Who is Lou Holtz
Lou Holtz, born Louis Holtz on the 6th January 1937, is a retired American football players and coach, as well as leading analyst and journalist. His is one of the most successful college football coaches of all time, holding the accolade of the only college football coach to lead six different programs to bowl games and guiding four to final top 20 rankings. His career was spent at famous institutions including North Carolina State University, South Carolina, New York jets, University of Arkansas, Notre Dame and Minnesota. His career record stands at 249-132-7 and his 1988 team from Notre Dame went 12-0, winning the Fiesta Bowl and becoming national champions.
Away from coaching, Holtz has written and contributed to 10 books, as well as taking a role as a college football analyst. He has been awarded many accolades in his later life, including being inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame, honorary doctorates from various universities, as well as Hall of Fames for the respective colleges he coached at.
His achievements will rarely be equalled and his quotes offer an insight into the man he is, his work ethic and values whilst coaching in such a demanding environment.
Lou Holtz Quotes
1.I won’t accept anything less than the best a player’s capable of doing… and he has the right to expect the best that I can do for him and the team!
2.Show me someone who has done something worthwhile, and I’ll show you someone who has overcome adversity.
3.You aren’t going to find anybody that’s going to be successful without making a sacrifice and without perseverance.
4.See, winners embrace hard work.
5.It is a fine thing to have ability, but the ability to discover ability in others is the true test.
6.When all is said and done, more is said than done.
7.Don’t be a spectator, don’t let life pass you by.
8.If you burn your neighbors house down, it doesn’t make your house look any better.
9.If you’re bored with life – you don’t get up every morning with a burning desire to do things – you don’t have enough goals.
10.Do right. Do your best. Treat others as you want to be treated.
11.Motivation is simple. You eliminate those who are not motivated.
12.In the successful organization, no detail is too small to escape close attention.
13.I never learn anything talking. I only learn things when I ask questions.
14.No one has ever drowned in sweat.
15.I think everyone should experience defeat at least once during their career. You learn a lot from it.
16.A lifetime contract for a coach means if you’re ahead in the third quarter and moving the ball, they can’t fire you.
17.How you respond to the challenge in the second half will determine what you become after the game, whether you are a winner or a loser.
18.On this team, we’re all united in a common goal: to keep my job.
19.If you try to fight the course, it will beat you.
20.You’ll never get ahead of anyone as long as you try to get even with him.
21.I can’t believe that God put us on this earth to be ordinary.
22.The man who complains about the way the ball bounces is likely the one who dropped it.
23.It’s not the load that breaks you down, it’s the way you carry it.
24.Life is ten percent what happens to you and ninety percent how you respond to it.
25.Coaching is nothing more than eliminating mistakes before you get fired.
26.The problem with having a sense of humor is often that people you use it on aren’t in a very good mood.
27.You’re never as good as everyone tells you when you win, and you’re never as bad as they say when you lose.
28.I believe that having a spiritual life is so important in everybody’s life.
29.My first assistant-coaching job in football was at William & Mary in 1961.
30.If Tiger Woods had played football, he would have been a quarterback.
31.I give opinions, not advice.
32.All an agent is going to do is buy things for a player, damage his eligibility, and make the player dependent on them.
33.How do you know what it’s like to be stupid if you’ve never been smart?
34.Don’t tell your problems to people: eighty percent don’t care; and the other twenty percent are glad you have them.
35.I just have an enthusiasm for life.
36.To win a national championship, you’ve got to be a little lucky.
37.If you look at the history of Notre Dame, if you hire a coach who’s been successful at another college program, they’re going to be ultra successful at Notre Dame because the talent will always be there.
38.You don’t go to Notre Dame to learn something; you go to Notre Dame to be somebody.
39.For victory in life, we’ve got to keep focused on the goal, and the goal is Heaven.
40.If he’s got golf clubs in his truck or a camper in his driveway, I don’t hire him.
41.I look at athletes in all sports and try to picture what kind of football player they’d be, what position they’d play and so on.
42.I do think coaches need to get away from the game more, though. It’s good for them.
43.I don’t exercise.
44.In the nineties, everybody wants to talk about their rights and privileges. Twenty-five years ago, people talked about their obligations and responsibilities.
45.God looks after children, animals and idiots.
46.I think that we have opportunities all around us – sometimes we just don’t recognize them.
47.I was raised in a religious environment, and my wife is one of the more religious people that I have ever known.
48.When I work a game as an analyst, all I do is look at the game like a coach.
49.I don’t drink water, haven’t drank water in 40 years.
50.Ability is what you’re capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it.
51.Notre Dame is the one school that has a national recruiting base, from Florida to Texas to California.
52.The key to winning is choosing to do God’s will and loving others with all you’ve got
53.Sacrifice, discipline and prayer are essential. We gain strength through God’s word. We receive grace from the sacrament. And when we fumble due to sin – and it’s gonna happen – confession puts us back on the field.
54.No matter what happens on the field, getting an education makes you a winner.
55.I’m no genius.
56.I truly believe the things Notre Dame stands for.
57.I don’t think there’s been anything in the game of football in my lifetime that has changed college football more than redshirting.
58.When the bank asks me about my assets, I include my friendship with Regis Philbin.
59.All my life, I’ve been trying to make a hole-in-one. The closest I’ve come is a bogey.
60.Virtually nothing is impossible in this world if you just put your mind to it and maintain a positive attitude.
