Tim Jankovich Edit
Sun, 10/31 11:02AM • 35:35
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
coach, basketball, game, people, coaching, player, play, team, confidence, long, head coach, win, timeout, world, wanted, shot, smu, years, postseason, thought
SPEAKERS
Paul Barnett, Tim Jankovic
Paul Barnett 00:00
Team shank KOVITCH Good evening, Radha. Good afternoon, your time and welcome to the great coaches podcast.
Tim Jankovic 00:06
Thank you very much appreciate you having me. Very excited to
Paul Barnett 00:09
hear a little bit about basketball. And also that wonderful accent that you've got there going will be very interesting for all the listeners here in Europe. Well,
Tim Jankovic 00:17
I want yours. I want your accent especially, I want to take it back to college. I think it could have done wonders. I'm very jealous. I don't know if I do me that much. Good. Now, I don't know. But it could have done an awful lot of good back then. So
Paul Barnett 00:29
I'm saying all the right things to begin to it. Maybe I'll jump in actually ask you something really difficult to get as going? Where are you in the world today? And what have you been up to so far?
Tim Jankovic 00:39
Where am I in the world, I'm in Dallas, Texas, is where I am in the world. I love Dallas. Been here going on 10 years. And I've been head coach at SMU for five and a half, which I took over half of the year, and was the assistant the other part of that. So this is the longest I've ever been anywhere since I left home has a kid and it's been a terrific run. And I love Dallas and I love SMU team. If
Paul Barnett 01:04
I could maybe start by talking a little bit about your long and storied career. Because as I go back and I look at some of the coaches, you've worked with some real icons in there. There's LON KRUGER, Jack Hartman, Eddie Sutton, Bill, self, and Boyd grant. And those were just the tip of the iceberg that I could find while I was researching. But what I'd really like to do is just start by asking you, what is it you think the great coaches do differently? That sets them apart?
Tim Jankovic 01:30
It's a great question, because I've thought about it a lot. And I have been incredibly, incredibly lucky to work for literally some of the greatest coaches of our time or all time really. And I asked myself that while I was with them, and even since I left, and what I really have come up with that every one of them was very different. And every one of them was true to their cells. And it showed me that first of all, there's not a certain personality that you have to have to be a great coach, you can, there were they were all very different. But it also made me see that being a great coach is an art. It's an art, it's a talent, it is not a science, it's not something that you can hand to somebody else, you can teach people a lot. But there is an art to it, there is a personality trait that can't define just being able to communicate with people in a way that Bond's them and forms a team and goes after goals and keeps people united and also a good teacher and on and on and on. But in the end to me, what I learned is, it is an art, it is a talent. And a lot of it is genetic. It's done at birth of personality traits that someone has has a lot to do with it[PB1] .
Paul Barnett 02:44
Let's pick up on this genetic idea if we can, because as a player, you experienced great success at Kansas State and legendary Jack Hartman. Each year, there you are ranked in the top 20. And you progress to the NCAA once getting to the Elite Eight. But you also studied business and you graduated with business finance and a master's in radio and television.
Tim Jankovic 03:04
It doesn't really show on the on the masters. But I can assure you that was all not a lot of practical. There wasn't a lot of on camera. So that's why everybody's wondering why isn't he better at this? That's why, but no, go ahead. I didn't mean to interrupt. No, we're not wondering
Paul Barnett 03:17
that at all. What we're wondering is, when did you choose to become a coach? Was it in your genes? And if so, what brought it out and set you on that journey?
Tim Jankovic 03:27
No, no, I never wanted to be a coach at all. I never thought about being a coach. What I wanted to be was the greatest player that ever lived. And obviously I fell incredibly short of that goal that it was a big goal. And I worked very, very hard for years and years and years and years to try to become the best that I could be when college was done. I had no desire whatsoever. To be a coach. A lot of people told me you ought to go into coaching. I did love basketball, but with all my heart that was inside of me, but I decided well I didn't make the NBA I wanted to be an NBA player didn't make it. I was going Believe it or not. I was enrolled in SMU Law School. Ironically, way back in the 80s. I had chosen to go to SMU law school if the NBA didn't work out which it didn't. So I was headed to SMU. And then I got a call out of the blue from Beverly Hills, California, asking if I wanted to be an institutional stockbroker. I didn't even know what that was. But I said come out and take the trip and for fun is what I thought and then one thing led to another I took the job. So I was in investment banking. I was an institutional stock broker in Beverly Hills. I rebelled against basketball. I didn't watch one time I was very upset. And in the NCAA tournament that first year, so nine months whatever. Later, I turned on the TV and I was like, Man, I missed this so much and I just missed basketball and then the wheels started turning and six months later, I decided to get out of that profession and get into coaching and I've been in it ever since. Well,
Paul Barnett 04:56
38 years actually is a collegiate coach. Actually it's probably 30 on. I think with the season coming,
Tim Jankovic 05:02
I stopped counting, I definitely stopped counting. Well, there's
Paul Barnett 05:04
definitely 14 of those years as a division one head coach. Now I wanted to ask you, what do you think the traits are that people need to have, in order to have longevity as a coach?
Tim Jankovic 05:15
Well, first of all, I think that is the number one thing that a person needs to figure out in this profession, because it is not a safe way to make a living, to say the least. And I think back with you mentioned, 3839 years in my 20s, there was all these people, my friends, that we would hang out on the road and recruit, and then you get in your 30s, and kind of look up and some of them are gone. And then one day, you look up and you're in your late 40s. And you're like, Oh, my God, it's just where are the people that we started with? This is a profession, that the ultimate goal is to make a profession of it. And it is very difficult to do that, given the stress and pressure and things that go on. But I do think, to answer your question, what do you need to do to have that kind of longevity, this what I tell all young coaches, first of all, it's so competitive, you better have an unbelievable work ethic. Number one, because there's so many people trying to feed their family with the stress and the pressure that goes with it. So the work that's being done competitively is very high. So you have to do that, you have to be incredibly resilient, because there's a lot of lows. I don't care where you are, what program you're in how well you're doing, there are some incredible lows and adversity, that can set you off track, and you have to be able to fight through those. And the other thing that I really tell anybody that wants to get into it is you really have to have value, you can't just, it looks fun, I want to go be a coach, well, then you better be graded at least one, maybe two things, and develop that to the highest level you possibly can. So that over a long, long period of time, you are attractive to somebody to put them in your program, whether as the head coach of the assistant coach, you have a talent or some talents that people will actually pay for. And that takes it goes back to work, you have to work at it to become a great recruiter to become a great X and oh guy to become a great strategist to become a better teacher, whatever it is that you're going to excel at, you have to have that great value and put all that together and add little lock. And that's how somebody can make it for a long, long time.[PB2]
Paul Barnett 07:30
Tim, could I pick up on something you said the twice in your answer. You mentioned the word stress. And when I was researching and preparing for today, I found this fascinating statistic from your college career as a player and that was that you shot 91.7% success rate from the free throw line. That's 20% More versus the average. So clearly, there must be something about you being comfortable in the spotlight, or being able to handle that moment when everyone is looking at you. And I wanted to ask if you've got advice for others on handling that moment when everybody's focusing in on you and looking at how you perform.
Tim Jankovic 08:08
It's a great question. For me personally, my early ambitions as a kid, fifth grade, seventh grade, eighth grade, I always had tremendous ambition. I mentioned before a half joke, and I want to be the greatest player that ever lived and, or somewhere close to that, which of course was never going to happen. But I had that desire. But at the same time, I certainly did not have an innate confidence that actually matched that ambition. There was no way like I remember a fifth grade, we had a free throw contest for the whole city. And you had to win your first I had to win your grade school. Okay, he had to win your grade school to compete. And if you want then you got to play at the Kansas State halftime free throw contest. Well, I wanted to win the city. And of course, I wanted it too bad and didn't even make it past my own school for God's sake. So the ambition was there, but not necessarily the confidence. So the point of all this is for me, I can't speak for everyone. But I do think that you can practice your way into a tremendous amount of confidence. And that's what I lived when I made up my mind. To be a player that was the most important thing in the world, to me all the way through school, was to spend seven, eight hours a day, whatever it took every single day. And that's how confidence grew. So in any situation that I've been in high school, college as a coach, I've just always felt totally confident because I knew that I put in the time. I knew that I had seen results. And then you get a sense of calm and when you get to that point you actually perform better under a microscope than you do when you're just kind of on your own or practicing or whatever. But before you get to that point or for me anyway, then there was a lot of stress. And sometimes I would perform worse than I should have just because I wasn't as comfortable and confident. So I am a big believer that you can practice your way into a tremendous amount of confidence, whether that be in basketball, or tennis, or musically, or leadership, or speaking, or whatever it is, I do think that's how you build your confidence. That's the only way I know other than some people are just born with an incredible amount of it. Sometimes, unjustifiably, but it is a wonderful trait to have[PB3]
Paul Barnett 10:35
teamies confidence and self belief linked, or are they separate facets of a person's innate skills that they bring as a participant in a team?
Tim Jankovic 10:46
That's a good question, I don't know, I guess my gut would be they're basically the same. And I think we're all born with a certain amount of security or insecurity at birth. Obviously, your environment and your parents love and affection. And the way you're treated, certainly is going to contribute to that. That's really what I'm saying is I don't think it has to be your stamp at birth, that this is the amount of self belief you're going to have your whole life. Obviously, the external world can lift us or can beat us up. I think if you let it beat you up, and lowers your confidence, you're not going to ever feel comfortable in a spotlight or anything where there's a lot of people that are judging you. So I don't think you have to just accept whatever it is that you're born with, at the same time, if you're born with a lot the world can knock you down to and that I think is the real test is is adversity and how you handle failure.[PB4]
Paul Barnett 11:42
I'd like to Julian if we can on adversity, because you've got five League Tournament titles and 10 NCAA appearances across your long career. How does coaching in the postseason, when presumably the pressure is higher, differ from the regular season?
Tim Jankovic 11:59
It's a lot higher, it's funner. I will say that it's a lot funner? Well, let's just go back to when I first played in postseason in college, we were fortunate enough to play in a lot of NCAA, I think we played in nine NCAA games. And I know going back to confidence, the first one or two certainly didn't feel comfortable, confident, the unknown was pretty big, probably made it bigger than it was. And then as it went along the comfort zone and then the feeling of Well, truth is this really just another game, they just a lot more people are paying attention to it. So there's that hurdle to get over. And I think, as a coach with teams, even though it's very difficult to control my belief, and what I've learned watching other great coaches, what I've tried to incorporate into our players, is to relax more than they get up for the game to relax and be confident and treat it as any other game and not make it more than it is because I have seen and live through that feeling where the players are really skittish. I don't know if that's the right word, but hyper. They don't look like themselves. You just played a game a week ago, and they don't look that way. They're hurrying, and everything they do thinking they've got to be so much more than they were, I think the fear of elimination. Obviously that's what all postseason, it's an elimination game. They're all elimination games, and that works on people. But I believe that when things are the most energized, the stakes are the highest the spotlight is the brightest, is when people have to find a way to relax the most. Not the opposite, which is to get all revved up like they never have before. I think that backfires more often than not any special[PB5]
Paul Barnett 13:45
tips or tools or things you use to relax people going into those games,
Tim Jankovic 13:50
not for me, or any of the coaches that I've worked for, like there weren't any, like we had any programs or a yoga or a film or anything like that, I think it's more about the demeanor of the coach. First of all, they're going to cue off of you, subconsciously and consciously. And if they can feel the coaches stressed and telling everybody, they got to do better than there's going to be a certain amount of tension. So I think part of it is that and I think also just being straightforward with the players and saying, you're going to feel this moment and it is big, and it's your tendency is going to be to try harder, harder. But you can't let the moment speed you up. And I think that's really the way in basketball anyways, his pressure can just speed everybody up. And I'm going to try to jump higher, and I'm gonna try to run faster and it's like, well, now you're a little out of control and you don't want to be out of control. You want to be totally in control. You want to be in the zone and you never find the zone when you're out of control. But all that talk is great just happening right in front of you. There's not a whole lot you can do about it sometimes that's why there's some of the upsets. Well in all sports, but in basketball, I've lived so many of them on both sides of it, but a lot of times Those big upsets have a lot to do with the emotional pressure that is being felt in that moment, if it was just another game, you don't see nearly as many of those, one of[PB6]
Paul Barnett 15:11
the things I find fascinating about basketball is the coach is almost the sixth player, because you can call plays, you can get involved in the game in the way that you can in a lot of other sports. So I wanted to talk about the role as the sixth player. And when you choose to interject yourself and say, call the timeout, stop the play. And when you choose to stand back, and sort of let the game unfold, and what you've learned about juggling that process over the years,
Tim Jankovic 15:38
you just reminded me of something my first head coaching job, I was an assistant coach at Kansas State, but part of my job was to be the head JV coach at Kansas State, it was a JV program, which was all walk ons, we had all our walk ons out there. And we would play against the junior colleges in Kansas, which there were many great junior college basketball programs. And so I was a head coach. For the first time I was given I think about our 15 minutes a day to practice. And I had to figure out okay, what do we practice and that came kind of natural. Honestly, I just kind of did what we did when I was a player, mostly thinking I was really smart, but I wasn't so I could prepare us. But then the game came. So the first game came. And I was sitting there and the game starts. And honest to God, it dawned on me that for the first time, it's like, what is my role in this thing? Right? What is it? So I just sat there for like four minutes and just watch the game go up and down trying to figure out should I be saying things and, and like my firt I think I'll substitute one guy, but maybe we'll substitute a guy and I was completely worthless, not knowing what my role is. And so the longer you become a head coach, you try to find, alright, well, how much do you want to do you want to yell on every play? Do you want to be screaming every time everything you want to be one of those guys for me know, if you watch and I have watched closely, I studied coaches from the time I got into coaching and including my own coach, the best coaches, they're not yelling and screaming every play at all. There's a calmness they're watching. And they're waiting to see when they need to interject. And I think less is more. a barking dog over there just gets tuned out. And so I think there's going back to one of your original questions. It's an art, it really is an art and great coaches find their way to impact every game, whether subtly or some games, far more than others. I can tell you this, that I love the games, and every coach would tell you this, I think where I coached the least, where it was all done in practice, it's kind of on autopilot. We're taking control of what we need to take control of when you coach that's the greatest coach team, not the one where the coach is having to do 45 things during the game. [PB7] Now sometimes they go wrong. And then you've got to interject more when it comes to time outs. Again, it's a feel for me, what I feel is just momentum play. I watch coaches do this. I'm fascinated guys, so they'll be coming from behind or something. I'll make two threes in a row and then they'll call timeout. I'm like, Oh my Lord, why would you break your own momentum. That's when the other guy is supposed to call it's make him call the timeout. You just settled your guys down when they're feeling the best. So never do that. You will never ever ever see me call a timeout ever. When things are going really good. But when do you call timeout is when you feel enough of the momentum common the other way? Do you do it right away all the time? No, it depends on the situation. Your team? Are you on the road? Are you at home? Is it a game that you could afford to lose to allow your players to try to fight through it and see if they can? Or is it a game? Hey, we're not having a test here. We need to try to win this game. So you call it one of the main reasons you call it is you want to hold off momentum. You're either a saver or a spender of timeouts you are because you only get so many and it's like well do you just spend them earlier? Right away? Or do you try to save them? And I wonder if it doesn't go back to your spending habits. Monetarily I'm a saver I'm not a spender. I just save I just I'm not a big throw money around I like to say, and I like to save timeouts. And now that I've looked at my entire career, I have saved way, way way too many timeouts. But I like to have them for late game. The late game is one to me you need the most there's no guarantee when you call a momentum timeout with 14 minutes to go in the half. That's really going to change moment. There's no guarantee. It may be a worthless timeout might not might come the crowd down. But there's a guarantee late in the game. If you've got three timeouts left and they're pressing and you got to get it in and then you couldn't get it in and then you got to figure out a strategy and then they take the lead and you got to have a good shot. It's always good to have like game time. The question is, can we afford to save those darn things. And then we just got beat, and we never needed them. So that's a tough call. I'm a saver. I don't like to call them that much. I hate calling them on last second plays because all you do is let the defense change or get sad, or I like late game, if we need a basket, go down and make a play is what I prefer.
Paul Barnett 20:25
Team, I have a great quote from you, actually, you say, I don't think you can be a great team. Unless you are great defensively. So I wanted to ask you, how do you create the mindset and team environment that supports a defense first mentality,
Tim Jankovic 20:38
it's getting harder and harder because athletes right now, and I don't think it's their fault at all. It's just the world that we live in, there's so much motivation, to go somewhere else to go to the next level to be paid to be, let's say in high school to go to the college and the big school and, and so because of that, it makes it tougher to get the team bond that the team is always first it's become tougher, and I have a lot of years in this, I've watched it happen. It doesn't mean players these days don't care about winning, it doesn't mean that they're not good people, it just means that there are more distractions and their ears, telling them to worry about what's out there, and not what's in here. So that's very difficult. I do believe in that because I'm positive that you can't play real good offense every night, you just can't, they just doesn't work that way in basketball. Some nights you just everything's perfect. Nobody can make a shot some nights, the defense is just on top of what you're doing. And nobody can make a shot. So you can play defense every night. Great you can, you can have tremendous effort and commitment to defense, you can have tremendous effort, and commitment to rebounding. And those things, that's how you make a great season. Someone taught me this a long time ago, if this is how many games you play, well, this many games, you're going to shoot great, you're gonna win them all. And then this many games, you're gonna shoot pretty well, that's the mid ground, and you hope to win a good percentage of those to have a good season. But great seasons are made over here. When you cannot, you're going to have X number of games where you just can't make a shot or your offense is out of sync or they're taking you out of everything. And the stat sheet at the end says you shot 36% And you had 18 turnovers, can you win those games. And if you have a team that is built to win those games, that's how you have great seasons[PB8] . So I am. That's why wherever you saw that I'm a big believer, because I know those things hold true. As far as getting everyone to believe it, we just try to show them results. Look at the team. These are the teams that won the conference, the last three or four years look at their defensive numbers, look at their rebounding numbers, it's almost always one, two or three to win the league. Look at the sweet 16. Look at the Final Four, look at their defensive numbers. And it almost always plays out. So we say as a team, we want to go to the tournament want to go to the Sweet 16, we want to go to the Final Four, we want to win the conference. In order to do that you got to put up these kinds of defensive numbers. So we just try to sell it in reality in history. We give him history basically and say this is history. And it's hard to argue with the numbers.
Paul Barnett 23:19
Talking history team, you started off by saying five and a half years now in Dallas, longest time you've ever been in one place and you're heading into 39th season as a coach, either a head coach or an assistant and I wondered, are there any immovable values any non negotiables as a coach that have traveled with you through that journey?
Tim Jankovic 23:38
Wow, that's a great woof. That's a heck of a question. Well, for me, it was ingrained. Early, my college coach, all the coaches I worked with, particularly at an early age, but all the way through that we're gonna do this the right way. We're not going to break rules. We're not going to shortcut we're going to do it the hard way, which is the right way. My coach Hartmann, I asked him with all the cheating around what keeps you you want to win. And you know, it'd be easier if you just cheat. He was like, hey, I want to sleep great at night when I want to feel good about myself. And when you when you know that you did it the right way. So that has always stuck with me. Other values for me, I had to ask myself, well, why are you getting in this game? And I think why did I get into coaching? Why did I get out of institutional stockbroker, or anything else that I might have wanted to do? And the first reason was, I love the game. I love the game. I still love the game. I think it's the most beautiful game. On Earth when it's played correctly. It's pretty ugly when it's not. But when it's played correctly, I think it's a beautiful game. It is a beautiful thing to be a part of a team that is bonded for a common goal and just kind of puts the outside world away and together, moves forward. That's a beauty thing. And then I guess lastly that it really, it was magnified. I did early on, get into it, I wanted to help people teach, but not to the level that maybe I should have, when I got into it, it was more about the love of the game and want to be back in the competitive world that I was as a player. But when my son was born, many years after I got into coaching, it really changed my values. And it really saved me in coaching, because it was starting to get where this is all it was just trying to win another game. That's what I started to feel like after a number of years, like, at first I loved what the competition does, like after a number of years like this is all we're trying to do is win another game or two more, five more and, and it started to not mean quite as much as it used to. And when he was born, it changed all that because I knew for the first time I was like, Well, I am coaching someone's everyone I'm coaching their parents feel about them, like I do him. And that changed the way I saw my role like I really, really need to help them I need to spend more time thinking about helping them and less time thinking about helping me just winning games. And that was very significant. And that probably is the biggest reason I'm still in it. Because now I get more joy out of helping our guys out of this trying to help them have success and go on to have success. When I was young, I don't think I had enough life experience. Or maybe I wasn't mature enough. I didn't have that much to tell other than how to guard the pick and roll and how to throw a skip pass and drive a close that I knew the basketball part I wasn't worldly, maybe enough or mature enough or had enough experiences. But by the time I had my son, and the whole world changed in my mind and my heart changed, then it became more about trying to be a parent extended parent, I don't want to take the place of parents, but some of its treating our players just like I would treat my son if he was playing for. So I guess that's the best way to say it. And that value has sustained me in coaching. And honestly, if you say what is the funnest part of coaching, it's not winning is I mean, it's so important. And it's fun. But it's not as satisfying as watching your guys go on and have great success during and after they play for you. That's the best part. That is definitely the best part.[PB9]
Paul Barnett 27:38
Tim, can I pick up on this idea of being ethically challenged, you talked about it a little bit there during your answer. And then again at the end, and you talked about winning, not being necessarily the funnest part. And of course, the team you've been bring it up because the team you leading or coaching has had some challenges prior to you coming into the role, which meant that you weren't able to offer the same level of scholarships that you were before. And so you were forced, I guess, to look for different attributes, when evaluating talent, I'd be really interested to hear how you went about looking for people to fill the roster, without being able to offer them the same level of scholarship that perhaps your competitors are,
Tim Jankovic 28:19
that was a pretty rough period, we were put on probation. And they took nine scholars, most scholarships ever taken away from a college basketball team, which is amazing. We won't get into that. But it was the biggest challenge that I've ever gone through. And also because really, the truth is the public doesn't really know it, they don't really understand it and really don't care that much either. So what makes it so tough is that you're being judged as if everything's fine, and everything's like half of fine. So that was a real challenge. And I'm proud that we came out on the other side, and we're getting back to where we were before, which was a great level. And it was very difficult because of that to recruit the same level player that we were used to or that we're recruiting now. But when you ask, you know what, in my perfect world, what is it we look for, whether it's good times or bad, you're always looking at for the best. I think it kind of starts here for me and I've done this a long time. If I'm looking for a player, I like athletic players that can shoot the ball. For me. It's been difficult. If you want to be really good defensively, it's hard to be great defensively for slow. So to me, athletes, hopefully with length that can shoot because if you can't shoot, once you start to get scouted the floor gets really crowded. Your people are in held position all the time. So a non shooter can affect everyone else because they're always crowded by another defender. So that's where it starts. In other words don't go down the path with unless they fill those, check those boxes, and then from there, your hope is great character, great heart, passion, work ethic, those type things, the intangible things, to judge, if you can get that whole package, it's easy for all of us to know what we want. That's what we want. But sometimes once they come, it's like, there wasn't quite what we thought. Because the environment they come from is not going to be nearly as strenuous as the environment they go to, whenever you move up a level, people are tested, we're all tested when we do that. And so that's what we aspire to, we start there to go, this will be the list. And then now that we have a list, let's dig into their character, heart, work ethic, all those kinds of things, basketball, IQ, intelligence, those kinds of things. So that's our perfect world[PB10] . I am very excited because right now we have a lot of new guys, we have some tremendous guys from last year. And a lot of them are fitting the whole package that they they're checking all the boxes. And that's why it's been really fun so far. That's your dream team. That's who you want to coach. As of right now it looks kind of looks out what we are. And I hope I'm right about that.
Paul Barnett 31:18
You've mentioned work ethic, two or three times in this interview. And I guess I wanted to link this with the idea of your son, and you mentioned as well, he's gone on now. And he's 14 his own career in basketball. I want to ask you about work life balance in those years when you were helping to raise him and also build your own career as a coach, and what you learned along the way, about work life balance that perhaps all of us can learn from.
Tim Jankovic 31:44
That's a great one, as I said earlier, is being born or whatever was the greatest thing that happened to me. It was a life changer and a life shifter the first time that I really started thinking it wasn't always about me there was I realized there was a little selfishness or maybe a lot I was my thoughts were inward all the time. And that helped him certainly go outward. And because of the love, I felt and feel for him. My biggest thing was I wanted to be a great father to him. That would be more important than any basketball career. And he didn't want to fail in that. At the same time. I was a head coach trying to build a program at Illinois State got a new and he's young and I have to make decisions. Okay, well, I've got to work a lot of hours a lot. And I also need to be a great father, and how am I going to do both those things. And basically, what I figured out is, I'm not going to stay at the office all night, I'm going to come home after practice, and I'm gonna do a lot of work around him. I'm going to be around him, I'll take a lot of breaks, but I'm going to be present. I decided I'll take him to school every morning, that's going to be my job. And that was one of the greatest things he's gone now, as you mentioned, but I just decided I'm going to take him to school, almost every day of his life when I'm in town. And those 1020 minutes, whatever it was, every day. I took as he doesn't know this, but it was like this is a learning. We're going to talk about stuff. We're going to talk about how to treat others at school, we talk about making sure nobody's bullying somebody else and making sure that you show up early and you try hard and you trusted in all the values that you try to instill. That was the greatest time because I had a captive audience, two people in a car. He had to listen to me. He had no choice. And that's a lot of days when you start adding up from the time you're what four, I think you went to preschool or years old. On to when you're driving. I got all those years. That's a lot of days. So between that making sure I wasn't doing work all night at the office, I would do my work at home. And just doing the best I could I hope though, but I'm not the judge in the jury. He is. And I hope that if you asked him that he would say that he was great. I hope he wouldn't say well, I didn't see him enough. That would be a heartbreaker[PB11] .
Paul Barnett 34:08
Well, he must have done something right because he's gone into basketball. He hasn't run away from the sport.
Tim Jankovic 34:14
Or yeah, or terribly wrong. I tried to get him to be a tennis player. I tried hard. But he didn't bites. I tried to make it a lot of fun. I play a lot of tennis. I love tennis. And I tried hard man. I had some fun games we play and he'd laugh and joke. I thought I had him but he went the basketball round. So there you go.
Paul Barnett 34:32
We've talked about your son. And I'd like to perhaps finish by reflecting on the other people that you've been involved with over the years as he coached whether their support staff, whether they're student athletes, if we were able to put them all in a room now we would ask them, what's the legacy that Tim Jankovic just left? What would you hope that they would say?
Tim Jankovic 34:53
I would hope that they would say that he cared deeply about us And he tried the very, very best he could not only to help us in basketball, but to be good outside of basketball as well.[PB12]
Paul Barnett 35:09
I think that's a wonderful way to finish Tim, caring deeply on and off the court. And if I was to challenge you on anything, I'd say that you also lift them with a pretty strong ethic, ethical compass as well. But I appreciate your time today. It's been wonderful chatting with you all the best for the season ahead. And I hope that you can get back into that sweet 16 that you're hoping
Tim Jankovic 35:30
for. I hope so. Thank you very much. It's been a pleasure. Appreciate it.