From personal experience one of the hardest things to do is coach your own child in a high school varsity sport. As a parent, your natural instinct is to advocate for your child. But as a coach, your responsibility is to make the best decision for the team. Sometimes you find yourself being harder on your own child because you are trying to avoid the perception that you are showing favoritism. Other times, you have to bite your tongue when another coach is coaching your child hard. One thing I have learned is that you have to have a standard for every athlete, and your own child cannot be held to a different standard. You have to learn to be the coach on the field and Dad at home. You have to trust the standard, trust the program, and trust the coaches around you. And if you aren’t able to separate being the coach from being the parent, then you probably need to choose being the parent. Because perception will always be there about favoritism. The key is making sure your decisions are driven by the standard of the program, not by the fact that your child is wearing the uniform.

Just had a student-athlete receive his second college scholarship offer. Our head coach spoke with the college coach, and these were the questions they asked: • How is his home life? • How are his academics? • How is he in the weight room? • Is he coachable? • Does he pick up on concepts? • Are his parents a problem? • Is he a complainer? • Does he run track? • What is his legitimate size? Not one question about his stats. Not a single one. College coaches are evaluating the whole person. Character. Family. Academics. Work ethic. Coachability. Football IQ. Physical development. Attitude. The scoreboard matters. The film matters. The production matters. But when a college coach is deciding whether they want to invest in a young man for the next four years, who he is matters just as much as what he does on Friday night. That’s why we talk so much about building the person, not just the player. The game may get you noticed. Your character determines what happens next. @CoachJonWheeler

As an AD, I am seeing the days of “because I said so” are coming to an end. Athletes & parents want to know why and they should. Good programs have standards. Coaches communicate those standards, athletes are held accountable, and parents should talk with their athlete before approaching the coach. But accountability goes both ways. Coaches can make bad decisions. They can be inconsistent. They can fail to communicate. When that happens repeatedly, trust begins to crack. Don’t treat everyone the same. Treat everyone fairly. Every athlete and every situation is different. Fairness isn’t identical treatment, it’s having a standard, applying it with consistency and context, and being able to explain the why. Standards create accountability. Communication creates understanding. Consistency creates trust. Fairness creates credibility.

As an Athletic Director, I believe we live in an era where too many high school athletes are chasing the scholarship instead of embracing the grind, development, and process that will make them better. We also live in an era of the transfer portal, where opportunities for high school athletes are becoming more limited. My advice to every athlete who wants to play at the next level is simple: Focus on what you can control. Control your effort. Control your attitude. Control your development. Control how you respond to adversity. Control how you show up for your team every day. Don’t let the pursuit of a scholarship take away from the experience of becoming the best version of yourself. If you commit to the process, embrace the grind, and become the best player and person you can be, you will have no regrets. The scholarship should be a byproduct of your development, not the sole purpose of your journey. Trust the process. Earn your opportunities. Become the best version of yourself.