This past week I attended the National Athletic Directors Conference in Nashville,Tennessee. I look forward to this conference every year as I leave invigorated and full of new ideas to bring back to Mercy. I took three courses and attended breakout sessions. The breakout session I enjoyed was titled Building Culture through Positive Leadership. In this session they outlined the ways they built a winning culture.
1. Connection
2. Conviction
3. Courage
(Look familiar to last week's update related to practice!)
Both speakers informed us about methods they use to connect with coaches and the athletes throughout the year. Winning is the outcome but developing winners is the process. The process is the most important part of my athletic department. Winning is fun and can make for a very memorable season, but our focus is on developing our student athletes' character throughout a season.
On Saturday Mercy made their way to Felton, California to take on San Lorenzo Valley. It was a close game all the way through with Mercy leading 29-25 at half. In the second half San Lorenzo began to pull away. Mercy found themselves on the free throw line but could not convert. San Lorenzo Valley won 60-53.
On Saturday Mercy traveled to Fremont, for the final game of the Firebird Tournament. They took on a strong team who were the tournament hosts. Fremont found the back of the net twice and that was all they needed for the victory. Mercy will go into the break with lots of training before they pick back up again in January.