.

Correspond every week with parents about upcoming games, practice times, and other general announcements.

Write weekly memos to the team and everyone else on the lower level, on such subjects as academics, game information, or other special points of emphasis.

The failure to regularly communicate with kids and parents is the biggest cause of failure among coaches.

Send personally written encouraging notes to the players on school stationery.

Evaluate individuals and team several times during the season, not just at the end of the year.

Have the players fill out team and individual goal sheets.

Arrange brief monthly face-to-face meetings with the players to discuss their roles on the team and areas in which they can improve.

Schedule an overnight team retreat at the beginning of the season at an out-of-the-way site at which you can hold practices and team meetings.

Arrange team holiday parties at school or a coach's or player's home to build camaraderie.

Have a team pizza/movie party after a Friday practice.

Sponsor an open practice for parents and family at the start of the season, followed by a brief food/soda reception.

Have a "meet-the-parents" and/or booster-club members party.

Hold a team mass or prayer session on game day (for parochial or private schools).

Arrange for team study halls, if you have a late practice time.

Circulate weekly or bimonthly academic progress check forms for the faculty.

Have a player-of-the-week award for the entire program (offense, defense, hustle, attitude) and post it on the bulletin board in the locker room.

Build pride in the locker room by fixing it up with a paint job, logos, posters, laminated motivational sayings, a grease marker board (instead of a chalkboard), and a bulletin board updated regularly with articles, pictures, and statistics.

Hold weekly team locker room clean-up parties. It takes only five minutes and promotes pride and personal responsibility.

Bring in guest speakers for occasional motivational purposes. Videos can also be used.

Take coaches on a pre/post season strategy retreat.

Hold open gyms in the off-season and pre-season. Make sure that the participants are not involved in a sport at that time.

Arrange for optional pre-season conditioning for athletes not involved in a sport at that time.

Promote an end-of-the-season pot luck or dinner program.

Promote participation in summer leagues and team camps.

Game/Season Ideas

Delegate responsibility to your assistants and players.

Take care of referees. Make sure someone meets them and escorts them to and from locker room. Make sure they have towels, soda, and popcorn. During games, call them by first name rather than "Hey, Ref!"

On day of game, have shoot-arounds or walk-throughs after school.

Do video evaluations of players' shots several times during the season.

Do scouting reports on upcoming opponents and give copies to players.

Show team video clips of next opponent, and analyze your own team tape as well.

Make up playbooks and fundamental packets for each player.

Dress up players and managers on game day to promote unity and generate school awareness of that night's game.

Schedule varsity reserve games to provide JV and Varsity reserves with additional playing time.

Schedule a multi-team scrimmage at the beginning of the season and follow it with a reception for all participants.

Develop a smart pre-game warm-up routine to project a polished image.

Get yourself invited to a holiday tournament or host your own.

Meet with band director, cheerleading coaches, and game managers to ensure an exciting game atmosphere.

Ask art department and/or artistic students to design colorful posters and banners for the gym or playing facility.

Schedule one regular season game at a local professional or college arena/stadium to play in a "big time" setting.

Sponsor half-time contests with prizes and giveaways to boost excitement and attendance.

Have half-time games featuring district grade school teams or Special Olympics participants.

Have special recognition nights at your games honoring parents, gradeschool members, seniors, community members, and/or fire fighters and police officers.

Make sure to have concession stands, announcers, national anthem performers, a mascot, game statisticians, and video coordinators at every game.

Program Promotion

Have team engage in charity fund-raisers and other community outreach activities such as working at an area soup kitchen or food pantry, doing a Christmas food drive, cleaning up the school neighborhood, and/or raising money for local Boys and Girls Club.

Arrange post-game receptions in the cafeteria after games open to team members, family, cheerleaders, and opposing team.

Contact media to increase coverage of your team, inducing area radio stations and/or school or cable networks to carry your games.

Develop a positive relationship with the newspaper reporter who covers your team, frequently feeding him ideas for stories as well as supplying statistics and records.

Prepare a weekly sports highlight show for the school or community cable access station, showing interviews as well as game highlights.

Sponsor a junior program for grade schoolers, even as young as first graders, and have the varsity coaches and players work with these kids an hour a week. Allow these junior club members to perform at a halftime of one of your games.

Start a sports page on the Internet, featuring pictures, scores, and statistics updated weekly.

Have "fundamental nights" for lower and middle schoolers, featuring the high school coaches and players as demonstrators. Follow the evening with a reception for the kids and their parents.

Start a middle school ball boy/ball girls program. Allow these kids to do managerial duties in exchange for sitting on the bench and coming into the locker room for half-time and post game talks.

Advertise and promote your team's games by putting up fliers, posters, and banners in all district school hallways.

Have regular announcements over the PA, reporting game results to the student body.

Support other school teams by showing up together as a unit to cheer them on.

Sponsor a fund-raiser to raise additional revenue for your program: car washes, bake sales, rummage sales, or other events featuring sponsor donations.

Do varsity sport demonstrations at area grade-school assemblies.

Meet with grade-school coaches on an ongoing basis to talk about your playing system and program philosophy. Invite coaches to see your practices.

Sponsor coaching roundtables with grade-school coaches as a means of increasing their knowledge of your sport and strengthening your working relationship.

Arrange a coaches' clinic in the fall or spring featuring high school, college, or even coaches and host it at your school.

Write an article for publication in a coaching or sports magazine.

Sponsor a grade-school tournament, hosted at your school, as a means of attracting potential student-athletes. Include a coaches' hospitality room.

Conduct summer camps featuring coach and player guess speakers.

Sponsor a summer get-together with conference coaches and area grade-school coaches as well.

Arrange speaking engagements before community groups such as the Kiwanis, Lions, Rotary Club, etc. to promote your program.

Coaches today must be able to wear different hats in order to build a comprehensive program. Knowledge of X's and O's is no longer enough. You must be willing to reach out to different constituencies in order to build a complete K12 program.

By undertaking several of these projects and ideas, you will be reaching out to all members of your school and community and will increase attendance at games by making everyone aware of your team.

Most importantly, however, you will solidify your role as architect of a successful, comprehensive athletic program, built "from the bottom up!"