Mental Skills

Staying Tough in the Clutch This article can also be found on Coaches Toolbox, a collection of free resources for coaches of all sports Every coach would like their players to perform better in the clutch. One of the things we must first recognize that performing in pressure situation is a skill that can be practiced. You can coach your players to be ...

Don’t Choke: The Difference Between Playing to Win, and Playing Not to Lose   By John O’Sullivan, founder of Change the Game Project Is your child a great practice player, but one who struggles to perform in games? Does she score at will in easy games, but cannot the competitive ones? Does your team play great in meaningless games, but tense up and play poorly when the result matters? Does ...

10 Tips to help Control Your Emotions – Part 2 This article was provided by Inner Drive and is part 2 of a two part series. You can click here to read part 1 Are our emotions something that help us when it comes to sport, or do they hold us back? The answer? Both. Learning how to balance and control your emotions is what matters. In our first ...

10 Tips to help Control Your Emotions This article was provided by InnerDrive, is part 1 of a two part post. What does it take to really excel in the world of elite sport? The ability to deliver your best when it matters the most is a fundamental part of performing under pressure. Can this ability be taught, learned and developed? We have previously ...

Mental Strength: 14 Ways to Build it in Your Players By Dawn Redd-Kelley, head volleyball coach at Beloit College The following post was originally published on her coaching blog, Coach Dawn Writes Coaches ask for a simple, but very hard, thing from our athletes: complete focus for a couple of hours each day. I think this is a difficult mental task for our players to manage…I also think it requires ...

What To Think About the Night Before a Match This article was provided by InnerDrive, a mental skills training company What should athletes be thinking about before a match? Are some thoughts more helpful than others? We’ve looked through the research from the world of sport psychology to find 7 tips to help people achieve the right mindset before a big match. Positive Imagery – Visualising successful performance has been found to increase confidence. Spending ...

Strategies to Defeat Adversity By Juan Pablo Favero. Originally published on the Coach and Athletic Director site and republished with permission of both parties. It’s frustrating for athletes when they’re running on fumes, feeling like they have nothing more to give and that no matter what they do there is nothing left to push past a seemingly insurmountable wall. They can feel hopelessness, ...

Mental Skills Training Courtesy of Coaches Network By Kevin Bryant I have attended the Oregon Athletic Directors Association annual conference every year since 1999. This past spring, there was a first: A break-out session led by a sports psychologist. At these outstanding annual meetings, we’ve learned lessons on a broad spectrum of topics, but never before had attendees been introduced ...

The Psychology of Deliberate Practice   This article was provided by InnerDrive, a mental skills training company Why do some athletes improve at a faster rate than others? The answer it seems may (partly) lie in how they train. Researchers have been exploring the psychology of practice to explore what helps athletes develop quicker. Psychologists use the phrase ‘Deliberate Practice’ to describe the ...

7 Ways to Reduce the Fear of Failure Athletic performance can suffer  when an athlete is afraid  to fail. Athletes that are afraid to fail, may become ultra conservative and become less likely to take chances. To be successful athletes need to be willing to take chances. They cannot be afraid to make a play. In the article below by InnerDrive, their experts describe ...

Creating Brave Players   This article and other helpful coaching tools can be found at Coach Dawn Writes By Dawn Redd-Kelly, Head Volleyball Coach at Beloit College. Fear is the reason today is like yesterday.”—Leadership Freak That quotation sucker punched me!  Our goal as coaches is to create an atmosphere where our athletes feel comfortable taking risks and are brave in the ...

Perform Better Under Pressure This article was provided by InnerDrive, a mental skills training company Pressure is an interesting thing. For some people, it makes them nervous. Which often leads to making sloppy mistakes and generally under-performing. For others, pressure increases their concentration. They focus their efforts and as a result, perform to the best of their abilities.  So what ...

Developing Excellence This article was provided by InnerDrive, a mental skills training company What separates elite athletes from the rest? Not all individuals that start sport at grass-roots level make it all the way to the top. The further you go along the pathway to excellence, the narrower the athletic pool becomes.  Are there certain psychological skills that ...

Practicing Mental Skills This article was provided by Coaches Network Day in and day out, coaches focus on developing effective practice sessions and better game strategies. Players need to improve their skills, and there are an infinite number of new drills to try. But there is more to coaching than the daily tasks. For a team to be consistently successful, ...

Teaching Toughness to Females Teaching Female Athletes to Value Toughness By Dawn Redd-Kelly This article was originally published in her blog Coach Dawn Writes One of the things I hear a lot from young players is they don’t enjoy their team experience.  Sometimes they’ll say they don’t like their coach, their team isn’t very good, but many times (too many!), in a moment ...

Volleyball Side-Out Drill The Side-Out Drill is designed to help players get focused on their service following a side out. To be successful teams must quickly refocus after a side out and back that point up with a solid service point. The simple act of winning back to back points can be the difference between winning a losing. The ...

Mental Toughness and Clutch Performance These thoughts on clutch performance are from Spencer Wood Icebox Athlete Sports Performance Resources. Click that link to see his Mental Toughness Edge website. There are some articles on mental training and other resources as well. According to a study based on professional athletes in the NBA, NFL, and NHL, the following eight traits were found ...

Ball Control: Focus Drill Simple skills like passing the ball are generally executed with success. However, sometimes in the heat of battle simple tasks become more difficult. In the video below Jeff Meeker, Cornell College Head Coach and Sports Psychology Professor, provides coaches with the tools they need to sharpen and toughen their team’s mental game while developing volleyball-specific skills. ...

Volleyball Mindfulness Syndicated from AthleticManagement.com with permission. In the Moment Through mindfulness meditation, student-athletes can learn to be aware of the present and shut out distractions, leading to enhanced performance both on the court and off. By Dr. Michael Brumage and Dr. Mike Gross Standing in front of a group of West Virginia University athletes, we asked, “How much of your ...

Mental Game This article was provided by the Coaches Network By Kevin Bryant I have attended the Oregon Athletic Directors Association annual conference every year since 1999. This past spring, there was a first: A break-out session led by a sports psychologist. At these outstanding annual meetings, we’ve learned lessons on a broad spectrum of topics, but never before ...

Communication Key to Coaching This is article is from the Coaches Network By Alan Hargreaves and Richard Bate There is nothing worse than a player who won’t or can’t listen. Because successful communication with your players is crucial, it pays to have some insight into the field of knowledge called communication. This field of knowledge has much to teach us, including ...

Mental Toughness and Excuses Written by Brian Williams IMO, one of the most important life lessons coaches can teach their athletes is the lesson of refusing to make or accept excuses. I have assembled some quotes in this article that I hope will help as you work with your athletes to eliminate the use of excuses in your program. Excuses allow ...

Fear of Failure “The Fear of Failure” was originally posted at CoachesNetwork.com and was reposted by permission.  The site has hundreds of articles of interest to coaches and is definitely worth checking out! By Bill Cole How does an athlete react when they make a mistake, or when they fail? Do they have a plan for using failure to help ...

Overcoming Slumps How to Avoid or Overcome Performance Slumps Reposted with permission from CoachesNetwork.com Editor’s Note from Brian:  Even though the examples are from other sports, they are with giving some thought to for your volleyball team. By Dr. Wade Gilbert Whether coaching, or competing as an athlete, there inevitably comes a time during the season when performance and energy levels ...