Page 95 - How to Create a Winning Organization

Good Values Attract Good People

ON WOODEN 77
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: UCLA Varsity, 1967–1969;
three national championships

COACH WOODEN’S FIELD OF DREAMS
You may have seen the Kevin Costner movie, Field of Dreams—
“Build it and they will come.” Coach Wooden did that. He
built his basketball program a certain way—athletically, ethi-
cally, morally—because he believed it would attract a certain
type of person; the kind of individual he wanted on the team.
And if he didn’t have success that way, it was all right
with him because he felt his program made sense; in every
way it made sense to him. So he was going to do it that way.
Coach was almost a mystic in knowing what would happen.
And, he was right—when he built it, they came. I was one of
them.
I chose UCLA in large part because of what I saw and
heard regarding those values. Dr. Ralph Bunche and Jackie
Robinson wrote to me saying UCLA was a great place for an
education and athletics. Willie Naulls told me that race
wasn’t an issue with Coach Wooden.
And one of the most important things in my decision was
seeing Rafer Johnson on the Ed Sullivan Show. I knew he was
a world-class athlete, but he was on the show as president of
the student body at UCLA. That told me the school appreci-
ated him for more than just being a jock. It told me a whole
lot about what UCLA was about.
With his hair parted in the middle, Coach looked like he
fell off a box of Pepperidge Farm cookies. That was mislead-