It's nice to have the opportunity to play for so much money, but it's nicer to win it.

In order to have a winner, the team must have a feeling of unity; every player must put the team first ahead of personal glory.

I can reach a kid who doesn't have any ability as long as he doesn't know it.

Losing doesn't make me want to quit. It makes me want to fight that much harder.

I don't hire anybody not brighter than I am. If they're not brighter than I am, I don't need them.

The old lessons (work, self-discipline, sacrifice, teamwork, fighting to achieve) aren't being taught by many people other than football coaches these days. The football coach has a captive audience and can teach these lessons because the communication lines between himself and his players are more wide open than between kids and parents. We better teach these lessons or else the country's future population will be made up of a majority of crooks, drug addicts, or people on relief.

Back 12 years ago, when Dr. Mathews was president here, we had a plan that when I got ready to quit, we'd bring a certain guy in and he'd take over that day and I'd leave. But as time wore on, I realized that wouldn't have been good at all.