Lessons from Coach Donahue: Learning to Win and Lose Like a Champion When I was seven years old, I learned a lesson on a football field that has stayed with me for more than 50 years. It was 1972, my first year playing Little Giants/Pop Warner football in Amsterdam, NY, for the Maroon Maulers. I started young because I wanted to be like my older brother, Bobby. We didn’t win a single game. 0–10. After our final loss, Coach Donahue gathered us together. Truthfully, as seven- and eight-year-olds, we were mostly thinking about getting to the refreshment stand for our orange drinks and a cold piece of pizza. But Coach sat us down first. He reminded us that we were a young team and that, despite our record, we’d gotten better as the season progressed. Then he gave us a lesson in sportsmanship, humility and resilience that I’ve never forgotten: “You must learn to win and lose like a champion.” Those words followed me through football and through life. I was fortunate to play through college, eventually becoming a starting strong safety and special teams player on Union College’s Division III national championship runner-up team. After college, Coach Bagnoli helped me get an invitation to a free-agent tryout with the CFL’s Montreal Alouettes. My brother Bobby and I drove to the tryout because I never wanted to spend my life wondering whether I could have made it to the next level. I was cut in less than half a day. Question answered. I thanked everyone for the opportunity, went home, and a few years later went to law school. Looking back, that experience reinforced what Coach Donahue had taught me years earlier: When you win, win humbly. You don’t need to tell everyone how successful you are. If you’re good enough, the right people will notice. As we say in the law, res ipsa loquitur—the thing speaks for itself. When you lose, make no excuses and blame no one. Own the defeat. Acknowledge it. Compliment your opponent. Learn from it. Then get back to work. I’ve learned far more from some of my losses than I ever learned from my victories. A good friend once told me: “We are measured and remembered by how we react in our darkest hour—not when we win.” Life will knock all of us down at some point. Pick yourself up, wipe off the dirt and keep grinding. Keep learning. Keep improving. Turn defeat into experience, and experience into wisdom. And one last thing… The following year, at age eight, my teammates and I—the Maroon Maulers—went 10–0 and won the league championship. From 0–10 to 10–0. Thanks, Coach Donahue, for teaching us how to handle losing before we could win. William Nowak

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