The Knute Rockne quotations | |
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The quotations of Knute Rockne are many. I have tried to collect as many as I can on this page.
"No star playing, just football". "Football is a game played with arms, legs and shoulders but mostly from the neck up".
"Most men, when they think they are thinking, are merely rearanging their prejudices".
"I´ve found that prayers work best when you have big players".
"One man practicing sportsmanship is far better than 50 men preaching it".
"One man practicing sportsmanship is far better than a hundred teaching it".
"One loss is good for the soul, Too many losses is not good for the coach".
"Winning to often is as disastrous as losing too often. Both get the same results, the falling off of the public´s enthusiasm".
"I don´t want anybody going out there to die for dear old Notre Dame. Hell, I want you fighting to stay alive!"
"Build up your weaknesses until they become your strong points".
"Show me a gracious loser, and I´ll show you a failure" - remark to Wisconsin basketball coach Walter Meanwell.
Rockne never let the glory of a victory overshadow mistakes. He always said that: "When you were riding on the crest of a wave, youwere most likely to be missing out on something".
"The essence of football", according to Rockne, "was blocking, tackling, and execution based on timing, rhythm and deception".
"It´s up to us to show them what we´ve got. Let´s get down to business and carry the mail", Rockne told someone on the bench right after kick-off.
All football coaches hate to lose. Knute Rockne too. He did so little of it (the losing), but found it all wormwood and gall. He put it succinctly to his players: "We count on winning. And if we lose, don´t beef. And the best way to prevent beefing is - don´t lose".
Road games (or away games) were usually no "problem" for Rockne. He once said: "We use the same boys and the same plays on the road as we do at home. Our execution is expected to be the same. At home we´re the hosts, and I never liked the idea of being embarrased in front of our friends. On the road we´re somebody else´s guests - and we play in a way that they´re not going to forget we visited them".
"An automobile goes nowhere efficiently, unless it has a quick, hot spark to ignite things, to set the cogs of the machine in motion. So I try ti make every player on my team feel he´s the spark keeping our machine in motion. On him depends our success and victories", Rockne once said to a writer.
To the same writer Rockne said: "A coach´s greatest asset is his sense of responsibility - the reliance placed on him by his players. Handeling our personnel is the most important phase on coaching. The secret of coaching success can be reduced to a simple formula: strict disipline in your training program and on the field, combined with a high and continuing interest in all your other relationships with your kids".
Rockne would say: "We can all be geniuses because one definition of genius is the infinite capacity for taking pains. Perfection in petty detail is most essensial. Generalities don´t count and won´t help you in fotball".
Early in Rockne´s career he said this: "Win or lose, I´m running this team. Nobody else has anything to say about it´s make-up, it´s plans, it´s type of play. It´s my show. If I flop, let ´em pan me. If we´re a hit, let ´em say anything they want. I worked hard around here as an assistant for many years, and seldom saw my name in print. Well, all I want now is the truth".
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