As a coach you want your athletes to be motivated to play, but more importantly motivated to win. A player may have the best ability and skill that you look for in an athlete, but if they are not motivated to play than they are worthless to you as a coach. That when a coach needs to become a psychologists and figure out a way to get that athlete ready to play. There are many ways to motivate athletes and their team. One way is to use reinforcement, both positive and negative. An individual may respond to you yelling at them, while the other may not. The other athlete may need a pat on the shoulder, or words of encouragement to get ready to play. Goal setting may get a team or individual motivated to win or succeed in their sport. As a coach make sure the goals are achievable, because if they are not and the team fails, they will feel as if they let you as a coach down, but more importantly they feel they let them selves down. They may never recover from that defeat and the season may be washed away. Rituals are also good to get to get you players motivated. I can remember when are high school coach had us eat a team meal together before each game. We would always eat either sandwiches or pasta. The food never really mattered, but it was the bonds that the team formed right before the game. We would talk about what needs to be done in order to win, we also supported each other, and pumped each other up if we had a bad day at school. It was a time to get all the nervous energy out and all the adrenaline flowing through out your body.
             A critical moment in a team's season, is the moment that they are ready to step out onto the field and play. As a coach you want to say something to inspire your team to do there best. To get them all fired up to play, to go out there and win that game. It might not work for some of your players, but for the players that it does work for they are now twice as anxious to play. Sometimes the coach ca...