University of Notre Dame-sponsored program teaches students to value servant leadership over winning

BLOOMFIELD HILLS — At the end of the game, the champion is not always the team with the most points on the scoreboard or the athlete holding the trophy.

While it sounds somewhat radical, that’s the approach taken by the Play Like A Champion Today program. Developed at the University of Notre Dame, the educational ministry curriculum seeks to educate student-athletes, coaches and parents about the positive traits of sports and how proper behavior can enhance the game experience.

“A champion is more than just the winner, because typically that’s the first thing kids will say: ‘Well, it’s the winning team,’” said Kristin Sheehan, program director for Play Like A Champion Today. “But what else is it? (To be a champion) is to focus on those qualities of a champion, and how they can live those in their school and in their sports teams.”

Sheehan led an hourlong session for students Nov. 8 at the Academy of the Sacred Heart in Bloomfield Hills, challenging students to examine the gifts God has given them and to use them as servant-leaders for the good of others, including among their teammates.

When Sheehan asked the audience of 30 students to loudly declare the most important characteristic of a champion, their responses encompassed everything from humbleness, open-mindedness, leadership, dedication, accepting failure, confidence and teamwork.

Sophomore Iyle Wallace said the Play Like A Champion Today approach broadened her view of athletics.

“I swim, and it’s sometimes an independent sport; you don’t always have to look to your team, you can focus on yourself,” said Wallace, a state-meet qualifier. “But this showed me that if you rely on your team, you’ll get more out of it in the end.” 

Wallace added, “It doesn’t matter what level you’re on in swimming, but your teammates, even if they’re not as experienced in the sport, can teach you a lot about the sport. You don’t always have to focus for yourself, you should be more open to what others have to say.”

Students watched a short video featuring legendary college basketball coach John Wooden, who defined success as doing one’s personal best and not putting oneself above others.

Sheehan related the cardinal and theological virtues — prudence, justice, fortitude, temperance, faith, hope and charity — to the virtues of a champion, adding the seven “C's” of a servant leader: commitment, consistency, confidence, courage, composure, character and caring.

Sacred Heart athletic director Sal Malek previously attended a two-day Play Like A Champion Today workshop at Notre Dame, and jumped at the chance to bring the seminar to his school. 

He said the session provided the Gazelle student-athletes with several important lessons, adding the program models the Catholic High School League motto of “More than Good Sports, Good People.”

“Sometimes when you do your best, you might lose, but if you do it with class and sportsmanship ... that’s what you get out of the competition,” Malek said. “Somebody’s got to lose at the end of the game, no matter how good you are, and I think you have to understand that there’s always somebody better out there. But if you’ve done your best, and you’ve also helped other people do their best with their opportunities, you’ve done your job as a student-athlete.”

Sheehan said the Play Like a Champion Today program began in the 2000s when a Notre Dame professor, F. Clark Power, noticed unsportsmanlike behavior from some of the school's student-athletes.

“He noticed behaviors that really surprised him; in particular, behaviors like parents screaming at the kids, coaches not allowing their teams to shake hands at the end of the game; he even saw a fight in the parking lot one day among parents,” said Sheehan, who was a cheerleader when she attended Notre Dame. 

Sheehan added Power wrote a research paper on the subject that began to change the thinking around high school and college sports.

“We think sports build character, but does that mean good character?” Sheehan said. “Not necessarily, because of what the adults were modeling in the area of sports.”

The Play Like A Champion Today program began as a workshop for coaches, but has since expanded to include sessions for athletes — both youth and high school — and parents. The organization now holds sessions in 42 states and works with 87 Catholic dioceses.

The program now offers several elements of spirituality for student-athletes, Sheehan said, including retreats, “sports Stations of the Cross,” athletic reflections on the rosary and a novena to St. Sebastian, the patron of athletes. 

“As our partners come to us and say, ‘Hey, have you thought about this?’ we tend to create those opportunities as our partners see a need for them,” Sheehan said.

The session at Sacred Heart was a pilot program for the Catholic League, which plans to introduce it to member schools, Malek said.

“It’s part of ‘unleashing the Gospel,’ and this is what it’s all about — we’re doing this through athletics, the Gospel, and our way of life as a Catholic institution,” Malek said. “It’s pretty important, and it should spill from the school to the playgrounds and into the fields and the ice arenas, and our kids will be better kids for the future.”