Creating Tradition

I’ve been here at LLCC now quite a while.  It’s been quite a ride, a lot of work.  Since this is the start of my thirtieth year in volleyball, I’m trying to do a lot of reflective pieces.  This is one of them.  If you’d rather something more modern, consider checking out my book of coaching essays.  It’s under five bucks.  Give up a frappe mochachino latte today and have the book for a lifetime.

This morning I was reading a fluff piece on the upcoming football season and the importance of tradition to the University of Michigan’s football success–no mention of the exorbitant funding given to the program over the past century or that along with the rest of the Big Ten(14), they generally avoid playing less-funded teams who could beat them…wait, this isn’t a polemic against the Big Fourteen(10).  Anyways…

I started thinking about tradition.  What is it, how do you create it, can you create specific elements of it?  Why didn’t it exist before I got here to LLCC?  It turns out, I don’t have the answers to all of those questions, but figured they are all worth discussing because there is a great deal of value in tradition–look at how it works for those big-name college programs, look how it creates pride for those in the Marines or the Army.  Heck, not just the US military, there are military units in Europe that trace their lineage as organizations back more than 500 years!

So, let’s think about the questions.  Think of your answers as I struggle to give you mine!

What is tradition?  It’s defined as “the transmission of values from one generation to the next.”  In terms of coaching, this means what you teach and how it carries over from year to year, how the players become part of it.  The problem at a two-year school is that players arrive and are done playing in the space of about 15 months.  That’s not much time to get ‘buy-in’ from entering players and sophomores often have an eye on four-year schools as soon as they’re done with their second season.

How do you create tradition? I think the biggest requirement is time.  For a program to have tradition, there has to be limited turnover of personnel.  At a two-year school, that’s impossible with the athletes.  That means you need to have coaching/administrative stability.  I’ve been here 14 years.  That makes me the longest-tenured coach in our region.  And the state of Illinois.  Also the Midwest (other than Kirkwood Community College and a couple of schools in MI/OH).  In terms of tenure, I think our region goes something like: 14, 11, 8, 5, 4, 2, 2, 1, 1, 1.  We had a coach just retire after 28 years.  Which schools have the most success? The most ‘tradition’?  Yup–28, 14, 11.

What parts of tradition can you create?  You have no control over time.  That is an endurance contest.  Instead, you can follow up on the military inspiration.  If I mention ‘Green Beret’, an American immediately will see a soldier.  Civil War historians reading ‘damned black hat fellers’ will immediately recognize a reference to the elite Iron Brigade, the greatest brigade to fight against the treasonous states of the South.  Do you have special decorations for your uniforms?–look at the stickers on college football helmets!  Do you have special apparel–perhaps something permitted only for varsity letter-winners and not just anyone part of the program?  What about trinkets?  In the military, this could be shoulder cords, the medals/ribbons on a uniform.

Do you have rites-of-passage…to be clear, I’m not talking hazing!!!…?  With LLCC, we have something called ‘Hell Week’ which is the one week everyone contributes to fund-raising.  It sucks to do, but it brings everyone closer together through the shared sucky experience.  We have a couple drills that players know are good for them as players, but they absolutely despise.  –These are things that can be shared with those who come later.

This summer when a couple of alumni saw current players in yoga pants rather than slacks, they accused me of getting soft on the dress code (I wasn’t)–reminding me with the classic words “When I was here….” and mentioning it to current players as well!  This is a bond I share with all of them coach-to-player, but they also have without me.  They went through it all and came out okay on the other side.

(A little more on this after the next question…)

So why wasn’t there ‘tradition’ before I got here?  First, we’re back to the issue of time.  Before I came to LLCC, there’s no record of a coach being here more than three years.  As I noted above, players are here two years, so that when you switch coaches almost as quickly, there’s no continuity.  There’s no ability to make changes in practice planning, tactics, etc, stick.  New coaches are always adjusting to the school and higher-ups, not just dealing with new athletes and managing stuff in the gym.

That carried over into a different area–one where I think you can make a concrete difference in establishing tradition…even if you aren’t planning to remain long-term with your current school.  Other than the three coaches who came before me, there’s NO record of anyone who coached here…nothing at all.  (I’ll be able to get some of that coming up at our next alumni match–another way to bond/cement tradition).   Not only was there no record of who coached, roster lists and programs only go back to 2002 (again, something I’m working on via our alumni match).

I think stats are important.  They show where the program’s been, where it is, how things change.  Just as important (and practical), having a stat archive allows you as coach to give great tidbits to newspapers/media:

• Anderson shattered the school triple-double record, breaking it by six before adding two more at the National Tournament.

• Scott is the only outside hitter in program history to hit over .300 for a season.

• Jackson’s 64 assists against G.R. broke an 11-yr old record held by Kate Ehrlich in a five-set match against Springfield College.

That’s so much better than just listing stat totals, don’t you think?

I’ve taken the time to dig through my stats and then the available NJCAA stats–which only go back to 2002 unfortunately–to create a master list of who played when, how much they played, their yearly totals as well as career totals.  I can tell you that only four players have ever racked up 1,000 digs in a season (Anna Becker, Alicia Rankin, and Emily Orrick twice).  Since no one’s had more than 130 blocks since 2012, it’s looking like Megan Vladic’s career total of 338 is safe.

I just finished doing the same work for LLCC stats at Nationals only.  None of this is useful for evaluating current talent–I know that.  It’s about making sure current players see they are part of a big family, one with tradition.  It’s about recruits knowing that if they come here, they’ll become part of that tradition–that we think they can reach the high standards we strive for.

It’s been a lot of work–but worth it already.  I posted some to social media and have had alumni commenting.  They don’t just comment on the stats, but it brings back memories of specific matches or moments–everything that goes in to tradition.

So what have I missed regarding tradition?  Are there other things that coaches can do to instill tradition?  It can’t be microwaved–I’m sure of that.  Thoughts?