Latest / The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast / #190: Tim Langford-University of Oklahoma

Transcript

#190: Tim Langford-University of Oklahoma · The Gill Athletics Track and Field Connections Podcast

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  Track and field coach, the ones that point
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  people most every season. He's the voice of reason.
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  Speaking, the growth gotta prep for you carry the load.
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  Listen with both ears, can't Mentor, without a mentor, kids
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  of experience, you can reinvent those kids.
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  can you give up Hugh its choice and to fight not to win or lose?
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  about how to All about why you don't know what you're you know
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  who you are inside. Six, many ways to die.
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  every track coach could be blessed.
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  Hey, welcome back to the Gila thortex track and field
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  connections podcast were so happy.
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  You could be here. You know, our real goal here is
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  to uplift and honor coaches from around the country.
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  We are kind of on a real hot streak right now that I think
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  we've been on, I don't know. This is probably a bestowed 190
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  or so we've been on a hot streak about 190 times in a row.
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  Here we are just have coaches from all different aspects
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  division, one high school in Aiea Juco and just can't be more
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  prouder of the men and women who decide to really We kind of kind
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  of bear their soul here on the podcast so I'm just super
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  excited for their authenticity and openness in today's guests.
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  I have no doubts is going to be exactly the same, so help me.
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  Welcome the head coach from the University of Oklahoma.
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  The, why is the wonderful mr. Kim, Lankford Tim.
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  How are you, sir? Hey man, I'm doing great.
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  Thanks for having me. It's a wonderful day here in
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  Norman man. Every day in Norman's, kind of
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  nice. And I've been in Norman.
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  That's this is pretty nice there and just gets a little Breezy
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  from time to time, but Pretty good.
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  See already with the openness and honesty is like it is it
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  gets a little little open their man, I love it, I love it.
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  Well man Tim I'm super excited for today's conversation.
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  I kind of really just want to hop right into it.
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  Sometimes I'm known for my five minute opening intros we're just
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  going to hop right into it man. You know at some point for you,
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  Tim coaching switched for you. And what I mean by that is for a
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  long time for a while. It was something that was done
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  to you, you know, a coach would bark out this order tell you to
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  lift this go run that. Maybe you played another sport
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  blah, blah somewhere in your mind.
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  The idea of a wait I could be a coat like that.
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  Actually could be what I do had to start creeping into your
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  mind. Where does coaching as a
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  profession start for you. You know, I've always had good
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  coaches and mentors in my life. So I always saw it as, as an
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  option like me, you know, take it back to high school, middle
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  school and I had phenomenal, High School.
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  Coaches had a high school coach. He was a master sergeant in the
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  Army, so he was very militant in his style leadership style, but
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  it was, I mean, he showed you love as much as a military man.
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  Could, you know? He initially started the thought
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  that man, I wouldn't mind being like him one day and, you know,
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  it wasn't until that kind of became a reality got into a car
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  accident, and college, and broke almost everything cracked on my
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  ribs, on this side, crack my spleen puncture my kidney.
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  So while I was recovering actually got a chance to step
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  into that role, he hold on it so I love I always learn something
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  new. So, OK, pause, were there,
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  because the first question I thought about when you talked
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  about Andy. Remember, coach drill, sergeants
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  name, coach Rufus night? I was like Rufus night.
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  I love that. When you said there was like
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  this attraction to like, oh, I like what he does and I feel
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  loved and I feel the love because it because I always
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  thought, and I've said this before and different, like
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  coaching clinics before. You know, most young people are
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  not going to say this out loud, but they crave discipline and
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  structure. They're not going to say that
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  out loud because that's not cool.
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  And they would deny it but they like when practice starts at
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  2:00 and 2:30 is the end of the warm, you know, they like that
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  kind of thing. It's why I think Sports is very
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  attractive to young people because there is a start time
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  and end time there's responsibilities or
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  expectations. So coach Rufus did that for you?
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  Very Master Sergeant way man. That had to be something else.
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  Was how did you and maybe you didn't, how did you separate
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  that? What he was doing the coaching
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  side versus the military life? Because again, that's another
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  discipline structured. Why a lot of young people go
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  into military like, oh, okay, I'm going to be held
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  accountable. How did you not navigate towards
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  like a long military career? You know, for me he was was very
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  What's the word I'm looking for intent on his guidance and he
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  never tried to sell us the military, you know, just try to
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  sell us what we wanted and I think that was the difference.
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  You know, the thing that really made me gravitate towards the
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  sports side is, how do I do this for somebody else?
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  Because I'm in this vein and he reached me in this way.
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  Now I can repay him by basically duplicating him.
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  And being a version of him to carry on what he's trying to do.
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  Like that. That's what, that's what pushed
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  me like I said towards Sports and not towards military.
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  I mean, what do there's so many ways to like, honor your mentors
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  and family members that, you know, that gives so much to,
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  there's a lot of ways and there's gifts and there's, you
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  know, how affection, but is there a better way than, like,
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  oh, well, I'm gonna come, I'm gonna go.
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  Become you then, like it coach, you've been, you've done so much
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  alike that I'm Gonna go do what you do so I can keep your like,
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  Legacy continue moving. That's right.
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  So this accident, tell me more about this and were you aware
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  you an athlete at the time? Like this?
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  Stop athleticism. I was an athlete at a Radford
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  University, actually. I keep the picture of the car as
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  my mouse pad cover. I don't know if you can see it.
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  Yes. Oh man, you gotta get to YouTube
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  and see this holy cow. What happened was?
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  I was a janitor. The summer, and we had to be
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  there at 5:30 in the morning and it car has run the red light.
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  Right up the street from my house.
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  T-Bone me. Like I said, broke everything on
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  this side. Spent thing about five days in
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  intensive care. They wasn't sure if they're
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  going to take out my spleen or whatnot.
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  And they decided they were going to let it heal.
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  They didn't remove the spleen it said, but you have to walk like
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  you're on eggshells for the next six months.
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  So that took me back into school.
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  So wasn't wasn't training in the fall and you know, while you're
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  healing, you know, when I To the track.
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  And hey, put your foot here. Oh man, that work and you know
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  your hips up behind you know you doing it.
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  And coaching coaching coach Langford, who is instead of Tim
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  Langford was kind of born out of that a little bit more.
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  It's like man I really could be coach night, you know.
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  It we just kind of went from there Tim.
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  We are, you know, one mile per hour more or one second earlier
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  from not having this conversation.
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  Ation meaning it sounds like you easily could not be here right
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  now my friend absolutely absolutely.
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  Does that add to the weightiness of representing a coach Rufus
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  and going on like me? I my life could have been
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  snuffed out for no fault of My Own.
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  By the way, do you feel like you like, oh, oh, this is truly a
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  second chance, you know, and the F think there's so many people
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  that could, that could point to a milestone in their life, where
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  hey, this this could have been it, you know, a bad decision
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  where, you know, my life could have been completely different,
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  you know, whether that's, you know, you know, you say outside
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  of a club or, you know, 5:30 in the morning headed to work, or,
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  you know, whatever that looks like it's like, hey, you know,
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  we left, you know, two seconds early in And, you know,
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  basically it hit the fan and, you know, my life could have
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  changed, you know. So yeah, that's one of the
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  things that I'm like, I've got a, I've got a higher purpose,
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  I'm still here for a reason. Yeah, amen.
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  I like that. I have that visual of you, once
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  you're back on campus and, you know, you're still kind of
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  recovering. So, you're still a little ginger
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  and how you're walking and stuff and you go to practice because
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  that's what you've known, right there.
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  Where else am I going to go? I know I'm not be able to run
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  but I'm going to go to practice and he started like a put your
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  foot here. Hit placement here.
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  Here I have that visual just like and you kind of like, non
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  your head like, oh yeah. Okay, wait a minute, see this?
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  This is my groove like, okay, this is what I'm doing, right?
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  All right. What were you in college for
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  career? Like what did you think before
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  that accident, you're running? What were you studying and what
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  did you think? Like oh I'm going to become a PE
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  High School teacher right? For Coach Rufus.
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  That's right. Yeah.
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  You're gonna be coach Rufus without the e?
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  Major general part. That's, that's smart.
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  Absolutely. What did that change when you
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  kind of fell on your actual passion of coaching track and
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  field? Yeah, it changed.
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  And it was enhanced by just good Collegiate coaches.
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  That, you know, coach Knight was was my primary, you know, Mentor
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  motivator inspiration then I had, you know, we started the
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  track program at Radford University.
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  So myself and then I'll Barnes. Who was the resident director?
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  And he was the one that started the track club.
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  It was a bunch of cross-country guys and it was me.
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  And remember we sat down in a restaurant and you know, we all
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  got on these, you know, Radford wind shirts, you know,
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  everybody. It was so small they're like,
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  hey, what are you guys brothers or something?
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  And I'm the only black guy at the table and everybody look at
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  me. Like yep we're brothers but that
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  was That was the beginning of the Radford University program
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  and you know, I went and dr. Douglas Covington, our
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  president, you know, he said and we're starting a track program
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  and a major assembly, and I was the only non distance track
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  athlete at the time. You know.
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  So, you know, we kind of work from there and then I had, you
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  know, other mentors, very Shepherd, that coached me and,
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  you know, Pat Connolly was our coach at one time.
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  You know? So Olympian, Pat kindly, and Her
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  husband, Hal, you know, got a chance to meet them.
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  And and the more coaches are talk to the more.
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  They sing like me or what I want it to be, and like I said, it
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  just reaffirmed that. Yeah, I'm headed on the right
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  path. This is what I want to be doing.
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  How did you deal? I get that again.
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  The visual, you're so good at painting a picture here.
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  Tim, when you talk about, you know, team starting to distance.
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  So there, you know, predominately white and there's
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  one, you not predominantly white, how did You, I don't know
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  if I want to say overcome because that's an assumption.
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  Was there ever feelings of like, man?
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  I'm on an island. Those guys are doing Ten Mile
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  runs and I'm on the track. And if it was, how did you
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  overcome that aspect? Yeah.
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  You know, I can remember my first practice, we practiced at
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  Radford High School, didn't have a track on campus, you know,
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  coach Barnes. Once you finish with me, you
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  know, and, you know, he should watch my step, you know,
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  primarily a high jumper long jumper triple jumper, watch my
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  step and then at the end of practice, it started raining and
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  I'm thinking, okay, I'm gonna jump in the car and go back to
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  campus with Coach Barnes and he said, alright, see you guys at
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  the training room and this was my first try, I didn't know the
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  way back and I look at the distance Runners and they said,
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  all right, come on, let's go. He took off running and they got
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  smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller.
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  And I was like, okay, I think I got it from here, but, you know,
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  it never felt like I was necessarily on an island.
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  It was I was part of the group that just did some different.
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  It's cool. You know, like I'll never made
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  me feel, you know, outside. Side.
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  You know, he always included me and you know ended up being the
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  first team captain, the first conference champion in school
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  history, you know. So you know, I took the
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  opportunity to be a leader and I think that's kind of he felt
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  that or saw that in me and, you know, I was allowed to to, you
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  know, to grow that side of the program and it just felt like
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  home. I think there's a term for that.
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  I think it's called Trailblazer when you You're building
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  something that there is no you're out there with a machete
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  cutting a trail because there is no one before you you're the one
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  doing it before anybody else and other people follow you go.
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  Okay, this must be the path. Let's go forward.
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  Now that takes saying that out loud.
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  That takes a special person, you know, not everybody can be the
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  first to do something and not because they want the ability
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  because they don't have the maybe mentality or passion to do
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  that. You know that when you're up
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  front, well there's nothing to hide behind all eyes on you for
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  things like that and other people are better and thinking
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  this we have these people at following and building and
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  making something that's already built bigger or better where did
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  that kind of mentality come from you you that you you like the so
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  far? We're here in lead from the
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  front. Get a path that hasn't hasn't
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  seen their that I've got to, you know, build because there is no
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  instructions for. Where does that come from?
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  I don't know if it's only child syndrome is like, you know, I
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  think in my family, they They instill, individuality
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  leadership, you know and you're in control of what you want to
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  do, your control your destiny you know so make it the best
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  that you can possibly make it. And I think I can say it is
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  through the mentors that I've had you know, especially like I
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  said coach night if he would always say, you can be whatever
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  you want to be, you know, and he always a hey, attitude
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  determines your altitude, you know.
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  So how you choose to react respond, are you choose to take.
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  A situations that's going to determine your environment
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  that's going to tell you how far you go and I never let it go.
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  Yeah, it's awesome. There's plenty people that hear
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  those same type of motivations and they they push it aside.
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  I know there is also a leadership down the wrong paths,
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  right? Those are also Trailblazers just
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  in the wrong direction and so happy to hear that the so far,
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  the story at least is going towards the positive
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  trailblazing type of path. So how do you take this new?
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  Down passion this, you know, helping the other athletes and
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  trying things and going. Wow, okay.
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  That kind of work, you're not a coach, but meaning at that
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  point, meaning you haven't done any kind of formal training, you
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  know, that's like that you're still an athlete.
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  Who's now in a different role, how did that continue to grow
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  for you? Through the rest of the college
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  and, and past? Oh well, you know what?
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  Usually would be a Collegiate athletes.
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  Path is practice School home, you know, practice and you.
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  Do you rinse rinse and repeat, you know, but you know, a lot of
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  times to use the Radford High School track, we would also
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  coach the team, you know. So we could volunteer coach a
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  few times and so we know we think as I normal limit
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  lindenberg was the coach at the time and knowing he, let me come
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  out and, you know, and sometimes work with the high jumpers work
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  with some of the jumpers and, you know, we kind of go from
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  there, but the ultimate goal for me was always Return back to my
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  old high school, you know, and take over and, or help out as
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  much as I can, and give back. Because that was the ultimate
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  goal is, hey, I want to be in the school system.
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  I had all my mentors, you know, playing basketball, you know?
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  So, you know, I always want to repay my basketball coach great
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  basketball coach always, wanted to repay the track coach my
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  football coach, and that was the best way I could see myself
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  doing. It was through the service, that
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  give them back. Is like home is something
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  special for you. It is, it is and just for the
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  simple fact that home could be filled in so many ways.
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  A, with love, be with people who never got the opportunities that
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  I got there were better than me. And that always bothers me.
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  It's like how many people don't get the opportunity that we're
• 17:43
  blessed with. And I could go home on every
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  break and see the same people on the same stoop or the same
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  corner. You say, Hey, you know, yeah,
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  I'm getting ready to do this. If I can, if I can just catch a
• 17:57
  break, I want to do this. I could just catch a break.
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  Well, if if there's no Rufus night to show people a different
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  way. Remember coach night?
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  Yeah he had a CD of so he used to drive the activity bus to go
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  around and pick up people for track practice over breaks.
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  But then they wouldn't the heat wasn't on it.
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  And I was a dummy that showed up in the middle of winter in
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  Lynchburg Virginia without a jacket and he gave me the jacket
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  off his back. he said you going to practice but I'm here, you
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  cold but the song I'll say after practice, I get it but he said
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  no I'll keep it and I'm like someone who and he could have
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  done anything else with his life but to pour into us the way he
• 18:46
  did, I was like you know we got to keep this going.
• 18:50
  What a great example you know sometimes we do things that are
• 18:53
  we think of the time is pretty innocuous, you know, him given
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  you. His jacket wasn't like this
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  Monument for him was not this Monumental thing.
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  It was like oh this is what I do is One of my athletes, I care
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  for them, they're cold, I'm fine here, you take the jacket, but
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  we forget sometimes the other side of that and it was
• 19:13
  Monumental for you and you might not have seen it right then, and
• 19:17
  there. But as you gain experience in of
• 19:22
  life, it's like, wow, he didn't have to do that.
• 19:25
  And that made a big difference for me, like I was able to
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  practice, I like, I could see like, oh, he loved, no one else
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  was going to give me a jacket and and but yet he did.
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  What a great example of servant leadership right there and that
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  is the roof is not as it seems like the definition of servant
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  leadership. Absolutely, absolutely, yes.
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  So where do we go? After Radford, did you get the
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  degree in like physical education and what happened
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  next? Yeah, and went back to my old
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  house, I graduated in December. So I would actually I could have
• 19:57
  very easily been a police officer.
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  I was getting ready to go into my last interview for Lynchburg
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  police Department and the school board called me said, hey, I
• 20:07
  know you're graduating in December, take a permanent sub
• 20:10
  position and I want you to work in the Governor's School for the
• 20:13
  Arts and Heritage High School and that was my job for
• 20:18
  semester. And they said next semester were
• 20:20
  open up move, make sure that you get a teaching position.
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  Wow man. Again I'm always I like, I'm
• 20:28
  personally fascinated with these branches in our In, you know.
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  So of course this whole Marvel Multiverse.
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  You know, the thing is it's just fascinating to me, you know we
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  already discussed about your car.
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  Accident of how you know, that could have gone a different
• 20:44
  route set of right. Could have gone left, really
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  bad. Here is a place where, you know,
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  looking back now again you got the, you know, the rearview
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  mirror. You can see with what has
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  happened in your life. You could have been, like, you
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  would not have been on this podcast, my friend if you'd have
• 20:57
  gone on a been a cop, sorry. I mean you just, you know, you
• 20:59
  want to coach track, right? And I know this is so far the Hi
• 21:03
  crown for you is being on the the podcast here, but it's an
• 21:08
  interesting. You were one phone call away
• 21:11
  from not happening from going into it, which is a, you know,
• 21:14
  and I'm not downgrading police officer.
• 21:17
  That's a very Noble profession but that's so interesting.
• 21:20
  That one phone call and whoop there.
• 21:23
  Here you go. Here's the rest of my career.
• 21:25
  That's right. You ever think back like what if
• 21:27
  you would have missed that phone call and gone to the to the
• 21:30
  academy or however the process that you ever think about that?
• 21:33
  The time all the time, you know, and my dad, he worked private
• 21:37
  security and was in security pretty much his whole life.
• 21:40
  So he was like yeah. You know, it's a good profession
• 21:43
  that's a good profession and, you know, I think you should be
• 21:45
  a state trooper and I can remember breaking his heart.
• 21:50
  One time, I got selected to the state trooper Cadet program that
• 21:54
  was back in high school and I turned it down to go to
• 21:57
  basketball camp. And yeah, lady to speak to me
• 22:00
  for a week. He's like basketball.
• 22:05
  You're not going to be an NVA, come on, go to the patrol.
• 22:07
  Exactly exactly. But yeah, again you know, law
• 22:14
  enforcement lost out for the second time and you know, I
• 22:18
  followed my wife all of my dream and you know and took the
• 22:23
  position with the school system. Well as a sport we're better off
• 22:27
  for it. I'm glad that's the way you.
• 22:29
  I know he was disappointed but I'm happy.
• 22:32
  We're all happier. He went right instead of left.
• 22:37
  Hey, I'm definitely happy. He accepted it.
• 22:39
  You know, especially after the position started paying off,
• 22:43
  right? Yeah, absolutely.
• 22:45
  Which we're going to get to that because we know it does.
• 22:47
  So talk to us about that sub job and becoming a permanent
• 22:50
  teacher. And now you are coaching.
• 22:53
  This, isn't you helping? Because of physical limitations.
• 22:56
  This is this, is you your coaching?
• 22:59
  How did that first season go for you as a full-time or, you know,
• 23:02
  being a teacher full-time track coach?
• 23:05
  So it was, it was great, you know?
• 23:07
  Oh, that so starting in December.
• 23:09
  They immediately made me a basketball coach.
• 23:12
  Hmm. I coached 9th grade basketball
• 23:16
  then got moved up to junior varsity and then became
• 23:19
  assistant on Varsity in 11 season and we coach our team to
• 23:23
  the State final for a while. Then an assistant indoor track
• 23:27
  coach, you know. And then you know we go on to
• 23:31
  outdoor track and then I was still coaching spring basketball
• 23:36
  while coaching. Outdoor track.
• 23:38
  And I only got a semester on the high school level.
• 23:41
  And I miss the Spring, you know, I thought I was making decent
• 23:45
  money and had no time to spend it.
• 23:47
  Because I was always at the gym. you know, and I got I got a
• 23:52
  phone call earlier in the week and it was my coach, I'll Barnes
• 23:57
  and he said, hey, I just took the job at High Point University
• 24:00
  and I was wondering if you wanted to come help me out.
• 24:06
  I said okay well I'll come down and see what you're talking
• 24:08
  about and that Thursday I got another phone call, there was
• 24:15
  Pat Kali at Radford University. Hey coach, what you doing?
• 24:19
  Want a job it's like gotta have one but we talking about well
• 24:25
  I'm looking for an assistant coach and you know, I thought
• 24:28
  about you and you know, everybody said that you were
• 24:30
  going to be a pretty good coach one day and want to know what
• 24:33
  what you thought about coming to come and help us out and out of
• 24:37
  fairness to both of them took the one that called me first.
• 24:41
  And I saw it, I went down to High Point University and I have
• 24:45
  some, I should have asked him earlier.
• 24:47
  What's the pay? Oops, exactly exactly.
• 24:52
  So, you know that job. So the school system was getting
• 24:56
  ready to open up the position for me, as a teacher.
• 25:01
  So it's going to be some mid 30s.
• 25:04
  Plus all of my coaching stipends I was given to coach girls
• 25:08
  basketball that they were doing in the fall.
• 25:10
  It's going to be indoor track outdoor track and men's
• 25:15
  basketball during the winter and the spring.
• 25:17
  So the disciples were going to be great.
• 25:19
  And I think it would have put me mid-40s something like that.
• 25:23
  But yeah, I would have gladly taken and I turn that down for
• 25:28
  the job. It was paying ten thousand
• 25:29
  dollars a year. Yeah, oh ouch, no going
• 25:34
  backwards. But tonight, you know, through
• 25:40
  everything that was, that was, you know, one of my main
• 25:42
  mentors, obviously, through life and I said, well coach, I came
• 25:46
  back to help you and to into, you know, to move this forward.
• 25:52
  And he just looked at me, said, you know, about the most Major
• 25:55
  Payne voice. He could come up with sign.
• 25:57
  You can always come back home Did you just reference major
• 26:02
  pain? I love it.
• 26:04
  I'll everybody listening. That's in our age bracket is
• 26:06
  like, oh, that's hilarious. All of our younger coaches.
• 26:09
  Listen right now are like major pain.
• 26:10
  I thought the guys name is Rufus.
• 26:12
  Not I am so lost here now, exactly.
• 26:17
  And as we need to use, and you can always come back home and he
• 26:22
  said, give it a try. And I did, you know, a lot of
• 26:26
  coaches, especially beginning coaches, would you know?
• 26:31
  Fall over, do anything to get a college job offer, you get to at
• 26:37
  a really young age and stage of your career.
• 26:42
  I mean you're barely into your career.
• 26:43
  Let's, let's be honest here with coaching, you know, having some
• 26:48
  self-awareness Tim what do you think?
• 26:50
  Like, why you you know there are other people they could have
• 26:53
  called maybe the Radford one makes sense actually you know
• 26:57
  both because you have connections at both but you know
• 26:58
  again they have they have all other connections.
• 27:01
  INS, What do you think? You know why you for at this
• 27:04
  point in your career, you know, I never knew in terms of Why I
• 27:12
  was blessed with the opportunity, I would just
• 27:15
  thankful that somebody saw something in me that they give
• 27:18
  me a chance. And, you know, I'm on the campus
• 27:23
  of High Point. I'm 21 years old, you know,
• 27:26
  turning 22. And I'm coaching people my age
• 27:31
  and it is not a ga position. It's a, you know, you're the
• 27:35
  guy. So there's no student side of
• 27:37
  it. It's yeah.
• 27:39
  You're the guy was, I was the Home Depot a lot attendant from
• 27:44
  6 to 10. I taught activity classes from
• 27:49
  10. Into to and from 225.
• 27:52
  I was the assistant track coach and then after 5:30 from six to
• 27:57
  nine, I was in night study hall monitor.
• 28:00
  So, just you just piecing together, parts and pieces to
• 28:03
  make a living because ten thousand dollars.
• 28:05
  I think. I'll make a balloon.
• 28:06
  That's it. Absolutely, it's interesting,
• 28:09
  you talked about your age at that point, you know, 21 turning
• 28:12
  22, coaching, young people that are roughly your age and one of
• 28:17
  your other opportunities was rad for your alma mater, because I'm
• 28:20
  always interested in the switch from like when a kid goes from
• 28:24
  student-athlete to GA or student-athletes a coach within
• 28:27
  one year at their alma mater. It's like man one day one,
• 28:30
  Friday. You're playing Xbox with your
• 28:31
  friends and on Monday, you're running practice.
• 28:34
  And, you know, like how do you you got to change the
• 28:37
  relationship? The dynamic changes.
• 28:40
  All right, so you didn't, you didn't go to Radford to have to
• 28:42
  worry about that aspect. What were there?
• 28:45
  Any struggles or concerns? You know, you're 21, 22 and
• 28:48
  you're telling another 21, 22 year-old.
• 28:50
  A today's workout is X. Y&z any struggles that you had
• 28:54
  with that age? Dynamic.
• 28:56
  Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah.
• 28:57
  You know, and I lied about my age for a while, except High
• 29:00
  Point referred in the same conference, you know.
• 29:03
  So the same the only saving grace was the same hurdle.
• 29:08
  I was coaching, I'd beaten the previous year at the conference
• 29:10
  Championship. You know, the same triple
• 29:13
  jumper. I had beaten the same high
• 29:15
  jumper, you know? I was like, hey, I'm the
• 29:16
  conference Champion. Three years in a row, what are
• 29:18
  you going to tell me, you know, so I had respect there but I
• 29:24
  still hadn't learned the art of coaching management, you know?
• 29:28
  And, you know, I would If I wanted to go out of town, if I
• 29:32
  wanted to go have fun, go party. I went out of town at yourself,
• 29:35
  you know, it because there had to be that separation.
• 29:38
  It I knew when I left home, there were certain people that
• 29:44
  heard I'm leaving a great job, great opportunity and people
• 29:49
  said, you know, you stupid. You'll be back in, you'll be
• 29:53
  back in a year back in two years.
• 29:55
  Those are the things that stuck with me and, you know, I was
• 29:58
  like, hey, I'm big on proving people wrong, it was like, oh
• 30:01
  okay, I think I'll be back. I have no option.
• 30:04
  I have to make this work so, you know, messing it up over over,
• 30:10
  you know, a college kid, that, that's my age, you know, or
• 30:14
  that, you know that I mean, realistically, you know, Doesn't
• 30:19
  know the difference between, you know, oh, this is crossing a
• 30:23
  line, This is not crossing the line, you know, I had to be the
• 30:25
  bigger person and say, okay, this has to work for me.
• 30:30
  Where did that instant come from?
• 30:31
  Because not, everybody gets that right out the gate.
• 30:35
  We have plenty of those that make mistakes at that age to
• 30:38
  learn from that side of where that instinct come from.
• 30:41
  It was really the mentors that I had, you know, coach Barnes, you
• 30:47
  know, he got added me, you know, from day one, you know, and I
• 30:51
  still talk to him today, you know, and Coach Shumpert and it
• 30:55
  was the same way, you know, it's like, hey, you know, you can do
• 30:58
  this, you can do this, don't do that one, you know, and, you
• 31:01
  know, having enough enough know, sure enough deference to to know
• 31:05
  that they know better than you do.
• 31:07
  So that's really the source of it.
• 31:11
  Yeah, I think another word to use that you're shown.
• 31:14
  There is discernment, you know, having ideas and options present
• 31:18
  in front of you will it takes someone who understands
• 31:20
  discernment to pick the right ones for you or the group to
• 31:24
  move forward on. And I'm not quite sure that
• 31:26
  that's a trainable feature. I think that might be a
• 31:29
  god-given like you are strong in discernment when it comes to
• 31:33
  those type of activities. Because right, you know, We have
• 31:37
  mentors and obviously you've had strong mentors or life but they
• 31:40
  didn't write the play book for you.
• 31:42
  They didn't right? Okay.
• 31:43
  Look when you become the coach at 21.
• 31:45
  Here's what you're going to do you know you don't there's
• 31:46
  nothing there is like all right here here again that trouble
• 31:49
  he's like I got to figure it out and make my own path moving
• 31:52
  forward here. So how did it go?
• 31:54
  You're at High Point, you're doing a lot of different jobs.
• 31:57
  One of those is coaching track and field.
• 31:58
  Of course, how did you start learning how to coach track and
• 32:03
  field and we don't talk X's and O's here necessarily because
• 32:06
  that would be a disservice Everybody for me to talk X's and
• 32:08
  O's, the philosophy and style of coaching.
• 32:12
  How did you start developing that during your time at High
• 32:15
  Point, maxed out credit cards, buying anybody, who I thought
• 32:21
  might might be able to give me a negative success?
• 32:25
  And hey, what are you? What are you drinking?
• 32:26
  What are you eating? Okay, I'm buying I just want you
• 32:29
  to start talking and you know, I went down to the this is, when
• 32:33
  Charlie Francis was still, you know, still with this, I went to
• 32:36
  the Charlie Francis. Speed seminar, you know, they
• 32:38
  held it at UNC Asheville and I can remember that vividly
• 32:41
  because that was the first Clinic that I paid my own money
• 32:45
  to go to. And I was like, Hey, I just, you
• 32:49
  know, I just need a hotel room out and, you know, we're good to
• 32:53
  go and I went I went and, you know, I was the, I was the
• 32:58
  flower on the wall that nobody noticed in the sense, it wasn't,
• 33:01
  you know? So he's out.
• 33:03
  He's talking to people at dinner and I'm just sitting there in
• 33:05
  the corner, you know, I've already spent All my money.
• 33:07
  So I'm drinking water and eating the chips off the table.
• 33:12
  And just absorb just being a sponge.
• 33:15
  And what I started doing was developing my own pile of Truth.
• 33:20
  So, you know, I talked to, you know, you will get this from
• 33:25
  Charlie, Francis will get this from, you know, coach a, and
• 33:28
  I'll get this from coach Knight. Now get this from, you know, the
• 33:32
  the other mentors in my life and, you know, or, you know, I'm
• 33:35
  sitting around out here. Curtis prior talk, a lot to say
• 33:38
  something. You know, he's been in the
• 33:40
  business forever. I hear my colleagues say
• 33:42
  something and I'm listening and you know, I'm not I'm not gonna
• 33:46
  write it down immediately that rush back to my hotel room.
• 33:49
  I rushed back to my bag and write it down and when I get
• 33:51
  back and compared to my power truth and it's like okay does it
• 33:57
  fit how? I want to develop my system?
• 34:01
  Okay great, add it in, if it doesn't, don't throw it away,
• 34:04
  but led to the side because maybe later, Philosophy of
• 34:07
  changing that will be relevant to what we want to do.
• 34:11
  That's that's interesting too because you know I'm a huge
• 34:14
  coaching education fan and Advocate and both what's the
• 34:21
  right term here both programmatically meaning like
• 34:24
  usatf and u.s. tfcc a things like that and what you're
• 34:28
  describing there, it's camps and Clinics but also the the fly on
• 34:31
  the wall. Like asking questions, listening
• 34:33
  what other people do be whether it's at a meet at a clinic at
• 34:36
  the able next to the table. I think that's also an extremely
• 34:40
  important part of coaching education.
• 34:43
  I worry sometimes about coaching education with coaches when they
• 34:47
  hear how a mouse does something, or how to Curtis do something
• 34:50
  and they automatically take it back and without discernment,
• 34:54
  right? They just throw it out and then
• 34:55
  we'll see what happens. That's what mouse does.
• 34:57
  So let's do it. That's what Carol does.
• 34:59
  Let's do it. You seem to have had more of a
• 35:02
  okay, let me take it back and I love that term.
• 35:04
  Developing my own pile of truths.
• 35:06
  Okay, I Have guiding principles of what I believe.
• 35:09
  Training should look like that. That was built on your own
• 35:12
  experience and then the experience up to that point of
• 35:15
  you actually coaching. So you have this guiding
• 35:17
  principle. How do these other activities
• 35:20
  and thoughts, and philosophies from these other great people.
• 35:23
  I mean, I'm certainly, these are awesome people to be listening
• 35:27
  to, and taking nuggets from, that's for sure.
• 35:28
  But how does that actually fit into my system correctly in My
• 35:32
  Philosophy? Right, right.
• 35:34
  And it was, it was, it was trial and error, you know, sometimes I
• 35:39
  mean, you know, sometimes it was so irresponsible of me to, you
• 35:44
  know, to make some of those kids suffer through the changes that
• 35:47
  they were going through and it's like, hey, okay, we want to try
• 35:51
  to but I was always transparent. Hey, I'm learning this and you
• 35:55
  know, we discuss it as like, do you feel like you can benefit
• 35:58
  from this? Okay, let's try to put some of
• 36:00
  this into practice. And if they, you know I was I
• 36:04
  was blessed with with a group that they felt like summer.
• 36:09
  We had some of the older kids that kind of knew what I was
• 36:13
  doing knew what I was going through.
• 36:15
  But then some of the younger kids who you know, was blind,
• 36:18
  trust it's like hey okay coach said it let's do it and you know
• 36:22
  that that always help but like I said is it was still trial and
• 36:25
  error and like and developing your philosophies is tough
• 36:30
  because If you're not tried by fire, you know I tell my kids
• 36:34
  now so hey, I messed up a whole lot.
• 36:36
  Better athletes to you. I promise you.
• 36:37
  I know not. I know we're not to do so I'll
• 36:40
  get it right. That's some humbleness there.
• 36:42
  Hey look man, I've messed them up.
• 36:45
  That's it. Yeah.
• 36:46
  And you know whether it's in the periodization process is like,
• 36:49
  oh, why did they fizzle out here?
• 36:52
  Or whether it's in, you know, actually what to do, you know,
• 36:56
  and and and boo, help me boost age night or when I took my
• 37:01
  little too. Two jumps.
• 37:02
  You know he taught me more about Sprint training then in a jump
• 37:07
  session and how to categorize stuff you know and I was like oh
• 37:11
  so you do this on these days and this on these days and this one
• 37:14
  these days. Yeah it's like yeah these don't
• 37:16
  match and then these don't match and you know it years later when
• 37:19
  I go down to a go out to our CO2 the Olympic Training Center you
• 37:24
  know, Charles Clinton you know kind of added to that Paula
• 37:27
  truth with emerging Elite Education.
• 37:30
  You know like hey And that was that was aggressive, you know,
• 37:34
  and just it just as much as I love to be immersed, they were
• 37:37
  throwing everything at us that we could possibly think of, you
• 37:40
  know, dr. Mann, you know, talking about
• 37:42
  the biomechanics of it all and you know but it all has to fit.
• 37:46
  Otherwise it's information. Overload is like drinking from a
• 37:48
  fire hose. How much can you really digest?
• 37:51
  You're not you're not really quenching any thirst drinking
• 37:53
  from a fire hose. It sounds like the right thing
• 37:55
  but it is not the right way. What year did you do that?
• 37:58
  Level 2 with boo. So my level 2 actually I have it
• 38:02
  should have been 2000. Where was that?
• 38:12
  All right, I got all my stuff right.
• 38:13
  That's good, that's good. Where was that at?
• 38:16
  So, actually a 2004 and we did it at Mississippi State, that's
• 38:21
  what I was at Mississippi State. Those are special.
• 38:27
  Yeah, I remember that because we so we were the host and I did
• 38:31
  combined events and my ITC. My instructors training course
• 38:34
  there. Yes.
• 38:36
  But it's super interesting that you said the way you talked
• 38:38
  about, The Boo and little too because I'm one of those guys
• 38:42
  that would say it is well, level two and level 2 specifically
• 38:46
  with boo changed my entire career.
• 38:50
  It really did. And I, I actually say the exact
• 38:54
  same way you did. I go man, because that was my
• 38:57
  first level 2 and I signed, because I was a air quotes, I
• 39:00
  was a Sprint intervals coach. That's what I was, you know, I
• 39:02
  had to coach jumps, but I was a sprinter, knows coach Mac.
• 39:04
  So I signed up for Sprint's hurdles and I still remember
• 39:07
  where I was, I was a coaching at Ball State.
• 39:09
  Eight where I was in the car. When my corn called me and said
• 39:12
  hey I'm sorry the Sprints and hurdles is full but I have a
• 39:16
  slot for you in the jumps and I was like I mean I was devastated
• 39:19
  I was like ah man I'm a Sprint Turtles coach way I have to
• 39:24
  coach the jumps I don't want to coach a jumps and Mike told me
• 39:28
  he's like, hey you'll because I understand you're disappointed.
• 39:31
  You'll learn a lot about Sprints in this as well, trust me.
• 39:36
  And I was like, all right was like I'd probably eventually get
• 39:38
  it anyway. So let's do.
• 39:39
  And I begrudgingly did it, man. It was in Boise State.
• 39:42
  I drove from Muncie. Indiana to Boise steak.
• 39:45
  And yeah, that's a halt. And, oh, my goodness.
• 39:49
  I mean, in the next year, I did Sprint's with Dennis shaver and
• 39:54
  some of the other crew there, Gary Winkler, and learned a ton.
• 39:58
  You know, I'm not taking anything away from the Sprint's
• 40:01
  curriculum, the jumps in the training Theory.
• 40:04
  It's what you're describing there, where you put things, how
• 40:06
  you do things, what order, what time of the year, it was like,
• 40:09
  Like, I mean, it was literally the I had blinders on and boot
• 40:15
  took them off and gave me like corrective lenses.
• 40:18
  Like, oh, I can see, like this makes so much and I think a lot
• 40:21
  of that is the genius of his of his teaching.
• 40:24
  Like he just, I mean, the man was born to be a teacher and
• 40:28
  thank goodness. He does that in the form of
• 40:31
  track and field coaching because it's like no other.
• 40:34
  So I love like when you said that, I'd learn more about
• 40:36
  Sprint's during jumps level to as like, oh my that's that's my
• 40:39
  Perience. I share that with you.
• 40:41
  A hundred percent. That's right.
• 40:43
  Have you ever told booth at have you ever?
• 40:47
  No, yeah, if he watches then, he'll he'll learn it.
• 40:52
  I would encourage. You know I we had boo on the
• 40:55
  show last year, probably a year and two months ago now and
• 41:00
  fascinating. First of all known, boo now
• 41:02
  forever and consider him a mentor and friend.
• 41:05
  And so one to learn his journey was super interesting, High
• 41:08
  School football coach, defensive coordinator, all that kind of
• 41:11
  stuff is quite awesome but at the end a real treat for me,
• 41:15
  this was super cell. Fish honestly, but it was a real
• 41:18
  treat for me. I got to look this man in his
• 41:21
  eyes and in represent you and thousands of other coaches and
• 41:25
  say I told him I said, hey there are people who for one reason or
• 41:28
  other haven't been able to don't feel comfortable, whatever
• 41:31
  doesn't matter tell you thanks like you have had such an impact
• 41:35
  on them and so it really means a lot to me.
• 41:36
  That's why I say it's selfish. It means a lot to me to be able
• 41:38
  to represent. Lots of people out there, but I
• 41:41
  would encourage you to shoot him an email.
• 41:44
  Next time you see me in a clinic or me, just like a And just want
• 41:47
  to tell you like way, I want it so much and you know, I might be
• 41:50
  part of my story if where I am today is because of going to
• 41:55
  Mississippi State. And that's the, you know, great
• 41:57
  place for track and field as well.
• 41:59
  By the way, I'm going to start Vegas and having you for level 2
• 42:03
  man. That I just encourage you to do
• 42:05
  that you know, to do that. That's awesome.
• 42:07
  So you do level to that's a big that's a big undertaking.
• 42:11
  That's a whole week and you had to spend the whole week and
• 42:13
  start filtering the summer. I'm so sorry.
• 42:16
  Re. So sorry there was at that point
• 42:20
  there was not a lot to do in Starkville during the summer.
• 42:24
  That's for sure, right? It's grown mightily but as you
• 42:27
  were going through that class and learning and soaking up and
• 42:31
  you can kind of right now, you cannot you know have the
• 42:33
  memories of like oh man when he said X and we did this group
• 42:36
  project and yet it just, you know, it is this is literally a
• 42:39
  little overwhelming, all the things that you pick up, right?
• 42:42
  That light, an extra five. I don't know that you need a
• 42:46
  fire lit under you to do better. You're Self-motivating that
• 42:49
  sense. But was there an extra oomph of
• 42:51
  like, man? I cannot wait to get back and
• 42:53
  Coach like mean absolute legal right now.
• 42:58
  Like, what are we doing here? Yes, yes.
• 43:01
  And you know what was I knew? I had something when I think.
• 43:06
  So just I, this is my second year at Charleston Southern when
• 43:10
  I did this. Okay, so catch us up.
• 43:13
  Did you go from High Point to Charleston?
• 43:14
  Southern? Correct.
• 43:15
  Okay. High point for two years.
• 43:18
  And one of my mentors actually called me and say, hey
• 43:21
  Charleston Southern is looking for a new coach already through
• 43:25
  your name in the Hat there waiting on you to call and you
• 43:29
  know through longer process. You know, they already had the
• 43:33
  candidates then it turned out that none of the candidates were
• 43:36
  right and they called me down. I got the job and they're
• 43:40
  hosting conference. The first year and I'm walking
• 43:43
  into a head coaching position at a thing.
• 43:46
  I was 23 years old turning. 24th.
• 43:49
  Okay. Yeah, hold on now.
• 43:51
  Yeah. My favorite like this is a
• 43:56
  question. It's an automatic, any time when
• 43:58
  someone becomes a head coach for the first time?
• 43:59
  It's my automatic question, but I kind of know the answer.
• 44:03
  I have to know the answer here. There's no way.
• 44:05
  The answer is not to the - here, where you ready for this?
• 44:10
  No, absolutely. It's, it's always my litmus test
• 44:15
  of how on is someone's being with me because they're like, oh
• 44:16
  yeah, I was just super ready. I probably could have done it
• 44:18
  five years ago. I'm like, okay, you're full of
• 44:21
  it. What in the world were you
• 44:23
  thinking? Besides I hope they paid twelve
• 44:25
  thousand versus the 10,000 that you paid in High Point.
• 44:27
  Maybe it was in. I told, you know, Barry Shepherd
• 44:35
  was the one that called me, you know, I told myself, I don't
• 44:39
  think I'm right for this and he was like, trust me I know you,
• 44:44
  you're ready. Call them and I picked up.
• 44:49
  Yes sir. I mean what do you what do you
• 44:50
  say? You know a difference and I'll
• 44:54
  tell you how Unready, I felt unprepared.
• 44:59
  I felt in a sense. After a while, the athletic
• 45:03
  director asked the women's Coach Tasha, if I was homeless because
• 45:06
  I was always in the office. Yeah, I don't know.
• 45:12
  I mean, so many emotions when he said that sad amazing since
• 45:17
  like, oh, what a work ethic. I mean, holy cow, I was, I was,
• 45:23
  I was there because I didn't want to miss.
• 45:28
  What? I didn't know that.
• 45:29
  I didn't know. Say that again.
• 45:33
  I stayed in the office to make sure that I didn't miss.
• 45:38
  What? I didn't know that, I didn't
• 45:40
  know. Hmm.
• 45:42
  What does that mean about head coaching about the the the
• 45:48
  coaching side of it was coming along but how to manage how to
• 45:54
  you know, the logistics of Coach.
• 45:57
  There was no director of operations.
• 45:59
  There was no equipment manager. They were there was no travel
• 46:02
  agency to go through. I was the guy and it had to
• 46:07
  happen. If it didn't originate from me,
• 46:10
  it didn't happen for the program.
• 46:12
  So all of the meat entry, all of the hotels, all of the buses,
• 46:18
  all of the logistics that head coaches supposed to manage on
• 46:21
  that level. I'm done it.
• 46:25
  And, you know, what was I missing about alumni relations?
• 46:30
  What was I missing about, you know, the the approval of budget
• 46:36
  management. What was I missing?
• 46:38
  You know, and all of the areas of compliance and everything
• 46:41
  else that you had to go through as a head coach in on.
• 46:45
  Every assistant says that that says, I want that seat.
• 46:49
  You don't know what it's like until you sit there.
• 46:52
  And all rest on you and if you don't direct, it is not going to
• 46:57
  happen. And 2003 I sat in the seat and
• 47:04
  the thing that I could remember was the the neighbor that said,
• 47:09
  it ain't going to work. You'll be home in two years.
• 47:12
  From from leaving High School. Yeah.
• 47:15
  And I'm like, I'm going home, this will work.
• 47:21
  Just has to work because I'm not affiliate so, so I did
• 47:28
  everything right there in that corner office.
• 47:32
  So what surprised you the most becoming a new head coach at 23,
• 47:38
  by the way? I mean, come on besides having
• 47:41
  host conference by the way, and we'll put a pin in that because
• 47:44
  it's only track people think about that.
• 47:46
  No football coach goes, oh, we're hosting the conference
• 47:48
  meet, ya big deal, the other people take care of it.
• 47:51
  I'll coach my team. The track coach has to be like,
• 47:53
  whole, I gotta get officials, I gotta do the whole nine here,
• 47:58
  right? So besides that, what surprised
• 48:01
  you You like could you have some idea?
• 48:03
  You knew travel had to be done. Maybe didn't know how to do it
• 48:07
  or how to do it, effectively or efficiently budgeting etcetera,
• 48:10
  but what was the one thing like? Oh man, I did not.
• 48:12
  I actually do not realize I had to do X, Y, or Z or I didn't
• 48:16
  know this would be so hard. I thought this was gonna be a
• 48:19
  little bit easier. Uh-huh.
• 48:21
  Uh-huh. Managing, scholarship
• 48:25
  application. Because I think in most other
• 48:31
  places, I had another resource that the institution that would
• 48:34
  help me out. I had a business manager that
• 48:37
  she told me when I got the job. She said, I won't let you fail.
• 48:41
  She said, if you're if you're in danger she said I'm gonna be
• 48:44
  firm with you but I won't let you say no and I appreciate it
• 48:47
  but I didn't want to have to lean on her, but I knew somebody
• 48:50
  had my back even when it came to hosting conference, the head
• 48:55
  women's Coach, I was a hit men's coach to hit women.
• 48:57
  Tasha Ansley, you know, she had been working on, you know, some
• 49:02
  of the logistics for officials and the conference Championship.
• 49:06
  So we could tag team on that that was that was easier process
• 49:10
  because she was already there, she'd been there a year and she
• 49:13
  knew exactly, you know. Okay, we got a Direction Where
• 49:16
  We need to go but we had 3.9 scholarships.
• 49:21
  That was our funding and we had to fulfill a cross-country
• 49:27
  program, you know, and attract program 13.9 at a private
• 49:32
  institution and how do how we're going to do that?
• 49:37
  Yeah. How that's good.
• 49:38
  Because when you say 3.9 is like, wow, that's a really good
• 49:40
  GPA. Oh, wait a minute.
• 49:43
  That's scholarship for 20-plus events on track and field and
• 49:47
  cross country. Exactly.
• 49:49
  Exactly. And When I look at it like okay,
• 49:53
  great, where's the rest? Yeah, yeah, it there was no
• 49:57
  more. You're like, oh, this is for
• 49:59
  cross-country, really? Yeah, cross and track.
• 50:03
  Exactly. And you know, learning how much
• 50:08
  track meets travel cost. No, I want to keep them for
• 50:12
  spring break. Oh, I want to get this, you
• 50:14
  know, I saw Florida had this and yet, you're not Florida.
• 50:17
  Sorry no. Or you know it you know or you
• 50:21
  know hit Oklahoma did such and such and such and it was like,
• 50:24
  yeah, you're not going to do it. And it got to the point where,
• 50:27
  you know, as I move through, Charleston said I got my massage
• 50:31
  therapy degree because I saw every other school was traveling
• 50:34
  with a massage therapist that I wanted to be like so that's the
• 50:40
  other one I had went to the athletic director so you pay
• 50:43
  half hour pay half Wow, how many that's not that common?
• 50:48
  Yeah, I talked to coaches all day every day that part is not
• 50:52
  very common. Do you went out and got your
• 50:54
  massage therapy license. So, because you weren't able to
• 50:58
  hire a massage therapist, you're like, alright, well see you need
• 51:01
  Phil and eat, I'll go learn it myself myself, that's right,
• 51:04
  that's right. And, you know, you could scream
• 51:06
  hey, We need more money, we need more money, we need my money and
• 51:11
  everybody saying the same thing. Yeah, we do need more money, but
• 51:14
  I'm also I'll ask a few times and then I'll find another
• 51:17
  solution. So that was my solution as just
• 51:21
  go to massage therapy school. So how did the couple of years
• 51:24
  of Charleston Southern? Go in regards to being a head
• 51:26
  coach? How did how did your learning
• 51:28
  curve? Go greatly accelerated oh and
• 51:33
  even then I met people and I was there ten years, you know.
• 51:38
  So I've met people doing that 10-year period that that new
• 51:42
  considerably more than I did. I met people that were able to
• 51:45
  pour into my development? you know, and you know, we even
• 51:50
  had, we had a Jonathan Daniels who came back and he was a jumps
• 51:54
  coach for us and To add to what boo had already said in terms of
• 52:01
  categorizing, you know. So it may not be familiar with
• 52:05
  Jonathan. Jonathan was a professional long
• 52:07
  jumper, he actually jumped with a Carl.
• 52:10
  He worked with Tom to Les. Any work with Koh Chang over
• 52:14
  rice and those entire training groups with Carl Lewis and
• 52:18
  Roshan Stanford, and all of those guys.
• 52:21
  So he was a fly on the wall and that group and can bring, you
• 52:27
  know things. Talk to me to say, Hey, you
• 52:29
  know, so this is how the other groups are doing it.
• 52:31
  I mean, we sit and talk and my wife would have to call me like
• 52:35
  hey, when you coming home? Hey, I'll be home.
• 52:39
  You don't live in the office anymore.
• 52:40
  Get home. Right.
• 52:42
  Exactly, exactly. Exactly is like, you know, you
• 52:45
  do have a family. I was like, when I met you, I
• 52:47
  was in the office. What are you talking about?
• 52:50
  And it's changed here. Exactly, exactly.
• 52:57
  You did not actually say right. Right, yes, yes, yes, yes,
• 53:00
  ma'am, yes, ma'am. But you know, just just moving
• 53:05
  the program along and we had some success is when we went
• 53:08
  from accepting, you know, and give us scholarships to 49,
• 53:12
  second quarter mile or two to Cochin 45 second quarter
• 53:15
  mileage, you know? And I think by the time we left,
• 53:18
  as I showed progress, the athletic director started giving
• 53:22
  more scholarships into the program, we want from 3.9 by the
• 53:27
  time, I After in 13, we were at a 5.4.
• 53:32
  Yeah. Hey, you know, compared to 12.6
• 53:36
  fully fund. It we're still below half but at
• 53:39
  the same time, you know, it was it was a jump for us, right?
• 53:42
  You can only compare with the situation we're in today, right?
• 53:45
  So three point nine. To five point four is is huge,
• 53:48
  right? We certainly believe healthy
• 53:49
  things grow. So if you're growing in
• 53:52
  scholarship and budgeting and responsibility, that's that's a
• 53:55
  positive, the only healthy things are going that route, you
• 53:57
  know, No correct. Correct.
• 53:59
  And it it meant a lot to me every increase we got because it
• 54:04
  increase my buying power and increased, you know, the
• 54:07
  opportunities I could give to other students.
• 54:10
  And, like I said, in to the core me, I'm still, how do I repay
• 54:15
  coach night for somebody else? And, you know, so the more
• 54:20
  resources, the more you can do, the more you can be him on a
• 54:23
  larger scale, you know, and I think that's that one.
• 54:27
  Driving force. But like I said, you know, I
• 54:29
  want to be better. And I think we got better had a,
• 54:34
  you know, went from in, you know, everybody tries to
• 54:37
  classify you, okay. My I had Nathan Breeland who ran
• 54:42
  2073 when you know we're talking 2006 and that made the national
• 54:48
  meat and I'm like, oh okay let's do it.
• 54:52
  And you know, so we ran at Sac State, he was my first national
• 54:56
  qualifier. Then you know, had Michael rule,
• 55:00
  who ran 2089 in the same meat and you know also was a 46
• 55:04
  quarter mile. ER they had Levi Brooks who ran
• 55:07
  45, 45 7 and the 400 and then we came back head Yvonne young who
• 55:13
  was 1017 in the 1664, in the 1620 64 in the in the 200.
• 55:19
  And you know, we had Lavon Allen who, you know, ended up jumping
• 55:24
  8 meters, by the time he was done.
• 55:27
  Roman who ended up jumping eight meters, you know, and I'm
• 55:30
  looking breath and Drummond, was it was a future 8 meter long
• 55:33
  jumper, who I got 42 thousand dollars, and I don't know why he
• 55:39
  said yes, but he did. But, you know, the more we did
• 55:44
  the the more results would put out the more, you know, people
• 55:47
  start to trust us. It's like, oh okay.
• 55:49
  Yeah, I want to be good. So yeah, I'll come.
• 55:51
  Let's explore that a little bit. I think there's some value.
• 55:54
  Maybe we can reach further people out there and not just so
• 55:58
  the immediate person I thought I was like, oh, you know that
• 56:03
  situation that you described there being a 3.9, let's just
• 56:06
  call it for four or five this guy.
• 56:08
  Our ships, that's unfortunately, fairly common.
• 56:11
  There's a lot of Art majors smaller schools that are in that
• 56:14
  range and maybe worse off. There's people with two
• 56:16
  scholarships so. So, you think about that idea of
• 56:20
  few scholarships so, for college coaches.
• 56:23
  But also the High School coaches who are constantly working to
• 56:27
  get their kids into the right program on the next level in
• 56:31
  some, you know, I don't like the stereotypes of, like every kid
• 56:34
  thinks they deserve a full ride. It's such a row blah.
• 56:36
  And while there certainly are some Outstretched ideas of what
• 56:40
  may be, their marks should get them.
• 56:42
  I also don't mind. I mean what about 17 18 year old
• 56:45
  kids also? Don't mind a 17 year old kids
• 56:46
  shooting for the moon. I don't want to be a little bit
• 56:49
  the other side's. Like wait, you think you're only
• 56:51
  worth of quarters? Gosh, like you come on, man?
• 56:53
  Why don't you think the world of yourself here, right?
• 56:55
  I mean, the only going to get older brother the so stinking
• 56:58
  cute the world right now, but but but talk to us about how do
• 57:03
  you and how did you? And I know there's this team
• 57:06
  actually went a little bit longer, but But just staying
• 57:08
  right here in this Charleston Southern times.
• 57:10
  You did it for 10 years and had a lot of success.
• 57:12
  I mean you just nailed off marks that I mean I would second-guess
• 57:16
  that any coach would have said they wouldn't take on their
• 57:17
  team. Don't care what program there
• 57:19
  are those are, you know, those weren't good marks.
• 57:21
  Those were excellent marks. So, how do you manage a program
• 57:27
  with limited? So two things and probably more,
• 57:31
  but two things going against, you one, you don't have the
• 57:34
  allotment, you don't have the 11.6.
• 57:36
  Oh, you've got to be really frugal.
• 57:39
  You can't miss you, give us any 5% to someone, boy, they better
• 57:43
  be better outpaced. Even your expectations.
• 57:46
  It's not like you have four or five scholarships and that
• 57:50
  you're at the University of Florida.
• 57:51
  And what I mean by that is like, oh people are attracted to
• 57:53
  University for other reasons big-name college football team,
• 57:57
  Etc, year at Charleston. Southern with four, five
• 58:01
  scholarships. How did you develop your
• 58:03
  philosophy of recruiting? Performance analyzation.
• 58:09
  Like how did you pick? I have to assume and you correct
• 58:12
  me here. Tim those kids that you
• 58:13
  mentioned again all marks that no one's going to turn away from
• 58:17
  their team. I have to assume he said when
• 58:19
  kid ran 1018 1017 I have to assume.
• 58:20
  He did not run 1025 10:30 out of high school again.
• 58:24
  Correct me I could be wrong. I soon the kid was probably more
• 58:26
  of a 10-9, maybe even 11. Flat tiny kid, you'll get into
• 58:29
  some specifics. May be here.
• 58:30
  But how did you go through analyzing what kids to spend
• 58:34
  money on? How did you analyze, how much to
• 58:37
  spend money on? That's just Stay mean, you got
• 58:38
  to be really Frugal really efficient with your money and
• 58:41
  time with athletes. Talk to us about that process
• 58:45
  for you. You know, and most of those kids
• 58:49
  probably wouldn't have even gotten a, a major offer from a,
• 58:56
  from a recruiting standpoint. I looked at them early, I looked
• 58:59
  at them often and I found the kids who had the problems that I
• 59:06
  could fix. And, you know, I think every
• 59:09
  coach has to know what they're good at fixing.
• 59:13
  You know, they have to know honey, okay, my system works
• 59:16
  well for for this type of kid and you got to know your
• 59:20
  school's cheat code. You know, I know if if I can get
• 59:25
  them at this GPA and we can stack the aid, that can get this
• 59:29
  amount in academics, and they get the Pell Grant and they'll
• 59:32
  get this type of a and I'll get work.
• 59:35
  Okay, so now no, I not have to pay for, for I have to pay for
• 59:40
  You know, 50%. And you know that's casting a
• 59:45
  net you know you basically you selling Honda's so whore you
• 59:50
  looking for Honda's you know you're not going to find you
• 59:53
  know the Bentley you know in that in that pile you know
• 59:56
  you're casting a wide net to try to sift through and your
• 1:00:01
  perspective almost like like dope respect, you know your
• 1:00:04
  shift Shake. Nope, nothing there sift, shake
• 1:00:08
  it up happening and I went off the 10% rule, 10 percent of the
• 1:00:12
  Questionnaires I sent back. I was gone.
• 1:00:15
  I was actually going to get back you know out of those ten
• 1:00:19
  percent 10% might come to school and come for a visit out of
• 1:00:24
  those ten percent. 110 percent of that might actually be right
• 1:00:30
  and have the right financial aid package and say yes.
• 1:00:33
  So I can put out 100 questionnaires to get 10 back.
• 1:00:39
  And out of those 10. I might get one.
• 1:00:41
  That's the right one. And that's, you know, you do
• 1:00:45
  that several hundred times. And, you know, then you start
• 1:00:48
  finding a, you have after you have success that pipeline, this
• 1:00:53
  this coach trust me. They know what I can do for
• 1:00:56
  their kids. They know what I can't do for
• 1:00:57
  the kids. It's very financially and
• 1:01:00
  athletically, you know, and we had success in Georgia and, you
• 1:01:05
  know, we could go up to, I knew I could go up to Pennsylvania
• 1:01:09
  because school was going to cost just as much up there as it did.
• 1:01:13
  In Charleston, South Carolina. So I could give a yes a little
• 1:01:17
  bit easier. You know, you could go to
• 1:01:19
  California because school is going to cost.
• 1:01:21
  You know what? It costs.
• 1:01:22
  I knew I couldn't go to Texas and you know act, you know, as
• 1:01:26
  you learn as a coach as a recruiter.
• 1:01:29
  Hey where am I going to have success?
• 1:01:32
  And that's kind of where we started finding our success.
• 1:01:35
  And like I said, there were, there were a couple of coaches
• 1:01:38
  either in Georgia or, you know, at Florida or, you know, up in
• 1:01:41
  Pennsylvania or New York. California that could trust us
• 1:01:45
  to do right by their student athlete and and hey, I can do
• 1:01:50
  what I can do or can't do what I can't do.
• 1:01:52
  And I was up front, you know, where it might not be right for
• 1:01:55
  that particular kid, you're working on the coach, will
• 1:01:58
  remember that in the kids that hey, it wasn't right for me, but
• 1:02:01
  it might be right for you. So that, that was the process
• 1:02:05
  for me. So you mentioned a lot of great
• 1:02:08
  ideas there from knowing your school's, cheat code.
• 1:02:10
  I like how you put that now. I might be nice.
• 1:02:13
  But I feel like most coaches have that down or at least
• 1:02:18
  they're on the path. I mean, I know every scholarship
• 1:02:20
  available but you know, mixing the use of Pell Grants and
• 1:02:24
  scholarship that seems like a fairly common activity for
• 1:02:29
  coaches. You talked about hustling, you
• 1:02:32
  know, sending out 1,000 questionnaires, I'm gonna get
• 1:02:35
  100 back to them. Are actually going to be the
• 1:02:36
  right fit and one of them might say yes.
• 1:02:38
  So I'd better it's a numbers game.
• 1:02:40
  I hear a lot of times, right? So I and I feel like, you know,
• 1:02:44
  Most of us coaches wise. We're pretty good at that, I
• 1:02:47
  can't imagine how many trees we kill for questionnaires out
• 1:02:49
  there today, we do, we do a lot. Seems that seems right pipeline,
• 1:02:55
  you know, I think a lot of us are trying to build that.
• 1:02:57
  There's definitely maybe a discussion to be had about, you
• 1:03:00
  know, how much of as a college coach, how much do you involve
• 1:03:04
  the high school or Club coat? There's a kind of, you know,
• 1:03:07
  there's a spectrum, but there's some competing thoughts about
• 1:03:09
  recruiting do. I actually reach out to the high
• 1:03:11
  school coach or not and For that.
• 1:03:14
  But one thing that you said that right off the bat that I thought
• 1:03:16
  was super interesting was know what you can fix now.
• 1:03:22
  Tell me again, knowing that we don't talk X's and O's and God
• 1:03:25
  bless if you ever hear Tim at a clinic, if he's there to speak
• 1:03:30
  on whatever, Sprints hurdles jumps, it doesn't matter.
• 1:03:33
  Go listen to him speak, you will learn a lot.
• 1:03:36
  We're not going to get in that today, but I thought that was
• 1:03:38
  interesting in a self-awareness thing because if you know what
• 1:03:41
  you can fix on an athlete, that means you have to know what you
• 1:03:45
  are, not necessarily able to fix like, oh I my system.
• 1:03:49
  And My Philosophy is not great. At the person who's strong, this
• 1:03:52
  way, I need someone who's stronger over here, which means
• 1:03:54
  their weaknesses this way. Talk to us about that, because
• 1:03:57
  that sounds more of like, oh, I'm going to find the Hidden
• 1:04:00
  Gem. I'm going to go find.
• 1:04:02
  I'm going to throw crazy numbers here.
• 1:04:04
  I'm going to go find the 11:5 boy Sprinter and everybody, I
• 1:04:08
  got so fast girl, now, probably Sprinter, but I'm going to give
• 1:04:11
  him ten percent because They look like X and their strength
• 1:04:16
  is y and that means their weaknesses e and guess what?
• 1:04:18
  My strength is z. Like I can take that and go on
• 1:04:21
  with that. Tell me more about that kind of
• 1:04:22
  like Talent identification, that find the Hidden Gem philosophy.
• 1:04:26
  You had there. That's right.
• 1:04:27
  I mean, where the year finding that kid who does the right
• 1:04:32
  things that you like in your system immediately, but may not
• 1:04:37
  be as strong. Or you know lacks maturity or is
• 1:04:43
  you know use my argues examples in a couple of different places
• 1:04:47
  at Charleston Southern I had and Anthony award, he came out of
• 1:04:52
  high school or an 11-1, his freshman year he went in 60, you
• 1:04:56
  know, people say, oh, you know, okay, he was going to do that
• 1:04:59
  with maturity. Well, he still had to mature.
• 1:05:03
  Well, if wait a minute, there are gaggle of 11 ones that never
• 1:05:08
  Get 10 6. I'm not sure that's a given,
• 1:05:10
  like, oh, he just had to mature. What right?
• 1:05:13
  That's that's called coaching my friend.
• 1:05:14
  Yeah. Okay.
• 1:05:15
  Keep going, keep going. If you look at Levi, Brookes the
• 1:05:19
  one I tell you that ran a 45-7. This was a sophomore year, his
• 1:05:25
  state championship, he ran 48:17, you know.
• 1:05:29
  So again, it's seeing him run, you know, and it's like, he's
• 1:05:33
  got a consistent stride length, and he's got some of the things
• 1:05:36
  that I like, and I think he'll fit in very well.
• 1:05:38
  Well, with the system that we do to build a Rover string to
• 1:05:42
  build, you know, everything that he needs in order to be a great
• 1:05:46
  athlete and then watch it pay off.
• 1:05:48
  You know, Javon young was was 1056?
• 1:05:53
  No, I 1071 come out of high school, he signed them, then he
• 1:05:56
  went ran ten five after we signed them and then by his
• 1:06:00
  sophomore year he was 1017. But you know you to look at that
• 1:06:04
  kids like, ooh, I see you. I see what he's doing.
• 1:06:07
  I know I can fix it out. Almost, you're saying to
• 1:06:09
  yourself. I hope he doesn't fix it before.
• 1:06:11
  I get your good thing. You sent him a 10-7 because you
• 1:06:16
  might not have been able to sign of a 10-5.
• 1:06:19
  Yeah. You know, if we want to get
• 1:06:22
  stronger we go in the weight room and we lift weights if we
• 1:06:25
  want to get faster, maybe this is shocking.
• 1:06:27
  This is a maybe this is an X's and O's to you listening out
• 1:06:30
  there if you want to get faster you run.
• 1:06:31
  Fast by the way, I'm learning I'm doing a lot of kind of Deep
• 1:06:35
  dive in into ideas. You know, it's funny because we
• 1:06:39
  you know, when I say if you want to get stronger go the weight
• 1:06:40
  room ever. Again even you you shook your
• 1:06:42
  head like that, right? But for i d like we don't think
• 1:06:46
  about people who come up with a lots of and lots of good ideas
• 1:06:49
  of. Like we kind of think it's more
• 1:06:51
  natural. Like, oh, I just I, you know, I
• 1:06:53
  don't have that or oh, that that person has that.
• 1:06:56
  And we're actually learning that ideas is kind of like a muscle
• 1:06:59
  as well and the more you work towards them and Dissect.
• 1:07:02
  How you come up with? Good ideas, you can come up with
• 1:07:05
  more ideas. So how do you flex your muscle?
• 1:07:11
  How do you get in the weight room for what you're talking
• 1:07:12
  about with that Talent identification?
• 1:07:14
  You know you met because I would think that a lot of people
• 1:07:18
  listening right now. Heard you say that and we're
• 1:07:20
  like yeah I do that. It's not special here Tim.
• 1:07:22
  I don't know who this time guy is but he ain't saying nothing
• 1:07:25
  special. I do that.
• 1:07:25
  I go look at him I go. Yeah that no one's looking at
• 1:07:27
  that kid and so I take them on. I take that walk on and there.
• 1:07:32
  You know, I took the one, everybody has an example.
• 1:07:34
  I have at least one that went from walk onto All-American are
• 1:07:37
  all conference or improved tremendously, but I can go look
• 1:07:42
  at Juco D3 D2, any IE results and say but there's a lot of
• 1:07:48
  people being overlooked because there are plenty of.
• 1:07:50
  Yeah, I've said it, I still say, I'll say it right here to my
• 1:07:53
  friend. The head coach at Oklahoma, some
• 1:07:56
  of the best coaches around her and D3, because you go look at
• 1:07:59
  the national meet results. They're pretty good.
• 1:08:02
  My friend fact it was this past year the winner for the hunter
• 1:08:05
  was 1016 and the 200 is like 20 point and maybe that was the
• 1:08:07
  vision to. I do member, one of the reasons
• 1:08:09
  she's in the studio for kids and any division.
• 1:08:12
  One would have taken those kids and I assume because they were
• 1:08:15
  not a division one, they were not that great marks wise at a
• 1:08:19
  high school but someone had to have looked at them.
• 1:08:22
  They, I imagine they had the see, the kid that you have is D3
• 1:08:26
  kid. He went 10:16, I think was what
• 1:08:27
  he won the hundred and I imagine if I interviewed that kid said,
• 1:08:30
  hey out of high school, You ran what?
• 1:08:32
  And let's just say he said, 11 flat.
• 1:08:34
  Let's say he said tonight and he's like, yeah, I really wanted
• 1:08:36
  to go to and I'm not going to insinuate names but I really
• 1:08:40
  want, you know, I want to use you since you're right here.
• 1:08:42
  Tim I really wanted to go to Oklahoma.
• 1:08:43
  Like I grew up just south of the Dallas area was a sooner fan.
• 1:08:48
  But, you know, I ran 10 9 and they, they just said, you know,
• 1:08:51
  I wasn't Big 12 material which most probably would.
• 1:08:54
  Okay. It's not again, that's not a bad
• 1:08:56
  thing. You can't take every ten nine on
• 1:08:57
  your on your team, right? But other coaches also said,
• 1:09:00
  yeah, not not fast. Often.
• 1:09:02
  This kid goes to, I don't remember what school you went to
• 1:09:04
  in D3 and runs 1016. So obviously, a lot of people
• 1:09:08
  missed what they thought they were good at telling
• 1:09:10
  identification and they just lift it, right?
• 1:09:14
  So how do you, how do you, how do you benchpress?
• 1:09:18
  How do you get stronger? How do you get better at this
• 1:09:20
  Talent ID? So that you are not missing as
• 1:09:23
  many kids telling them. No.
• 1:09:24
  Sorry. This is, you know, our programs
• 1:09:25
  just doesn't have room for you and the other side of you think
• 1:09:29
  you see a kid like oh yeah, I can fix that kid and they come
• 1:09:31
  and And they don't get fixed right?
• 1:09:33
  Not everybody finds out. How do you Flex that muscle and
• 1:09:36
  get better at it? Oh my goodness.
• 1:09:40
  The more you I for and this is this is personal.
• 1:09:43
  So you know the more you can you can see conservation of momentum
• 1:09:50
  the more you can you can see the potential of oh man look at the
• 1:09:54
  and I call them variable factors you know elasticity you know
• 1:09:58
  lever length technical competency.
• 1:10:02
  You know, training age, you know, I mean I and I can go
• 1:10:06
  down, I can go down the list, you know, I like it's absolute
• 1:10:09
  strength, you know, ability to fire at a speed of contraction,
• 1:10:13
  you know, if we talking about hurdlers, you know there's a
• 1:10:15
  list of things that you look at there and you know you have
• 1:10:19
  whiffed on a couple or I've had to wait longer than I thought I
• 1:10:23
  did. You know?
• 1:10:24
  And the last one grit, you know how tough is the kid.
• 1:10:28
  You know. So yeah I've tried to master
• 1:10:32
  identifying those variable factors that say this one might
• 1:10:37
  be a good fit. But also when you're talking
• 1:10:40
  about working at a High Point University at a Charleston
• 1:10:44
  Southern, you know, even when I went on the South Carolina State
• 1:10:48
  what it took to score in a conference, you may be able to
• 1:10:51
  take more chances on developmental kids and what I
• 1:10:55
  found out. You know, once you go to a power
• 1:10:57
  5, you know, some of them pass because they don't have an
• 1:11:02
  immediate impact and I called that market value.
• 1:11:06
  What's the market value of the developmental kid?
• 1:11:09
  If you know, you're not going to get a return on them
• 1:11:12
  immediately, you know? Okay.
• 1:11:14
  So, you know, and Jim not again. Who I worked with for month
• 1:11:20
  here. And he always told me, he said,
• 1:11:23
  you know, on a mid-major level, you're as good as your seniors
• 1:11:27
  on the power 5, love with. You're as good as your freshman.
• 1:11:32
  And that stuck with me and it makes sense.
• 1:11:37
  Because what are you spending your money on And that's why
• 1:11:43
  sometimes, you know, a major school has to pass on the kid
• 1:11:47
  because their market value that can't get a return on investment
• 1:11:50
  for two years. And you know, the thing about
• 1:11:53
  most of the kids that I talked to you about that that ran as
• 1:11:56
  fast times it was it wasn't it was a two-year investment, you
• 1:12:00
  know and at 3.9 scholarships you know you really have to set up a
• 1:12:03
  program of this was going to pay off in a year.
• 1:12:05
  This is going to pay off the year after that this was going
• 1:12:08
  to pay off the year after that and then I have to recruit the
• 1:12:10
  next fresh. Women in order to get them in so
• 1:12:13
  they can have the ear growth or development for them to pay off
• 1:12:16
  but I got them all at the right price.
• 1:12:19
  And then you go and you blow a full scholarship on the
• 1:12:22
  developmental kid. And then you, you saying, you're
• 1:12:25
  in, at the power 5 institution and they don't pay off for two
• 1:12:28
  almost three years, you know, that's a good way to be
• 1:12:31
  unemployed. And fortunately, I appreciate
• 1:12:35
  that Insight in your rights. Not 100% game there.
• 1:12:39
  No one is hitting this 100% of time of Developmental kids at
• 1:12:42
  all, pan out to be great. If my great doesn't, it will
• 1:12:45
  America be great. They could be a go from walking
• 1:12:48
  into a contributing. Of your conference Champion for
• 1:12:50
  by one team or something. I mean you know there's levels
• 1:12:53
  to that part of the game, you listed several different kind of
• 1:12:56
  variables, you know that ended with grit is there a variable?
• 1:13:00
  That is a non-starter for you. And what I mean by that amount
• 1:13:04
  kind of explain it, let you kind of think about that question a
• 1:13:06
  little bit. Is there something?
• 1:13:08
  Whether it now we're kind of out of the realm of just
• 1:13:10
  developmental kids developmental included but also the All-Stars,
• 1:13:14
  the ones that you know, are everybody is quote, unquote,
• 1:13:16
  recruiting is there a Variable that would someone has or
• 1:13:21
  doesn't have that is a you're not coming to Tim lankford's
• 1:13:25
  program here, it may be lack of grid.
• 1:13:27
  It may be and not the variables that you have no control over
• 1:13:31
  meaning bad GPA because you just can't recruit them if they don't
• 1:13:34
  have the GPA and test requirements.
• 1:13:36
  But is there a, you know what Mike, if they're short I'm
• 1:13:39
  sorry. I just I'm not a good short
• 1:13:41
  person coach. I need the levers and you know
• 1:13:43
  for that helps with other things.
• 1:13:44
  Is there a variable that they that athlete Has or doesn't have
• 1:13:50
  that as a non-starter for you? I think it speaks to character
• 1:13:55
  for me, bad character or lazy. Because or as some people say
• 1:14:05
  Beyond reproach, you know, uncorrectable you know hey you
• 1:14:09
  know, I got it and there's nothing you're going to tell me.
• 1:14:12
  Okay, you got it. You got it, might as well go pro
• 1:14:15
  but those are the things that that in my program, okay?
• 1:14:19
  If I can't coach you, I can't help you.
• 1:14:22
  Well though, that was one of the funniest things I've ever heard
• 1:14:25
  like, oh, you got it. Alright, go pro, you don't need
• 1:14:27
  me. Exactly, exactly.
• 1:14:31
  Start using that with coaches. Would they wear like Lauren got
• 1:14:33
  it up like women? What you need me for me, you
• 1:14:35
  puzzle. Start your own pro circuit, I
• 1:14:36
  guess. Other things you have to know
• 1:14:43
  how much of the other variable factors you and, you know, I
• 1:14:45
  always say, you got to be spread on this level.
• 1:14:48
  Now you have to be a freak in one way or the other in my
• 1:14:52
  variable factors, you got to be a freak leveling free grit, you
• 1:14:57
  know that that was a Prefontaine you know, he would hurt more
• 1:15:00
  than anybody else and also freak work, ethic, Freedom,
• 1:15:04
  explosiveness, you know, strength elasticity, you know,
• 1:15:08
  find the Freaks and One one category or the other so they
• 1:15:12
  they don't bother me and be willing to learn to be progress
• 1:15:18
  and from where you are to where you're headed.
• 1:15:21
  And if you can do that you know like I said I think there's a
• 1:15:25
  there's a place for you here as long as you can show me.
• 1:15:28
  You have the market but well I think it's you know, we do have
• 1:15:31
  some student athletes at listen. I think those are pretty
• 1:15:34
  valuable lesson, right there. The the non-variable.
• 1:15:36
  The non-starter is character bad.
• 1:15:40
  Actor. Can't Target hard to overcome
• 1:15:41
  that. I can teach a short kid to run
• 1:15:43
  fast. I can teach a Long Tall kid
• 1:15:46
  throw far. Is tough to take a kid who just
• 1:15:49
  their morals and ethics, and are just not at a high standard.
• 1:15:53
  It's hard to change that. So let's for the sake of time.
• 1:15:56
  Tim, let's keep moving here. You said Charleston Southern for
• 1:15:58
  10 years. You kind of give us a little
• 1:16:00
  preview of where you go next. Talk to us about where you went
• 1:16:03
  and why did you go there? South Carolina State University
• 1:16:07
  and was there for six years? And it was the opportunity to
• 1:16:13
  become the head coach over men's and women's program.
• 1:16:17
  You know, obviously it was a raise, I didn't have to move my
• 1:16:19
  family, I commuted an hour to work every day which was he gave
• 1:16:25
  me recruiting time, think time to plan out the day, if I'm
• 1:16:31
  going up or, you know, from getting home, you know, I by the
• 1:16:34
  time you get home, you're recruiting is done.
• 1:16:37
  You know, you could get out of the car and give the rest of the
• 1:16:39
  time too. Family.
• 1:16:40
  But you know, really enjoyed the time enjoyed the the culture of
• 1:16:45
  an HBCU really enjoy the people that I work with, you know, and
• 1:16:52
  you know just didn't have a lot of resources and I knew that
• 1:16:55
  going in, you know, some of our hbcus struggle with with
• 1:16:59
  resources and funding and trying to, you know, keep a leg up, you
• 1:17:04
  know, with the with the majors or the you know, the our peers
• 1:17:07
  I'll say that and you know, I At the challenge.
• 1:17:10
  And it was fun produced. USA 60-meter national champion,
• 1:17:16
  out of South Carolina state produced, the NCAA for enemy
• 1:17:19
  Champion, you know, the South Carolina State.
• 1:17:21
  So, you know, we were able to get the talent in and cultivated
• 1:17:26
  a little bit, neither one of them were, you know, it was
• 1:17:29
  again more data standard of, you know, find the people that I
• 1:17:33
  knew I can fix these problems. You know, if you look at the
• 1:17:37
  meat Camp, who won the US, Say, 60 meter Championship, you know,
• 1:17:41
  when I saw him, you know again he was one of those kids that
• 1:17:45
  have run 10 7 when we start recruiting them and then the
• 1:17:47
  state media and 10-5, you know, and then by the time he
• 1:17:51
  graduates he was 1003 in the one.
• 1:17:54
  So you know that was, you know, C is Ultimate PR and a 60 was
• 1:17:58
  third at the NCAA championships and 60 meters the year.
• 1:18:01
  That Elijah Hall one, he was 655 654 and it's 60 and and
• 1:18:08
  anti-roll Richard, you know, Coming out of high school.
• 1:18:10
  He, he ran 4848 one coming out of high school but he had also
• 1:18:16
  run 1071 in the one. So we split him with football.
• 1:18:21
  And I told him I said, hey, I'll give you the money, you know?
• 1:18:24
  And like, you know, when you're done with football, come on out
• 1:18:28
  and he ultimately made the decision to hang up their
• 1:18:31
  football, cleats and come out for track.
• 1:18:34
  And within that next calendar year, he was at National
• 1:18:37
  Championships. So you continue that tradition
• 1:18:40
  of finding, I mean these are not Stellar kids at a high school
• 1:18:44
  and I hesitate to say that if they were they'd be a, maybe a
• 1:18:48
  power 5 or division, other division, one type of program.
• 1:18:52
  So you're still, you're just working your system of the
• 1:18:55
  tangibles of which, what you're looking for, what can I what can
• 1:18:58
  I what kids can I find that? I can fix it, I can improve, you
• 1:19:02
  know in a different word there. Yeah, correct.
• 1:19:05
  What fascinated hbcus are. In like their day deservedly.
• 1:19:11
  So, by the way some of it is certainly driven by no man
• 1:19:16
  Primetime Deion Sanders will have a most forgot Deion Sanders
• 1:19:19
  name. He's not a listener.
• 1:19:20
  So I don't have to worry about him making him mad, but some of
• 1:19:23
  it is driven by what Dion is doing at Jackson State, which,
• 1:19:27
  you know, and it has its own also device in this inside, the
• 1:19:30
  HBCU World specifically. But, you know, he's definitely
• 1:19:33
  like, you know, I coached at Mississippi State and so I went
• 1:19:36
  to Jackson a lot never outside. The track, they had some amazing
• 1:19:39
  track athletes and track coaches there, but did not, I did not
• 1:19:43
  look up on Saturday, Hal Jackson, State football was
• 1:19:46
  doing, I didn't care. And now today I'm like, hey,
• 1:19:50
  how'd that Jackson's? They do this week, like, I care
• 1:19:53
  for some reason because of what Dion's do, I retweeted they
• 1:19:57
  showed Dion, like, at the beginning of one of the football
• 1:19:59
  games, the crowds getting into it.
• 1:20:01
  I'm, I'm sure this is whether this is a typical HBCU
• 1:20:04
  atmosphere or specifically Jackson State, which they're
• 1:20:07
  getting like 50,000 people. Pilates game, by the way, until
• 1:20:11
  this year, Illinois wasn't getting 50,000 people, but it
• 1:20:15
  was just like this, Electric Fun band playing attitude by
• 1:20:19
  retweeting said, I would have walked onto this dude's program
• 1:20:22
  just to be in this atmosphere. Like it just seemed like the
• 1:20:24
  most fun in, you know, so many, not only great programs instead
• 1:20:30
  of HBCU but really great people, like I'm thinking of my guy
• 1:20:34
  Lamont Vaughn at Grambling now know better.
• 1:20:38
  Listen, by the way, then Richie being at Alabama, State longtime
• 1:20:42
  friend, both of those guys are Gil, connections podcast alums
• 1:20:46
  as well, Lincoln Pine Bluff. I mean, the list goes, you know,
• 1:20:50
  I hesitate to make list because I'm going to miss a lot of
• 1:20:54
  people but doing in South Carolina state fam.
• 1:20:56
  You, I was just amazing people that I've had the opportunity to
• 1:20:59
  work with over the years. What was it, like coaching and
• 1:21:03
  HBCU in regards to the like? Can you describe the?
• 1:21:07
  There is something special. Well, that I can't even relate
• 1:21:09
  to, I honestly, can you describe what it was like coaching and
• 1:21:13
  HBCU maybe the fraternity of HBCU coaches and athletes?
• 1:21:17
  What was that? That?
• 1:21:18
  Like, during that time there, you know, it really was amazing
• 1:21:23
  and, you know, we had a coach. But if you are head football,
• 1:21:26
  coach at the time, you know, he he poured more wisdom that he'd
• 1:21:32
  forgotten in life, then I'll ever know, you know.
• 1:21:35
  And, you know, he just being in head coach meetings and listen
• 1:21:38
  to him. And you know just things that
• 1:21:40
  he'd been through, you know, in his longtime coach at tenure,
• 1:21:45
  you know, it gave me - gave me wisdom to think about and how we
• 1:21:49
  want to run our program and you know, it was it was just the way
• 1:21:54
  everybody kind of banded together and it's us.
• 1:21:58
  You know, I could go over and I could sit and Maria governor's
• 1:22:02
  office. You know, that he's our head
• 1:22:03
  basketball coach and you know, we could just sit and talk a
• 1:22:06
  little bit and, you know, and Marie coach the Charleston
• 1:22:09
  Southern when I was there. So I knew him and then I could
• 1:22:13
  go play golf with Bill Robertson the head, women's basketball
• 1:22:16
  coach and and gain introspection from him.
• 1:22:20
  There was one year, you know, like, you know, I tell you, you
• 1:22:22
  know, resource trick and a little bit just dug paid for our
• 1:22:27
  shoes. You know, so it was like Hey you
• 1:22:30
  know your will by the track and field program shoes and but that
• 1:22:36
  gave you. The idea that hey, yeah, this
• 1:22:39
  this is, this is us against everyone else, you know, and we
• 1:22:44
  didn't operate so much in silos because it, hey, I was only
• 1:22:47
  full-time coach at South Carolina state.
• 1:22:50
  We had a part-time coach that, you know, we made, you know, we
• 1:22:55
  made our Cross Country Coach and You know, the ad that hired me,
• 1:23:00
  Charlene Johnson. She gave me GA positions that I
• 1:23:05
  never would help me out and help me, Dr. Vance, help me do all
• 1:23:08
  that stuff. I can remember, we drove from
• 1:23:11
  South Carolina to Delaware State, you know, for the cross
• 1:23:14
  country championships. And I mean, we drove up and, you
• 1:23:17
  know, we drove back, you know, after the meat.
• 1:23:19
  So you know, like I said it was a, we get things done here, type
• 1:23:23
  situation and I had I cut the the cross-country course.
• 1:23:28
  I wanted them to have their first cross home cross country
• 1:23:31
  meet I cut it with a push mower. Five miles.
• 1:23:35
  Hold on. This seems like one of those
• 1:23:39
  fables you know you're not old enough to be like you know your
• 1:23:43
  PR is like you know gold medal standard now, you know saying
• 1:23:46
  like hold on to make sure maybe my head phones aren't working.
• 1:23:51
  Well it sounded like you said you did a five-mile
• 1:23:53
  cross-country course with a push more you time I like the old
• 1:23:57
  school like that's right. You you can't.
• 1:24:01
  That's physically impossible to tell.
• 1:24:04
  Someone's going to call someone's gonna hit me up on
• 1:24:05
  Twitter or call me and say hey that Tim he's BS in this is not
• 1:24:08
  true. I was there it was a riding lawn
• 1:24:10
  mower for real. You did this with a push
• 1:24:13
  lawnmower. It was a book.
• 1:24:15
  I can text you the picture. If you want it.
• 1:24:17
  No, no, you have to yes. Yes, yes, yes.
• 1:24:20
  Because I again, people are in our listening, go on this.
• 1:24:22
  It I don't care if he says it's true, it's not text me the
• 1:24:25
  picture. I'm going to use when we
• 1:24:26
  publish. When you're listening to this,
• 1:24:28
  you'll go to my Twitter at my Cunningham.
• 1:24:29
  And this picture will be there because First of all, that's
• 1:24:33
  just physically phenomenal. But secondly, like leadership
• 1:24:39
  phenomenal like for to do that for your kids.
• 1:24:41
  Like again, that no excuses like, oh, you know, you know why
• 1:24:44
  I can't cut a cross country course because we don't have a
• 1:24:46
  access to a riding lawn mower or whatnot and you're like, I don't
• 1:24:49
  care. Here's what I got.
• 1:24:51
  Oh, man. And you see ya.
• 1:24:57
  The next thing I was waiting for is if you like Golf Course,
• 1:24:59
  grass as well. Like, okay.
• 1:25:00
  You walk five miles? Yeah.
• 1:25:03
  So again here creeps up this, you know, I'm not going to fail.
• 1:25:07
  I'm not a failure. I'm going to lead young men and
• 1:25:11
  women in this is what they need and deserve at South Carolina
• 1:25:15
  state at the time they deserve and need their own home, cross
• 1:25:18
  country so they can run a meat at home.
• 1:25:20
  That's right, that's right. And I located the the location
• 1:25:28
  probably a year before and I Called the city.
• 1:25:33
  It was a it was like a business Research Park, that was
• 1:25:36
  underdeveloped, I called him. And I asked him for permission
• 1:25:39
  to run the meet there and they told me sure you, okay, yeah,
• 1:25:44
  you can use it, just provide Insurance, you know, XYZ all of
• 1:25:47
  the, the Hoops, you have to jump through and I said, great
• 1:25:52
  immediately put out, we're going to have a home meat.
• 1:25:55
  So then, I went to the grounds crew.
• 1:25:57
  I said, hey, I need you guys to. I got a course and I drove it
• 1:26:00
  off in my in my truck. Fuck, you know, so I made sure I
• 1:26:03
  had the mileage, right, and I ran through it, you know, to
• 1:26:06
  make sure I had tire tracks down.
• 1:26:07
  That's, I've already run through it and, you know, you can see
• 1:26:10
  the tire tracks. You can see where I want to cut
• 1:26:12
  and they said, oh, we don't go off campus.
• 1:26:15
  I said, okay, well, you know I can get a trailer and I can just
• 1:26:19
  hook up the lawn mower and I can, I can, you know, just take
• 1:26:23
  the lawnmower over know you. We don't lend out our lawn
• 1:26:25
  mowers and I had that, okay, I put my foot in my mouth here,
• 1:26:31
  I've already promised people that were having a meet, you
• 1:26:34
  know, I need you to help me cuz I have stepped in it already.
• 1:26:38
  That's right. That's right.
• 1:26:41
  So, I started off. I had the idea.
• 1:26:43
  Well, I will cut the start line. And then the solution will come
• 1:26:48
  to me and I'll figure it out and I cut the start line and the
• 1:26:53
  solution didn't come. So I cut a little more and my
• 1:26:57
  mind drew a blank and I cut a little more and then it turned
• 1:27:01
  to I'm not going to fail again and then it turned to nobody
• 1:27:08
  will help me and more anger and determination and then it turned
• 1:27:14
  into A little depression. I teared up when I couldn't see
• 1:27:19
  the road and nobody could see me as I could get mauled by a bear.
• 1:27:22
  Right. In the middle of nowhere.
• 1:27:24
  Yeah, with a push lawnmower to protect yourself.
• 1:27:28
  You're basically effective against a blade of grass, my
• 1:27:31
  friend, any a squirrel. Could have attacked.
• 1:27:32
  You like, I'm dead. I gotta push lawnmower.
• 1:27:34
  Yeah, and we got it connected, and at my athletic director,
• 1:27:41
  Tom. And I've just walked, I said,
• 1:27:43
  you got to come see this. You got to come see this?
• 1:27:45
  Was why it was a see, a championship regulation.
• 1:27:48
  It was wide enough. He drove his Cadillac Escalade
• 1:27:52
  through the entire course. And after you finished, eating
• 1:27:55
  looked at me. He just said, you're crazy.
• 1:27:59
  I think a lot of us are saying that all right.
• 1:28:00
  Now Town, honestly, just to put that out there.
• 1:28:03
  I think. And yeah.
• 1:28:06
  So but it mentions it meant enough to me that, like I said,
• 1:28:11
  hey we've already said, this is what we're going to do.
• 1:28:15
  Be the kids in that program had never had a home contest and I
• 1:28:22
  know it we've had home track and field events but they'd never
• 1:28:25
  had home, cross-country, cross country matters, you know?
• 1:28:29
  And I wanted to show them that, hey, it does matter and this is
• 1:28:32
  something we can pull off. I was going to add that as like,
• 1:28:36
  let's not let it be lost here. Here's a Sprint's jumps hurdle,
• 1:28:39
  you know, those speed power events, who is doing something.
• 1:28:42
  I don't know many other crowd Sprints and jumps coaches who
• 1:28:46
  are going to do this for cross-country.
• 1:28:47
  They like yeah look man will hold the 10,000 at the track I
• 1:28:50
  guess but it could crash with a push lawnmower.
• 1:28:55
  Tim. What is you know and I have a
• 1:28:57
  very specific answer here for you.
• 1:28:58
  What is as you look about your time at South Carolina state,
• 1:29:01
  what is your greatest memory during that?
• 1:29:04
  Time hoof. It really was. seeing Tara real
• 1:29:14
  Richard, when the national championship, And the reason
• 1:29:19
  why, you know, I can say in terms of of Tyrell and maybe not
• 1:29:25
  Meek because to me, you know, that sticks with me just the
• 1:29:30
  same but it was an NCAA event for Tyrell, which means it
• 1:29:37
  brings back notoriety to the school as well.
• 1:29:39
  You know? And you can say, hey, this is,
• 1:29:41
  you know, the highest finish we've ever had.
• 1:29:43
  And in however many years on a division, one level, but You
• 1:29:48
  know to see if you can go back and watch, watch the clip, just
• 1:29:53
  no research, Tyra Richard, 400 meters indoors and even then
• 1:29:58
  they're talking about other people in the race.
• 1:30:02
  Everything. Then all of a sudden if you can
• 1:30:06
  find the prelim, it cameraman he won his prelim and they didn't
• 1:30:10
  even focus on him coming across the line.
• 1:30:13
  I forgot. That's right.
• 1:30:15
  They paying back to the made have been like a Lobel Vidal
• 1:30:19
  from Florida and they just let him go and then they watch the
• 1:30:23
  rest of the race and I'm like, that's okay.
• 1:30:27
  It again, comes back to me. Hey, don't know her name, relax.
• 1:30:33
  We got this. Do what you came here to do.
• 1:30:37
  Well, I remember, I was at that meat but I'm afraid that was not
• 1:30:40
  the answer. I was looking for town.
• 1:30:43
  Okay. Your greatest memory for South
• 1:30:45
  Carolina state should be is that's where your and I our
• 1:30:47
  relationship our friendship. That's how I really got to know.
• 1:30:53
  I'm really disappointed that all the amazing things that you
• 1:30:57
  accomplished your time there that that one didn't fumble of.
• 1:31:00
  I was really like man, I don't know Tim we got to get to
• 1:31:04
  consider some things here at the poster.
• 1:31:11
  But I'll Dukes aside an amazing job and that is I'm very proud.
• 1:31:15
  That is where you and I really started to get to know each
• 1:31:17
  other and establish a friendship and and always.
• 1:31:20
  And I remember, you know, it was early before the 60 meter kid
• 1:31:24
  really came on scene as like a music.
• 1:31:26
  People are paying attention. I didn't know about your high
• 1:31:28
  point and I knew about I think I knew Charleston Southern because
• 1:31:31
  I think as I go I knew you came from.
• 1:31:32
  Georgia said, well hey my Peter Pan teaching, you're doing a
• 1:31:34
  great job and keep it up, you know, you're and I think after
• 1:31:39
  Miss doesn't sound all that. Like not proficient.
• 1:31:44
  Isn't a presence that I think is the word didn't sound all too
• 1:31:47
  great. When I say this, I think it was
• 1:31:49
  after ordering the 400-meter. I think it might be even before
• 1:31:53
  the prelim somewhere. I just said, hey man, you do
• 1:31:55
  know, you're not going to be a South Carolina state for very
• 1:31:57
  long. You know, like what you mean?
• 1:31:58
  Like you're like, you're like, I love it here.
• 1:32:00
  I was like, yeah, I know that, and I'm not saying anything
• 1:32:04
  about South Carolina state has like, but you're used to, on a
• 1:32:07
  different level, you deserve to be on a different level, and
• 1:32:10
  it's going to happen soon. And I remember you're like, oh
• 1:32:12
  yeah, thanks Mike. That's so not.
• 1:32:14
  You know it's like yeah I'm sure you told everybody that might,
• 1:32:16
  you know, that kind of thing. And I was like nah man I was
• 1:32:19
  like this does some time ever coming back, you know the from
• 1:32:22
  the meat and you never asked how his demeanor thing is, I was
• 1:32:24
  really good and I was like hey man I told you know not
• 1:32:27
  everybody knows every coach here.
• 1:32:29
  This my job than every coach and I was like hey man there's this
• 1:32:31
  guy at South Carolina state as a kid one.
• 1:32:33
  I was like but it's just it's just different.
• 1:32:35
  There's just a there's a different way of thinking acting
• 1:32:38
  and being I think that that I Soluble, you know, I say early.
• 1:32:43
  It's not that you know, again it's hard to say like yeah.
• 1:32:45
  The form of M champ. Mike what do you know, you
• 1:32:47
  really pulled that one out of the hat, right?
• 1:32:51
  But really, that was the right answer to him is that you and I
• 1:32:53
  met right during that time there.
• 1:32:55
  So he lets, as we move in to wrap up mode here for our time,
• 1:32:58
  considerations that you go from, I called it, you go from South
• 1:33:03
  Carolina, state to the University of Oklahoma, and very
• 1:33:06
  quickly, became the interim, head coach, and then very
• 1:33:09
  quickly became the head coach. They were smart enough to To
• 1:33:11
  remove that tag interim. I'm always, it's always curious
• 1:33:15
  to me when they named an interim coach and like, oh, so you think
• 1:33:17
  he's good enough to hold the Band-Aid together because, you
• 1:33:19
  know, transition of coaches is never easy, right?
• 1:33:22
  Isn't, I mean, and that the kind of leader you want, if you
• 1:33:24
  believe in him for that, you know, the kind of leader you
• 1:33:26
  want for your program. Like, it's always weird to me,
• 1:33:29
  right? I'd almost like to let them like
• 1:33:31
  don't even have a head coach, then just figure out how you're
• 1:33:33
  going to his next coach. Me you got an interim, that's
• 1:33:35
  your guy. Come on now.
• 1:33:36
  So talk to us about I mean you're kind of you know kind of
• 1:33:40
  broad swaths. Dear.
• 1:33:41
  Type here, you're living the dream.
• 1:33:43
  You went from Air quotes of your small school.
• 1:33:45
  I don't really like that term to the power 5 there are.
• 1:33:49
  I mean I'm sure I could put out a tweet and say, hey how many of
• 1:33:53
  you want to work on the power 5 and I'd get a lot of responses?
• 1:33:57
  It's a dream for a lot of people.
• 1:33:59
  By the way hand in the air that was me.
• 1:34:01
  My whole career was to get to the SEC because I was from the
• 1:34:04
  south and got there and loved it and, you know, cherish my time
• 1:34:07
  as a Mississippi State, Bulldog coach there.
• 1:34:09
  I'm so old now Tim that, you know, one of my Former athletes
• 1:34:12
  is now the head coach there said all that is is a mold that's
• 1:34:16
  he's a very young head coach those.
• 1:34:18
  I tell myself to feel to feel a little better but shout-out to
• 1:34:24
  Chris Wood's me. I love you.
• 1:34:25
  And I know you listen every once in a while here, so talk to us
• 1:34:28
  about that transition. It's haven't done it myself, I
• 1:34:31
  know it's not easy. It's, it's not the, you're not
• 1:34:35
  automatically in Disney World, like, everything's just handed
• 1:34:40
  to you and you're automatically. You just And because you're at
• 1:34:42
  Oklahoma because you're a sooner, you just automatically
• 1:34:44
  win, it's hard work for a guy, your style.
• 1:34:48
  I imagine it. You're going to correct me here.
• 1:34:52
  Maybe a little hard for you and what I mean by that is you are
• 1:34:54
  so good at developing underdeveloped, talent and you
• 1:34:58
  mentioned, you're only as good as your freshman so you don't
• 1:35:01
  have a lot of time to go find the underdeveloped kids.
• 1:35:05
  You've got to find some kids that are already have some
• 1:35:07
  development and then here's the key.
• 1:35:09
  Most people think we haven't so easy to power 5, you got to Go
• 1:35:11
  and get 10 10 kids and make them run 10 flat, that's not easy,
• 1:35:14
  I'm sorry. That is the, that is iquivalent.
• 1:35:19
  That is the same kind of hardness as taking an 11-1 kid
• 1:35:22
  to 10 5, that is also hard. Don't I don't pooh-pooh on that
• 1:35:26
  is also extremely hard. Did an amazing job as a coach
• 1:35:28
  you take a 10 2010 kid and make them 10 flat.
• 1:35:31
  You have done to make that is extremely hard and you have to,
• 1:35:33
  by the way, 10 10 10, 20 kid don't score in the SEC, rarely
• 1:35:37
  will score the Big 12. So it's at these great kids and
• 1:35:40
  you got to make them greater How was the transition for you
• 1:35:43
  personally, in coaching wise professionally?
• 1:35:46
  Oh, it took courage because, you know, I'm a head coach for now
• 1:35:53
  16 years. That's a final state to give it
• 1:35:56
  up to become an assistant at the University of Oklahoma and, you
• 1:36:01
  know, my wife worked for the federal government.
• 1:36:03
  So I packed everything, I had in a truck and pointing it away
• 1:36:07
  from my family away, from everything I ever knew.
• 1:36:12
  To go on my family on the east coast and hey again it's it's
• 1:36:18
  that transition from high school to college all over again and I
• 1:36:22
  had somebody else say no, it ain't gonna work, he'll be back.
• 1:36:26
  And again, kiss my wife and said, hey, I don't plan on
• 1:36:32
  failing, you know, I didn't come all the way out here to fail and
• 1:36:35
  you know that the transition the biggest group that that wanted
• 1:36:41
  my head coach, interim position to be permanent that stood up
• 1:36:45
  and voiced it. The cross country team, get out.
• 1:36:50
  Yep. You are from the get-go at
• 1:36:53
  Radford. You are a cross-country guy at
• 1:36:56
  heart, you missed your calling. I know you were a great athlete.
• 1:36:58
  But now something tells me, you could have been like a 13 flat
• 1:37:01
  5K guy or something. Like you missed your real
• 1:37:03
  calling. You are a cross-country distance
• 1:37:05
  guy. Holy cow.
• 1:37:06
  It was amazing, you know. So we do they, Jim was having
• 1:37:11
  trouble getting a cross-country coach in.
• 1:37:13
  So I was an arm cross country coach. during that time and, you
• 1:37:17
  know, we got our got our coach in and then he decided that he
• 1:37:22
  said, hey, I think I want to step away and do some other
• 1:37:24
  things in life and that's when I got there, the interim position
• 1:37:31
  and we got the staff on board and you know, some of the stuff
• 1:37:33
  is just mainly stabilizing staff because even on a power 5 level
• 1:37:40
  on every level hey if you have somebody good everybody else
• 1:37:45
  wants who's Good. And, you know, you talk about,
• 1:37:47
  you know, turning in 11 flat person to 10 5 and then
• 1:37:53
  especially what you said about, you know, getting the, the 1020
• 1:37:58
  or the 10 one, down to 10 flat, there, how many hundreds of 11
• 1:38:03
  flat people. There's a very, very finite
• 1:38:06
  number of people that run 10-under, tend to coming out of
• 1:38:10
  high school that you can take down and, and make that wear
• 1:38:15
  this. National or or high school wise,
• 1:38:19
  you know? So they have the world becomes
• 1:38:20
  your playground, your recruiting service and, you know, you've
• 1:38:24
  got to find them. You know, you have to find the
• 1:38:26
  next people that should be in the Olympics while also, you
• 1:38:31
  know, making sure you you show everyone else.
• 1:38:34
  Love that may not be the immediate points course.
• 1:38:38
  Somebody have to say no to You know, one of the things that
• 1:38:43
  smacks me in the head, I mean, directly on within 2 weeks.
• 1:38:47
  So I go from Ball State University to Mississippi State.
• 1:38:51
  And I'm so excited because I'm like, oh man, you know,
• 1:38:53
  everybody, every recruit that I call, I don't to tell them where
• 1:38:56
  Mississippi State a little know because of football and you
• 1:38:58
  know, Ball State, they had no clue where I was and I was like,
• 1:39:01
  oh recruiting out, you know, recruiting was kind of my thing.
• 1:39:03
  I really enjoyed it a high level and I was like, oh man,
• 1:39:05
  recruiting is going to be so much easier.
• 1:39:10
  One of the fee I hear you laughing.
• 1:39:11
  You Go, where the story is going.
• 1:39:12
  Yeah, and one of the first recruits was from Newark
• 1:39:16
  Academy. He was LZ Coleman, he set the
• 1:39:18
  indoor 400-meter National Record and you know, I call him and
• 1:39:22
  sure enough. He knew at least we're
• 1:39:23
  Mississippi was and knew that Mississippi state was SEC and
• 1:39:25
  whatnot. And we started having a pretty
• 1:39:27
  good rapport. And I was like, so LZ is like,
• 1:39:29
  what's your top five that, what schools are you thinking about?
• 1:39:32
  Like to basically sussing out who's my competition here and
• 1:39:36
  he's like, yeah, you know, Florida USC, Baylor, I think it
• 1:39:40
  was Texas. And LSU and I was like, oh wait
• 1:39:45
  a minute. I now have to compete against
• 1:39:48
  Mouse in Gainesville. I have to compete against Dennis
• 1:39:51
  at Baton Rouge. I had to compete against LA and
• 1:39:57
  USC like, oh, this didn't get easier.
• 1:40:00
  This got harder, holy like, it smacked me in the head like, ah,
• 1:40:05
  crap. I do have an opportunity to
• 1:40:06
  recruit and Cochise kids, but it ain't they just come in like you
• 1:40:11
  got to fight for. Him and other people by the way.
• 1:40:12
  And like the one that really hit me was that, you know, he said
• 1:40:14
  Florida because I'm like, oh man Mouse is a mentor.
• 1:40:16
  Like, I I asked Mouse how to coach, you know, that was my,
• 1:40:20
  you know, when I first started coaching high schools, okay.
• 1:40:21
  How do you do it? That was always a guy like, oh
• 1:40:23
  man, I'm a listen that guy. And now it's like, oh, I gotta I
• 1:40:26
  gotta beat him in Gainesville, by the way, to Starkville.
• 1:40:29
  I mean, it was not a fair fight. I always like, when I tell this
• 1:40:32
  story is like to remind people, we did sign him by the way.
• 1:40:35
  So we did win that one. But what what the so far, you
• 1:40:40
  know, you're still early in. Your power 5, Oklahoma career
• 1:40:44
  here, that's going to last for a long time but you're at the
• 1:40:46
  infancy H here what? So far has smacked you in the
• 1:40:48
  head. What's humbled you have like oh
• 1:40:50
  man not necessarily that you didn't see coming but like oh
• 1:40:53
  yeah this you know what? They write thinks we eat gold
• 1:40:56
  here guess what? Here's our struggle.
• 1:40:59
  It popped me in my face. I didn't realize I was going to
• 1:41:01
  have to that this would be so hard.
• 1:41:03
  What was that for you so far? Absolutely and just looking at
• 1:41:09
  results from our conference I had four guys in the 100 that at
• 1:41:16
  the conference meet last year, the fourth guy was 1024 and he
• 1:41:22
  didn't make the final. And you look at, I had the top
• 1:41:27
  qualifier in the 200 at 2038 he was a freshman and the finals
• 1:41:33
  2038 got last. Yeah.
• 1:41:37
  Yeah, 1970 to 1981 20 flat. My kid got fourth at 2004 and
• 1:41:44
  then my other kid got fit at 20.1.
• 1:41:47
  Oh, that's ridiculous. Okay.
• 1:41:52
  There are limited amount of points and you're not the only
• 1:41:54
  one that wants them. Oh, that's yes.
• 1:41:57
  There is a limited amount of Point.
• 1:41:59
  Those are very finite, but what is not finite is everybody wants
• 1:42:04
  them. Yes, that's a really good way
• 1:42:08
  that happens in all levels. That's, you know, a D2
• 1:42:10
  conference in Ohio and yeah, II conference in.
• 1:42:13
  Missouri, there are the finite points, everyone.
• 1:42:15
  That's where you have to step your game up continually
• 1:42:18
  continually. Right.
• 1:42:20
  Right. Right.
• 1:42:21
  Right? And in the landscape of College,
• 1:42:24
  athletics is changing. As I'm getting used to this
• 1:42:28
  level throw in and I 0 throw in the the transfer portal changes
• 1:42:36
  and and more changes that are coming to it as well.
• 1:42:39
  You know, it's and then manage more people because the more
• 1:42:43
  people you have, the more communication you have to have,
• 1:42:46
  the more you have to make sure you're managing it the right way
• 1:42:49
  to empower your coaches. So they can empower the team.
• 1:42:53
  You know, where you where? I went from mid-major.
• 1:42:56
  Just me. It's all on me to get it done.
• 1:42:58
  It's all immediate it done. Now, we're in the mode of be the
• 1:43:03
  best delegator, the best Empower enabler of success that you can
• 1:43:08
  be and keep everybody in the loop.
• 1:43:12
  That that was St. The bigger challenge.
• 1:43:15
  You know, as you get to this level managing more people, you
• 1:43:19
  have to manage more people. And I like that.
• 1:43:23
  Okay, Tim last question. And then we will wrap up here
• 1:43:25
  today, speaking of changes and ever continually changing its
• 1:43:29
  pretty. I think everybody knows it's no
• 1:43:32
  secret here, Oklahoma and your friends down in Austin are
• 1:43:35
  coming over to the SEC. That's, that's my hometown
• 1:43:38
  Countryman. That's it means more in the SEC.
• 1:43:41
  And I don't care, who wants to argue about that.
• 1:43:43
  It is true, it means more and SEC.
• 1:43:47
  Are you excited nervous? Scared.
• 1:43:49
  You can be open and honest here, how are you thinking about?
• 1:43:51
  About that transition into the SEC for your program excited
• 1:43:56
  because of a the level of play. Be everybody, that is of an
• 1:44:03
  elite mindset, future Olympians, they want to be in the SEC.
• 1:44:07
  They see the SEC as is one of the top conference if not the
• 1:44:10
  top conference. It's okay.
• 1:44:11
  Say that is the top conference. Yes.
• 1:44:13
  Right. Right.
• 1:44:14
  You know. I am one of those, by the way,
• 1:44:16
  you know, there's somebody SEC. Homers that is me.
• 1:44:18
  I think in the tiddlywinks I'm like oh yeah that's he sees best
• 1:44:21
  intently - oh yeah it don't matter.
• 1:44:23
  What sport activity. Oh yeah, that's easy.
• 1:44:24
  We were the best. Yeah, that's right.
• 1:44:27
  You know the just It brings new funding in terms of Revenue
• 1:44:33
  sharing, which is going to benefit, you know, what we do on
• 1:44:37
  a major level. If we need to, if we need to
• 1:44:40
  provide more resources for our, for our kids, that in terms of
• 1:44:44
  facilities, in terms of services, we provide it's going
• 1:44:47
  to widen the Gap and what we provide, what everyone else can
• 1:44:50
  provide. So it's I'm excited.
• 1:44:53
  Is it more work? Absolutely.
• 1:44:55
  But I've also held the philosophy of I want to be the
• 1:44:58
  best in the nation. You know, where that I was in
• 1:45:01
  the SEC or when I was in Charleston, Southern or high
• 1:45:03
  point. And if they exist in the nation,
• 1:45:07
  then I've already I've already been going against a mentally,
• 1:45:11
  well, I'll tell you what, I told, another coach at one of
• 1:45:15
  them there in this, down a little bit too much at one of
• 1:45:16
  those two institutions that are coming to the city.
• 1:45:18
  Seen as like, you know, I was in the SEC before Missouri and am.
• 1:45:24
  And it's a bloodbath. I mean, it just, it's almost to
• 1:45:26
  the point where it wasn't fun because our goals were Instead
• 1:45:30
  of blaze, it was another Just Killer round of things to do and
• 1:45:34
  then go to Regionals in the Nationals.
• 1:45:36
  And they'll you know, after I left Mizzou and Texas, A&M came
• 1:45:40
  in, I was like, oh man, just got worse, it took the number of
• 1:45:43
  Walk-Ons at you could even think about you.
• 1:45:45
  You talk about again, you know, market value, what can a
• 1:45:47
  freshman do right off the bat? Well, it was harder for a
• 1:45:49
  freshman, to do something right off the bat and now I told this
• 1:45:53
  other coaching like now you guys Oklahoma and Texas.
• 1:45:55
  You guys are going into this thing like I would just skip it.
• 1:45:59
  I would look, we're just gonna get it.
• 1:46:00
  Last in this, you see, we're now we'll go win and instead of legs
• 1:46:02
  because of that, but I was like, it's just not going to be fun,
• 1:46:05
  man. Just as ridiculous.
• 1:46:07
  You mention. 1024 was your fourth kid.
• 1:46:10
  Yeah. That's going to be like 100 in
• 1:46:11
  the SEC. But here's what's cool.
• 1:46:14
  And I don't mean that I'm not demeaning that kid about I'm not
• 1:46:17
  debating you as the coach. It's like you know what's
• 1:46:18
  awesome is because 1024 will be the 100th Mark.
• 1:46:22
  Well, that type of kid and this type of coach will say okay well
• 1:46:25
  then that's not good enough, how do we become 1014, 1004 994,
• 1:46:28
  whatever it Is the game. It's kind of like that 48th Mark
• 1:46:32
  for regionals when that first Mark came out.
• 1:46:35
  It's, you know, go back and look at 48th was when regionals first
• 1:46:37
  came out, it's a song and a dance nowadays now to get 48
• 1:46:40
  that stuff. It's because they're became a
• 1:46:43
  marker to reach for 48. So that marker kept getting
• 1:46:46
  faster and faster and Higher and Higher and farther and farther.
• 1:46:49
  And it's what the things going to do this.
• 1:46:50
  He see the bad part. Is there are still only going to
• 1:46:53
  be eight spots that are give get points in the SEC.
• 1:46:57
  They'll still be a very finite points and Everybody will be
• 1:47:01
  after this point. So Tim man.
• 1:47:03
  Thank you so much for today. We are really excited me and I
• 1:47:06
  mean not not only because you're going to the SEC.
• 1:47:09
  And again that's just my personal because I'm going to CC
• 1:47:12
  homework, but we're excited to see your leadership as a sooner
• 1:47:16
  and what the program will continue to rise.
• 1:47:19
  You know, it's a slow-moving process to turn one of those big
• 1:47:23
  old Freighters out there in the ocean, right?
• 1:47:26
  Well, a power 5, programming and program, fire that program.
• 1:47:30
  Five program that has as much history as Oklahoma is one of
• 1:47:33
  those big Freighters. So you don't just change
• 1:47:35
  culture. You don't just change success
• 1:47:38
  overnight. It's slow moving increments.
• 1:47:41
  So knowing how young you are here in this in your time at
• 1:47:45
  Oklahoma, your three is going to build your for your five.
• 1:47:48
  It's just going to continue to grow, continue to move in your
• 1:47:51
  direction, with your fingerprint on it.
• 1:47:53
  And I figure, you're going to find some how some way to do
• 1:47:56
  this. How I, how I can.
• 1:48:00
  Help an athlete. How I can spot that.
• 1:48:02
  I think you're going to find a way a unique way to do that in
• 1:48:04
  this next level as well. And that's a, that's a, that's a
• 1:48:07
  harder thing. Let's not kid ourselves, you
• 1:48:09
  know, I love Mouse. So this is not a slam on Mouse.
• 1:48:11
  Anybody can go tell him, he can get mad at me.
• 1:48:13
  He won't though, but Mouse ain't Takin 51.
• 1:48:15
  Second quarter, mile or so out of high school, right?
• 1:48:18
  You may have won every one so I'm not, you know, I'm sure, you
• 1:48:20
  know, he's a genius, but he's not taking them and making them
• 1:48:22
  45s. It's hard, you don't have time
• 1:48:24
  Etc. Now he's taken 46 is making a
• 1:48:27
  point force but here right now But it's going to be, I think
• 1:48:32
  you're going to find your own unique fingerprint as you
• 1:48:35
  continue to develop your program there.
• 1:48:37
  And we're really just excited, just to watch from the from the
• 1:48:39
  sidelines and and see you grow in your program grow there in
• 1:48:43
  Oklahoma. Hey thanks.
• 1:48:44
  It's a pleasure to serve. I mean, I'm in a unique position
• 1:48:48
  and you know, it's a blessing to have opportunity and and to
• 1:48:52
  share some time with you. And like I said, if it helps
• 1:48:55
  somebody else anything. I've said then I've done my job.
• 1:48:58
  I love it, man, you are At the heart.
• 1:49:00
  You are coach Knight. You are a servant leader.
• 1:49:02
  My friend you are you got into this to emulate and continue his
• 1:49:07
  fingerprint on this sport specifically?
• 1:49:09
  And dude you're doing it. You are what, this is what I
• 1:49:13
  love about coaching track and field because it doesn't matter
• 1:49:15
  if you cook two kids or 200 kids, because those kids go on
• 1:49:18
  to be doctors mother's Brothers, fathers track coaches, their,
• 1:49:23
  their legacy is exponential and multiplies.
• 1:49:26
  You are here on the shoulders of other great men like coach,
• 1:49:30
  Coach night there, that continues growing, you've
• 1:49:32
  coached kids that have gone into coaching that a coach other kid.
• 1:49:35
  Your impact is millions just like coach nights is millions.
• 1:49:39
  It's that positive impact. You make, Tanya make on young
• 1:49:41
  people on a daily basis. That's what matters whether
• 1:49:44
  that's again, two kids, two hundred kids and you're just
• 1:49:47
  doing an excellent job and we're so proud that you join us here
• 1:49:50
  today on the Gill connections podcast, my friend.
• 1:49:52
  Hey, Mike, thanks for having me. Oh man, it's our blessing.
• 1:49:55
  Thank you for being here today, again, you know, we are in the
• 1:49:57
  middle of a, just a, I don't know how, Gets any better with
• 1:50:00
  this month, we've just had some fire guests and but we do, we
• 1:50:03
  got even more coaches. Coming up that I think you'll
• 1:50:06
  enjoy as we continue our Legacy. Our goal here of uplifting and
• 1:50:10
  honor coaches around the country.
• 1:50:12
  Thanks for being here and we'll see you next week.
• 1:50:14
  Thanks.