Quotes By Mike Krzyzewski

That's another thing, we made up games. We didn't have equipment. When it snowed, we would play slow motion tackle football. We would play hockey, but we wouldn't skate. We just made things up. I loved doing that.

You can see and you can listen, but you have to have moments in which you feel.

Throughout my life, my mom has been the person that I've always looked up to.

It's always an honor to be ranked high, but whatever is said about you, you take it and then take a realistic look at yourself and who you are.

Everybody wants to take responsibility when you win, but when you fail, all these fingers are pointing.

Basketball was not my main sport in grade school, or even the first year of high school.

When I was in sixth grade, I wanted to become a priest.

In high school, in sport, I had a coach who told me I was much better than I thought I was, and would make me do more in a positive sense. He was the first person who taught me not to be afraid of failure.

Imagination has a great deal to do with winning.

Each group and each youngster is different. As a leader or coach, you get to know what they need.

When you win, sometimes it overshadows a poor performance.

It is the ultimate honor for a coach to be his country's coach.

I'm fortunate now that I coach at Duke University and we've won a lot. I have some kids who haven't failed that much. But when they get to college, they're going to fail some time. That's a thing that I can help them the most with.

My ambition in high school was to be a high school coach and teacher, and that's still what I do: teach.

With me and basketball, it became part of me.

I've been so fortunate in my life that my family has never been jealous of my success. They have shown true love and commitment to me by being supportive. They shared in it.

To me, teamwork is the beauty of our sport, where you have five acting as one. You become selfless.

The life expectancy of a team is about eight months. Then the next year, it's a whole new team.

I always wanted to teach.

I have a rule on my team: when we talk to one another, we look each other right in the eye, because I think it's tough to lie to somebody. You give respect to somebody.

Playing sport was somewhat frivolous, but I liked it. I rebelled a little bit, and wouldn't go to music lessons and things like that, but I would go and play ball. My parents learned to love it because they saw how much I got out of it.

The other thing I knew I had was a high level of competitiveness.

Leadership is an ever-evolving position.

Parents can really help, but they can also really hinder the development of their youngsters.

If you win a National Championship, or you win two, people think you have not only seen the Holy Grail, but you've embraced it. Basically, I do what a lot of people do, but I've been able to win.

Even though we want huge individual egos, our collective ego is unbelievable.

When I was growing up, there weren't any Little Leagues in the city. Parents worked all the time. They didn't have time to take their kids out to play baseball and football.

The thing I loved the most - and still love the most about teaching - is that you can connect with an individual or a group, and see that individual or group exceed their limits.

Fun is to experience things you would not have been able to experience in any other setting.

My parents didn't really understand too much about sport. At that time, we were in a Polish community in the inner city of Chicago, and I was the youngest of a bunch of cousins. Polish families are real big, with cousins and aunts and uncles.