"I think some parents now look at a youngster failing as the final thing. It's a process, and failure is part of the process. I would like it if the teacher and the parents would connect more. I think that used to be, but we're losing a little bit of that right now"
About this Quote
Krzyzewski is doing what great coaches do: taking a word everyone fears - failure - and turning it into a training tool. Coming from a career built on film sessions, missed shots, and brutal March exits, his point isn’t motivational wallpaper. It’s a critique of how parenting has started to treat a bad grade or a rough season as a verdict on a kid’s future, not a datapoint in a longer arc.
The subtext is about time horizons. Coaches live in iterations: you lose, you adjust, you practice, you get better. A lot of modern adult anxiety - turbocharged by college admissions pressure, youth sports monetization, and the always-on scoreboard of social media - collapses that timeline. When “the youngster failing” becomes “the final thing,” the adult response shifts from support to control: argue with the ref, email the teacher, find a different team, protect the resume. The kid learns the wrong lesson: avoid risk, avoid embarrassment, avoid honest feedback.
His call for teachers and parents to “connect more” nods to an older civic model where school and home were in regular, imperfect partnership. He’s also hinting that the relationship has become transactional: parents as customers, teachers as service providers. As a coach, he’s defending the authority of development itself - the idea that setbacks aren’t scandalous but necessary. It’s not nostalgia so much as a warning: if adults can’t tolerate failure, kids won’t learn how to metabolize it.
The subtext is about time horizons. Coaches live in iterations: you lose, you adjust, you practice, you get better. A lot of modern adult anxiety - turbocharged by college admissions pressure, youth sports monetization, and the always-on scoreboard of social media - collapses that timeline. When “the youngster failing” becomes “the final thing,” the adult response shifts from support to control: argue with the ref, email the teacher, find a different team, protect the resume. The kid learns the wrong lesson: avoid risk, avoid embarrassment, avoid honest feedback.
His call for teachers and parents to “connect more” nods to an older civic model where school and home were in regular, imperfect partnership. He’s also hinting that the relationship has become transactional: parents as customers, teachers as service providers. As a coach, he’s defending the authority of development itself - the idea that setbacks aren’t scandalous but necessary. It’s not nostalgia so much as a warning: if adults can’t tolerate failure, kids won’t learn how to metabolize it.
Quote Details
| Topic | Parenting |
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