What determines if a high school coach is a great coach?

[Dunk 1]

Personally, I think in this area to be considered a great coach he would have to have an appearance in the final four. Just winning league championships is not enough. I think deep tourny runs are the key. What do you all think?

[Heavy D]

Evidently just go 19-1 for one season. Even if you have won less than 30% of your games throughout your career, one season of 19-1 and a league title earns you the title of "Great Coach" in the eyes of many from a local school.

[moonshine]

Develop good students and have a clean well organized program which has more wins than losses! Also it helps to will a few championships and once in a while and make a deep run in the tournment.

By the way I am not associated with LYBA or Logan Bobcats! Please refrain form trashing these two fine organizations

[newlex/sheridan]

I think a great coach gets the most that he can out of each player on his team and helps them to improve over the course of the season. They bring the group together and teach them to play/win/lose as a team and to represent their school/family/community in a positive manner both on an off the court and in the classroom, in short they become a better person for playing for you. I also think that a great coach puts a program in place that teaches all aspects of the game and develops talent from the youngest levels to the varsity. If you are able to do this the wins will follow. Realistically, you aren't going to win a state title or league title every single year unless you are at one of those dreaded private schools who cherry pick their players but if the program is ran correctly you will be in the mix for a league title and quality tourny run every season. There have been several great coaches who never appeared in a state tourny and there haver been several sub-par coaches (satch sullinger, IMO) who have won state titles and national coach of the year awards.

[caglewis]

^^^^^^^^^ Very well said!!!!!! I totally agree.

[Binary]

Evidently just go 19-1 for one season. Even if you have won less than 30% of your games throughout your career, one season of 19-1 and a league title earns you the title of "Great Coach" in the eyes of many from a local school.

I think a coach has to win more than 30% to be considered a great coach. And no 1 good season does not make him great. Newlex/sher made some good points, but ultimately we are talking about the game of basketball are we not? So overall wins and losses have to account for something. Bottom line, great coaches win games sometimes with less talent than the teams they face.

[datchillicav]

District Championships. State Championships. Regional Championships. League Championships. In that order.
District Championships measure how many times you have a "very good" team.
State Championships measure how many times you have an "elite" or "all-time" team
Regional Championships measure how many "great" teams you have
League Championships how many times you have a "good" team that is better than the schools in similar circumstances for the most part geographically and enrollment wise.
Sectional Championships mean nothing IMO.

Off the court, How many players you send to college. Including D2 and 3 as well. Also, the conduct in which you run your program is very important but it is harder to measure.

[Heavy D]

District Championships. State Championships. Regional Championships. League Championships. In that order.
District Championships measure how many times you have a "very good" team.
State Championships measure how many times you have an "elite" or "all-time" team
Regional Championships measure how many "great" teams you have
League Championships how many times you have a "good" team that is better than the schools in similar circumstances for the most part geographically and enrollment wise.
Sectional Championships mean nothing IMO.

Off the court, How many players you send to college. Including D2 and 3 as well. Also, the conduct in which you run your program is very important but it is harder to measure.

I think the underlined part of your post is important. Sometimes league championships can be misleading when you are a lot bigger than most of the other schools in your league.

[Binary]

Coaching is more than teaching basketball and wins and losses. It is taking athletics to prepare young men and women for life, and I have sat and listened fascinated hearing former players now in their 50s and even 60s talking about things a former coach taught them that they took into their later jobs, marriages and raising families. That, IMO is the definition of greatness.

I remember telling a football coach one time that if his teams never won a single game I would still rather have him influencing my children than anyone I could think of.

While those things are important, there are people who do not even coach who do those things. Teachers, ministers, counselors even moms and dads have that type of influence. But this is coaching we are talking about. So to be a great coach, I think they need to do the above sometimes, but also to win games over their careers. JMHO

[Generals_85]

A great coach is someone who wins. That is it. Being a coach means you have to win games if you want to keep your job. Someone who wins more tournament games consistantly throughout their career more than others obviously is a better coach.
I hear people in my area talk about one local coach. They talk about how dedicated he is and how the kids in his program are very respectful. But, he has a winning percentage of 52% and has won one sectional title in 11 years and 0 league titles. To me, this coach is a nice guy but not a very good coach.
We then have another fella in our area who has won several league titles, sectional titles, district titles, some regional titles, a few state runners-up, and won one state title. He has done this with class. He is a great coach. So I guess all of this book I am writing basically says that being a nice guy doesnt make you a great coach. I'm done. Ha ha ha.

[newlex/sheridan]

Satch Sullinger won a bunch of games, some district titles and a state title.......he isn't a good coach, plain and simple. You win with hard work, you win big with talent that works hard. After a few years of establishing your program you should have players coming with the ability to win at a high rate if your program is ran the correct way.

[old bird]

A great coach is one that wins (and loses) with sportsmanship.

[jottings]

Good posts, newlex-sheridan and GAHS-4-Ever. You folks know what you are talking about.

[crazymidgets]

I agree Jottings, Newlex/sheridan and Gahs-4-ever those were were good posts, you got it going on.

[Chained Eagle]

I have decided to chime in with my two cents on this topic. Some have made very good points, some I question and some I wonder if they are serious or just looking for confrontation. People's differnent ideas is interesting to read.

Some of the better thoughts IMO would include building the program from lower levels through varsity, improving team and individuals thoughout the season, building the group into a team, assisting with building character, commitment, discipline and etc... Winning some championships should be included in describing greatness. Winning them with open enrollment, transfers, recruits is far less impressive than winning them with your own though. As for winning, coach of school A winning 10 games could be more impressive than coach of school B winning 16 or more games. Not sure I agree with having players move on to the next level as a mark of greatness. Tells me if you have players moving on the the next level you should be winning.

With that being said, IMO the word GREAT is thrown around to easily today. In southeastern Ohio I think we have many good coaches. Great coaches? None would jump out at me as being GREAT. I think you would have to look hard around the state to find GREAT coaches.

[love_the_game]

I think a great coach gets the most that he can out of each player on his team and helps them to improve over the course of the season. They bring the group together and teach them to play/win/lose as a team and to represent their school/family/community in a positive manner both on an off the court and in the classroom, in short they become a better person for playing for you. I also think that a great coach puts a program in place that teaches all aspects of the game and develops talent from the youngest levels to the varsity. If you are able to do this the wins will follow. Realistically, you aren't going to win a state title or league title every single year unless you are at one of those dreaded private schools who cherry pick their players but if the program is ran correctly you will be in the mix for a league title and quality tourny run every season. There have been several great coaches who never appeared in a state tourny and there haver been several sub-par coaches (satch sullinger, IMO) who have won state titles and national coach of the year awards.

This is very well put Newlex/sheridan! I think we get so caught up in the winning and losing that it is overlooked that these are kids becoming young men and women and they need to learn so much more than how to be a good basketball player. They need to learn sportsmanship because things in life do not always go the way we would like and we need to learn how to not lose our cool about it. They need to learn how to win gracefully and lose gracefully. They need to learn how to work as a TEAM (very much overlooked in our sports programs today) because learning how to work together for a common good is important in learning how to be good spouses, parents, employees, etc. I think we could go on and on about these aspects of life. Just wanted to let you know that your post was right on!!

[osumufan]

Great coaches win ball games. But they also have integrity and morals and try to instill them in the boys they coach. Don't care if you win the league and go far in the tourney every year. If you don't live your life with morals and integrity you are not great! I'll just leave it as that!

[SickRick]

I think a great coach gets the most that he can out of each player on his team and helps them to improve over the course of the season. They bring the group together and teach them to play/win/lose as a team and to represent their school/family/community in a positive manner both on an off the court and in the classroom, in short they become a better person for playing for you. I also think that a great coach puts a program in place that teaches all aspects of the game and develops talent from the youngest levels to the varsity. If you are able to do this the wins will follow. Realistically, you aren't going to win a state title or league title every single year unless you are at one of those dreaded private schools who cherry pick their players but if the program is ran correctly you will be in the mix for a league title and quality tourny run every season. There have been several great coaches who never appeared in a state tourny and there haver been several sub-par coaches (satch sullinger, IMO) who have won state titles and national coach of the year awards.

I agree

[DYNAM0]

You fellas can say what you want, but I know of a coach or two that have been deemed as great coaches, but are not the most moralistic people around. They get their players to play hard, and they win with equal or better talent than the other teams. They also get a few transfers here and there. I have seen several people on here say those coaches, the one in particular, are great though.

[newlex/sheridan]

I guess it just depends on what you feel is important and impressive. Most coaches have many good qualities and some not so great, they have their strengthes an weaknesses. Seeing how nobody is perfect the best I think you could hope for is to put a quality staff in place that compliments each others strengthes and weaknesses.