Coaches may not be the reason students come out for sports, but they're usually the reason students stay out for sports. Coaches don't give students ability, but they discover or develop it. Coaches make both the quantitative and qualitative difference. Coaches are the reason some schools win more than others. Coaches are the reason some schools have better sportsmanship than others.
Coaches are the reason some schools have a more educationally based program than others.
Coaches make the difference between a program of excesses and a program of education. Coaches are the critical link in the educational process of athletics, they are the critical link in the sportsmanship at contests, and they are the critical link in the traditions of success which some schools enjoy. It has always been so, and it always will be so. No one higher up or lower down the organizational chart has more impact on athletes than do coaches. Coaches are the delivery system of educational athletics, and they deliver well .