by Pete Carroll
This would be the first of many encounters with Will and the Trojans. He made a surprise appearance as “Ricky Bobby” from the film Talladega Nights in full race car regalia; we raced in a charity event called “Swim with Mike”; and he showed up to practice as the superhero “Captain Compete,” saving a stuntman who fell off the filming scaffold, and even extinguishing another stuntman who was on fire on the practice field. Most recently, Will hosted an extraordinary fund-raiser at the NOKIA Theatre at L.A. Live, raising nearly a million dollars for A Better LA, my foundation. He truly has made great efforts to bring fun to the Trojans over the years and I couldn’t be more appreciative.
There have been a number of priceless moments shared with the team and coaches, way too many to recount. The fact that USC is in the heart of Los Angeles and down the road from Hollywood afforded us many opportunities to connect with actors, entertainers, and notable sports figures on a fairly regular basis. I will always be grateful to all the wonderful people who contributed to make our experience at USC so special.
At the beginning of this chapter, I stated that the best fun for a football team is celebrating in a victorious locker room. The process of getting to that locker room is long and arduous. Whatever it takes to make the journey fun and engaging is worth it to me. Outsiders would be staggered by the effort we would make to keep the players guessing, never letting them in on what was coming next, just to enhance the impact of the upcoming event. No one had more fun than me, and I guess competing to pull off another prank on the players was a way of keeping me engaged and tuned in as well.
There is somewhat of a method to the madness behind the effort to make it fun and keep the team entertained. First, stirring up the environment we worked in is designed to keep it fresh and alive. We are teachers committed to our players learning at an extremely high level. That learning will directly affect how well prepared they are and how well they ultimately perform. A thriving learning environment has to increase the attention of our players. Second, there is an underlying message to convey to your team as you demonstrate confidence in them. When you allow them the opportunity to enjoy a change of tempo at the expense of a meeting or practice you are demonstrating that you believe in them. As I have said earlier, any way you can bolster the players’ confidence and demonstrate your belief in them will make them stronger.
Over the years, our players have developed a unique ability to quickly transition between being serious and being lighthearted. They have developed the skill to do this because on any given day, we might change the tone and tempo of meetings or practice. Dealing with and practicing how you control your emotions, if done well, can become a valuable asset for an individual performer or a team. In football, the momentum swings in any game can cause a team to vacillate from one end of the spectrum to the other. To effectively handle major swings of emotion in a game is a skill that will allow a player to perform at his best. An example of the command of this skill was observed back in 2008 versus Ohio State.
Our 2008 matchup against the Buckeyes was about as hyped-up a contest as you get to see. Each team had played in two of the past four national championships, but we had not taken the field against each other in nearly twenty years. The energy at the Coliseum that day was wild. Going into the game, we were ranked number one and Ohio State number five, but the outcome was anyone’s guess. Ohio State was coming into the Coliseum that day, and more than ninety-two thousand fans had made sure there wasn’t an empty seat. Throughout that week, our players had to deal with the concept of a “big game” and the pressures that can be associated with that, but they handled it like it was any other game. We practiced well, stayed focused, and prepared for the matchup. As we sat in the locker room minutes before the game, I recall looking over to the alums and boosters in the hallway and noticing them sweating bullets. I couldn’t help but smile. They were so serious and so worried that it was almost painful, and none of them even had to play a snap!
Our players were loose and relaxed as if they were just going into another practice. With all that pressure on them, they were confident, poised, and excited to play the game. Noticeably, they were playful and very comfortable even as game time drew near. Why? It wasn’t because they took the moment for granted or because they felt for one second that victory was somehow assured. It was because no group could have worked harder to be ready for that moment or put more of themselves into the effort than our players.
Yet with everyone around them as tense as you could possibly imagine, I am proud to say that our players were just excited to play football. They knew they had put in all the work to prepare during the week and were looking forward to just cutting it loose on the field.
Our coaches could easily have spent those final moments telling their players how much was at stake, how important this win was for us, but they did not. What would have been the point? They knew the same thing our players did: The moment had arrived and they were ready to play ball.
The difference between our players’ states of mind and that of the alums and boosters was not who was more serious—it was more a matter of us feeling loose and ready to play. Our guys knew that the only thing left to do was go out and perform like they had been prepared to do. And that is exactly what happened, as the Trojans dominated the game, winning 35-3.
18
PLAYING IN THE ABSENCE OF FEAR
A head coach’s primary objective is to orchestrate the overall mentality of his team. Great teams commonly display an air of confidence that separates them from others. They have earned the right to be confident through their hard work and success. The best teams utilize that confidence to share a feeling where they not only expect to win, they know they are going to win. That knowing is what allows a team to play in the absence of fear. That concept was the main objective and the ultimate focus throughout my nine years at USC and will also be now in Seattle.
When everything comes together for highly successful teams, they know they are going to win before they step out onto the field. This knowing is the most powerful state of mind for any team, and this is precisely what we set out to capture every season at USC. In my time as a coach I’ve learned that possibly the greatest detractor from high performance is fear: fear that you are not prepared, fear that you are in over your head, fear that you are not worthy, and ultimately, fear of failure. If you can eliminate that fear—not through arrogance or just wishing difficulties away, but through hard work and preparation— you will put yourself in an incredibly powerful position to take on the challenges you face.
I am a firm believer in the idea that more often than not, people will live up to the expectations you set for them, and when it comes to our players, we set those expectations extremely high from their first day in the program—often even well beyond what the player himself thinks he can achieve—and we make sure they know it. High expectations are one of the most powerful tools we have. But we also understand that, if those expectations are unrealistic, inappropriate for the individual player in question, or so overwhelming and long term that players don’t have the opportunity to enjoy smaller accomplishments along the way, then we are just setting our players up to fail.
Ideally, we want to create an atmosphere or a culture where our players can perform in the absence of fear. It is my job to orchestrate this “knowing we are going to win” mentality. Achieving that means finding ways to prove to players that they can rely on themselves and their teammates to perform at the highest level in the face of any challenge—even losing.
While the Win Forever philosophy sounds great when things are going well, what happens when things go wrong? How do you Win Forever given that everyone loses sometimes? The reality is that, no matter how well you practice, how fully you develop your philosophy, or how effectively you recruit, you will lose now and then. What separates those who have a true Win Forever outlook from those who don’t is the ability to approach that challenge of losing with the same competitive spirit with which they approach everyt
hing else. When I say that “everything counts” or that every challenge in life is a chance to compete, I mean it. I don’t mean “everything except losing.” Personally, I hate to lose more than almost anything. What I hate even more is learning the hard way. I want that for the other guy. But in reality we can learn tremendously from our losses and our mistakes, though that is tough to admit.
Those setbacks, challenges, and hardships have been learning experiences, and I have learned to respect and appreciate them. In their own way, what they have taught me was as much a part of our Rose Bowl victories and national championships at USC as anything else I have picked up along the way.
In fact, it was in our most difficult moments at USC that I leaned on the Win Forever approach the most. We have had our share of disappointments, but few more dramatic than at the end of the 2005 season, when we faced the University of Texas in the BCS national championship game. We were twenty-six seconds away from winning an unprecedented third straight national title.
The Longhorns’ quarterback, Vince Young, had delivered a superhuman effort all night, and we knew that he was sure to save his best for last. The game had gone back and forth all night. We had our offense, led by Matt Leinart, Reggie Bush, Steve Smith, Dwayne Jarrett, and LenDale White, performing at a high level—they even set a Rose Bowl record with 574 total yards of offense. But Texas also had a high-powered machine and kept the score close throughout the game.
Up 38-33 with 4:03 remaining, we needed a couple first downs to clinch a victory. We had practiced this situation numerous times and were confident that we could operate our “four-minute offense” and win the game. After all, moments like this were what we were all about as a team. After a short run by LenDale and a completion from Matt to Dwayne, we had one of the two necessary first downs to clinch the BCS championship. On first down we gave the ball back to LenDale for a three-yard gain, which got us to midfield. After an incompletion and another short run by LenDale, we were faced with fourth and two.
We were confident with our play call for this fourth and two situation, “27 Power Quad.” LenDale had run it all season long with near-perfect success. He took the handoff and as he was forced to cut back, a Texas defensive lineman made a great play to take away his running lane. We were stopped inches short of the first down marker, giving the ball back to Texas.
As Young and his offense jogged onto the field with 2:13 left in the game, down 38-33, I knew our defense would have to make a play, as Young was performing in the proverbial “zone,” with no sign of slowing down. He started by completing a pass for minus two yards, followed by an incompletion on second down. On third and twelve from the Texas forty-two-yard line, he completed a pass to Quan Cosby for seven yards, short of a first down. However, we were called for a facemask penalty, keeping the Longhorns drive alive.
Young completed a pass to Brian Carter for nine yards, ran for seven, and completed another pass for seventeen yards, moving his team to our thirteen-yard line with the clock winding down. We were calling all sorts of defenses as we pressured two linebackers on one snap, played coverage on the next, and brought a corner blitz on another, but Young kept at it. On first down, he threw an incomplete pass. On second, he ran for five yards, and on third and five from our eight-yard line he threw another incompletion out of the end zone to stop the clock. And there we were, fourth and five with only twenty-six seconds remaining.
The 93,986 fans were standing up—half screaming and half holding their breath. It was as magnificent a setting as any competitor could ask to be a part of. We decided to bring our two inside linebackers on a blitz and play man coverage. As Young dropped back, he went through his progression and stepped up in the pocket, avoiding our pressure. He took off to his right and we had no chance to catch him as he raced to the end zone for the game-winning touchdown. That superhuman effort, which totaled 267 yards passing, plus 200 yards rushing on nineteen carries, for a total of 467 yards by one player, was a Rose Bowl record. As a result, Vince Young earned the game’s MVP award.
As I entered the locker room following the game, I was racing to think of what I would tell the players. We had just had our thirty-four-game winning streak snapped and had fallen short of a third straight national championship. I decided to tell the truth:Men, we came within nineteen seconds of winning a third consecutive national title—nineteen seconds! To put in all of the work we put in, there is no way that nineteen seconds can define us as winners or losers. We’ve always said that for someone to beat us we either have to turn it over a number of times and give the game away or they have to play out of their minds, and tonight, number ten had one of the greatest single game performances in the history of college football, and still, we were only nineteen seconds away from winning! Give Texas all the credit in the world, but you’re still champions. Nineteen seconds will never define you.
While I did not want to take anything away from Texas, as they were the superior team that night, I wanted our players to still feel like champions. It had been a historic season and one that our entire program should have been proud of. We were not going to let nineteen seconds define us. Because of the character of our players, and because they knew from experience that it is possible to play to your full potential and still not walk away with the win, we would not let that one loss define us.
Certainly we had other tough losses at USC. What is truly remarkable is how our players and coaches responded in every situation. By returning to the truth of who we were and by looking forward to the challenge of our next opponent, we were able to be incredibly resilient, in spite of any adversity. We never dragged the past along with us, because the past is not a place where we can compete. I think it is in part because we refused to do that in victory that we were so successful in moving on from a defeat. Instead, we focused on recapturing the essence of who we knew ourselves to be and on controlling what was directly in front of us, and then hit the practice field with the intention of getting better the very next day. We never allowed the disappointment of losing to diminish the attitude and energy we needed to bring every day.
When you have gotten to a place where you are as ready to embrace the learning opportunities given to you by the games you lose as to embrace the ones given to you by the games you win, then you are ready for all potential outcomes. That state of mind, when you are truly competing for the sake of performance alone, is when you are performing in the absence of fear, and I promise you that an organization that can get to that mind-set will succeed—will win—not just for a game or a season but from that moment onward.
19
SETTING A VISION AND SEEING IT
Growing up outside San Francisco, I was a casual fan of the Grateful Dead. I remember hearing an interview with the late, great guitar player and leader of the band, Jerry Garcia.
I can’t remember exactly what question the interviewer asked him, but it was something along the lines of “How do you feel about being possibly the greatest rock-and-roll band of all time?” A classic softball question, but rather than responding with the usual fluff, Jerry said something I’ll never forget. “No, man,” he answered, ever so relaxed. “That’s not how we think of ourselves at all. We don’t want to be the best ones doing something—we want to be the only ones doing it.”
That cool reply stuck in my head. And as I thought about it over the years, I came to realize what an important concept Garcia was onto. The best performers, whether athletes, entertainers, or anybody else trying to do anything well, are the ones who aren’t trying to win by playing someone else’s game. Each person is made up of a unique combination of strengths, weaknesses, abilities, and talents, and any one of us can only truly maximize our potential in the context of that individual makeup. That’s why it doesn’t make sense to think about competition in the context of any one opponent: If you are really in a Win Forever mind-set, the only comparison that matters is yourself. Your goal should be to maximize your potential and your performance as a permanent way of being, rathe
r than just thinking in terms of individual victories.
Furthermore, one of the most important facets of the Win Forever approach is to help people see what they can become and then to support them. We want to help our players, both at USC and now in Seattle, make the connection with their potential until it becomes real for them. It’s not so much about getting to that goal in a certain amount of time as it is about the process of working to get there. Once that confidence takes hold, you can see things start to happen. As a coach working to build confidence, you have to convince your players that not only do they have the power to control their performance, but they’re the only ones who do. Other people can factor into their success, either by helping them realize their goals or by motivating them to get there, but it’s the individual himself who ultimately is the only one who has the power to develop his fullest potential.
Getting that across to players is a constant occupation. You have to continually encourage people to the point where they feel empowered to call the shots that will position them to become the best they can be. It’s not any one specific thing but rather an ongoing process of showing them what they’re capable of.
Personally, I have learned that if you create a vision for yourself and stick with it, you can make amazing things happen in your life. My experience is that once you have done the work to create the clear vision, it is the discipline and effort to maintain the vision that can make it all come true. The two go hand in hand. The moment you’ve created that vision, you’re on your way, but it’s the diligence with which you stick to that vision that allows you to get there.