Page 151 - How to Create a Winning Organization

It Takes 10 Hands to Score a Basket
hammer was heading your way when you heard that. The 133
hammer was the bench, or worse, the shower. Many times he
wouldn’t exactly tell you what you couldn’t do, but he worked
things so that it was hard to do them.
Every year during football season there was a Cal Weekend
up at Berkeley when the Bruins played the Bears. Coach didn’t
want his players going up there because it was a big party week-
end. But instead of telling us we couldn’t go, he just moved
practice on Friday back to 6 p.m. Then he kept us late and
worked us so hard that nobody had the time or energy to drive
all night to get there.
But one year John Galbraith and I decided to fly up for Cal
Weekend. I was a Beta Theta Pi and had a couple of beers at
the fraternity party on Saturday night after the game. Some-
how, Coach Wooden found out not only that I went up to
Berkeley but that I’d had a few beers.
Monday morning I got a call that he wanted to see me in
his office. “Did you have fun this weekend?” he asked. I nod-
ded. “You know, Gail, if I ever see you drinking, you’re gone.”
I nodded, but I was in shock. “How does he know? How did
he find out?” I was thinking.
“Now, you’ve got a very good year coming up. You don’t
want to jeopardize that, do you? You don’t want to hurt the
team, do you?” I answered, “No, Coach. I don’t want to hurt
the team.”
“Good. I’ll see you at practice.”
The thing was, he wouldn’t try and catch you doing some-
thing wrong like having a beer. That wasn’t his style. He
wanted you to assume responsibility for your actions, to have
self-control. The whole point of that conversation on Mon-
day was to make me think about what choices I was making.
And I did.