The Great Coaches: Leadership & Life

Liam is a former Irish Hurling player and now Coach. Liam played 13 senior games with Tipperary over 10 years. He retired in 1999 and in 2002 began coaching Tipperary youth teams. In 2007 he was appointed senior coach, and in 2010 he led to team to their 26th All Ireland Victory. Liam then took a year break from coaching at the highest level to spend more time with his family, as well as to c...

Graham is a Rugby Union Coach. He started coaching in 1975 while teaching at Auckland Grammar school. His coaching and teaching continued and in 1993 he was to win the first of 4 consecutive Provincial Championships with Auckland. In 1996 he resigned as a headmaster to take up full time coaching with the Auckland Blues, leading them to back to back Super 12 titles in 1996 and 1997. He then took on...

Our Great Coach on this episode is Tim Sheens.   Tim Sheens is an Australian Rugby League coach. He played 166 games for the Penrith Panthers and then moved in to coaching in 1984. He coached the Canberra Raiders to Premierships, in 1989, 90 and 94 and then in 2005 led the Wests Tigers to the premiership. He has also coached the NSW team to the 1991 state or origin series win and the Australi...

Kelly is an American Volleyball coach. He started coaching volleyball in his teens, helping out at summer camps. He then went on to Assist at High School level before getting his chance as an Assistant at the University of Houston in 1997. He was given his first Head Coaching role at the University of Albany in 2001 and led them to 3 regular season championships. In 2012 he was appointed as Head C...

Becky is an American soccer coach who has just retired after leading the University of Florida Gators for 26 years. She was the inaugural coach in 1994, and went on to win the NCAA title in 1998. She retired with a winning percentage of 75, and ranks second in total number of all-time wins among Division I coaches. In her time at Florida she also led the team to 14 SEC championships. With her coll...

As a player, Sean was a Goalie at Springfield and was twice names All American. Sean coached Endicott University from 1998 to 2015, leading them to 8 CCC Championships, as well as taking the Division 3 school to as high as 5 in the National rankings. He has coached 21 All American players. And in 2020 led the the Cannons in the Premier Lacrosse League, to the Championship. Sean is a terrific...

Today’s episode is focuses on the topic of Serial Winning Coaches   And Dr David Turner and I are joined for the discussion by Professor Cliff Mallett and Professor Sergio Lara-Bercial who have just written a book called Learning from Serial Winning Coaches based on their research interviewing 17 of these coaches across 10 sports and 10 different countries.   Cliff Mallett is an Oly...

Kevin is an American paralympic athlete and now Wheelchair Rugby coach. As an athlete he won 2 Bronze medals at the 1988 Paralympics, before transitioning into coaching Wheelchair Rugby in 1992. His team, Lakeshore then went on to 5 consecutive National Titles. This led to him being appointed Team USA coach where we won a silver at 2002 World Championships and a Bronze at the 2004 Paralympics. In...

Our Great Coach on this episode is rugby's Damian McGrath. Damian started life as a teacher, but then in his words “took a gamble” and moved into professional coaching. He has now coached teams across multiple countries, in both rugby league, Rugby union, as well as Rugby sevens. He has coached at Club level with the Leeds Rhinos in England’s Super League and was England’s Assistant Coach at the 2...

Muffet is an American Basketball coach who led the women’s team at Notre Dame for 33 seasons. In all she led the team to 9 final fours, 7 championship games and 2 NCAA champion ships in 2001 and 2018. She was inducted into the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame in 2011 and the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and Legends of Coaching award in 2017.   Some of the highlights...

Doug is a former Ice Hockey Head Coach, GM, and sportscaster and he has just written a terrific new book called Draft Day: How Hockey Teams Pick Winners or Get Left Behind.    Doug is a great story teller and some of the highlights of our discussion were; The importance of scouting staff, and how in Hockey they have to cover Canada, the USA. And key parts of Europe like Czech, Slovenia,...

Mike Hesson is New Zealand cricket coach. He started his coaching career in his early 20’s while playing in the UK. From there he progressed through Assistant coaching before accepting a the role as Argentina’s head coach in 2003. He returned to New Zealand and became Head Coach of Otago and leading them to the 2008 one-day trophy and the 2009 T20 championship. In 2011 he took on the job of Head C...

Vern is that rare individual who has coached at the elite level across multiple sports. His foundation is in Track & Field coaching, however over a career that spans almost 50 years he has worked in Major League Soccer, Major League Baseball, the NBA, Cricket, the NHL, Softball, Swimming and with San Francisco Forty Niners. Kansas City Chiefs. He is also the author of 9 books and over 100 arti...

Anson is an American soccer coach (in the USA it is referred to as soccer not Football) who is currently the Head Coach of the Womens Team at the University of North Carolina. Under his leadership the team has won 21 of the 31 NCAA Championships. His teams have a winning record of 91%. He has been named the NCAA coach of the year on 8 occasions. In 1991 he also led the USA team to the first Womens...

Aimee is an American Gymnastics coach who led the USA Team at the 2016 Rio Olympics. However, she is perhaps best known as the coach of Simone Biles, who she started coaching in 2003 when Simone was just 6. Aimee and Simone were together for 14 World Championship and Olympic Gold medals. Simone became the first woman ever to win three straight all-around titles and the first gymnast to capture 10...

Our Great Coach on this episode is Brendan Joyce. Brendan played for 13 seasons in the Australian National Basketball League. Upon retiring he transitioned into coaching and led the Ballarat Miners to 2 CBA Championships.   He then went on to coach more than 400 games in the National Basketball League, winning the championship in 2001 with the Wollongong Hawks . He Has coached at 3 Olympics,...

Today’s episode is focuses on the topic of A Second Set of Eyes.   And we are joined for the conversation by Cody Royle. Cody is an author, podcast host and a Coach of elite level sports coaches and he has just written a fantastic book called a second set of eyes.   Some of the highlights from this interview with Cody are:   The idea of helping the coaches he works with to in his wo...

Mike Thibault is an American Basketball coach. He started his career as a scout with the LA Lakers in 1978, eventually becoming an Assistant Coach. He was working with the team in 1980 when they won the NBA championship. He then moved to the Chicago Bulls where he worked as a Director of Scouting and Assistant Coach, and was in the room when the Bulls chose Michael Jordan in the draft. He has gone...

Today’s episode is on the topic of People Skills, and we are joined for the discussion by Allistair McCaw. Allistair is that rare person who excels across disciplines and industries. In addition to being an author who has sold over 300,000 books, his podcast ranks in the top 1% in the world, and for the last 25 years he has also consulted and worked with Olympic Gold Marriage, Grand Slam Champions...

 Noel Donaldson is a rowing coach. He was a coxswain and competed at the 1979 world championships and then transitioned in to coaching in 1980. In the 1990 in began coaching Australia’s Oarsome Foursome, who won Olympic Golds in 1992 and 1996 and 5 world championships. He also coached Georgina Douglas to World Championships in 1998 and 1999. In 2013 became the coach of the New Zealand te...

This episode is On Mental Skills and we are joined for the discussion by Aaron Walsh. Aaron a Mental Skills Coach presently working with the Chiefs Rugby and Scotland Rugby. Aaron has also worked  with Hockey New Zealand and New Zealand Football. He also coaches players from the San Francisco Giants, Arizona Diamondbacks and NY Mets and New Zealand All Blacks. He also coaches corporate leader...

Jack is a former rugby union player who represented both the USA and World 15. He has also coached the USA National team the Eagles to 16 Test victories. He is presently in his 41st year as coach of the University of California bears. IN that times he has led the team to 23 National Collegiate Championships in 15s, and five national titles in 7s He has also been named a Living Legend by the Pac-12...

Our Great Coach on this episode is John Kessel.   As a volleyball player John participated in 16 U.S. Open Championships and played professionally in Europe.   He started coaching at the Collegiate level in the USA in 1971 and led teams to National titles in 1986 and 1987. He was Team Leader for the 2000 USA Olympic Beach Volleyball Teams in Sydney, which brought home one gold medal, and...

Alan is a volleyball player and now coach. As a player he was a Collegiate All American and represented the USA Team. He was an Assistant Coach at his Alma Mater, Long Beach State University in 1996 before taking over as Head Coach in 2000. He has led them to 7 final four appearances and back-to-back NCAA championships in 2018 and 2019. From 2009 until 2012 he was also the Coach of the USA Men’s t...

Today’s episode is on the topic of Being Coachable, and we are joined for the discussion by Allistair McCaw, who has just written a terrific new book called Habits that Make a Champion . Allistair is that rare person who excels across disciplines and industries. In addition to being an author who has sold over 300,000 books, his podcast ranks in the top 1% in the world, and for the last 25 years h...