Top 56 Al McGuire Quotes
#1. My rule was I wouldn't recruit a kid if he had grass in front of his house. That's not my world. My world has a cracked sidewalk.
Al McGuire
#2. Live every day as if it were Saturday night.
Al McGuire
#3. The people who know basketball, their elevators don't go to the top.
Al McGuire
#4. When I'm losing, they call me nuts. When I'm winning, they call me eccentric.
Al McGuire
#5. You can always tell the Catholic schools by the length of the cheerleaders' skirts.
Al McGuire
#7. Life is what you allow yourself not to see.
Al McGuire
#8. Can't win without talent, you know.
Al McGuire
#9. If a player leaves Marquette and doesn't have some of my blood in him, then I don't think I've done a good job.
Al McGuire
#10. A team should be an extension of a coach's personality. My teams are arrogant and obnoxious.
Al McGuire
#11. When I was losing, they called me nuts. When I was winning they called me eccentric.
Al McGuire
#12. Make your life exciting. Do what you have to do as long as you don't hurt people.
Al McGuire
#13. I don't believe in looking past anybody - I wouldn't look past the Little Sisters of the Poor after they stayed up all night.
Al McGuire
#14. I think everyone should go to college and get a degree and then spend six months as a bartender and six months as a cabdriver. Then they would really be educated.
Al McGuire
#15. If the waitress has dirty ankles, the chili is good.
Al McGuire
#16. When a guy takes off his coat, he's not going to fight. When a guy takes off his wristwatch, watch out!
Al McGuire
#17. Don't be just another guy going down the street and going nowhere.
Al McGuire
#18. All love affairs end. Eventually the girl is gonna put curlers in her hair.
Al McGuire
#19. Dean Meminger was quicker than 11:15 Mass at a seaside resort.
Al McGuire
#20. I don't discuss basketball. I dictate basketball. I'm not interested in philosophy classes.
Al McGuire
#21. I'm an Einstein of the streets and an Oxford scholar of common sense.
Al McGuire
#22. I just can't recruit where there's grass around. You gotta have a concrete lawn before I feel comfortable enough to go in and talk to you parents.
Al McGuire
#23. I think the world is run by 'C' students.
Al McGuire
#24. It's so ridiculous to see a golfer with a one foot putt and everybody is saying "Shhh" and not moving a muscle. Then we allow nineteen year-old kids to face a game-deciding free throw with seventeen thousand people yelling.
Al McGuire
#25. I want my team to have my personality: surly, obnoxious, and arrogant.
Al McGuire
#26. Winning is overrated. The only time it is really important is in surgery and war.
Al McGuire
#27. We rush for the stars as we crawl toward our graves.
Al McGuire
#28. I let ballplayers yell back at me because I wasn't trying to prove I'm boss. I know I'm boss.
Al McGuire
#29. If you're straight with your players, they'll be straight with you.
Al McGuire
#30. There's no one who's dropped on top of the mountain. You've got to work your way to the top.
Al McGuire
#31. The next time I will cry is when I die. My life has been that beautiful.
Al McGuire
#32. Live in the moment that you are in.
Al McGuire
#33. I'm not saying that they were Einsteins; they were marginal students. But every ballplayer whoever touched me has moved up his station in life. And the players moved up my station.
Al McGuire
#34. The only mystery in life is why the kamikaze pilots wore helmets.
Al McGuire
#35. On how to make the game more exciting - Eliminate the referees, raise the basket four feet, double the size of the basketball, limit the height of the players to 5 feet 9 inches, bring back the centre jump, allow taxi drivers in for free and allow the players to carry guns.
Al McGuire
#36. Help one kid at a time. He'll maybe go back and help a few more.
Al McGuire
#37. Remember, half the doctors in this country graduated in the bottom half of their class.
Al McGuire
#38. Don't call me son unless you're going to include me in your will. (When Adolph Rupp called him, "Son.")
Al McGuire
#39. The best thing about freshmen is that they become sophomores.
Al McGuire
#40. Every obnoxious fan has a wife at home that dominates him.
Al McGuire
#41. Winning is only important in war and surgery.
Al McGuire
#42. If winning weren't important nobody would keep score.
Al McGuire
#43. That's it. Curtains. Off to the races. Treetops. Seashells and balloons.
Al McGuire
#44. I come from New York where, if you fall down, someone will pick you up by your wallet.
Al McGuire
#45. I don't know why people question the academic training of an athlete. Fifty percent of the doctors in this country graduated in the bottom half of their classes.
Al McGuire
#46. It's a profession in which, the longer you stay, the closer you are to being fired.
Al McGuire
#47. I don't think any decent human being enjoys recruiting.
Al McGuire
#48. They call me eccentric. They used to call me nuts. I haven't changed. The only difference between being eccentric and being nuts is the number of security boxes you own.
Al McGuire
#51. Keep it simple, when you get too complex you forget the obvious.
Al McGuire
#52. Our guys took Shop and Advanced Shop. Shop is when you make a chair. Advanced Shop is when you paint it.
Al McGuire
#53. The nicest thing about coaching is that one day you feel like you can play handball against a curb, and on other days you feel like you can fly to the moon.
Al McGuire
#54. You measure a player from the head up.
Al McGuire
#55. I had my moment on the stage. The trick in life is to know when to leave.
Al McGuire
#56. Butch, you come from DeWitt Clinton. There are five thousand brothers in that school. You're the best there. You've been all-city two years in a row. How bad can you be? You come with me and we'll make nice music.
Al McGuire
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