“A good coach must celebrate in private. He cannot gloat to the press after a victory or criticize heavily after defeat… His game is of such motivation and strategy that only a few people understand his craft.”

The point of the game is not how well the individual does, but whether the team wins. That’s the beautiful heart of the game, the blending of personalities, the mutual sacrifices for the group success.

When we engage people positively, we create a receptive platform for the ideas and information we wish to communicate.

Classic Christmas cookies are really time-consuming. Instead, make a bar you can bake in a pan and just cut up, like a brownie or a blondie or a shortbread, which still has that Christmas vibe.

Leadership is not something that is done to people, like fixing your teeth. Leadership is unlocking people’s potential to become better.

Give to another human being without the expectation of a return.

Trying to take money out of politics is like trying to take jumping out of basketball.

I might lose because I wasn’t tall enough; I might lose because I wasn’t fast enough. But I wasn’t going to lose because I wasn’t ready.

Imagination allows us to escape the predictable. It enables us to reply to the common wisdom that we cannot soar by saying, ‘Just watch!’

A lot of people want to change the world, but only a few people want to change themselves. When it comes to the issue of race in America, we have to do both.

When you’re not practicing, someone somewhere is. And when the two of you meet, assuming roughly equal ability, the other person will win.

Tax (reform) is ultimately a decision about values.

Sports is a metaphor for overcoming obstacles and achieving against great odds. Athletes, in times of difficulty, can be important role models.

Every time I have some moment on a seashore, or in the mountains, or sometimes in a quiet forest, I think this is why the environment has to be preserved.

Basketball can serve as a kind of metaphor for ultimate cooperation. It is a sport where success, as symbolized by the championship, requires that the dictates of community prevail over selfish impulses.

Working with the UN’s diplomacy and development arms, we can prevent minor differences from escalating into wars.

When you make speeches you elicit expectations against which you will be held accountable.

I never played a round when I didn’t learn something new about the game.

I play with friends, but we don’t play friendly games.

This is a game of misses. The guy who misses the best is going to win.

We certainly haven’t used that as a motivation, … The games themselves and the time that they’ve put in in preparation for these games is motivation enough. I don’t think that has anything to do with it at all.

It takes me about a week and a half to really analyze a game – play by play.

Nobody likes to fail but failure is an essential part of life and of learning. If your uniform isn’t dirty, you haven’t been in the game.

The game is the ultimate significance to me because it is so important to a lot of people. It has left a mark on our culture to be voted as one of the best to ever play.

At home I mostly stick to online Scrabble, or chess or Risk – games I find far less addictive than the spectacular games created for consoles these days. But, whenever I get the chance I head over to my friend Kyri’s house to play his PS3.