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It’s crunch time people…only a few more days to find that perfect gift for everyone on your list. Though I suppose at this point, it doesn’t really have to be perfect, does it? I do have a list of gifts that would be perfect for your team to receive this year. Gifts that would make them better teammates and better players. They may not know that they need these gifts though, so you’ll need to write up a wish list for them. Here they are:

8 things you’d be fired up for Santa to leave under your player’s Christmas trees

1. Confidence. In themselves, in their abilities, and the future of the team. It’s essential to any sort of success your team may have…and it’s got to be consistent. Situational confidence is short-lived, to be crushed by the next loss or poor performance. But genuine confidence? Now that’s the good stuff! It’s a belief held deep down within the athlete that they will ultimately be successful.

2. Success. We love our athletes, don’t we? And we want the best for them and hope that all of their hard work and focused intensity will pay off in the end with some sort of tangible success. Whether it’s the non-starter who becomes a starter, or the starter who makes all-conference, or the all-conference player that receives national recognition…we all hope for a measure of success for our players.

3. Self-motivation. In my mind, the best gift that Santa could leave! Every drill, every game, every weight room workout is only as good as the amount of effort our athletes are willing to put in. For those who are internally motivated to work hard in the off-season, during preseason, in the weight room…those are the athletes who will see tremendous improvement over the course of their careers.

4. Hard work. There’s only one person who knows if your players are working to their full potential…that’s the players themselves! We can put them into physically and mentally challenging situations, but it’s up to them to truly challenge themselves. We all hope that we’ll have a team full of players that will never “dog it” in a drill or not push themselves in a practice, but we’ve got to trust them to take things seriously. Those athletes who are willing to keep their foot on the gas pedal throughout the entire season will ultimately experience success.

5. Leadership. The responsibility of being a team leader is exciting to some and daunting to others. We’d love for our teams to be full of leaders and leaders-in-training. Your current leaders could model to your leaders-in-training the proper ways to motivate and encourage people. An openness and desire to lead is essential because I don’t think that you can thrust leadership onto someone, but rather it must be accepted.

6. Teaminess. That’s a word that I’ve made up that describes the state of an individual who values their teammates and enjoys being in a team environment. The teamy player puts their teammates first and is willing to sacrifice personal glory for the good of the team. Teaminess is what occurs when a group of people come together with a common goal, a common purpose, and a common level of dedication.

7. Skill. Hopefully Santa will leave a gigantic box of skill under our player’s trees! Because all of the intangibles in the world won’t do the team much good if it’s not combined with skill. But those intangibles should spur the player on to work at their skill level with a laser-like focus.

8. Hunger. I’m sure we’ve all coached the athlete that was blessed with a tremendous heaping of skill, but junks it away with their laziness. I’m not talking about that athlete, but rather the one who is very skilled and willing to work to better their already finely tuned skills. The athlete who wants to win and be successful so badly that they can literally taste it. The player who is being propelled by their desire to get better every single day.

Those are the things that I want for my players. They’ve got a finite amount of time to accomplish great things and my wish for them is that they do everything within their power to attain their goals.