August 22, 2025 âą 56 mins
Episode 100 â Legendary Leadership with Sue Enquist
Itâs a milestone moment on Significant Coaching with Matt Rogersâour 100th episodeâand thereâs no better guest to celebrate with than Sue Enquist.
One of the most respected coaches in college athletics, Sue helped lead UCLA to 5 NCAA Division I National Championships and another 6 as a player and assistant coach. Today, sheâs a sought-after consultant and speaker whose influence reaches far beyond softball. Most recently, she worked with the USA Womenâs Volleyball team at the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris, helping them capture the silver medal by focusing on culture, values, intentional leadership...and FUN!
In this powerful conversation, Sue shares timeless lessons on building championship teams, creating human-centered cultures, and helping athletes and coaches thrive mentally, physically, and emotionally. Whether youâre a coach, a parent, or a leader in any field, this episode will inspire you to raise your standard.
And donât miss Part 2 of our conversation on the Significant Recruiting Podcast, where Sue talks directly to families navigating the recruiting journey.
For more resources, visit CoachMattRogers.com, and check out my new book, The Volleyball Recruitâs Journal, now available on Amazon.
Learn more and connect with Matt Rogers here: https://linktr.ee/coachmattrogers
Listen on Apple, Spotify, Amazon, iHeartRadio, and all your favorite podcast platforms.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
There's a lot of noise in thebleachers, and I reckon parents
(00:04):
are like what do I do?
I say, buy two beach chairs.
And go park down the left fieldline and watch your child.
That's number one.
You have to reframe.
It's not a gossip center andit's not about you.
So reframe.
I'm gonna get out of the noise.
I want my daughter and my son tosee me.
I'm over here.
And we always say, watch themovie.
Come in quietly.
(00:24):
Sit down.
Keep your pie hole shut.
Welcome back to a very special100th episode of the Significant
Coaching Podcast.
I never thought we would getthis far, but I wanna take a
(00:45):
moment to thank all of ourwonderful guests who have joined
me, who have educated familiesand coaches across the country.
It has been an awesome journeyand I hope to keep it going, I'm
your host, Matt Rogers.
Today's guest, as you just heardin the opening clip.
Is someone whose impact on sportand leadership is almost
impossible to measure.
(01:07):
She is more than just one of thegreatest college coaches in the
last 50 years.
She has become a nationaltreasure for the work she
continues to do to make theathletes and coaches who
participate in the sports welove mentally, physically, and
emotionally healthier.
I am speaking about thelegendary coach Sue Enquist at
(01:27):
UCLA, her alma Mater Sue helpedguide the Bruins to five NCAA
division one nationalchampionships and a sixth as a
player becoming one of the mostrespected coaches in college
athletics.
But her story didn't end whenshe stepped away from the
dugout.
Today she's a sought afterconsultant, speaker, and culture
builder, helping leaders andteams far beyond softball learn
(01:51):
how to perform at their best.
Most recently, she worked withthe USA Women's Volleyball Team
at the 2024 Olympic Games inParis, where she focused on
building a human centeredculture, reinforcing mission and
values, and helping the teamcapture the silver medal.
At that level where the marginsand physical talent are razor
(02:11):
thin, Sue teaches that it's thediscipline, the intentionality,
and the culture that tip thebalance.
In this conversation, Sue shareshow to create environments where
athletes, coaches, and parentscan thrive.
Why culture is the most powerfulcompetitive advantage a leader
can build, and what coaches andfamilies alike need to remember
(02:33):
when the pressure is at itshighest.
And before we begin, I wannaremind you to visit coach matt
rogers.com for more coaching,recruiting, and parenting tools
and resources.
And check out my brand new book,the Volleyball Recruits Journal,
now available on amazon.com.
Alright, here's my conversationwith the incomparable Sue
(02:54):
Enquist.
Coach Enquist, thanks for beingon.
It's just an honor to talk toyou.
I've been a big fan for so long,and as you and I talked before,
we recorded, we were colleaguesfor a while at NCSA.
That's right.
So I've been next collegiatesport athlete.
Yep.
Yes.
I've been impressed witheverything you've done.
Obviously world class, career,hall of fame career in so many
different ways.
(03:14):
So that brings me to last summerwhere my wife and I are sitting
on the couch and we're about towatch the Olympic volleyball
team play.
And I go to my wife, I go, SueEnquist is on the bench.
And later they did an interviewwith you and I learned that you
were the advisor for the team.
And I was like, oh my gosh, whata great decision.
Because I'm, I've told you this.
(03:34):
I'm a big believer that if youcan coach and you can inspire
and you can motivate and you canteach discipline, the technique
is nothing.
The technique, everybody canlearn if you can do all those
other things.
So tell me how that came about.
Yeah.
My actual role was I was in as aconsultant.
It was my second quad.
I came aboard through thepandemic in our march to Tokyo,
(03:57):
and then the second quad wasParis last year.
I, my role was as a consultantwas really trying to frame up
individual mastery, but our truefocus was around team culture
because at that level and yourviewers know this, when you get
to the Olympics, the margins areso small around physical talent
that you have to be dialed ineverything.
(04:18):
And the coaches at the time wereinterested in, and the players
were interested in how can we goahead and dial that in as well.
And so during the pandemic, Iwas doing an event for USA,
volleyball on leadership.
Pandemic hit everybody.
Shut down.
It went to Zoom just byhappenstance.
I'm on the Zoom the same time asthe captain of USA volleyball.
(04:42):
She had no idea who I was.
She goes to Kar Kiri, who's thehead coach, and says there was
some random lady, I, some randomlady was on there.
Maybe she could talk to ourteam.
Kch, who is in mastery, who is asuch a professional, right?
And a Bruin, right?
And, but I did not know Kch.
A lot of people don't know that.
Anyway, long story short, workedout, came in, built some
(05:06):
scaffolding around theirmission, around their values,
and built a culture that wasreally human centered.
And, to be honest with you, inmy, I've been in sport over 50
years.
I'm 67 years old.
I've been in sport formally as aprofessional for over 50 years.
(05:28):
Outside of the UCLA brewingbubble, I have never been
associated with a group ofprofessionals and professional
players like I have with USAvolleyball.
If you're a mother or a fatherout there and you're not real
sure if your daughter should gointo lacrosse or volleyball or
basketball or volleyball ortennis or volleyball, I'm saying
(05:50):
go into volleyball.
But you're gonna notice I didn'tsay softball or volleyball'cause
everybody needs to know where myheart is.
But long story short my job wasto really just keep our culture
dialed, which we're notnaturally wired to make it about
the other person.
And so it takes real intention,real discipline.
And the women of USA volleyballare unbelievable.
(06:11):
I say this often, if I could putthem in the duplication machine,
yeah.
This world would be a lot betterplace.
Special human beings.
Yeah.
And I just had you'll appreciatethis.
I just had Olivia Foley, who'sthe division three national
volleyball player of the year onthe podcast, and we were talking
(06:32):
about they just won threestraight national championships
at Junior.
And we talked about thatmentality and the, they just,
sometimes they just played withanger, not towards anybody, but
just, we're exhausted.
We've, we're playing more gamesthan everybody.
We've, we're winning more setsthan everybody and everybody's
given us our A game.
And you had that at UCLA and youwere part of that with the
(06:54):
Olympic team.
Where do you think that begins?
Where does that begin?
Where we get kids to understand?
W where their body and theirmind can go to be great.
Yeah.
It's such a big question tounpack.
I think the first thing thatpeople need to understand is
performance doesn't matter.
Sport or spelling, bees oracademics performance is really
(07:15):
about this idea of what, what'shappening mentally and then
being dialed physically, right?
It doesn't even matter spellingbee.
You've gotta get your bodyregulated.
And when you look at our highperformers, the thing that
parents and athletes need tounderstand is it is a very
personal journey for every highperformer and we overuse high
(07:38):
performance a lot.
We now know, science now tellsus that it's actually a fallacy.
That less than 5% of the timeyou are in your peak performance
operating and dialed mentallyand physically.
Wow.
The ones that separatethemselves are the ones that
know how to navigate all thedifferent emotional levels that
(08:00):
you go through, and masteryaround failure recovery.
So what we now know, whetherit's men or women, doesn't
matter, team or individualsport, what separates them is
they can move through everythingwith incredible efficiency to be
locked in the moment, be whereyour feet are and give a hundred
percent of what you have.
Because this generation now hasto deal with focus challenges
(08:23):
and they have to deal withinjuries.
Injuries.
I say this often, injuries isnow a standard.
Yeah.
It is a part of a conversationwith every coach that's dealing
with somebody that's dealdealing with high performance or
just competition in general.
And so if we can dial thesethings in and look at your body
and your mind as an F1 car.
You gotta set of dials and yougotta be able to know when to
(08:46):
tweak each one of themthroughout your pre in and post
competition.
And those that have got thatdialed end up having the best
opportunity to be their best.
And more importantly, they havejoy.
They know how to have FUN, it'slike the new F word.
We know how to do that.
And that is a skill thatinvolves rigor.
(09:07):
When I say rigor, a disciplinedattention to detail takes rigor
to create the conditions tohave.
JOY.
What role do the parents play inall that?
Huh?
Oh, such a I'm just gonna throwloaded general questions at you
that are so hard to answer.
Yeah let's dive, I'll put somecontext in this.
(09:28):
Let's get off the freeway ofhigh performance and talk about
right.
First of all, to every mom anddad out there that has a son or
daughter of or non-binarychildren that are navigating
high performance academics,athletics, sports, whatever it
is I see you how hard this isbecause there is no standard
(09:49):
curriculum around sportperformance.
There is no standard pathwaythat parents can jump on and
follow with assurance that it'svetted and verified information
about the biology of the body,about the physiology of the
body, about their mentalperformance and how the mind
works, not even getting into thetechnical and tactical and
(10:12):
failure recovery standards thatyou need in each one of these
sports.
So to the parents, I see you inhow you have to try to build out
a dial for your son or daughterthat allows them to be
navigating all of these thingsthroughout their life.
But this is what I know to betrue.
Disclaimer, I have no children.
(10:33):
Disclaimer, I have no children.
But I watched Parenting ofPerforming Children come across
my doorstep for 27 years atUCLI, and this is what I know to
be true to the father.
You set self-efficacy, andyou'll notice I don't say
confidence.
Confidence gets overused.
It's too high of a bar.
Gen A, gen Z, they don't totallyrelate to it'cause we
(10:56):
romanticized it.
It makes it sound like I amgonna be the champion.
So no one's gonna say, I amconfident.
Confidence just means trust inthe moment, right?
Dad sets self-efficacy.
Let's just believe in ourself inthis moment.
Dad can set that self-efficacyby putting out the conditions
where that child succeeds andfails on their own.
(11:19):
And the father is the guide railthere?
No, he's not carrying her.
No, he's not coaching her in rowthree ever.
No.
Shut your pie hole in therecruiting office.
Visit.
Shut your pie hole.
Let the scholar athlete do allthe talking to the mother.
I see you.
You are the bus driver, thenurse, the big sister, the
(11:42):
psychologist, the cook.
You are all of it.
I see you.
Thank you for all the lonelywork.
But this is what she doesn'tneed.
She doesn't need 17 texts everyday from you because you are her
best friend.
A teenager does not need amother As a best friend, you're
stunting her own youngwomanhood.
(12:03):
To be an independent thinker, tobe able to tackle problems.
'cause her default setting is,I'm gonna text mom, I'm gonna
text mom.
So we ask questions in therecruiting process that is gonna
tell me about their criticalthinking skills.
'cause you learn criticalthinking skills.
When I say critical thinking,I'm talking about thinking.
Meaning do I as a young, soon tobe young adult 18, going to
(12:28):
college, am I aware about thethinking that is needed in each
part of my day?
We call it thinking aboutthinking.
And there are three thinkingmodels that you have to have.
My thinking model about me, it'sall about me.
It's just me.
You get to be me.
When your head hits the pillowand you wake up in the morning,
boom, you're done.
You've got your eight hours ofbe me, the second model or what
(12:52):
we're calling, thinking about,thinking of.
Now I'm in team mode.
What does my family need?
What does my classmate need?
What does my teammate need?
And that's the majority of yourday.
And then last is community.
Who am I serving?
Whose shoulders did I stand onand how am I showing my
gratitude every single day?
So for us, we literally say yourindividual lens, your team lens
(13:15):
and your community lens.
Thinking about thinking, moms,we need you to help us in this
area.
So when she comes to the coachcan sit there and ask really
challenging questions and thechild doesn't say this I what?
The minute I see that, yep.
(13:38):
It's a red flag.
'cause mom and dad, I've got 20shortstops that have an open ba,
a backhand that can throw a ropeto first base.
I have 20.
So someone that can't articulateand doesn't have clarity around
their performance skills andtheir relationship skills, you
are gonna go drop down on thatlist.
And so that's criticallyimportant in the interview
process to be able to look me inthe eye, tell me what you are,
(14:01):
tell me what you're not, andgive me examples about how you
master failure recovery.
Yeah.
How do we teach parents to focuson those things?
I think parents I wish that wecould get parents to re, we
want, if we want parents, if wewant parents to be at the same
(14:23):
bar that we're expecting ourscholar athletes to be at we
have to put them through alearning ecosystem.
Who is teaching that?
We say, I hear this often, likethere's no books on parenting.
Yes, there is.
Yeah.
There's hundreds too many.
This idea about what does aparent of a performing child
(14:44):
look like?
Your job is to create theconditions for them to succeed
and fail on their own, and thenbe the leveler in between to be
their engineer belief.
In other words, you are gonnacreate the conditions.
You're gonna create thequestions for that athlete to
answer, I failed today.
(15:05):
I have a better tomorrow.
Coming and projecting optimism.
Projecting optimism is, Ibelieve the strongest, most
important skill a parent canhave.
Hey, you know what, Susie?
Yeah.
You went, oh, for four today.
It was painful to watch.
You're not a failure.
You failed.
Yeah.
Tell me what we're gonna dotonight, tomorrow morning before
(15:26):
we go back to the park.
Non-emotional.
Hell yeah.
Look at thumbs up guys.
Yes, we're celebrating people.
We're celebrating.
We're celebrating 1% betterevery day.
If we can get our parents toactually walk through these
little step-by-step moments inbetween the child's performance
environments to be the engineerbelief, you're not supposed to
(15:50):
be the hero you're supposed tobe projecting.
It's gonna be a better tomorrowif we do A, B, C, D, and then
that falls on the athletethrough their effort and their
attitude.
The only two things they cancontrol in life.
I say it often, you can onlycontrol two things.
Your effort give a hundredpercent what you have in your
attitude.
Whether I'm starting.
(16:11):
Or I'm literally in the dugoutas a game changer.
We call'em game changers on USAvolleyball, we call them game
changers, right?
It's a super important role.
Parents need to be a part ofthat, be on a learning pathway
as she continues, or hecontinues to go up.
That up the food chain ofserious competitive sports.
Sue, I know you, you understandthis, but I find it, there's so
(16:33):
many parents that don't wannaread the book.
They listen to thisconversation, they go, I wanna
do this.
But then they get overwhelmedand they stop, or they revert
back to who they're comfortablebeing.
Where does executive functionskills.
Come into play here to help theparent have some simple things
that they know, okay, this iswhat I want to count my, I want
(16:54):
to, I wanna make sure I'm doingfor every game.
And those executive functionskills for that kid that maybe
has, that just can't grasp allof this that we're talking about
and just needs those two orthree things.
Remember, okay, this is how I'mgonna prepare.
This is what I'm gonna do duringcompetition.
This is what I'm gonna do after.
How, where does all that work?
Into this?
For, let me first I'm reallyinterested in tackling, having
(17:17):
conversations with the parentsbecause if the number one thing
there, you have to shift thisthinking around she's just
playing a sport.
Because what happens once theyshift a travel ball, they're now
in this engine.
Yeah, they're in this dialogue.
They're in this language thatthey can't get out of.
So the first thing is justunderstand the minute you sit in
(17:38):
the bleachers, you're in thenoise zone.
There's a lot of noise in thebleachers, and I reckon parents
are like what do I do?
I say, buy two beach chairs.
It's worth the$75 to buy twobeach chairs in Southern
California.
It's probably about$125 for twogood beach chairs, right?
And go park down the left fieldline and watch your child.
(18:01):
That's number one.
You have to reframe.
It's not a gossip center andit's not about you.
So reframe.
I'm gonna get out of the noise.
I want my daughter and my son tosee me.
I'm over here.
And we always say, watch themovie.
Come in quietly.
Sit down.
Keep your pie hole shut.
Because now we know all the datathat we're getting.
They're feeling pressure becauseparents are being overly
(18:23):
positive.
You're all right.
You've got this you know whatthe kids tell us from eight to
18.
I wish it could just be quiet.
So that's number one.
Reframe where you physicallysit.
That's a marker that it's notabout me.
Number two.
Don't talk to your child afterthe game about the game unless
(18:43):
they want to.
So that's the number two.
You gotta be in your executivefunctioning brain.
Once again, it's not about me.
I know your D Dad.
I see you.
I know you wanna know about thefourth inning was the runner on
second there was one out and thecount was two and two.
And you wanna know why shedidn't swing at that curve ball?
And that's her pitch.
I know you wanna know that.
And I just say, just remember 10and two.
(19:05):
10 and two.
Get in the car, hands on the 10and two and just drive home.
If they wanna talk about it, letthem talk about it.
You may look back there, youprobably see the part of their
head.
'cause their head's down andthey're already in their phone.
Yep.
Yep.
Let'em, if they wanna talk aboutit, let'em talk to you.
That's another reframe.
The third reframe is parents arelooking at the path to college
(19:30):
and the recruiting process assome sort of party that they're
gonna get invited to.
And I and you.
Can you tell I'm retired?
'cause I could never talk likethis if I was a full-time coach.
Coaches can't talk like this.
'cause they may be.
I may.
I'm gonna turn off 60% of thepeople that are listening.
I'm gonna turn off.
They're gonna go screw her.
I'm gonna, I'm gonna speak thetruth of what coaches can't talk
(19:54):
about.
Coaches are sick and tired ofparents thinking it's the
coach's job to find them.
The half a million of them.
Yeah.
Parents stop waiting to beinvited to the college party and
look at the path to college.
(20:15):
Like you look at your healthinsurance, your life insurance,
and your car insurance.
Oh man.
We spent a lot of time.
Comparing, fitting up, find thematch.
But when it comes to travelball, we drop Susie off to Chuck
in a truck and we don't evenlook at what kind of background
they have in their recruitingclinics.
(20:36):
They're putting on.
We don't look at their sciencebackground if they're teaching
mechanics, that's tough.
As a college coach, knowingthese parents come into an
environment that isn'tcertified, there aren't
standards.
And on the flip side, I knowthere are club coaches.
Club coaches, I see you outthere.
So many of the club coaches aredoing it.
If you are a club coach outthere that is a volunteer,
(20:59):
you're like, dude, I'm a bankerMonday through Friday and I do
travel ball on the weekend.
Thank you so much, sir.
And ma'am, thank you.
Yeah, I'm not talking about thevolunteer coach, I'm talking
about those coaches that aredoing this full time.
If you're gonna talk aboutmechanics, you better have some
(21:20):
certification around OnBase U orsomebody that's doing the
science behind the mechanics ofmovement.
If you're gonna be talking aboutwhat mental toughness is, you
better be using people that arevetted and verified in the
industry.
If you're coming across as afull-time travel ball coach and
I say this the same thing on thecollege side, that we're now at
(21:41):
a point where softball is abusiness and we have standards
that we should uphold, eventhough nobody is holding you
accountable to it.
Once again, I'm gonna say itthree times.
Volunteer coach.
I'm not talking about you.
I wish you could, but Iunderstand your job.
You could be a banker or a bakerand you're just putting in your
four hours on Saturday.
I appreciate you and I see you.
(22:03):
I've been in so many interviews.
I've been interviewing coachesand hiring coaches.
I've been gone throughinterviews to be a head coach.
No one's ever asked me thisstuff.
No one's ever asked me about, Ijust talked to a university
president.
He goes, Matt, every time acoach comes in here that we're
interviewing I point'em to thewhiteboard and say, tell me what
your culture's gonna look like.
Tell me what you're gonna beknown about.
(22:24):
Tell me why these kids are goingto be healthy and successful,
find joy.
They're gonna be disciplined.
They're gonna leave here betterpeople.
If it, if the ads and thepresidents aren't asking those
questions what are we expectingfrom what we're getting?
Even, and I know this isprovocative and people roll
their eyes when I say this and Ido.
I own my bias.
(22:45):
I'm a college coach, so I havemore empathy for the college
coach.
'cause I know today what thecollege coach is going through.
I'm a consultant.
I work with college coaches inall sports.
It is.
We are in any, I've been only inone other renaissance in my
career, my 50 years.
This is only the secondRenaissance.
The first renaissance was when aIAW association of
(23:07):
Intercollegiate athletics forwomen transferred into the NCAA
two A.
It was a clown car.
Yeah.
Doesn't it feel like a clown carright now?
Yeah.
One day you're an amateur.
The next day you've got NIL fora million dollars.
And if any parent could bebehind the curtain of how a
(23:29):
coach is trying to navigate.
This massive shift.
Have empathy and parents takecharge of your recruiting
journey.
It's not a party where you'rewaiting for an invite.
Don't wait for the phone toring.
There are too many of you andnot enough coaches.
Do the math.
Use the technology.
We have recruit educationservices out there that can do
(23:51):
the technology for you.
You can get free services andnot pay a dime for recruiting
service.
We start doing that.
I think the parents are gonnabecome more educated and
understand their role in thiswhole process.
'cause right now, Matt, rightnow what parent does they get in
the bleachers, they meet Mr.
And Mrs.
Jones, their daughter is threeyears ahead.
(24:12):
So they become the authority.
They everything they're saying,it's oh, I'm gonna do that
because look at, she already gota verbal to Northwestern.
I'm gonna, I'm gonna go there onthat path.
Instead of saying every childhas their own path and you've
gotta do the matching.
Before you start doing the coldcalling and the cold emailing,
(24:33):
go ahead and email the 1400colleges.
Good luck with that.
Yeah I'm with you.
And that's why I do what I dois, it's all about the kid.
First, you can't worry about thecolleges, you can't worry about
divisions.
You have to worry about who yourchild is because if they don't
know what their priorities are,they don't know what brings them
(24:53):
joy and what makes them happyand what makes them healthy.
H how do you even know what typeof college to look for, what
type of coach they need and whatkind of communication they need
to be prepared for.
And Matt, one of the things justto be relevant because it is
such a growing thing where thisrenaissance and remember every
renaissance if history Yeah.
They're always, there's always amessy front end.
(25:14):
We're in the front end of aRenaissance we'll Recorrect,
we'll get it back.
To, to making more sense.
It will never be the way it was.
Yeah.
But what I want parents tounderstand is what I see when I
am consulting, and this is atall levels, I'm at all levels,
but it's a similar principle.
(25:34):
You have to decide when you makea decision, am I gonna be a
customer or am I gonna be astudent athlete for four years
and get a degree from there?
You have to have an honestconversation with your child
around that.
That if I make a commitment togo to Arizona, but deep down
(25:55):
inside, if I know anotherschool, if Oklahoma comes
calling, am I going to Oklahoma?
Then I'm a customer at Arizona.
I'm a customer.
I'm just shopping every year.
This is the hard part.
People don't like to hear mesay.
College coaches hate it.
When I say this.
The more college coaches thathave it broken down like this,
(26:18):
they're crushing the NIL.
They're crushing the transferportal.
They look at the transferportal.
It is an asset.
It is an accessory for me, butthey know how many people on
their team are traditionalstudent athletes.
They want the degree and howmany are customers.
And when you learn as a collegecoach to start using that
vernacular in your recruitingprocess, we can now open the
(26:40):
door and not make it this bigsecret.
I'm not saying they're gonna dowhat they say they're gonna do
because life changes, decisionschange.
The reason this is important isthis traditional student is
thinking every other student isa traditional student.
And our default mindset iseverybody's gonna be here for
four years.
Graduate.
(27:01):
No that world's gone guys.
It's gone.
Let's, in our culturalscaffolding framework around how
we operate individually and as ateam, let's have conversations
around this and let's get it outof the closet.
I think transfer portal feelsvery similar to when we first
(27:22):
started talking about mentalhealth.
Back in the early two thousandswas the first time we really
started publicly talking aboutmental health.
We're still not there, but wefirst started talking about it.
I go around telling collegecoaches, talk about it, get it
out of the closet because ithelps you strategize more.
'cause some of these dollarofferings, they can be life
(27:44):
changing for the first fiveyears of your life after
college.
And this is what I always say,oh my gosh, you got$250,000,
that's great.
Your life's gonna be amazinguntil 2029.
Now what are we gonna do?
You have no degree.
That's right.
No place to go.
That's right.
And you've already spent all themoney.
Now what?
That's right.
So this idea that if I'm gettinghundreds of thousands of
dollars, that's life changing.
(28:05):
It's not, you want parents tomake a 60 year division
decision.
Where do we wanna be in those 40years of my working life?
Pick a school that aligns withthat.
Or even if you're transferring,pick a school that aligns with
that.
So win, lose, draw, or you'regetting a lot of money, you're
gonna get that degree to takecare of yourself for the next 40
(28:27):
years after you graduate whenyou're 22 years old.
I love it.
I'm on 100%.
I have a 16-year-old daughterwho played club volleyball for
the last six, seven years.
And I wanna talk about mentalhealth a little bit with you.
My biggest concern that I seewith what she's gone through is
(28:48):
the time commitment.
She goes from high schoolvolleyball in July.
To November and then immediatelyinto open gyms for club, and
then they're competing untilJuly and then right back into
high school.
Yeah.
It's a lot to unpack, right?
Let's go.
Let's start.
Let's start at the top and thenpeel it down.
(29:09):
I wish I truly believe this.
I wish we had amateur clubsports partnered with the NCAA
two A.
Yeah, so that student athlete ismirroring a very protected
schedule and based on how manysports you're playing, it would
be a mandatory dead period whereit is a legit dead period.
So if it's a dead period, youcan't go play another sport.
(29:32):
You're in your reset rejuvenateperiod.
That's number one.
Number two is.
The brain isn't wired to be on24 7, but society-wise, we
haven't acknowledged that.
So the poor scholar athlete istrying to keep the brain on 24
7.
We know we're failing miserablyon that, but let's start at the
(29:54):
top.
When we talk about mentalhealth, we have to break it up
into two categories.
One is clinical.
So we have young children outthere that are actually
suffering from chemicalimbalances that require a
clinical health expert.
(30:17):
And then we have many more thatare dealing with mental
performance challenges.
They've got performance anxiety.
They've socialized these wordslike pressure.
Anxious, anxiety, and the brainis very compliant.
So when you start talking about,I'm super nervous, I have so
much anxiety, the brain is likeyou.
(30:39):
You have anxiety.
Puts on all the red lights, thebrain puts on the red lights,
gets the chemicals going.
The blood now starts flowingeverywhere.
So now that young child issweating, possibly tacky throat,
lumping their throat, sweatypalms, stomach ache, mud butt,
we've all been there Once we canteach our young children.
(31:03):
Everybody has mental performancechallenges and there are somes
that, that have clinical mentalhealth challenges and both of
them can get to the top.
Coached at UCLA for 27 years and15 Olympians.
We've had athletes that hadserious case of both and still
went to the top, stayed on top,and now are really high
(31:25):
functioning humans in society.
So we need the parents to lookat mental performance and mental
health, almost like it's amanagement cycle and not a
disability.
So we're not looking foraccommodations.
We're not saying, oh, she wantsthe day off'cause she's got a
(31:45):
lot of performance anxiety.
And in high performance we justcall it energy.
So when my energy ismisdirected, misguided, we now
know our breath can realign us.
In terms of being anxious,anxiety, feeling pressure, it's
just energy.
(32:06):
It first starts with our words.
We've gotta change thevernacular that I'm feeling
really elevated today.
Brain's oh, you're elevated.
I know how to dera decelerateyou.
I'm gonna go ahead and put mybreathing kits to work.
We now have specific breathingkits to elevate or calm down and
from the day forward, from whenthey're in second grade, when
(32:29):
they were feeling anxious.
Everybody's body dealsdifferently with environments
that they pick up a vibration.
We have children, we have youngadults, we have Olympians and
high performers that areempaths.
Their body.
We call them high frequency,meaning their frequency.
(32:50):
When they walk into rooms, theygo to ball games.
Their frequency is picking upeverything.
They're picking up thetemperature of the room.
They're picking up the noise,they're picking up the closeness
of people.
Their little bodies are takingall that in.
We call'em high freaks becausewe wanna celebrate them because
they actually have thecapability of going to even a
(33:13):
higher level once they cancontrol that.
But we have to stop shamingpeople that are empath.
Dude, stop it.
Quit whining.
Quit being a baby.
Get off the floor.
Stop crying'cause you'reoverwhelmed.
No, actually race to over to herand say, you want me to go
through some breathing with youright now?
(33:34):
Here sit.
Sit up and let's just close oureyes.
Let's ground our feet.
Let's start to get centered withour breath and let's work,
breathing kit number one, andlet's get our breath back.
We'll start there.
Let's be where our feet are.
Be the helper.
Don't be captain obvious.
And that starts with the parentsand then it goes to the
teammates at the top.
(33:55):
Mental health, break it up.
Mental health, mentalperformance.
Understand in this, we havepeople that pick up a lot of
signals.
This one, it could be chemical.
There may be other assets thatneed to be a part of their kit,
their mental performance kit.
And we have to feel good aboutall of it because all of them
are capable of going the top.
(34:19):
How much of this were you doing30 years ago that you couldn't
define and couldn't put it intocategories like you can so
easily now?
Where were you 30 years ago withall of this?
Now remember, 30 years ago I was37.
Let's talk about, 40 years ago.
Okay.
40 years ago whatever you'recomfortable with.
Early in my career I was just ayeller.
(34:41):
Yeah.
I'm not talking about how areyou feeling?
I'm not talking about yourbreath.
All I'm talking about are yourfeet that have to run.
'cause you're one minute late.
So go do your 400 up downs.
Shut up.
Put up.
And I regret that.
I regret that I could have beena better coach if I had more
(35:02):
knowledge.
Yeah.
I'm with you.
I'm around.
Treat them as a human first.
Yeah.
And a person second.
Yeah.
I was the same way.
And a player second.
Where's the balance though,coach?
We, there still has to be anunderstanding how to get there.
Can we do that without thechallenge?
Without, i'm talking aboutreadiness.
I'm not talking about physicalstandards.
Physical standards we're,they're they're unchanging.
(35:23):
Your physical expectations basedon the coach you're playing for.
He or she doesn't have to changethat.
We get confused.
Okay.
When we get confused when wetalk about mental and physical,
and we talk about spent spendingspending seven minutes to get
mentally ready.
People think it goes like this.
Oh, mental readiness, that meansI have to lower the standard.
(35:43):
No, it doesn't.
That standard stays there,beginning, middle, and end.
There's my standard.
It's unwavering.
It my world, it's unwaveringbecause we don't have the
capacity to be able to take aweekend off these programs.
When you're to our sportparents, when you're watching
these programs, when you'rewatching the UCLAs and the
(36:06):
Oklahomas and the Alabamas andthe Floridas.
And the Texas and Texas Tech,you're watching these top, they
don't get a weekend off ingeneral.
And we now have to acknowledgeas a leader, coach, teacher, if
I don't get a weekend offphysically, because I'm supposed
to win every game, I've gottalearn how to regulate my mental
(36:28):
performance.
I've gotta learn how to regulatemy body.
So now the next I call it the22nd century thinking is we're
looking at rest and rigor withthe same level of commitment
that rest is built into yourdigital calendar.
How many students out there, andlet's not get into time
(36:48):
management, but you should bescheduling rest into every
digital calendar.
Parents should be putting it inand you should have rest, what
we call rest blocks.
Three day, three times a day.
You stack those just like youstack your workouts, right?
We're always saying we're tryingto stack another good day.
(37:09):
I now say, stack a good dayphysically and stack a good day
mentally.
Did you get your rest windowsdone?
What is, what does a rest blocklook like?
Imagine what a rest block is itor we also call it the zero
block.
What do you think they do in thezero block?
I would imagine it's some kindof meditation or sleep.
Yeah.
You're doing zero.
Yeah.
Nothing.
Nothing.
(37:30):
No phone, no lights, nodistractions.
If you wanna just sit under atree and hear your breathing,
that's a beautiful zero station.
What would you recommend a blocklike that?
How long should it be?
Depends on the person.
Depends on the time of the day.
Okay.
There are athletes right nowthat have to, they have to
execute.
I was going through a timemanagement'cause time, we talk
(37:52):
about an epidemic around mentalhealth and I acknowledge that it
is.
Epidemic.
You wanna know another epiEpidemic?
Time management.
Oh, it's terrible.
Parents.
Yeah.
Parents, please teach them timemanagement.
Yeah.
Don't tell them everythingthey're doing hour by hour,
(38:14):
Johnny, now you're gonna go takea shower, Johnny, now you're
gonna put your shoes on.
Johnny.
Now we're gonna go to practice.
Johnny.
Now no.
Give Johnny the week and tellhim to put it in his digital
counter.
And people always, I always getemails after and people will
say, when do I start that?
The minute you give them aphone.
My, my daughter's 10.
(38:34):
She has a phone start then.
Yep.
And they're like, oh, I don'tknow.
It's so complicated.
Have you ever seen those kids?
I'm so impressed with Gen A.
So Gen A is coming after Gen Z,right?
Parents will say to me, oh, thisis so complicated with all the
digital and.
I said, are you watching yourdaughter do those TikTok dances?
She is legit.
(38:56):
She could do three minutes withher friends, completely in sync.
The amount of mental load,physical execution and timing,
just like filling your digitalcalendar.
She can do it.
Give her a chance to do it.
Ab absolutely.
I'm a huge proponent of it, andI wish somebody would've taught
me this 40 years ago, becausefor me, yeah, I know, me too.
(39:18):
For me this phone, as much as Ihate it, sometimes if I didn't
have it, I think I would be ahot mess because an alarm will
go off and he'll say, you gottaprep for sue.
An alarm will go off and say,Hey, grab your son and go for a
walk.
You're not gonna have any timewith him today.
(39:38):
This is gonna be your hour to gospend some time with him.
Yeah, exactly.
And so what we call thoseintention, what you just said,
we call those intention blocks,right?
I'm gonna have intention, likefor example, I have a, let's say
I have a history test on Monday.
My intention block on Sunday isreread chapters one through
five.
And so we have blocks of what wecall hard events.
(40:01):
And then every event usuallyinvolves a prep block.
So how many prep blocks do Ineed for the history test?
Depends on how prepared you are.
So if you're not prepared, it'sFriday.
Now my test is Monday.
You're gonna have to putprobably six preparation blocks
in your calendar to read.
Okay.
But remember you gotta put yourrest blocks in there as well.
(40:22):
And then I'm recommending withour Gen A, when I work with Gen
A's.
Putting what age is that coach?
Is that it, I think they'resaying like, there's an overlap,
but it's around eight to 10years old to like up to 18.
It, there's a crossover.
So that's my son and mydaughter.
It's right behind.
So yeah, so gen Zs I think arelike 18 to 20, 8 30, somewhere
(40:43):
in there.
Okay.
I don't quote me on thatexactly, but they're coming up
after the Gen Zers.
And what we're working on ishaving them look at social
media, like it's homework, so itshould be in your calendar.
And there are times that you doit, and there are times you
don't do it like that a lot.
And that's, that takes babysteps because right now for our
(41:05):
half of our millennials, for ourGen Z and Gen A, it is not
technology.
So I always tell parents, let meexplain it to you.
We look at the phone astechnology.
It came into our life.
We didn't have it.
And then we had it.
So it sits out here.
I always tell parents thinkabout the phone to your daughter
is like the toilet to us.
(41:28):
Okay.
You, someone said to you, HeyMatt, you know we're gonna do,
we're gonna put a timer on whenyou can go to the bathroom.
You're like, wait a minute.
I've had free access 24 7 to thetoilet my whole life.
But it will help you understandhow difficult it is for them to
separate.
'cause there is no separation.
It did not come into their life.
It's been there all along.
(41:49):
That's right.
Interesting.
Coach I wanna go back to what Iasked you before.
I loved where we went with it,but I want to talk about the
length of the travel ballseason.
'cause I think we, we have toaddress it at some point.
'cause we have all these greatathletes who love their sport,
they're passionate about theirsport.
They can't wait to get up andget better at it and go be with
their team.
(42:10):
And by the 90th game of thesummer, they can't imagine
picking up a bat or being out inthe hundred degree weather
anymore because they've done itso much and they're so burned
out with all the noise we'retalking about.
Can we start there?
Is it reasonable to say we'regonna block this out where, like
(42:31):
you talked about with the ncaa,it's gonna be a three month
season for travel ball andthat's it.
Yeah, the water's under thebridge.
It's very difficult.
You see how they get around therules?
There, the high school did it,right?
They built in policy.
Yeah.
But you saw how they get aroundthe rule.
And so I think for me, I wouldlove to be more proactive
(42:53):
around, I just wish there was adeeper connection with n NCAA
two A and club ball.
And what would that look like?
Let's say there's two areas forme, technically.
Three.
The physical, how the bodymoves.
So let's just say functionalmovement, mental performance,
(43:13):
time management, criticalthinking skills.
Okay.
Just think, okay.
The office skills.
Okay.
I would love for the n NCAA twoA to put together a consortia,
men and women and any travelball group can come and be a
part of that and access theinformation.
(43:35):
And no.
NC two A is not gonna make moneyoff this.
Travel ball's not gonna makemoney off it.
What's happening right now iscolleges travel ball are going
into the pocket of the parenttelling them, you gotta get, you
gotta do this tournament, yougotta do this recruit.
And the parent, the poor parentdoesn't know how to discern what
(43:55):
is life threatening and what is,we're trying to keep our travel
ball program going, or we'retrying to fundraise for our
college program'cause they'reequally guilty.
So I sit here, I have a bias, Iwanna own it.
I'm a college coach, but for thelast 20 years, I'm now in
everybody's mess.
I now consult with travel ballcoaches.
I have a new understanding.
(44:16):
When I started one softball mat.
I had a whole new understandingof what the poor travel ball
coach is dealing with, right?
Especially the ones that aredoing it part-time.
I do not have empathy for peoplethat are making a business outta
travel ball, and I don't have aproblem with it either.
I like it.
There's some beautiful, bigorganizations that are doing it
(44:37):
right?
Driven by character, has a legittransparent process and they're
delivering results.
I love that.
I feel badly for that group thatdoesn't know what end is up.
Wouldn't it be great if a parentknew that vetted and verified,
good Housekeeping seal fortravel ball is this and you can
(44:57):
get it at all of these sites.
And so the travel ball coach isgonna get out of the business of
recruit education, get out ofthe business of business skills,
get out of the business ofmental training, unless that is
your certified area and you area subject matter expert in.
And you th and your idea is we,the ncaa provides those things
(45:20):
that these coaches, NC two A andthe, and wouldn't it be
beautiful it would be theU-S-O-P-C in all our national
governing bodies, partner withthe NCAA two A and create this
layer that is required.
You know what I equate it to?
And the only way you could getthis done, and I'm, I'm speaking
innovation.
This could get done if we tiedall of this path to college
(45:42):
education for children that areperforming.
I don't care if it's dance, I,anything sports.
If we tied it into insurance, ifwe tied it into insurance, now
everyone is gonna shift.
This is serious.
We're gonna hold it over Theparent, you can't play.
(46:03):
We all know you can't playunless you get your certified
insurance.
If we put all of that underneathinsurance.
Then before they get into theirfirst tournament, they already
know about what the odds are,mom and dad.
The odds of your daughter or songetting a full ride to the
school of their choice is 1e-05%and you're gonna go, no wait.
(46:29):
The staff high year is five to20%.
No.
I said, tell your choice.
Not oh, I got offered ascholarship at this school.
I never wanted to go to thatschool.
What if we said that?
But right now, we're living aworld where parents are hand
over fist money.
It's the lotto.
They are living a world foreight years.
(46:50):
It's a lottery.
It is the way we're doing it.
Imagine if we said no, we'reactually gonna have a way
through technology.
You're actually gonna see from athird party is gonna say, this
is where you fit.
Not the travel ball coach, notthe college coach, A third
party.
Is gonna be able to say, here'sthe clump of schools that would
(47:13):
love to hear from you.
Imagine if we gave that answerbook to the parents.
Don't they deserve that?
Don't the parents deserve that?
If we can figure that out, Iwill.
I'll do everything to be a part.
Listen, I just believe inAmerica.
I'm a believer.
Can you imagine if we got thetop insurance people together
the legit ones?
(47:33):
Not the criminals.
We got the NC two A education.
A lot of people don't know aboutNNC two education.
Get on the website, get into NCtwo.org.
If the parents ever clicked onall the student athlete links
that they've put together, it isthe best.
But good luck.
Great.
Good luck having people tell youthat it's there.
(47:55):
Yeah.
And then imagine if we justgrabbed 15 of the top.
Amazon executives and said, Hey,Amazon, I don't work for Amazon,
so people don't be texting methat you're working for, I'm not
working for Amazon, but I amfascinated.
I'm fascinated that if I go inthere, I exactly where you're
(48:17):
going.
Yeah.
If I buy those blue socks thathave neon yellow trim, it is two
minutes later I'm like, Hey,look at these cute racing pants
that you could run your race,your road race in that would
match your socks.
The technology is there.
Do you think it is, from anevaluation standpoint though, do
(48:39):
you think the AI is there toevaluate what you're looking for
in a softball player?
Oh, it's coming my friend.
We already have bots that canplay center field that can read
the trajectory of the ball.
So trust me, it's coming.
It's just a matter of who'sgonna control it.
That's the problem.
And then there's the characterside and then there's, mental.
(49:00):
But imagine if we had a thinkabout this on your parent when
you're a young daughter, shefinishes pre-K and she's getting
ready to go into K and then intofirst grade.
You already know she has to gothrough certain standards and
will be dipping into certaindomains.
Yeah.
That would be a perfect place tostart.
(49:21):
But right now, you know what theparent knows.
Get on that one team that'sgonna be in the Colorado
tournament that mom and dad,that is a tournament lotto.
There are 32,000 softballfamilies there.
Yes, they are 175 miles awayfrom each other.
(49:42):
Good luck for that one school,gonna find your daughter at the
same time that you happen to beplaying.
It is such shenanigans.
Yeah.
And being out of it.
And I was in it, I was in it,I'm a guilty one.
I hold myself accountaccountable.
I was part of the problem'causeI was a college coach that just
(50:02):
kept benefiting from the system.
'cause I was at UCLA.
But would you if I told you allthis 30 years ago that you.
That you had this, that youcould do this a different way,
would've you have, would youhave ego have allowed you to
change it?
Because that's the problem.
If nobody that's in thatposition now will let go of
(50:24):
their ego and say, yes, I'mgonna be a part of this new way
we're going to recruit and thenew way we're going to evaluate,
would you have done it?
Let me reframe it.
I get a little heightened on theword the ego.
'cause college coach here, Igotta take care of my college
coaches.
People think that the collegecoach doesn't wanna let go of
their ego.
It actually has to do witheverybody is doing all these
tournaments.
(50:44):
'cause they're trying to get tothe top schools.
The top schools don't need thestandardization because the best
percolate to the top.
Yes.
So Patty Gasso at Oklahoma, No.
When you're the best, no one'scoming to Patty's pity party.
Because she's the best.
But she actually has this samechallenges because she has no
(51:06):
margin for error.
Every single year, Oklahoma,Texas, UCLA, whatever, they have
to, they can't be off by one ortwo pitchers or they're gonna
drop to eight or nine or 10.
Okay.
But if we said, look, we'redoing this for the other 80%,
(51:26):
okay, then I think we could getcoaches to say, yeah let's do
that.
And there have been some people,we've gotta acknowledge Dave
King and Triple Crown.
We have to acknowledge themworking so hard to standardize
talent.
And it is the future.
We're just not getting thebuy-in at the same rate.
(51:46):
Historically, we're actuallyright on pace.
Like baseball.
It took baseball decades.
It took baseball 40 years tostart creating a true common
language around a five toolplayer.
So we've gotta be patient.
We just, we were just startingthe standardization and I was at
the end of my career when westarted it all and look, we're
(52:07):
already 25 years in and we're,we still don't have a complete
common language where everyone'sspeaking the same language
around physical standards.
And we've got some wonderfulmental profiling standards out
there, but there's just too muchnoise and the parent stays away
'cause they don't know whichone's vetted what, which one's
verified.
Yeah.
That's a big problem.
Where do we go?
Which one do we choose?
(52:29):
Coach?
I could this conversation needsto continue to grow and I'll be
a major proponent in pushing itand making sure people are
listening and we keep havingthis conversation at a high
level.
I wanna take a little break andthen for five, 10 minutes just
talk about recruiting and reallygive some advice to parents and
coaches and kids.
Gimme one piece of advice to thecoaches out there that they just
(52:52):
need to hear.
Whether you're a youth coach,whether you're a high school
coach, whether you're a collegecoach, just that one nugget that
you think if you're gonna gointo your season, if you're
gonna coach young people, thisis the one thing I want you to
start thinking about.
If you're a parent and you're afan, I want you to understand
there's a big recruiting enginebehind the curtain that you
(53:14):
don't even see when you come tothe park.
I want the parent to know whenyou're sitting there and you
look over and that top 10 coachthere, I'm gonna ask the parent,
try not to get nervous.
They're actually, what the coachis looking for is, I wanna see
them fail and see how theyreact.
Yeah.
Of course the, of course theywanna see if they can hit that
(53:35):
great picture.
Of course that's a given.
But they, the college coachknows that every day that kid's
not gonna be hitting that oppo,double off the fence.
They're looking at barrel angle,they're looking at reaction
time.
But one thing they're reallylooking at is how are they
managing their failure recovery?
Are they a good teammate?
They're looking at theinteraction.
(53:56):
Those college coaches arelooking at a lot during warmup.
They don't miss a beat.
And so as a parent, be the voiceto your young child to say on
game day it's celebration day.
You get to wear a specialuniform.
So you got your, we always sayit's good old softball with a
party dress on,'cause it's gameday.
Have a lot of joy out there.
(54:17):
Be the engineer belief as aparent, Hey, you know what,
today.
I just can't wait to watch youplay.
PLAY.
Yeah.
So be that person that is thatcomforter for the child.
And then during the game, justbe heads up.
If you're a big mechanics yellerat your child, have you ever
asked your child, Hey, are yougood with me saying, level up.
(54:38):
Level up.
If your child says, yeah, I loveit when you say that, perfect.
Never heard a child say that.
Yeah, the second.
The second thing is, everysingle time this is a marker, a
mental marker.
Every time you sit down on thebleachers, for every hour of
watching softball, have you put10 minutes into your recruiting
(55:00):
plan for your daughter.
Yeah.
Okay.
Love that.
So the 10 to hour rule, right?
So if you're at the park for sixhours.
You owe your daughter an hour ofrecruit planning.
It's a great way to keep thebalance.
I agree.
I agree.
Coach, you're a nationaltreasurer.
Thanks so much for doing this.
I appreciate everything you'vedone and I'm so excited that
(55:20):
you're in this world.
Thank you my friend.
It's great to be with you.
That wraps up part one of myconversation with Sue Enquist
and wow, is she a wealth ofinformation?
What a gift to learn fromsomeone who has shaped not only
champions on the field, buthealthier athletes and coaches
in every arena she touches.
But we're not done yet.
(55:41):
Be sure to come back for parttwo of my conversation with
Coach Sue on the significantrecruiting podcast, where we'll
dive deeper into our perspectiveon the recruiting landscape and
the advice every family needs tohear.
You won't want to miss it.
That'll be out this upcomingMonday.
In the meantime, if you'relooking for tools to guide your
own recruiting journey, visitcoach matt rogers.com and don't
(56:03):
forget to check out my brand newbook, the Volleyball Recruits
Journal, now available onamazon.com.
It's built to help athletes andfamilies stay organized, stay
focused, and stay groundedthroughout the recruiting
process.
Thanks for joining me today.
Until next time, stay focused,stay humble, and stay in the
fight.
There's a lot of noise in thebleachers, and I reckon parents
(00:04):
are like what do I do?
I say, buy two beach chairs.
And go park down the left fieldline and watch your child.
That's number one.
You have to reframe.
It's not a gossip center andit's not about you.
So reframe.
I'm gonna get out of the noise.
I want my daughter and my son tosee me.
I'm over here.
And we always say, watch themovie.
Come in quietly.
(00:24):
Sit down.
Keep your pie hole shut.
Welcome back to a very special100th episode of the Significant
Coaching Podcast.
I never thought we would getthis far, but I wanna take a
(00:45):
moment to thank all of ourwonderful guests who have joined
me, who have educated familiesand coaches across the country.
It has been an awesome journeyand I hope to keep it going, I'm
your host, Matt Rogers.
Today's guest, as you just heardin the opening clip.
Is someone whose impact on sportand leadership is almost
impossible to measure.
(01:07):
She is more than just one of thegreatest college coaches in the
last 50 years.
She has become a nationaltreasure for the work she
continues to do to make theathletes and coaches who
participate in the sports welove mentally, physically, and
emotionally healthier.
I am speaking about thelegendary coach Sue Enquist at
(01:27):
UCLA, her alma Mater Sue helpedguide the Bruins to five NCAA
division one nationalchampionships and a sixth as a
player becoming one of the mostrespected coaches in college
athletics.
But her story didn't end whenshe stepped away from the
dugout.
Today she's a sought afterconsultant, speaker, and culture
builder, helping leaders andteams far beyond softball learn
(01:51):
how to perform at their best.
Most recently, she worked withthe USA Women's Volleyball Team
at the 2024 Olympic Games inParis, where she focused on
building a human centeredculture, reinforcing mission and
values, and helping the teamcapture the silver medal.
At that level where the marginsand physical talent are razor
(02:11):
thin, Sue teaches that it's thediscipline, the intentionality,
and the culture that tip thebalance.
In this conversation, Sue shareshow to create environments where
athletes, coaches, and parentscan thrive.
Why culture is the most powerfulcompetitive advantage a leader
can build, and what coaches andfamilies alike need to remember
(02:33):
when the pressure is at itshighest.
And before we begin, I wannaremind you to visit coach matt
rogers.com for more coaching,recruiting, and parenting tools
and resources.
And check out my brand new book,the Volleyball Recruits Journal,
now available on amazon.com.
Alright, here's my conversationwith the incomparable Sue
(02:54):
Enquist.
Coach Enquist, thanks for beingon.
It's just an honor to talk toyou.
I've been a big fan for so long,and as you and I talked before,
we recorded, we were colleaguesfor a while at NCSA.
That's right.
So I've been next collegiatesport athlete.
Yep.
Yes.
I've been impressed witheverything you've done.
Obviously world class, career,hall of fame career in so many
different ways.
(03:14):
So that brings me to last summerwhere my wife and I are sitting
on the couch and we're about towatch the Olympic volleyball
team play.
And I go to my wife, I go, SueEnquist is on the bench.
And later they did an interviewwith you and I learned that you
were the advisor for the team.
And I was like, oh my gosh, whata great decision.
Because I'm, I've told you this.
(03:34):
I'm a big believer that if youcan coach and you can inspire
and you can motivate and you canteach discipline, the technique
is nothing.
The technique, everybody canlearn if you can do all those
other things.
So tell me how that came about.
Yeah.
My actual role was I was in as aconsultant.
It was my second quad.
I came aboard through thepandemic in our march to Tokyo,
(03:57):
and then the second quad wasParis last year.
I, my role was as a consultantwas really trying to frame up
individual mastery, but our truefocus was around team culture
because at that level and yourviewers know this, when you get
to the Olympics, the margins areso small around physical talent
that you have to be dialed ineverything.
(04:18):
And the coaches at the time wereinterested in, and the players
were interested in how can we goahead and dial that in as well.
And so during the pandemic, Iwas doing an event for USA,
volleyball on leadership.
Pandemic hit everybody.
Shut down.
It went to Zoom just byhappenstance.
I'm on the Zoom the same time asthe captain of USA volleyball.
(04:42):
She had no idea who I was.
She goes to Kar Kiri, who's thehead coach, and says there was
some random lady, I, some randomlady was on there.
Maybe she could talk to ourteam.
Kch, who is in mastery, who is asuch a professional, right?
And a Bruin, right?
And, but I did not know Kch.
A lot of people don't know that.
Anyway, long story short, workedout, came in, built some
(05:06):
scaffolding around theirmission, around their values,
and built a culture that wasreally human centered.
And, to be honest with you, inmy, I've been in sport over 50
years.
I'm 67 years old.
I've been in sport formally as aprofessional for over 50 years.
(05:28):
Outside of the UCLA brewingbubble, I have never been
associated with a group ofprofessionals and professional
players like I have with USAvolleyball.
If you're a mother or a fatherout there and you're not real
sure if your daughter should gointo lacrosse or volleyball or
basketball or volleyball ortennis or volleyball, I'm saying
(05:50):
go into volleyball.
But you're gonna notice I didn'tsay softball or volleyball'cause
everybody needs to know where myheart is.
But long story short my job wasto really just keep our culture
dialed, which we're notnaturally wired to make it about
the other person.
And so it takes real intention,real discipline.
And the women of USA volleyballare unbelievable.
(06:11):
I say this often, if I could putthem in the duplication machine,
yeah.
This world would be a lot betterplace.
Special human beings.
Yeah.
And I just had you'll appreciatethis.
I just had Olivia Foley, who'sthe division three national
volleyball player of the year onthe podcast, and we were talking
(06:32):
about they just won threestraight national championships
at Junior.
And we talked about thatmentality and the, they just,
sometimes they just played withanger, not towards anybody, but
just, we're exhausted.
We've, we're playing more gamesthan everybody.
We've, we're winning more setsthan everybody and everybody's
given us our A game.
And you had that at UCLA and youwere part of that with the
(06:54):
Olympic team.
Where do you think that begins?
Where does that begin?
Where we get kids to understand?
W where their body and theirmind can go to be great.
Yeah.
It's such a big question tounpack.
I think the first thing thatpeople need to understand is
performance doesn't matter.
Sport or spelling, bees oracademics performance is really
(07:15):
about this idea of what, what'shappening mentally and then
being dialed physically, right?
It doesn't even matter spellingbee.
You've gotta get your bodyregulated.
And when you look at our highperformers, the thing that
parents and athletes need tounderstand is it is a very
personal journey for every highperformer and we overuse high
(07:38):
performance a lot.
We now know, science now tellsus that it's actually a fallacy.
That less than 5% of the timeyou are in your peak performance
operating and dialed mentallyand physically.
Wow.
The ones that separatethemselves are the ones that
know how to navigate all thedifferent emotional levels that
(08:00):
you go through, and masteryaround failure recovery.
So what we now know, whetherit's men or women, doesn't
matter, team or individualsport, what separates them is
they can move through everythingwith incredible efficiency to be
locked in the moment, be whereyour feet are and give a hundred
percent of what you have.
Because this generation now hasto deal with focus challenges
(08:23):
and they have to deal withinjuries.
Injuries.
I say this often, injuries isnow a standard.
Yeah.
It is a part of a conversationwith every coach that's dealing
with somebody that's dealdealing with high performance or
just competition in general.
And so if we can dial thesethings in and look at your body
and your mind as an F1 car.
You gotta set of dials and yougotta be able to know when to
(08:46):
tweak each one of themthroughout your pre in and post
competition.
And those that have got thatdialed end up having the best
opportunity to be their best.
And more importantly, they havejoy.
They know how to have FUN, it'slike the new F word.
We know how to do that.
And that is a skill thatinvolves rigor.
(09:07):
When I say rigor, a disciplinedattention to detail takes rigor
to create the conditions tohave.
JOY.
What role do the parents play inall that?
Huh?
Oh, such a I'm just gonna throwloaded general questions at you
that are so hard to answer.
Yeah let's dive, I'll put somecontext in this.
(09:28):
Let's get off the freeway ofhigh performance and talk about
right.
First of all, to every mom anddad out there that has a son or
daughter of or non-binarychildren that are navigating
high performance academics,athletics, sports, whatever it
is I see you how hard this isbecause there is no standard
(09:49):
curriculum around sportperformance.
There is no standard pathwaythat parents can jump on and
follow with assurance that it'svetted and verified information
about the biology of the body,about the physiology of the
body, about their mentalperformance and how the mind
works, not even getting into thetechnical and tactical and
(10:12):
failure recovery standards thatyou need in each one of these
sports.
So to the parents, I see you inhow you have to try to build out
a dial for your son or daughterthat allows them to be
navigating all of these thingsthroughout their life.
But this is what I know to betrue.
Disclaimer, I have no children.
(10:33):
Disclaimer, I have no children.
But I watched Parenting ofPerforming Children come across
my doorstep for 27 years atUCLI, and this is what I know to
be true to the father.
You set self-efficacy, andyou'll notice I don't say
confidence.
Confidence gets overused.
It's too high of a bar.
Gen A, gen Z, they don't totallyrelate to it'cause we
(10:56):
romanticized it.
It makes it sound like I amgonna be the champion.
So no one's gonna say, I amconfident.
Confidence just means trust inthe moment, right?
Dad sets self-efficacy.
Let's just believe in ourself inthis moment.
Dad can set that self-efficacyby putting out the conditions
where that child succeeds andfails on their own.
(11:19):
And the father is the guide railthere?
No, he's not carrying her.
No, he's not coaching her in rowthree ever.
No.
Shut your pie hole in therecruiting office.
Visit.
Shut your pie hole.
Let the scholar athlete do allthe talking to the mother.
I see you.
You are the bus driver, thenurse, the big sister, the
(11:42):
psychologist, the cook.
You are all of it.
I see you.
Thank you for all the lonelywork.
But this is what she doesn'tneed.
She doesn't need 17 texts everyday from you because you are her
best friend.
A teenager does not need amother As a best friend, you're
stunting her own youngwomanhood.
(12:03):
To be an independent thinker, tobe able to tackle problems.
'cause her default setting is,I'm gonna text mom, I'm gonna
text mom.
So we ask questions in therecruiting process that is gonna
tell me about their criticalthinking skills.
'cause you learn criticalthinking skills.
When I say critical thinking,I'm talking about thinking.
Meaning do I as a young, soon tobe young adult 18, going to
(12:28):
college, am I aware about thethinking that is needed in each
part of my day?
We call it thinking aboutthinking.
And there are three thinkingmodels that you have to have.
My thinking model about me, it'sall about me.
It's just me.
You get to be me.
When your head hits the pillowand you wake up in the morning,
boom, you're done.
You've got your eight hours ofbe me, the second model or what
(12:52):
we're calling, thinking about,thinking of.
Now I'm in team mode.
What does my family need?
What does my classmate need?
What does my teammate need?
And that's the majority of yourday.
And then last is community.
Who am I serving?
Whose shoulders did I stand onand how am I showing my
gratitude every single day?
So for us, we literally say yourindividual lens, your team lens
(13:15):
and your community lens.
Thinking about thinking, moms,we need you to help us in this
area.
So when she comes to the coachcan sit there and ask really
challenging questions and thechild doesn't say this I what?
The minute I see that, yep.
(13:38):
It's a red flag.
'cause mom and dad, I've got 20shortstops that have an open ba,
a backhand that can throw a ropeto first base.
I have 20.
So someone that can't articulateand doesn't have clarity around
their performance skills andtheir relationship skills, you
are gonna go drop down on thatlist.
And so that's criticallyimportant in the interview
process to be able to look me inthe eye, tell me what you are,
(14:01):
tell me what you're not, andgive me examples about how you
master failure recovery.
Yeah.
How do we teach parents to focuson those things?
I think parents I wish that wecould get parents to re, we
want, if we want parents, if wewant parents to be at the same
(14:23):
bar that we're expecting ourscholar athletes to be at we
have to put them through alearning ecosystem.
Who is teaching that?
We say, I hear this often, likethere's no books on parenting.
Yes, there is.
Yeah.
There's hundreds too many.
This idea about what does aparent of a performing child
(14:44):
look like?
Your job is to create theconditions for them to succeed
and fail on their own, and thenbe the leveler in between to be
their engineer belief.
In other words, you are gonnacreate the conditions.
You're gonna create thequestions for that athlete to
answer, I failed today.
(15:05):
I have a better tomorrow.
Coming and projecting optimism.
Projecting optimism is, Ibelieve the strongest, most
important skill a parent canhave.
Hey, you know what, Susie?
Yeah.
You went, oh, for four today.
It was painful to watch.
You're not a failure.
You failed.
Yeah.
Tell me what we're gonna dotonight, tomorrow morning before
(15:26):
we go back to the park.
Non-emotional.
Hell yeah.
Look at thumbs up guys.
Yes, we're celebrating people.
We're celebrating.
We're celebrating 1% betterevery day.
If we can get our parents toactually walk through these
little step-by-step moments inbetween the child's performance
environments to be the engineerbelief, you're not supposed to
(15:50):
be the hero you're supposed tobe projecting.
It's gonna be a better tomorrowif we do A, B, C, D, and then
that falls on the athletethrough their effort and their
attitude.
The only two things they cancontrol in life.
I say it often, you can onlycontrol two things.
Your effort give a hundredpercent what you have in your
attitude.
Whether I'm starting.
(16:11):
Or I'm literally in the dugoutas a game changer.
We call'em game changers on USAvolleyball, we call them game
changers, right?
It's a super important role.
Parents need to be a part ofthat, be on a learning pathway
as she continues, or hecontinues to go up.
That up the food chain ofserious competitive sports.
Sue, I know you, you understandthis, but I find it, there's so
(16:33):
many parents that don't wannaread the book.
They listen to thisconversation, they go, I wanna
do this.
But then they get overwhelmedand they stop, or they revert
back to who they're comfortablebeing.
Where does executive functionskills.
Come into play here to help theparent have some simple things
that they know, okay, this iswhat I want to count my, I want
(16:54):
to, I wanna make sure I'm doingfor every game.
And those executive functionskills for that kid that maybe
has, that just can't grasp allof this that we're talking about
and just needs those two orthree things.
Remember, okay, this is how I'mgonna prepare.
This is what I'm gonna do duringcompetition.
This is what I'm gonna do after.
How, where does all that work?
Into this?
For, let me first I'm reallyinterested in tackling, having
(17:17):
conversations with the parentsbecause if the number one thing
there, you have to shift thisthinking around she's just
playing a sport.
Because what happens once theyshift a travel ball, they're now
in this engine.
Yeah, they're in this dialogue.
They're in this language thatthey can't get out of.
So the first thing is justunderstand the minute you sit in
(17:38):
the bleachers, you're in thenoise zone.
There's a lot of noise in thebleachers, and I reckon parents
are like what do I do?
I say, buy two beach chairs.
It's worth the$75 to buy twobeach chairs in Southern
California.
It's probably about$125 for twogood beach chairs, right?
And go park down the left fieldline and watch your child.
(18:01):
That's number one.
You have to reframe.
It's not a gossip center andit's not about you.
So reframe.
I'm gonna get out of the noise.
I want my daughter and my son tosee me.
I'm over here.
And we always say, watch themovie.
Come in quietly.
Sit down.
Keep your pie hole shut.
Because now we know all the datathat we're getting.
They're feeling pressure becauseparents are being overly
(18:23):
positive.
You're all right.
You've got this you know whatthe kids tell us from eight to
18.
I wish it could just be quiet.
So that's number one.
Reframe where you physicallysit.
That's a marker that it's notabout me.
Number two.
Don't talk to your child afterthe game about the game unless
(18:43):
they want to.
So that's the number two.
You gotta be in your executivefunctioning brain.
Once again, it's not about me.
I know your D Dad.
I see you.
I know you wanna know about thefourth inning was the runner on
second there was one out and thecount was two and two.
And you wanna know why shedidn't swing at that curve ball?
And that's her pitch.
I know you wanna know that.
And I just say, just remember 10and two.
(19:05):
10 and two.
Get in the car, hands on the 10and two and just drive home.
If they wanna talk about it, letthem talk about it.
You may look back there, youprobably see the part of their
head.
'cause their head's down andthey're already in their phone.
Yep.
Yep.
Let'em, if they wanna talk aboutit, let'em talk to you.
That's another reframe.
The third reframe is parents arelooking at the path to college
(19:30):
and the recruiting process assome sort of party that they're
gonna get invited to.
And I and you.
Can you tell I'm retired?
'cause I could never talk likethis if I was a full-time coach.
Coaches can't talk like this.
'cause they may be.
I may.
I'm gonna turn off 60% of thepeople that are listening.
I'm gonna turn off.
They're gonna go screw her.
I'm gonna, I'm gonna speak thetruth of what coaches can't talk
(19:54):
about.
Coaches are sick and tired ofparents thinking it's the
coach's job to find them.
The half a million of them.
Yeah.
Parents stop waiting to beinvited to the college party and
look at the path to college.
(20:15):
Like you look at your healthinsurance, your life insurance,
and your car insurance.
Oh man.
We spent a lot of time.
Comparing, fitting up, find thematch.
But when it comes to travelball, we drop Susie off to Chuck
in a truck and we don't evenlook at what kind of background
they have in their recruitingclinics.
(20:36):
They're putting on.
We don't look at their sciencebackground if they're teaching
mechanics, that's tough.
As a college coach, knowingthese parents come into an
environment that isn'tcertified, there aren't
standards.
And on the flip side, I knowthere are club coaches.
Club coaches, I see you outthere.
So many of the club coaches aredoing it.
If you are a club coach outthere that is a volunteer,
(20:59):
you're like, dude, I'm a bankerMonday through Friday and I do
travel ball on the weekend.
Thank you so much, sir.
And ma'am, thank you.
Yeah, I'm not talking about thevolunteer coach, I'm talking
about those coaches that aredoing this full time.
If you're gonna talk aboutmechanics, you better have some
(21:20):
certification around OnBase U orsomebody that's doing the
science behind the mechanics ofmovement.
If you're gonna be talking aboutwhat mental toughness is, you
better be using people that arevetted and verified in the
industry.
If you're coming across as afull-time travel ball coach and
I say this the same thing on thecollege side, that we're now at
(21:41):
a point where softball is abusiness and we have standards
that we should uphold, eventhough nobody is holding you
accountable to it.
Once again, I'm gonna say itthree times.
Volunteer coach.
I'm not talking about you.
I wish you could, but Iunderstand your job.
You could be a banker or a bakerand you're just putting in your
four hours on Saturday.
I appreciate you and I see you.
(22:03):
I've been in so many interviews.
I've been interviewing coachesand hiring coaches.
I've been gone throughinterviews to be a head coach.
No one's ever asked me thisstuff.
No one's ever asked me about, Ijust talked to a university
president.
He goes, Matt, every time acoach comes in here that we're
interviewing I point'em to thewhiteboard and say, tell me what
your culture's gonna look like.
Tell me what you're gonna beknown about.
(22:24):
Tell me why these kids are goingto be healthy and successful,
find joy.
They're gonna be disciplined.
They're gonna leave here betterpeople.
If it, if the ads and thepresidents aren't asking those
questions what are we expectingfrom what we're getting?
Even, and I know this isprovocative and people roll
their eyes when I say this and Ido.
I own my bias.
(22:45):
I'm a college coach, so I havemore empathy for the college
coach.
'cause I know today what thecollege coach is going through.
I'm a consultant.
I work with college coaches inall sports.
It is.
We are in any, I've been only inone other renaissance in my
career, my 50 years.
This is only the secondRenaissance.
The first renaissance was when aIAW association of
(23:07):
Intercollegiate athletics forwomen transferred into the NCAA
two A.
It was a clown car.
Yeah.
Doesn't it feel like a clown carright now?
Yeah.
One day you're an amateur.
The next day you've got NIL fora million dollars.
And if any parent could bebehind the curtain of how a
(23:29):
coach is trying to navigate.
This massive shift.
Have empathy and parents takecharge of your recruiting
journey.
It's not a party where you'rewaiting for an invite.
Don't wait for the phone toring.
There are too many of you andnot enough coaches.
Do the math.
Use the technology.
We have recruit educationservices out there that can do
(23:51):
the technology for you.
You can get free services andnot pay a dime for recruiting
service.
We start doing that.
I think the parents are gonnabecome more educated and
understand their role in thiswhole process.
'cause right now, Matt, rightnow what parent does they get in
the bleachers, they meet Mr.
And Mrs.
Jones, their daughter is threeyears ahead.
(24:12):
So they become the authority.
They everything they're saying,it's oh, I'm gonna do that
because look at, she already gota verbal to Northwestern.
I'm gonna, I'm gonna go there onthat path.
Instead of saying every childhas their own path and you've
gotta do the matching.
Before you start doing the coldcalling and the cold emailing,
(24:33):
go ahead and email the 1400colleges.
Good luck with that.
Yeah I'm with you.
And that's why I do what I dois, it's all about the kid.
First, you can't worry about thecolleges, you can't worry about
divisions.
You have to worry about who yourchild is because if they don't
know what their priorities are,they don't know what brings them
(24:53):
joy and what makes them happyand what makes them healthy.
H how do you even know what typeof college to look for, what
type of coach they need and whatkind of communication they need
to be prepared for.
And Matt, one of the things justto be relevant because it is
such a growing thing where thisrenaissance and remember every
renaissance if history Yeah.
They're always, there's always amessy front end.
(25:14):
We're in the front end of aRenaissance we'll Recorrect,
we'll get it back.
To, to making more sense.
It will never be the way it was.
Yeah.
But what I want parents tounderstand is what I see when I
am consulting, and this is atall levels, I'm at all levels,
but it's a similar principle.
(25:34):
You have to decide when you makea decision, am I gonna be a
customer or am I gonna be astudent athlete for four years
and get a degree from there?
You have to have an honestconversation with your child
around that.
That if I make a commitment togo to Arizona, but deep down
(25:55):
inside, if I know anotherschool, if Oklahoma comes
calling, am I going to Oklahoma?
Then I'm a customer at Arizona.
I'm a customer.
I'm just shopping every year.
This is the hard part.
People don't like to hear mesay.
College coaches hate it.
When I say this.
The more college coaches thathave it broken down like this,
(26:18):
they're crushing the NIL.
They're crushing the transferportal.
They look at the transferportal.
It is an asset.
It is an accessory for me, butthey know how many people on
their team are traditionalstudent athletes.
They want the degree and howmany are customers.
And when you learn as a collegecoach to start using that
vernacular in your recruitingprocess, we can now open the
(26:40):
door and not make it this bigsecret.
I'm not saying they're gonna dowhat they say they're gonna do
because life changes, decisionschange.
The reason this is important isthis traditional student is
thinking every other student isa traditional student.
And our default mindset iseverybody's gonna be here for
four years.
Graduate.
(27:01):
No that world's gone guys.
It's gone.
Let's, in our culturalscaffolding framework around how
we operate individually and as ateam, let's have conversations
around this and let's get it outof the closet.
I think transfer portal feelsvery similar to when we first
(27:22):
started talking about mentalhealth.
Back in the early two thousandswas the first time we really
started publicly talking aboutmental health.
We're still not there, but wefirst started talking about it.
I go around telling collegecoaches, talk about it, get it
out of the closet because ithelps you strategize more.
'cause some of these dollarofferings, they can be life
(27:44):
changing for the first fiveyears of your life after
college.
And this is what I always say,oh my gosh, you got$250,000,
that's great.
Your life's gonna be amazinguntil 2029.
Now what are we gonna do?
You have no degree.
That's right.
No place to go.
That's right.
And you've already spent all themoney.
Now what?
That's right.
So this idea that if I'm gettinghundreds of thousands of
dollars, that's life changing.
(28:05):
It's not, you want parents tomake a 60 year division
decision.
Where do we wanna be in those 40years of my working life?
Pick a school that aligns withthat.
Or even if you're transferring,pick a school that aligns with
that.
So win, lose, draw, or you'regetting a lot of money, you're
gonna get that degree to takecare of yourself for the next 40
(28:27):
years after you graduate whenyou're 22 years old.
I love it.
I'm on 100%.
I have a 16-year-old daughterwho played club volleyball for
the last six, seven years.
And I wanna talk about mentalhealth a little bit with you.
My biggest concern that I seewith what she's gone through is
(28:48):
the time commitment.
She goes from high schoolvolleyball in July.
To November and then immediatelyinto open gyms for club, and
then they're competing untilJuly and then right back into
high school.
Yeah.
It's a lot to unpack, right?
Let's go.
Let's start.
Let's start at the top and thenpeel it down.
(29:09):
I wish I truly believe this.
I wish we had amateur clubsports partnered with the NCAA
two A.
Yeah, so that student athlete ismirroring a very protected
schedule and based on how manysports you're playing, it would
be a mandatory dead period whereit is a legit dead period.
So if it's a dead period, youcan't go play another sport.
(29:32):
You're in your reset rejuvenateperiod.
That's number one.
Number two is.
The brain isn't wired to be on24 7, but society-wise, we
haven't acknowledged that.
So the poor scholar athlete istrying to keep the brain on 24
7.
We know we're failing miserablyon that, but let's start at the
(29:54):
top.
When we talk about mentalhealth, we have to break it up
into two categories.
One is clinical.
So we have young children outthere that are actually
suffering from chemicalimbalances that require a
clinical health expert.
(30:17):
And then we have many more thatare dealing with mental
performance challenges.
They've got performance anxiety.
They've socialized these wordslike pressure.
Anxious, anxiety, and the brainis very compliant.
So when you start talking about,I'm super nervous, I have so
much anxiety, the brain is likeyou.
(30:39):
You have anxiety.
Puts on all the red lights, thebrain puts on the red lights,
gets the chemicals going.
The blood now starts flowingeverywhere.
So now that young child issweating, possibly tacky throat,
lumping their throat, sweatypalms, stomach ache, mud butt,
we've all been there Once we canteach our young children.
(31:03):
Everybody has mental performancechallenges and there are somes
that, that have clinical mentalhealth challenges and both of
them can get to the top.
Coached at UCLA for 27 years and15 Olympians.
We've had athletes that hadserious case of both and still
went to the top, stayed on top,and now are really high
(31:25):
functioning humans in society.
So we need the parents to lookat mental performance and mental
health, almost like it's amanagement cycle and not a
disability.
So we're not looking foraccommodations.
We're not saying, oh, she wantsthe day off'cause she's got a
(31:45):
lot of performance anxiety.
And in high performance we justcall it energy.
So when my energy ismisdirected, misguided, we now
know our breath can realign us.
In terms of being anxious,anxiety, feeling pressure, it's
just energy.
(32:06):
It first starts with our words.
We've gotta change thevernacular that I'm feeling
really elevated today.
Brain's oh, you're elevated.
I know how to dera decelerateyou.
I'm gonna go ahead and put mybreathing kits to work.
We now have specific breathingkits to elevate or calm down and
from the day forward, from whenthey're in second grade, when
(32:29):
they were feeling anxious.
Everybody's body dealsdifferently with environments
that they pick up a vibration.
We have children, we have youngadults, we have Olympians and
high performers that areempaths.
Their body.
We call them high frequency,meaning their frequency.
(32:50):
When they walk into rooms, theygo to ball games.
Their frequency is picking upeverything.
They're picking up thetemperature of the room.
They're picking up the noise,they're picking up the closeness
of people.
Their little bodies are takingall that in.
We call'em high freaks becausewe wanna celebrate them because
they actually have thecapability of going to even a
(33:13):
higher level once they cancontrol that.
But we have to stop shamingpeople that are empath.
Dude, stop it.
Quit whining.
Quit being a baby.
Get off the floor.
Stop crying'cause you'reoverwhelmed.
No, actually race to over to herand say, you want me to go
through some breathing with youright now?
(33:34):
Here sit.
Sit up and let's just close oureyes.
Let's ground our feet.
Let's start to get centered withour breath and let's work,
breathing kit number one, andlet's get our breath back.
We'll start there.
Let's be where our feet are.
Be the helper.
Don't be captain obvious.
And that starts with the parentsand then it goes to the
teammates at the top.
(33:55):
Mental health, break it up.
Mental health, mentalperformance.
Understand in this, we havepeople that pick up a lot of
signals.
This one, it could be chemical.
There may be other assets thatneed to be a part of their kit,
their mental performance kit.
And we have to feel good aboutall of it because all of them
are capable of going the top.
(34:19):
How much of this were you doing30 years ago that you couldn't
define and couldn't put it intocategories like you can so
easily now?
Where were you 30 years ago withall of this?
Now remember, 30 years ago I was37.
Let's talk about, 40 years ago.
Okay.
40 years ago whatever you'recomfortable with.
Early in my career I was just ayeller.
(34:41):
Yeah.
I'm not talking about how areyou feeling?
I'm not talking about yourbreath.
All I'm talking about are yourfeet that have to run.
'cause you're one minute late.
So go do your 400 up downs.
Shut up.
Put up.
And I regret that.
I regret that I could have beena better coach if I had more
(35:02):
knowledge.
Yeah.
I'm with you.
I'm around.
Treat them as a human first.
Yeah.
And a person second.
Yeah.
I was the same way.
And a player second.
Where's the balance though,coach?
We, there still has to be anunderstanding how to get there.
Can we do that without thechallenge?
Without, i'm talking aboutreadiness.
I'm not talking about physicalstandards.
Physical standards we're,they're they're unchanging.
(35:23):
Your physical expectations basedon the coach you're playing for.
He or she doesn't have to changethat.
We get confused.
Okay.
When we get confused when wetalk about mental and physical,
and we talk about spent spendingspending seven minutes to get
mentally ready.
People think it goes like this.
Oh, mental readiness, that meansI have to lower the standard.
(35:43):
No, it doesn't.
That standard stays there,beginning, middle, and end.
There's my standard.
It's unwavering.
It my world, it's unwaveringbecause we don't have the
capacity to be able to take aweekend off these programs.
When you're to our sportparents, when you're watching
these programs, when you'rewatching the UCLAs and the
(36:06):
Oklahomas and the Alabamas andthe Floridas.
And the Texas and Texas Tech,you're watching these top, they
don't get a weekend off ingeneral.
And we now have to acknowledgeas a leader, coach, teacher, if
I don't get a weekend offphysically, because I'm supposed
to win every game, I've gottalearn how to regulate my mental
(36:28):
performance.
I've gotta learn how to regulatemy body.
So now the next I call it the22nd century thinking is we're
looking at rest and rigor withthe same level of commitment
that rest is built into yourdigital calendar.
How many students out there, andlet's not get into time
(36:48):
management, but you should bescheduling rest into every
digital calendar.
Parents should be putting it inand you should have rest, what
we call rest blocks.
Three day, three times a day.
You stack those just like youstack your workouts, right?
We're always saying we're tryingto stack another good day.
(37:09):
I now say, stack a good dayphysically and stack a good day
mentally.
Did you get your rest windowsdone?
What is, what does a rest blocklook like?
Imagine what a rest block is itor we also call it the zero
block.
What do you think they do in thezero block?
I would imagine it's some kindof meditation or sleep.
Yeah.
You're doing zero.
Yeah.
Nothing.
Nothing.
(37:30):
No phone, no lights, nodistractions.
If you wanna just sit under atree and hear your breathing,
that's a beautiful zero station.
What would you recommend a blocklike that?
How long should it be?
Depends on the person.
Depends on the time of the day.
Okay.
There are athletes right nowthat have to, they have to
execute.
I was going through a timemanagement'cause time, we talk
(37:52):
about an epidemic around mentalhealth and I acknowledge that it
is.
Epidemic.
You wanna know another epiEpidemic?
Time management.
Oh, it's terrible.
Parents.
Yeah.
Parents, please teach them timemanagement.
Yeah.
Don't tell them everythingthey're doing hour by hour,
(38:14):
Johnny, now you're gonna go takea shower, Johnny, now you're
gonna put your shoes on.
Johnny.
Now we're gonna go to practice.
Johnny.
Now no.
Give Johnny the week and tellhim to put it in his digital
counter.
And people always, I always getemails after and people will
say, when do I start that?
The minute you give them aphone.
My, my daughter's 10.
(38:34):
She has a phone start then.
Yep.
And they're like, oh, I don'tknow.
It's so complicated.
Have you ever seen those kids?
I'm so impressed with Gen A.
So Gen A is coming after Gen Z,right?
Parents will say to me, oh, thisis so complicated with all the
digital and.
I said, are you watching yourdaughter do those TikTok dances?
She is legit.
(38:56):
She could do three minutes withher friends, completely in sync.
The amount of mental load,physical execution and timing,
just like filling your digitalcalendar.
She can do it.
Give her a chance to do it.
Ab absolutely.
I'm a huge proponent of it, andI wish somebody would've taught
me this 40 years ago, becausefor me, yeah, I know, me too.
(39:18):
For me this phone, as much as Ihate it, sometimes if I didn't
have it, I think I would be ahot mess because an alarm will
go off and he'll say, you gottaprep for sue.
An alarm will go off and say,Hey, grab your son and go for a
walk.
You're not gonna have any timewith him today.
(39:38):
This is gonna be your hour to gospend some time with him.
Yeah, exactly.
And so what we call thoseintention, what you just said,
we call those intention blocks,right?
I'm gonna have intention, likefor example, I have a, let's say
I have a history test on Monday.
My intention block on Sunday isreread chapters one through
five.
And so we have blocks of what wecall hard events.
(40:01):
And then every event usuallyinvolves a prep block.
So how many prep blocks do Ineed for the history test?
Depends on how prepared you are.
So if you're not prepared, it'sFriday.
Now my test is Monday.
You're gonna have to putprobably six preparation blocks
in your calendar to read.
Okay.
But remember you gotta put yourrest blocks in there as well.
(40:22):
And then I'm recommending withour Gen A, when I work with Gen
A's.
Putting what age is that coach?
Is that it, I think they'resaying like, there's an overlap,
but it's around eight to 10years old to like up to 18.
It, there's a crossover.
So that's my son and mydaughter.
It's right behind.
So yeah, so gen Zs I think arelike 18 to 20, 8 30, somewhere
(40:43):
in there.
Okay.
I don't quote me on thatexactly, but they're coming up
after the Gen Zers.
And what we're working on ishaving them look at social
media, like it's homework, so itshould be in your calendar.
And there are times that you doit, and there are times you
don't do it like that a lot.
And that's, that takes babysteps because right now for our
(41:05):
half of our millennials, for ourGen Z and Gen A, it is not
technology.
So I always tell parents, let meexplain it to you.
We look at the phone astechnology.
It came into our life.
We didn't have it.
And then we had it.
So it sits out here.
I always tell parents thinkabout the phone to your daughter
is like the toilet to us.
(41:28):
Okay.
You, someone said to you, HeyMatt, you know we're gonna do,
we're gonna put a timer on whenyou can go to the bathroom.
You're like, wait a minute.
I've had free access 24 7 to thetoilet my whole life.
But it will help you understandhow difficult it is for them to
separate.
'cause there is no separation.
It did not come into their life.
It's been there all along.
(41:49):
That's right.
Interesting.
Coach I wanna go back to what Iasked you before.
I loved where we went with it,but I want to talk about the
length of the travel ballseason.
'cause I think we, we have toaddress it at some point.
'cause we have all these greatathletes who love their sport,
they're passionate about theirsport.
They can't wait to get up andget better at it and go be with
their team.
(42:10):
And by the 90th game of thesummer, they can't imagine
picking up a bat or being out inthe hundred degree weather
anymore because they've done itso much and they're so burned
out with all the noise we'retalking about.
Can we start there?
Is it reasonable to say we'regonna block this out where, like
(42:31):
you talked about with the ncaa,it's gonna be a three month
season for travel ball andthat's it.
Yeah, the water's under thebridge.
It's very difficult.
You see how they get around therules?
There, the high school did it,right?
They built in policy.
Yeah.
But you saw how they get aroundthe rule.
And so I think for me, I wouldlove to be more proactive
(42:53):
around, I just wish there was adeeper connection with n NCAA
two A and club ball.
And what would that look like?
Let's say there's two areas forme, technically.
Three.
The physical, how the bodymoves.
So let's just say functionalmovement, mental performance,
(43:13):
time management, criticalthinking skills.
Okay.
Just think, okay.
The office skills.
Okay.
I would love for the n NCAA twoA to put together a consortia,
men and women and any travelball group can come and be a
part of that and access theinformation.
(43:35):
And no.
NC two A is not gonna make moneyoff this.
Travel ball's not gonna makemoney off it.
What's happening right now iscolleges travel ball are going
into the pocket of the parenttelling them, you gotta get, you
gotta do this tournament, yougotta do this recruit.
And the parent, the poor parentdoesn't know how to discern what
(43:55):
is life threatening and what is,we're trying to keep our travel
ball program going, or we'retrying to fundraise for our
college program'cause they'reequally guilty.
So I sit here, I have a bias, Iwanna own it.
I'm a college coach, but for thelast 20 years, I'm now in
everybody's mess.
I now consult with travel ballcoaches.
I have a new understanding.
(44:16):
When I started one softball mat.
I had a whole new understandingof what the poor travel ball
coach is dealing with, right?
Especially the ones that aredoing it part-time.
I do not have empathy for peoplethat are making a business outta
travel ball, and I don't have aproblem with it either.
I like it.
There's some beautiful, bigorganizations that are doing it
(44:37):
right?
Driven by character, has a legittransparent process and they're
delivering results.
I love that.
I feel badly for that group thatdoesn't know what end is up.
Wouldn't it be great if a parentknew that vetted and verified,
good Housekeeping seal fortravel ball is this and you can
(44:57):
get it at all of these sites.
And so the travel ball coach isgonna get out of the business of
recruit education, get out ofthe business of business skills,
get out of the business ofmental training, unless that is
your certified area and you area subject matter expert in.
And you th and your idea is we,the ncaa provides those things
(45:20):
that these coaches, NC two A andthe, and wouldn't it be
beautiful it would be theU-S-O-P-C in all our national
governing bodies, partner withthe NCAA two A and create this
layer that is required.
You know what I equate it to?
And the only way you could getthis done, and I'm, I'm speaking
innovation.
This could get done if we tiedall of this path to college
(45:42):
education for children that areperforming.
I don't care if it's dance, I,anything sports.
If we tied it into insurance, ifwe tied it into insurance, now
everyone is gonna shift.
This is serious.
We're gonna hold it over Theparent, you can't play.
(46:03):
We all know you can't playunless you get your certified
insurance.
If we put all of that underneathinsurance.
Then before they get into theirfirst tournament, they already
know about what the odds are,mom and dad.
The odds of your daughter or songetting a full ride to the
school of their choice is 1e-05%and you're gonna go, no wait.
(46:29):
The staff high year is five to20%.
No.
I said, tell your choice.
Not oh, I got offered ascholarship at this school.
I never wanted to go to thatschool.
What if we said that?
But right now, we're living aworld where parents are hand
over fist money.
It's the lotto.
They are living a world foreight years.
(46:50):
It's a lottery.
It is the way we're doing it.
Imagine if we said no, we'reactually gonna have a way
through technology.
You're actually gonna see from athird party is gonna say, this
is where you fit.
Not the travel ball coach, notthe college coach, A third
party.
Is gonna be able to say, here'sthe clump of schools that would
(47:13):
love to hear from you.
Imagine if we gave that answerbook to the parents.
Don't they deserve that?
Don't the parents deserve that?
If we can figure that out, Iwill.
I'll do everything to be a part.
Listen, I just believe inAmerica.
I'm a believer.
Can you imagine if we got thetop insurance people together
the legit ones?
(47:33):
Not the criminals.
We got the NC two A education.
A lot of people don't know aboutNNC two education.
Get on the website, get into NCtwo.org.
If the parents ever clicked onall the student athlete links
that they've put together, it isthe best.
But good luck.
Great.
Good luck having people tell youthat it's there.
(47:55):
Yeah.
And then imagine if we justgrabbed 15 of the top.
Amazon executives and said, Hey,Amazon, I don't work for Amazon,
so people don't be texting methat you're working for, I'm not
working for Amazon, but I amfascinated.
I'm fascinated that if I go inthere, I exactly where you're
(48:17):
going.
Yeah.
If I buy those blue socks thathave neon yellow trim, it is two
minutes later I'm like, Hey,look at these cute racing pants
that you could run your race,your road race in that would
match your socks.
The technology is there.
Do you think it is, from anevaluation standpoint though, do
(48:39):
you think the AI is there toevaluate what you're looking for
in a softball player?
Oh, it's coming my friend.
We already have bots that canplay center field that can read
the trajectory of the ball.
So trust me, it's coming.
It's just a matter of who'sgonna control it.
That's the problem.
And then there's the characterside and then there's, mental.
(49:00):
But imagine if we had a thinkabout this on your parent when
you're a young daughter, shefinishes pre-K and she's getting
ready to go into K and then intofirst grade.
You already know she has to gothrough certain standards and
will be dipping into certaindomains.
Yeah.
That would be a perfect place tostart.
(49:21):
But right now, you know what theparent knows.
Get on that one team that'sgonna be in the Colorado
tournament that mom and dad,that is a tournament lotto.
There are 32,000 softballfamilies there.
Yes, they are 175 miles awayfrom each other.
(49:42):
Good luck for that one school,gonna find your daughter at the
same time that you happen to beplaying.
It is such shenanigans.
Yeah.
And being out of it.
And I was in it, I was in it,I'm a guilty one.
I hold myself accountaccountable.
I was part of the problem'causeI was a college coach that just
(50:02):
kept benefiting from the system.
'cause I was at UCLA.
But would you if I told you allthis 30 years ago that you.
That you had this, that youcould do this a different way,
would've you have, would youhave ego have allowed you to
change it?
Because that's the problem.
If nobody that's in thatposition now will let go of
(50:24):
their ego and say, yes, I'mgonna be a part of this new way
we're going to recruit and thenew way we're going to evaluate,
would you have done it?
Let me reframe it.
I get a little heightened on theword the ego.
'cause college coach here, Igotta take care of my college
coaches.
People think that the collegecoach doesn't wanna let go of
their ego.
It actually has to do witheverybody is doing all these
tournaments.
(50:44):
'cause they're trying to get tothe top schools.
The top schools don't need thestandardization because the best
percolate to the top.
Yes.
So Patty Gasso at Oklahoma, No.
When you're the best, no one'scoming to Patty's pity party.
Because she's the best.
But she actually has this samechallenges because she has no
(51:06):
margin for error.
Every single year, Oklahoma,Texas, UCLA, whatever, they have
to, they can't be off by one ortwo pitchers or they're gonna
drop to eight or nine or 10.
Okay.
But if we said, look, we'redoing this for the other 80%,
(51:26):
okay, then I think we could getcoaches to say, yeah let's do
that.
And there have been some people,we've gotta acknowledge Dave
King and Triple Crown.
We have to acknowledge themworking so hard to standardize
talent.
And it is the future.
We're just not getting thebuy-in at the same rate.
(51:46):
Historically, we're actuallyright on pace.
Like baseball.
It took baseball decades.
It took baseball 40 years tostart creating a true common
language around a five toolplayer.
So we've gotta be patient.
We just, we were just startingthe standardization and I was at
the end of my career when westarted it all and look, we're
(52:07):
already 25 years in and we're,we still don't have a complete
common language where everyone'sspeaking the same language
around physical standards.
And we've got some wonderfulmental profiling standards out
there, but there's just too muchnoise and the parent stays away
'cause they don't know whichone's vetted what, which one's
verified.
Yeah.
That's a big problem.
Where do we go?
Which one do we choose?
(52:29):
Coach?
I could this conversation needsto continue to grow and I'll be
a major proponent in pushing itand making sure people are
listening and we keep havingthis conversation at a high
level.
I wanna take a little break andthen for five, 10 minutes just
talk about recruiting and reallygive some advice to parents and
coaches and kids.
Gimme one piece of advice to thecoaches out there that they just
(52:52):
need to hear.
Whether you're a youth coach,whether you're a high school
coach, whether you're a collegecoach, just that one nugget that
you think if you're gonna gointo your season, if you're
gonna coach young people, thisis the one thing I want you to
start thinking about.
If you're a parent and you're afan, I want you to understand
there's a big recruiting enginebehind the curtain that you
(53:14):
don't even see when you come tothe park.
I want the parent to know whenyou're sitting there and you
look over and that top 10 coachthere, I'm gonna ask the parent,
try not to get nervous.
They're actually, what the coachis looking for is, I wanna see
them fail and see how theyreact.
Yeah.
Of course the, of course theywanna see if they can hit that
(53:35):
great picture.
Of course that's a given.
But they, the college coachknows that every day that kid's
not gonna be hitting that oppo,double off the fence.
They're looking at barrel angle,they're looking at reaction
time.
But one thing they're reallylooking at is how are they
managing their failure recovery?
Are they a good teammate?
They're looking at theinteraction.
(53:56):
Those college coaches arelooking at a lot during warmup.
They don't miss a beat.
And so as a parent, be the voiceto your young child to say on
game day it's celebration day.
You get to wear a specialuniform.
So you got your, we always sayit's good old softball with a
party dress on,'cause it's gameday.
Have a lot of joy out there.
(54:17):
Be the engineer belief as aparent, Hey, you know what,
today.
I just can't wait to watch youplay.
PLAY.
Yeah.
So be that person that is thatcomforter for the child.
And then during the game, justbe heads up.
If you're a big mechanics yellerat your child, have you ever
asked your child, Hey, are yougood with me saying, level up.
(54:38):
Level up.
If your child says, yeah, I loveit when you say that, perfect.
Never heard a child say that.
Yeah, the second.
The second thing is, everysingle time this is a marker, a
mental marker.
Every time you sit down on thebleachers, for every hour of
watching softball, have you put10 minutes into your recruiting
(55:00):
plan for your daughter.
Yeah.
Okay.
Love that.
So the 10 to hour rule, right?
So if you're at the park for sixhours.
You owe your daughter an hour ofrecruit planning.
It's a great way to keep thebalance.
I agree.
I agree.
Coach, you're a nationaltreasurer.
Thanks so much for doing this.
I appreciate everything you'vedone and I'm so excited that
(55:20):
you're in this world.
Thank you my friend.
It's great to be with you.
That wraps up part one of myconversation with Sue Enquist
and wow, is she a wealth ofinformation?
What a gift to learn fromsomeone who has shaped not only
champions on the field, buthealthier athletes and coaches
in every arena she touches.
But we're not done yet.
(55:41):
Be sure to come back for parttwo of my conversation with
Coach Sue on the significantrecruiting podcast, where we'll
dive deeper into our perspectiveon the recruiting landscape and
the advice every family needs tohear.
You won't want to miss it.
That'll be out this upcomingMonday.
In the meantime, if you'relooking for tools to guide your
own recruiting journey, visitcoach matt rogers.com and don't
(56:03):
forget to check out my brand newbook, the Volleyball Recruits
Journal, now available onamazon.com.
It's built to help athletes andfamilies stay organized, stay
focused, and stay groundedthroughout the recruiting
process.
Thanks for joining me today.
Until next time, stay focused,stay humble, and stay in the
fight.
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