It was 1957, and Frank Calloway was the new football coach of the Fort Bragg Timberwolves varsity squad. He had served in Korea from 1950, when he turned eighteen, until 1953. Upon returning stateside, Calloway had availed himself of the opportunity to attend college. On his graduation from Stanford in 1957, he returned home and found employment at Fort Bragg High as one of the school’s P.E. instructors. He also was to function, as mentioned, as the football team’s head coach.
During his high school years, Frank had played middle linebacker for the Timberwolves. What he lacked in natural talent, he made up for in anticipation, decisiveness, and intensity. What he lacked in size—inclining more toward the wiry than the stout—he made up for in the weight room and an iron will. Frank had been offered a football scholarship to the same university he later attended on the G.I. Bill, but turned it down to enlist in the Army—as his father Jackson had done during World War 1.
There was a quiet intensity about Frank that was intimidating to some of his players at first. They knew who he was—his picture was behind glass in the school’s trophy case in connection with the championships the Timberwolves had won in the mid-to-late 1940s. The players also knew their new coach had been on the front lines in Korea. But Frank, although true to his name in his manner of speech, was not as hard-nosed or demanding as the team imagined him to be. He did expect two things from his players, though, and if they failed him in either area, they were either benched or kicked off the team, depending on how egregious and persistent the failure was.
Coach Calloway emphasized these two requirements in his exhortation to the team prior to their taking the field for the initial game of his first season as coach, as they were about to take on their main rival, the Ukiah Wildcats:
“Now listen up, fellas. They are a bigger school than we are; some of their players are bigger and maybe stronger than us; some of them might be faster than us; some of them may even be more talented and athletic than we are. But I still like our chances.
“I want you to picture, in your minds, a victory. In this victory, we win a hard-fought game, 31-30. OK?”
The players thought Frank was making the point that they were not to let up, if they got ahead, and not to give up if they fell behind. It would be a close game. But that wasn’t what he was getting at. He continued:
“Now I want you to envision a victory where we win 50-0, but we do it by cheating and playing dirty.”
Frank let these two scenarios sink in. Some of the players were now confused about where Frank was going with this mental exercise.
“As you imagined those scenarios,” Frank continued, “Which one made you feel better?”
Coach Calloway looked around at the team, gazing into the eyes of each of them in turn, gauging their reaction. None of them volunteered a comment. “That was not a rhetorical question!” Frank said.
“The 31-30 victory, Coach,” Brick Lima, the left guard, finally said. “It’s still a victory, and we got it without cheating.”
“Good,” Frank said, nodding his head but still not smiling. “Now imagine the first scenario, but instead of winning 31-30, we lose by that score, and compare that with the second scenario. Which do you prefer, playing the game right and losing by 1, or playing dirty and winning big?”
Nobody wanted to venture an answer to this conundrum. They knew now that it was not a rhetorical question, but weren’t sure what the coach thought of these two scenarios. Was he saying, ‘Win at all costs—win fair and square if possible, but win, regardless of how you do it’?
Frank allowed the players time to gather their thoughts, but when nobody answered, he didn’t put them on the spot. He summed up:
“Fellas, I want you to forget about the numbers on the scoreboard. Don’t even look at the scoreboard. Let me worry about that. Just play the game right—fair and square, in a sportsmanlike manner—and give it your all. I can’t expect more than that; nobody can—or should—but I do most definitely expect that! If you do those two things: Play the game in a sportsmanlike manner, and put your whole effort into it—holding nothing back—you should be happy with yourselves—and I’ll be proud of you, too!”
Some members of the team were still not crystal clear about what exactly was being required of them.
“Coach?”
“Go ahead, Fred.”
“What do you mean, exactly, by ‘sportsmanlike’?”
“I’m talking about sportsmanship—respect for the game; respect for your teammates, your coaches, the refs, the other guys, and those who paid to come see you play. What I mean, specifically, is this: No showboating—when you score a touchdown, simply hand the ball to the ref, with no whooping or hollering or carrying on; No whining about the calls made by the referees; No tripping, trying to injure the other fellas, or breaking any rules just because you don’t think the refs are going to see you do it; No barking at each other, when one of you makes a mistake; No trash-talking the other team; No threats directed at the other team; No profanity—by that I mean I don’t want to hear anything out of your mouths stronger than ‘damn’ and ‘hell’—and I don’t even really want to hear that; Keep your cool, even if the other side loses theirs; and no complaining about or second-guessing the plays I send in. What I call, you run, no questions asked. Got it?”
“Yes, coach,” said several voices, at almost the same instant, but at various volumes.
“Now,” Frank concluded, “Even if we lose—and it is, of course, possible—as long as you do those two things: play the game right, and to the best of your ability—you will have won, as far as I’m concerned. In either case, I want you to hold your heads high as you take the field, and I want you to hold your heads high as you walk off the field—regardless of the numbers on the scoreboard.”
This was the speech the team needed in order to have both the motivation to play their best and the appropriate amount of “looseness” to just go out and play the way they knew how, without being overly concerned about the consequences of losing, if it came to that. It helped having the assurance that Coach Calloway would be satisfied with them as long as they gave it their best effort. And that’s what they did. Two things were required of them and, to a man, the team was successful in accomplishing both: They played the game right, and they gave it their all.
As time expired, the Timberwolves walked off the field with their heads held high. The final score? 31-30.
Frank Calloway, Teacher (1967):