NCAA coaches: What our teams taught us

There is a link between sports and humanity

With the new NCAA basketball season underway Friday, we’re focusing on building strong teams one game at a time. But with the tensions over politics and many other forces fraying the fabric of our nation, we also find ourselves thinking about the larger questions of what a team symbolizes.

This March, the pressures our players faced in the national spotlight were intense. It was only the 10th time in NCAA history that both the men’s and women’s teams from one school went to the Final Four together. Our men’s team made it that far after starting the tournament with its first NCAA men’s basketball win since 1973. Our women’s team went on to win our university’s first basketball national championship.

What often gets lost in such dramatic moments is the human dimension of young players from many different backgrounds who have come together for a common purpose.

Our men’s team last season, for example, had student-athletes from six U.S. states and five countries, including Australia, Estonia and Senegal; small rural towns such as Lancaster, S.C. (population 9,000) and big communities such as Raleigh, N.C.

On our women’s team, we had student-athletes from nine states, including places as different from one another as Houston, Texas; Noblesville, Ind.; Bronx, N.Y.; and Hyde Park, Mass.

This year, our rosters have changed — about half of our players are new to our teams, and most of our starters have never been in that position before. They must create new teams together.

Our women’s and men’s teams know each other. We watch each other’s practices, support each other during the months of training, and attend each other’s games. When both teams made the Final Four, the players lived through the same spotlight — the cameras everywhere, the news conferences with reporters from around the world, social media seeking out player comments and millions of sports fans tuning in.

In such circumstances, the bonds within a team are tested. Opponents want to exploit every competitive flaw, and critics are everywhere. Players must stick together. Adversity keeps coming. The women’s team had one of its best players get injured right before the tournament and had to rally despite missing her greatly. The men’s team was the underdog in every tournament game it played.

Yet when they first walk into a locker room, these players barely know each other. Their home lives, educational backgrounds, communities and sometimes even their languages are different. Nevertheless, they need each other to succeed.

We learned this through our own lives. One of us is the son of Cuban immigrants. He worked his way up the high school and college coaching ranks to pursue his dream of coaching at the highest university level. The other is from the projects of North Philadelphia. She competed against boys on those tough streets before playing for one of the best NCAA programs and eventually three gold-medal winning Olympic teams.

Both of us also experienced the love of devoted mothers and other adults who looked out for us time and again at pivotal moments.

Like any Division I coaches, we ask our student-athletes for hundreds of hours in practices and training rooms. But over our years coaching at the same school, we have shared our conviction that to be special, a team must do more than work hard. Players must also look out for each other.

We know what fans see on the court. What they don’t see is the caring off the court — where teammates who are in many ways so different lift each other up, encourage each other, raise each other’s eyes to the goal.

We know it’s only basketball, and only sports. But we do believe in something at the core of all human connections. It is as good for a team as it is for a community of any kind. It is the value of striving to be your brother’s and your sister’s keeper.