Speaker A
Uh, and welcome. You know, welcome to the Brotherhood. Uh, but welcome to the best brand in college sports, the best brand, uh, as good a tradition as there is in any sport worldwide: Duke basketball. And the people that were responsible for that set in your seats. Uh, not all the time, because when Billis was here, we, uh, we didn't have a practice facility, and he really needed it, by the way. And, uh, uh, but, uh, uh, now you're in those seats. Uh, it's an awesome opportunity, uh, to be, uh, to be a part of something better than anyone else. And, uh, but as you start your year, and that was a good workout, really good workout, competitive, you know, you guys are working hard on that. But, uh, uh, you're not going to win, uh, because of our tradition or our brand. Uh, and don't assume that you just have it because you don't. That doesn't mean you can't have it, but you have to recognize what created the brand and the tradition. Uh, there were, I'm going to tell you about three of the things that helped make the brand and make the tradition. The very first thing is preparation. Um, I was fortunate, uh, to play for one of the greatest coaches of all time, Coach Bob Knight. He was brilliant. Uh, uh, he ran hard practices too. And, uh, one of the things he said that I believe in and really, uh, built my career as a coach on it was, uh, the very first thing: preparation. Uh, obviously, like today, you had the will to win, right? Everyone you're going to play against is going to have the will to win. You, you're going to want to win. But the most important thing is to have the will to prepare to win. Preparation to win is much more important than the will to win. But if you combine the preparation to win and the will to win, I get chills thinking about it. You got a chance, man. You got a chance. But the preparation is hard. Obviously, when you're here, the coaches are in charge. You're competitive and whatever, right? Today was probably good preparation. You know, uh, uh, what do you do before you get here? You, that's what the great players, the great teams do. What do you do when you're not, not here with the coaches? You know, how do you eat? How do you sleep? Who do you hang with? You know, it's all important. And when you do come in here, because of restrictions and hours and that, who else helps you prepare? Yeah, uh, some, uh, the managers out there help you. Do you know their names when they come in? Do you say thanks? You know, do you treat them as equals? Because they are, and they're an important part of your preparation. Before you go to the training room, before practice, does someone have to beg you to do what you're supposed to do, or do you just do it? In other words, are you one with Nick and Jose? You, yeah. After a workout, there's before, there's recovery. How do you recover? You know, uh, I mean, I've coached some of the best teams in college basketball and the greatest players, but I also coached the US team for 11 years, and they were the greatest players. And the two best preparers were Kobe Bryant and LeBron James, and LeBron learned how to prepare even better from Kobe. You know what they did off the court put them in a position to be great. They didn't wait till they got on the court. They did the things necessary to prepare them. And you guys better be prepared, uh, because there's a bull's eye on you. You know, everyone you play against, it'll be that kid's and that program's most important game. Count on it. Count on it. They want the brand. They want the TR. They want, and you walk into the gym, boom, they want you. That's a privilege to have the bull's eye on you. Because you know what? By them coming at you just like today, the most important thing that I saw today was you made each other better. You competed against each other. You cannot get there alone. So you want this level of competition. So at these other teams, come on, man, we're okay with the, we're okay with the bull's eye. We like the bull. We like the bull's eye. But you better be prepared for it. And probably the last 25 years, uh, our program, uh, our program, including the last two years, is our program. And, uh, we probably won 70% of our away games, which is probably better than most or anybody. In 75% of those games when we lost, they stormed the court. When you're on the road, one of the best feelings, and the guys who played, you know, is to silence the crowd. Damn right. We have the B I. And by the way, your fans are leaving at the three-minute mark every once in a while. Remember those timeouts where you just say timeout? What do you want, coach? I said, I just want you to look in the stands. These are leaving. And a big smile gets across because those will be some of the moments that you're going to enjoy the most. You enjoy the most. But preparation is, is a key. The second thing I want to tell you is that we have a thing here we call next play. You know, uh, you got to be the next play is the play that you're going to be in. So whatever you've done doesn't mean crap. It's what you're going to do. And our game is continuous, just like your PR offense defense until Jay Robert will make a bad call and stop the clock. By the way, I made more notes on their poor performance today, and I'm sure you guys all agree with it, right? There's just some of the horrendous calls, and you know, come on. Yeah, a couple. Yeah, yeah, they should have gotten you for holding a couple times, but no, they don't. And, uh, uh, but, uh, next play means, uh, basketball favors the player and the team that's are continuous thinkers. You don't get time in between pitches or snaps or whatever. And so whatever you just did was important then, but it's not important now. And the best way to get to next play is to talk. And actually, today was not bad with talk. Uh, there was some good talk, but you need to talk all, all the time and be in the moment. You know, our game is about great moments, right? It'd be damn, it'd be a damn shame if you weren't ready for the moment because you were thinking about what you just did, right? And you're in control of that. And what it is, it, it, it's, uh, it's mental toughness. Yeah, there's physical toughness and there's mental toughness. But I, you're going to make a mistake. I missed a shot. You, you can't be thinking about the miss or the make. You got to be thinking about the rebound, the defense, or whatever the hell you're going to do. And if you don't do that, then a guy who thinks quicker than you is going to beat you, even if you're more talented than him. So the next play mentality and talk is the key thing. And I, I was actually very encouraged today with, with, with talk because usually teams are silent. You guys were, were pretty good with that. But you got to be good with it all the time. The third thing is defense. I know you're going to practice a lot of offense and that, uh, and, and you're going to practice a lot of defense. If you want to win this whole thing, be the best defensive team in the country. And you have an opportunity to do that. Uh, you're, you're tall, you're deep, and you're, you're athletic. Uh, you know what? You're not yet, you're not wide like the best defensive teams are wide. You, and you know how you get wide? By talking. Yeah. Yeah. If you're just playing or standing and you're not talking, your arms go down. I've watched you on defense quite a bit today, and whenever someone was talking, they were like this. It's human nature. You know, you're like this, and as soon as you start talk, right, your arms go out. You know, and so who's in charge of that? You. And if you're wide, then your first step is going to be stronger and longer. Your reaction's going to be quicker, right? Because you're not waiting for something to happen. By talking, you're anticipating that it's going to happen. And so my wish for you and, uh, Coach Sh WS me come a few more workouts in that I'll be watching how you progress. Uh, my wish for you is to be the best defensive team in the country. The second wish, and we talked about this with every one of our teams, right? SE, well, with that you guys, we wanted to be the best talking team, not trash talking. We, we can let our, our actions will prove who we are, you know, and the thir
