CTC-3 "How You See Your Players Impacts Your Coaching" Luke patterson

We chat with Coach Luke Patterson on this episode.

Luke has coached multiple sports including soccer at Cooper High School and basketball at Camp Ernst.

Topics include: 

- Marriage communication as a coach
- Viewing your players with the God-given potential within them
- A hilarious story involving him running suicide drills with his players
- Transformational Leadership: training and top takeaways

Transcript

spk_0:   0:00
This is the coach to coach podcast Episode number three. Hey, what's up, everybody? Welcome to the coach to coach Podcast. We believe the coachman win with their team and their personal life. And in the home, I'm your host, Nate silly. And we have another great episode lined up for you today. We're part of so many awesome conversations with some amazing cultures are on another Kentucky and greater Cincinnati area, and this is a way where we can learn from one another and grow in our leadership with our teams and personally with our families. This podcast responsible. You know, the Kentucky Fellowship of Christian Athletes were so grateful to our financial supporters and volunteers. You make things like this podcast possible to learn more. Visit N. K Y, F, C A dot or GE on the show. Today we have a very special guest, A good friend of mine, Luke Patterson. Luke is a boon County High School alone. He has coached at the varsity level head coach at Cooper High School with soccer and currently just began at Camp Burns Middle School with a girls basketball gig. And he is a great due to learn from He's processed a lot, learned a ton and is eager to share some of the things he's learned. And he has a great embarrassing moment story you're not gonna wanna miss. A Elsa mentions one of his high school coaches that has a great characteristic that I think we can all learn from. I will leave you hanging any more. Let's turn Brian into Let's get into our interview with Hey, what's up, everybody? We're here with Coach Luke Patterson. Luke. How you doing, brother? Pretty good. Yeah, he told me he is. This is a committed person to be interviewing cause he is locked in a closet right now on his chromebook making it happen. I love it. It's true. Ah, good deal. Let's jump right in. I just love to give them a quick picture of Who the heck are you, man? So give us a quick back story on Luke. And what got you interested in coaching in the first place?

spk_1:   2:20
Yeah. So, um, I am Ah, I'm a teacher. And so I, um I teach math at Camp Parents Middle School, and my background as an athlete was predominantly based around soccer and basketball, So those were the two sports that, um, I've coached. Currently, I'm coaching six Break Girls basketball. What got me interested in coaching? I was just I love sports. I mean, that's, you know, you hear a lot of stuff swirling around the five love languages while the six love languages sports and that's that's mine right there. I just love it. Way to my heart.

spk_0:   3:01
Yeah, good deal. Makes a lot of sense to stain around the game and finding me once you can't play anymore. Other than old man, why I'm seeing basketball, you got to find other ways to stay connected and get rolling. Now it makes a lot of sense. What was your first coaching gig?

spk_1:   3:17
The first, Actually, the first coaching gig was my My brother is like three and 1/2 years younger than me, and when I was in high school, you played inner Miralles at his middle school and they didn't have a coach. So me and ah, buddy of mine, who also had a younger brother on the team. We both coached that team together, and we did it for two years. We did it when they were in seventh grade, and when they were in eighth grade, which would have been our junior and senior years, respectively. And we ran the table our first year with just these random kids from Inter Miro. So that was my first taste of coaching was actually while I was in high school and and we absolutely loved it. It was a ton of fun.

spk_0:   4:00
Thought was always good to have a good taste in your mouth out of the gate. I'm sure that could be coming back. It's like getting a really good golf shot keeps coming back the next time.

spk_1:   4:08
Yeah, when women certainly helps.

spk_0:   4:11
Yeah, Grifter. And then was your next your next pitching? Uh, deal? Was that all the way up until you're doing Cooper soccer or what was the guy?

spk_1:   4:22
No. Yeah, my first, I guess. Let Jake coaching job. I started teaching in 2008. I was teaching at 20 awful middle School, and I coached the eighth grade girls basketball team that year. Oh, so that was my first gig where, ah, you know, it's a little bit more of a sanction sport with, you know, actual referee's not teenagers and T shirts and stuff like that. So year one teaching going through my intern year for for those of you that know what that's like. And it started my master's. We had a baby and I decided that coaching basketball would be a great idea.

spk_0:   5:00
Yeah, Kate tip is a custom word. Which is the name of that intern trooper talking about masters. Holy cow, man. What were you thinking?

spk_1:   5:09
Yeah, I don't know. Uh, Goodyear Those fun.

spk_0:   5:15
Yeah, that's awesome. Well, I know we love thio fair. A good laugh on here. And I always loved Thio. Ask. People were talking with what would be Ah, funniest moment. An embarrassing moment. You know, over the course of your different teams, that would be a good Yeah, just a good story that you tell around a dinner table time and time again.

spk_1:   5:37
Yeah. So it's actually that that first team that I coached a twin Awful. When I was doing the eighth grade girls, we just came off of a bad loss and and I was mad. Ah, they weren't playing, you know, Thio my standards. And so they all knew coming in like, Oh, this is gonna be a tough practice. Coach is gonna work us and they came in, and in my mind, I thought, Well, you know what? I really want to sell this team concept like, Hey, I'm in this with you guys. So they get on the line and we're getting ready to do some running. And I decided, you know what? Just to show them that I'm committed to them as well. I decide I'm going to get on the line and run with it

spk_0:   6:21
again.

spk_1:   6:21
So we get going. You know, I say, go on, we start running. We're doing lying touches just your normal suicides. And I have ah, girl, my team that you know, goes on to play. Ah, d one volleyball actually played down a more head, you know, of all places, somewhere you're familiar with. And, um, she's just just super athletic. And so I'm running, you know, And I'm not all that removed from my high school glory days. So I'm thinking in my mind, I should still be in pretty good shape. So we're running and it's that last leg. It's the full court leg of running the suicide, and we turn around and I'm running and I see this girl out of the corner of my eye and she's running stride for stride with me and I'm like, Oh, no, I'm not I'm not gonna let an eighth grade girl beat me on this So in my mind I'm like all right, Time to turn on the Jets So my brain was turning on the Jets But my feet weren't turning on the Jets quite as much as my brain was And I tripped And I have a floor so hard and just slid and slid and stood And every girl on my team to stop running And they they were just laughing at lost. So yeah, they lost it. I lost all the intensity of the practice of like, we're gonna work hard and no, I'm laying on the ground. And then, to make matters worse, I didn't do any type of warm up or anything. I just started running cold turkey and and I felt my lunch starting to move

spk_0:   7:52
O. J. And

spk_1:   7:52
I had to run out of that. Jim and I ran out in the hallway and vomited into a garbage to make it worse. I mean, it just couldn't It couldn't have gotten any worse than that. So

spk_0:   8:03
slides and then goes and Oh, my gosh. Yeah, Make

spk_1:   8:07
off! My assistant coach stayed in there with, um and, um, I didn't tell the girls why I was running out in the hallway. I just ran out there. Oh, play connected. Like I just need you to go out away then. But he knew why I was going out there. And so that was Ah, yeah, That was one of the more interesting moments that I experienced as a coach.

spk_0:   8:28
That's amazing, man. Thanks for sharing. That's good stuff. Good deal. I know that we have talked personally at length at different times under some of the some of the tensions that so many coaches face that you face my wife's taste and a lot of other people that we know of face just the struggle of kind of performing coach at a really, really high level, but also finding ways to thrive just in your own personal journey. And then with family on the home front, all that good stuff. What lessons have you learned in managing family life encroaching?

spk_1:   9:05
Yeah, I think the 1st 1 is just making sure that I'm communicating with my wife like she needs to know when practices are when games are, um, those first couple of years of coaching, I just kind of assumed that she would just know that I had all this stuff going on. So for me, like growing up, playing in sports all the way through through high school, she didn't have the same experiences. And, um, you know, her athletic career kind of fizzled out as 1/9 grader, and so for me, I just I had it in my mind like, Well, you know, I'm part of sports. This is what you do. It's what I've always done. And I figured she would know that. And so I just kind of learned over the course of the years, make sure she knows like, Hey, this is when our practices are and then listen. Like if she's saying, Hey, you know, we're missing you at home and that kind of thing when we're sitting down and going over the schedule together and she's like, Man, this is a lot. That's a cue to me like Okay, I need to make sure that I'm protecting and carving out some time, so that would probably be the most important thing is just make sure that the communication is solid. Uh, you know what I got? So this is actually my year coming back into coaching, I took a little bit of a hiatus. Uh, I was coaching varsity soccer at Cooper, which, you know, I'm coaching basketball at the middle school basketball on I've done Ah, you know, soccer at the high school level. Soccer is kind of my first love in terms of sports. Um, and it was through communicating with my wife that I determined I needed to take a bit of a break from just coaching altogether because we had 1/3 baby on the way and I was just gone so much and it wasn't healthy for a marriage. It wasn't healthy for me being a father. And and I just had to put some of my own personal loves aside, or my family who you know, I love and prioritized bumpy things. Um, so for me, for our family, for the work was just having that open stream, it communication and saying, Let's take a break. And now that you know we don't have little babies running around, we decided might be a good year to jump back into it, and so far it's been great. I answer a question.

spk_0:   11:24
Yeah, absolutely. That makes a lot of sense. Communication just in general, regardless of the relationship, is huge that we found. I mean, the moment that we both committed Thio as a couple, Caitlin and I threw a Google calendar, a shared calendar where we both see my mother's appointments all the time, including practices and games and all that great stuff. Yeah, there's a game changer for us, and that's any time that we're letting stuff drop. Or we're having having have some conversations about what's going on, attention of coaching and family life you'd usually boils down to. There wasn't enough communication on the front end. So yeah, totally rocking with you there on. Just find managing expectations of what I heard you say to that. That's a lot, especially if Lindsay didn't have ah deeper experience in high school. No. One, what a normal season of a sport looks like. It's a lot to you, no matter what sport or what level. It could be a bunch of ours. Sure, you can only expand if you if you let it go a cz. Well, if you're not really focused on on managing the time.

spk_1:   12:33
Yeah, I mean, that was I was, like, communicating with her that the decision to step away from soccer a few years ago. To me, that was landing in like a dream job. Like I'm the head coach of diversity program, Um, touching the sport that I love. And through communication with her, we kind of figured out because we had little babies and it was an outdoor sport. Uh, I was gone, basically about 30 nights there be throughout the course of the season, about 25 to 30 times where I flat out, didn't see my kids before they were in bed, and we had little ones. And the weather wasn't always agreeable. So it was just really difficult for them to come to Gaines. And so we had that look at that and say All right, well, if I want to continue coaching, maybe we need to look at something that's gonna be for this particular season in life. A little bit more family friendly. Hence me landing in the, you know, cut in sixth grade girls. Now am Prince Middle School, which has been an amazing experience in terms off, um, my family getting to be involved in that. So in the past, all my coaching experiences were like very I don't know. It wasn't a box. It was like, You know, my coaching stuff is here. My family stuff is here. And those two things just did not cross. They didn't cross paths at all, and now you know, by being a little bit more, deliver it through, talking out things with her. I'm able to jump back into the coaching ring, and I'm messing my family with this coaching experience and granted the season's young. But it is. It has been such an amazing experience being able to do that and doing that with my wife, which is this totally new ground for us.

spk_0:   14:16
Yeah, that's awesome. I know you've said You kids have been ableto hang around practice a little bit more, which wasn't really the case before that, right? And just seeing that, seeing that integration happens really cool, I know there's, Ah, we went through this thing called transformational Leadership, which is one of the three main training's or tools that we offer with FDA, with coaches and just just curious that was there may be one or two strategies or one or two tools that kind of stuck out before you that would be applicable to your coaching or the you've thought about experimenting with a little bit.

spk_1:   14:53
Yeah, So the 1st 1 The What's the guy's name for Taylor, I think. Is that right? E S o. He poured. It was around. Ah, bunch of different strategies and they're they're all excellent. But there's there's a ton of acronyms and I work in education, so there's already a ton of acronyms, so you'll have to forgive me if I don't remember all the acronyms. There's the one where it's he tells this story. It's an anecdote of him, I think, coaching a volleyball team and it tells the story of before, you know, practices get going before they have their stuff. They sit down and and they just talk. They get that he would let his players kind of get stuff off their mind before they got down to business. And that's something that I have implemented this year and for my girls and other younger. So it's it's just tell me something good and I mean, it is like every single one of them have something to tell me. Um, which which is excellent, because it's building relationships with these girls so that they're starting toe, you know, trust me, they're feeling more comfortable with me when which is nice, because when it comes down to basketball, they have a question or they need to work through something. They're gonna feel more comfortable coming to me, or they're gonna be more likely to listen to the instruction that I give them. Plus, it just kind of clears their head, you know, They're they're they're adolescents. They got a lot of stuff going on. It's after the school day. So they have stuff with their peers. I got stuff of their studies, and it just gives them an opportunity to just, like, work that thing out. Just get that out of there, and then and then we can focus on basketball, and and that has been I feel like a really, really powerful thing that came out of the transformational leadership stuff. We haven't done this yet, but I'm planning on here in the next week or two. Um, you know, we get a little bit more. Practice time, less games. Thegame stone to pick up a little bit after Christmas for us. Uh, you know, he talks about really kind of casting. Like, what is the mission of this team? Like, what is it? What is our vision for the team? I think that's the VP. Most of stuff. And, you know, with sixth graders, I don't know how in detail will go with that, but I think having conversations around like, hey, what is our goal as a team would be something that would be really, really good for these kids just to think about, uh, you know, let's make sure that we're all on the same page and let them establish that goal. Hey, what is what are we gonna consider being a successful season? Because my definition of a successful season may not be the same thing, is what they define us with successful season. Just getting that stuff out there for all of us to here and have those conversations I think could be really, really beneficial. And that's a lot of stuff that's tied into the transformational leadership. Training is well,

spk_0:   17:38
yeah, no, that's awesome. That's something even even if that love liken, envision it helping your really want to get out of the motivation of the kid's day today? If if there's an end goal, if they have a picture where they're going, then you can backtrack it all the way down to all right. Today. This is why we're doing this. You know, this run through this drill or whatever it is that might be boring on a normal day. But because we know it's attached to this picture of the future, it might give him a little more motivation. Get rolling. That's great stuff. I'm glad you're playing around with some of that.

spk_1:   18:10
Yeah, that's a good skill for these kids to because, you know, for my age group, particularly being sixth grade, a lot of them probably haven't thought out goals. It's just your and that Cisco That doesn't just stop with sports. I mean, that's something that's gonna continue for them moving into, uh, academics, their personal life later and just starting to get them to think about what is it that we want to accomplish? I'm here on this team, Um, you know, what do we need to do together as a team to accomplish this common goal that happened. S so for me, it's kind of exciting because, you know, it's it's starting to scratch the surface for some of these girls in terms of just thinking like adults.

spk_0:   18:52
Yeah, absolutely. In building those communications skills you were talking back enemy we're talking about is called the Waddle Model on Beacon Going more death if people wanted a dive into that Maur. But essentially, it's Yeah, there's your welcoming. You start off with a positive impression, and then you even ask him what's going on in the life there. Is there anything that they would work on even though you might not be able to get to it during that practice and then you go into Hey, here's what. Here's what we're doing today. Here's the practice plan and empowers you tell people where to go, and then you kind of launched him with a quote or some sort of other positive thing. I know I was talking with one of the one of the baseball coach is in the area, and when he first saw that, he was like, Oh my gosh, I just go straight to hey, freshman, get the bucket through this. He just starts pointing people to go places. Yeah, it just it would just It would take five minutes to head neck with these kids on a different level. Get step into their life a little bit, give them clarity on what we're doing today, which could be a big deal. Like fear of the unknown spent what still is for me, an adult. But as a middle school or high school, there is a big deal. Like you know what's coming next and clear in that deck is powerful. Step, Yeah, if

spk_1:   20:01
I think back to the days when I was a player, it was more fun playing with the guys that I got along really well with and the same thing. Like if I had a coach that you know, was relatable those team experiences, even if we don't win every game, those team experiences were way better than the team. Experiences where, you know, you felt like you're playing with a couple of jerks. So you didn't feel like that coach really cared, Uh, so just really, really setting that tone. Um, you know, I feel this super helpful.

spk_0:   20:34
Yeah, well, we one thing We always love the chat about a little bit. Some people call it your personal Mount Rushmore or just other people that have really mentor you along the way. But we've always, always like to take a second and who are maybe one or two coaches along your journey that really stick out in your mind. That and they really made a difference in my life. They develop me, they encourage me on, made an impact.

spk_1:   21:00
Yeah, I could think of a couple of them. The first coach that comes to mind would be my high school soccer coach. Um, you know, I'm a Boone County High School, Um, and in my high school soccer coach was Sean niece. And the thing that I really, really appreciate it about him was that he kept it together so there would be times where and here's what I mean by that, there would be times where it's like, you know, where high school boys were foolish, you know, And we'd be acting. He never lost his cool with us when you know, really, a lot of times they probably deserved the, uh, you know, have him lose his cool with us. Um, but he was always just really, really straightforward. Um, you know, he's in this. He was predictable. If that makes sense, like you knew what you could expect out of coach knees, you know, his behavior was gonna be pretty even keeled most the time. If you got a little bit fired up, you know, it was never you don't feel like it was just screaming at you for no reason or anything like that. Um, and then the other thing, like, he was just a incredibly competent, um, player himself. And so we knew the game, and so it was really, really easy to listen to. But one quick story about him that that kind of speaks to the kind of coach that he waas so, you know, a little bit. There was there was a moment during my senior year. Ah, where I I actually lost my starting spot to a junior, and that was a major shot to my pride. And, you know, the season went on and the season ended and, you know, it was all over. But he was a teacher at her school, so I saw him all the time. I was actually in this is Jim t chosen his gym class. It was just one time during the gym class. He kind of, you know, I'm talking to him and I don't even know what it was about. But what he said to me, he's like, Hey, you know, when I when I took that starting spot for you for that, you know, period of time Because I really don't think I handled that well. Like I needed toe maybe work on some other stuff with you as opposed to just throwing in the next guy. And for some reason, you know, because that that hurts when you lose your starting spot. And for me, it was a really, really great experience in terms of just learning from it. Bad experience in the terms of like, Hey, you don't want to lose your starting spot. But in coming and saying, you know what? I didn't handle that as well as I would have liked to. I wish I would have, you know, maybe taking the opportunity to work on what it was that you needed to work on to make you a better player. Um, that spoke to me about his character and So for me, moving forward as, ah, you know, Coach later on. One of the things that I always tried to do with my players is just make sure that I'm super open about communicating with them and what it is specifically that they need to work on what it is that I see. Um, you know, out of their play, just just to make sure that I'm unopened book to that player, Um, so that there's not any surprises for them. And and that's what I kind of think he was saying. He didn't say it directly, but what I kind of think he was saying was, Hey, I kind of surprised you with you losing that starting job for a while and really, what I should have been doing was saying, Hey, you know, if we don't get this together, you're in danger of losing your starting spot. Um, does that make sense?

spk_0:   24:20
Absolutely. And that's that's an incredible example of just being being riel and recognizing as a coach that you pretty much have two options. You can put up this big facade like you have it all together all the time. You know everything. Never be in question at all. Or you can recognize the fact that you're human and open up and admit when you screw up and it gives everybody else freedom to admit the same thing. And if you have that trust and have a culture that says, Yeah, when somebody does mess up, we can we know how to handle that and we're going to call it out and forgive each other, learn from it and move on. I mean, gosh, I just I would envision a team that does that well, would end up being into performing a lot better at the end of you. That's great.

spk_1:   25:06
Yeah, it was. It was a solid coach, and, you know, we made a pretty good run, and we're one of the better teams at our school that had in that period of time through the nineties, Um, early 2000. So, um, and I think I think a lot of it was just the way he managed us. The way he worked with his players and then communicated with us. Yeah, very cold.

spk_0:   25:29
Well, I know your your faith plays a huge part in what you do on every area of life. Whether it's work, marriage, family, and I'm sure coaching it is no different. So I just want to give you a little bit of room to speak to. How does your face sort of influence? How you coach? You know what that looks like in the purpose behind it?

spk_1:   25:53
Yeah, sure. So for me first, most, uh, my faith impacts the way that I coach in the way that I just view people in general, you know, like I didn't really believe that everybody's made in the image of God. And so, like every single one of these girls that are on my basketball theme are somebody that's you know what I would call an image fair. Like there is so much value and every single person, Um and then because of that, there's tons and tons of potential within every single person. And so what I want to do is bring out, you know, as much of that kid as I can. And it's not just about basketball, it's I wantto work on developing their character, you know? How do we handle adversity? How do you handle it when somebody's ah jerk to you? We're coming into a game a couple weeks ago, Um, that, you know, I know in the past, I've had some experiences at the school that have not been exactly positive it. And so I'm walking into this situation with these sixth grade girls at a lot of them haven't played in these kind of environments. And so the practice before our game, I mean, we spent a good five minute team meeting on me, explaining to them like, Listen, there's gonna be potentially things that are said to you that you've never heard there's that's not even just the players like you may even have parents yelling things in. Uh, I was able to just kind of encourage him and say, like, Look, the teams that I coach, we we rise above that, you know, we stay, Um, we don't match evil with evil, you know, we will play hard. And even if somebody's being a Dirk, they fall down. We're helping him up like that. That's my team. And so all of that is just based on seeing every single person is having value to. That's one thing. Another thing that the faith does my faith does that impacts. My coaching is just being realistic about my expectations with my players. So, um, you know, stepping back into the coaching arena this year, I was a little bit nervous because I was gonna be taken off a little bit, Uh, off of my practice schedules from what I've found in the past, meaning that I'm just We're not practicing every single day, Um, like I've done in the past. And that was a little bit of a nerve racking decision, because in the past, I've had, you know, a parent or two that's criticized me for not working players hard enough. Now, usually I kind of chalk that up. Just that crazy dad that needs to take it, Joe Pill and relax. And, you know, like the one guy was convinced his daughter was gonna play for Tennessee and, you know, she was a 5.8 power forward for me in eighth grade. I'm like, pretty sure she's not even on the radar, but anyway, so taking Ah, look at just what are my own personal priorities and making sure that I make room for my players to have the same kind of priorities with something that I added this year and a big part of that was just how are we going to use our time? So I sent out an email early in the season and told the parents, You know, I have ah, list of priorities and my my priorities are in this order their you know, our first my faith and then my family and then my health. And then my my career, my job and then basketball. You know, basketball's fifth on that list. And so if anything comes up with those poor things Ah, head of basketball, I'm going to deal with it before I worry about basketball and I encourage, you know, my players toe do that as well. And I just I just sent it out as an email, just kind of a blank of the email saying, Hey, you know, like this is what I'm about. And within that same email, I said, Hey, we're not gonna be practicing on Fridays and Saturdays, and I deliberately told them This is so that there's family time carved out for you. You know, I've explained this to the girls like Hey, you know, we don't have stuff on Saturdays. Let's let's take advantage of that time that you have your already at school all week. Let's, you know, spend some time with your family and I sent that out and I was a little bit nervous about it. Just because I was like, some people will be frustrated. We're not practicing enough. And what ended up happening was I had the exact opposite happened. Only have 10 players and four parents have contacted me individually, kind of quietly on inside and have just said they really, really appreciated me communicating that with the been saying, You know, hey, we really appreciate being able to have this family time together. On the weekend I had one parent sent me a really touching email about his daughter. She's praying about being on the basketball team through the tryout process. And if she did make it one of the things that she was excited if I was being ableto, you know, kind of be a light to some of these other players and my email sending that out that Dad gave him the, you know, confidence to write me back and say, Hey, look, this is you know my daughter's doing while she's on your team. Uh, so for me. I was like, Wow, that's That's what it's about Like that is just sign one for me to be able to do that, like look at kids building character. What I thought would end up being possibly a negative thing and getting pushback from parents has actually been a huge positive in terms of just receiving support from them. The girls seem to appreciate it, and, you know, we're only a couple of games in, but we seem to be playing really, really well. And that helps a lot of stuff, too. Um, yes. So just making sure that there's there's appropriate boundaries around sporting personal life and making sure that in a way, I'm almost protecting these players from all over scheduling themselves to making sure that they have time carp out for other things that you know are frankly just more important than basketball. So just faith in family.

spk_0:   31:54
Yeah, well, it's just amazing and props for having the courage Thio to send that out and move with that we've talked to the coach can really be the most influential occupation, if you will, on families before that very reason. I mean, the coach really hate holds the keys to the family schedule man, if it's a normal mandatory practice, I know when I was in that stage of life it was I'm their period. I drop whatever else I totally binned everything around that and just to recognize that and be more deliberate with it and at the same time, not sacrificing because you still want to. So wanna have a winning team to you, Someone who put points up on the board and get the W's and warm well, but making the absolutely most of the time you do have getting after it being very intentional there, I think, allows you to have some more that margins, that let's be really exciting to see how the rest of season plays out. And that's so cool that you had that many families explicitly verbalize it. And you know, you might even have more of the other six. That kind of and would endorse it as well. But it just, you know, didn't want I didn't wantto take that. Take that chance.

spk_1:   33:13
Yeah, I really appreciated that. After maybe I was a nerve wracking choice,

spk_0:   33:17
I'm sure absolutely but kind of kind of wrapping up before we uh, take a dive here. What would be a top take away? I mean, if our listeners, if they don't take anything else away from our combo here, what would be maybe 11 top takeaway or leadership principle that you would really encourage people to chew on once they finish listening here,

spk_1:   33:41
Um, I think that the I thought and I think that the number one take would throw out there is when you're a coach, you know, you're kind of on an island at times, you know, you may have assistant coaches and you have other people that you could talk to you that know the game, and they know your players and that kind of stuff, and they could give you input. Um, I think that as a coach becomes important to be able to discern, when do I need to go outside of myself? And when do I just need to be the coach and make the decision? I'm not sure if that makes sense, but just kind of Ah, an example of that would be like some, for instance, setting the practice schedule. You know, um, on some of that stuff, it's like I could consult with my athletic director, which I did at the beginning of the season. And when I told him I wasn't gonna be practicing on the Fridays or size Ah, he's like, Well, I don't know, You know, I'm not sure how that's gonna be received. I've never not practiced on those ace. And I was like, Wow, I'm I'm gonna do it anyway, um, so I I wanted to get his feedback because again, he's by athletic director. I needed to just say like, Well, I'm the coverage. I'm running this team s o. I want that feedback. But at the same time, every now and again to become there's this decision where it's like, No, I'm the coach. Um, I'm I'm making this call on this. Yes, it's just discerning. When are those decisions that you just kind of put your foot down? You say I'm a coach? I'm making this call on my own, even if other people don't really in one of those decisions that I'm kind of gonna listen to other people. Um, I'm not sure if that's a very big way for people. I wish I could come up with a better example of it.

spk_0:   35:33
But now you've already shared some great stuff already, and I do think that's a great thing to think about is it's at the end of day. At some point, you there's gonna be a decision point that's going to align or go against your core values. And if you are seeking wisdom from other people, do they share your same core values as well? I think that would play a lot in food. They're always kind of considering the source as you seek out advice on decisions. And is it helping you fulfill your purpose in vision for your life and your team? And I'm like, No, I think it's a great That's a great thing to process through. Good, Awesome. What? Look again, I appreciate your time. I I told you before, but I really appreciate it. Just our friendship and all the conversations we've had and your heart and with your family and just you as a father and your leadership of different different things were involved with whether it be church of different things on just excited for you to see. Yeah, that's how how the camper next season's gonna turn out and really looking forward to hearing stories of moving forward. Thanks again coach Luke Patterson for German on the podcast, with us sharing a hilarious story, some really good thoughts and ideas about coach he had in high school and ways he's currently navigating coaching and family life on everything that goes along with that, if you would, it would mean the world to us if you would subscribe to this podcast on iTunes. We have a couple of episodes that have already been released. We'd love for you to go back and listen to that is and catch up. If you like to learn more about the Northern Kentucky Fellowship of Christian athletes, just go to N. K Y F c a dot org's until next time, keep growing, keep learning and keep changing lives on your team and in your home.