Last week, at his first Big 12 meetings as the head coach at Texas, Tom Herman was asked about the biggest thing he needed to fix as the new head coach of the Longhorns.
His answer had nothing to do with recruiting, scheme, or talent. Instead, it focused on culture, specifically at practice.
“It’s learning how to practice. That practices are not walk-throughs. They’re not jog-throughs. They’re not 'just-take-a-play-off' because it’s just practice. We’re not Allen Iverson. We ’re Michael Jordan," Herman stated according to Bruce Feldman.
Of course, in the Iverson reference Herman is referring to is this iconic press conference moment from the future NBA Hall of Famer that celebrated its 15 year anniversary earlier this week.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGDBR2L5kzI
"There’s a famous quote that we’ll have once we get our graphics up on the wall where Michael Jordan, I believe said that in a two-sentence quote he uses the word ‘practice’ six or seven times. He talks about how he made practices so hard that the games were easy, and that’s kinda what we live by. That transition was new and a bit of a shock to these guys, but they’re willing and that is the first step — just learning how to fight through all of the fatigue and pain and all of that stuff to get better and to improve and to compete every rep every day."