Herb Brooks
Herb Brooks
Herbert Paul Brooks, Jr.was an American ice hockey player and coach. His most notable achievement came in 1980 as head coach of the gold medal-winning U.S. Olympic hockey team at Lake Placid. At the games, Brooks' US team upset the heavily favored Soviet team in a match that came to be known as the 'Miracle on Ice'. Brooks would go on to coach multiple NHL teams, as well as the French hockey team at the 1998 Winter Olympics, and ultimately...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionCoach
Date of Birth5 August 1937
CitySaint Paul, MN
CountryUnited States of America
We need to look at what Europe is doing to get better and try to get better ourselves. We need to make some changes and that can only be good for the game. Tolstoy once said, 'Everybody wants to change the world, but they don't want to change themselves.' So we all have to change our thinking and focus on getting our kids better.
You're playing worse and worse every day and right now you're playing like it's next month.
What is courage? Let me tell you what I think it is. An indefinable quality that makes a man put out that extra something, when it seems there is nothing else to give. I dare you to be better than you are. I dare you to be a thoroughbred.
My recruiting key - I looked for PEOPLE first, athletes second. I wanted people with a sound value system as you cannot buy values. You're only as good as your values. I learned early on that you do not put greatness into people...but somehow try to pull it out.
Risk something or forever sit with your dreams.
You win with people, not with talent. So the quality of the people is very important in building your team. I always looked for people with a solid value system. Then I recruited kids from a cross-section of different personalities, talents and styles of play.
Let me start with issuing you a challenge: Be better than you are. Set a goal that seems unattainable, and when you reach that goal, set another one even higher.
Success is won by those who believe in winning & then prepare for that moment. Many want to win, but how many prepare? That is the big difference. A sound value system held water then, holds water today, and will hold water in the future.
I don't think it will. It'll never stop.
Nine out of ten time we play this team, the would beat us. But not tonight because tonight is our night, tonight we win.
Success is won by those who believe in winning and then prepare for that moment.
And maybe I'm a little smarter now than I was before for all the stupid things I've done.
You're only as good as your values.
Maybe I'm sort of like the players - there's still a lot of little boy in me.