March Madness: Control what you can control.
The NCAA tournament is by far my favorite sporting event of the year. The opening round starts this weekend with ‘must-win’, David versus Goliath match-ups. The next few days are always the most exciting in sports.
The rules are pretty straight forward. Lose a game and you are out. Win 6 straight and you are the national champion. It’s that easy. Or is it?
The tournament can be chaos, hence the name March Madness, and especially for a group of youngsters about to play on the biggest stage of their lives. The height and speed of the competition, being under-seeded, taking numerous trips across the country to play in unfamiliar territory, injury, COVID-19…all of these will add to this year’s tournament chaos.
Luckily, coaches and staff are giving their players some of the best advice of their young adulthood…
“Control what you can control.”
I was a young aviation officer in United States Air Force when I was first given this advice. There I was, flying through the mountains at night, trying to complete an airdrop mission on time. The weather was terrible and the wind continued to shift around at nearly 40 miles per hour. This made being on time difficult, and our crew standard was to be within 5 seconds of our TOT (time over target).
I was clearly frustrated with the wind and the weather. It made my job tough. Then my flight instructor said, “Control what you can control.”
He was right. I cannot control the weather and wind, but I can control direction of flight and airspeed. Those were two things I could change to help us complete our airdrop on time.
“Control what you can control.”
This is a great time of year for all us to remember that advice. Young athletes are playing in a basketball tournament full of uncertainty (who will be my next opponent?) and chaos (upsets, injuries, illness, and so on), but there are things the team and staff control to give their program the best chance of winning (i.e. film study, game planning, injury prevention, attitude, execution).
In the madness, are you controlling what you can for yourself and for your team?
For more on this topic, read here about playing the cards you are dealt.
