Peter G. Tormey - The Thursday Speeches: Lessons in Life, Leadership, and Football from Coach Don James

THE

Lessons in Life, Leadership, and Football

from Coach Don James

Peter Tormey, Ph.D.

Copyright 2014 Peter Tormey

Smashwords Edition

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Also available in trade paperback

(ISBN: 978-0-692-32835-4)

Cover design: Matt Gollnick

Page layout: Lighthouse24

Contents

Dedication

This book is dedicated to the late and legendaryUniversity of Washington football Coach Don James and his family.James words and leadership have inspired the best in the countlesspeople whose lives he touched, including mine, during the fouryears he was my coach at Washington.

The Thursday Speeches represents anappreciative tribute to a great man. I hope this book will allowmany others to benefit from the wisdom of Don James, a giant ofcollege football and a person of humility, faith, and love.

Whether in athletics, business, government, or in thecontext of ones own family, the best leaders inspire others toharness their utmost potential to benefit the common good. No onedid that as well as Don James.

I also dedicate this book to my wife Kelly for hernever-ending love and support, and to our children Mary Kate, Tara,and Brendan that they may live inspired lives.

Acknowledgements

This book would not have been possible without theassistance and time of Don James, my football coach at theUniversity of Washington (19761979) whose leadership I will neverforget.

Don believed strongly in the power of education totransform lives. He believed education was a lifelong process and,as The Thursday Speeches demonstrates, he was a voraciousreader who was constantly learning and looking for creative newways to improve the Husky football program. Lifelong learning, hetold me, was the single thing that helped him most in hiscareer.

The key thing is you never stop learning, hesaid. You are looking to learn every day.

Throughout his exceptional career, Coach James helpedevery student who sought his assistance in an educationalprojectwhether it was a quick interview with a reporter for thestudent newspaper orin my casea request for his activeparticipation in a doctoral dissertation that involved multipleinterviews over the course of several years.

Don urged us, his players, to go as far as wepossibly could with education. I took his advice and earned a Ph.D.I hope this book inspires you to seize the power of learning torealize your dreams and make a difference for others in ourworld.

Special thanks to Carol James for her support of thisproject. Grateful appreciation also to editor Linda Nathan, LogosWord Designs, LLC, www.logosword.com ; DougHeatherly, Lighthouse24, for interior page design and formatting;and Jeff Harrison for his advice and recommendations.Acknowledgements are also due to Rev. Robert H. Schuller,sportswriter Steve Rudman, and the estate of author Og Mandino forpermission to quote.

A portion of the proceeds from the book will becontributed to the UWs Don James Football Endowment Fund toprovide scholarship assistance to student-athletes who participatein the Husky football program.

Introduction

Two days before Christmas 1974, Don James seized thereins of a University of Washington football program in disarray.In his 18 years at Washington, James compiled a 153-57-2 record enroute to becoming the most successful football coach in the historyof UW and the Pacific-12 Conference. He took his teams to 15 bowlgames (10-5) including nine straight from 1979-87. He guided theHuskies to six Rose Bowls and is one of only four coaches to winfour Rose Bowl games. His 1991 team finished the season 12-0, beatMichigan in the Rose Bowl, and was named National Champion byUSA Today/CNN, UPI, the Football Writers, SportsIllustrated, and several computer rankings. President of theAmerican Football Coaches Association in 1989, James was NationalCollege Coach of the Year twice. He was inducted into the HuskyHall of Fame in 1993 and entered the College Football Hall of Famein 1997. As but one measure of his coaching skill, SportsIllustrated once named the three best college football coachesin the country: No. 1, Don James; No. 2, Don James; No. 3, DonJames.

As a player in James second recruiting class atWashington, I was fortunate to have been part of what James wouldlater describe as the cornerstone of his program. In summertraining camp before my freshman season, Coach James told us wewere there to fulfill our destiny, to be a part of something great,to play in the Rose Bowl and, importantly, to win it. We believedhim and it came to pass.

Under James leadership, our teams beat Michigan inthe 1978 Rose Bowl and Texas in the 1979 Sun Bowl, and he helpedestablish Washington as a perennial powerhouse for nearly twodecades. With James as our coach, we knew we had a chance to beatany team, any day.

Although Coach James died of pancreatic cancer onOctober 20, 2013 at age 80, his legacy and wisdom live on throughthe countless lives he touched and changed. His life was based onstrong values, faith, and an unmatched work ethic he learned as achild growing up in Massillon, Ohio, during the Great Depression,one of four sons of Florence and Thomas James. Dons father heldtwo jobs to ensure that the James boys could go to college, workingfrom midnight until 8 a.m. at the steel mill before turningaround and laying brick for another eight hours, every day, fivedays a week. For his part, Don began carrying bricks for pay at age9 in the summer for his uncles construction company. In doing so,he began to realize that a college education would be one key tohis future success; he was already familiar with the other key:hard work.

He played quarterback and defensive back for twostate championship teams at Massillon High, idolized his coaches,and decided then and there to become a football coach. He went onto play quarterback at the University of Miami where he set fiveschool passing records and married the love of his life, CarolHoobler.

At Washington, Coach James used words and stories tomotivate the Huskies to slay the football giants of his day. Thisbook pulls back the curtain to give readers an insidersperspective to the exact words James used to inspire the Huskies toreach the pinnacle of American college football. His words, thebasis for The Thursday Speeches, offer valuable advice foreveryone living in our competitive world, especially coaches,athletes, and leaders in all fields of endeavor.

TheThursday Speeches

James wrote his pre-game speeches by longhand eachWednesday, before practice, on 11-by-14-inch yellow legal padswhile sitting at his office desk. He made final edits each Thursdaybefore taking the final speech with him into the room where theHuskies were gathered before practice, placing the pages on apodium and reciting themoften with great passionto his teams for18 seasons. The speeches offer a portal to James successrevealingthe words he used to inspire the Huskies to victory and direct themto visualize success during the two days leading up to kickoff,which he called the final 48 hours.