Quotes & Sayings About Basketball Family

Until my senior year, baseball and basketball were my best sports; and even when I was a senior, I still wanted to play baseball professionally. But the family wanted me to go to college, and I guess I agreed with them, or else I would have accepted some of the offers I got. — Joe Namath

I didn't miss any games, but Coach Knight came out and spent three days with my family in Chicago when my dad passed away. I came back and played and it was good therapy for me. Having a basketball family and a coach who understood and actually became like a father figure for that time was comforting to me, and I'm sure that will be comforting to Coleman. — Mike Krzyzewski

When you're 18, when you're at college, sports can be your life. You can watch every baseball game, every college basketball game, every football game. Once you have a family and kids, you can't do that anymore. — Drew Magary

We look for opportunities to play together including basketball, tennis, swimming, riding bikes and touch football. I try to provide a loving environment where we can play. I think that's good on so many levels - emotionally, for family interactions and, of course, physically. — Alan Thicke

Basketball Rule #1

In this game of life
your family is the court
and the ball is your heart.
No matter how good you are,
no matter how down you get,
always leave
your heart
on the court. — Kwame Alexander

I also wanted my basketball players to know that I really cared about them. Forget basketball; as a person, I cared, I cared about their family. — John Wooden

The rest of the family hated Orlando. It was full of ass-backward transplants, bad food, and doo-doo basketball players. It was everything that sucked about the South with none of the benefits. People drove ride-on lawn mowers through their neighborhoods wearing Home Depot hats, but you couldn't find any decent barbecue within five counties. No Southern hospitality, just hot asphalt and suburban phoniness. All the ignorance, none of the sense. — Eddie Huang

I can't play the game of basketball and live my life on what other people expect me to do or what they think I should do. That doesn't make me happy. What makes me happy is being able to make plays for my teammates, to be able to represent the name on the back of my jersey. — LeBron James

Some people insist they've never met a gay person. But Three Degrees of Jason Collins dictates that no NBA player can claim that anymore. Pro basketball is a family. And pretty much every family I know has a brother, sister or cousin who's gay. In the brotherhood of the NBA, I just happen to be the one who's out. — Jason Collins

I've always had a passion for giving back. It's a family tradition that comes from my devout parents. They were always giving back and serving the community. So when I became fortunate enough and blessed to play the game of basketball, I was also fortunate enough to follow in my parents' footsteps and give back like the way they did. — Dikembe Mutombo

It is most difficult, in my mind, to separate any success, whether it be
in your profession, your family, or as in my case, in basketball, from
religion. — John Wooden

It means I don't have to charter that big jet for the family. — Shaquille O'Neal

To be a team, you must be a family. — Don Meyer

Regard your team as a family. Give the same attention to the bottom guy as you do the top guy. You have a responsibility to all of your players. — Pete Newell

There was a kid that had five brothers and sisters, and the family was missing for like five days. I was watching TV, they [found each other] and now they're in San Antonio. So I bought them a little apartment in San Antonio. But I'm doing stuff like that all over. — Shaquille O'Neal

My whole family likes to play basketball. George II plays for his high school team and George III and George IV and George V are going to be good players. One day we're going to have a team and call it Georgetown. — George Foreman

One time, I put up 40, 50 points dunking on Shawn Bradley. After the game, he brought his family over. He was like, 'This is my wife. She wants to take a picture.' I'm like, 'Nice to meet you.' I smile into the camera, take the picture, and then feel guilty about dunking on him so many times. — Shaquille O'Neal

Faith, family, academics and then sports was the order of priorities in my family. My parents really stuck to these principles when raising me and my two brothers. As long as we took care of everything, they let us play as much basketball as we wanted. — Jeremy Lin

When we got back to the house Logan grabbed his basketball, threw it really hard against the hallway wall, knocked the framed family photo to the floor-it didn't break, he didn't pick it up-and left with a couple of his friends. Thebes picked up the photo, hung it back on the wall, sighed heavily like she'd travelled to every corner of the world, on her knees, with a knife in her back and a boa constrictor wrapped around her chest, and then made us a couple of blueberry smoothies. — Miriam Toews

As I look back on the day I signed my professional contract in 1973, I've never gone to sleep wondering if I could pay the bills or take care of my family. That's what basketball has done for me. It's given me the greatest of thrills from high school to college to the Olympics to coaching to broadcasting. — Doug Collins

I like the nucleus that we have. I'm excited. I want to be here as long as possible. It's like family. I love being here. — Kevin Durant

My family was poor, my father drove a cab for a living, but we felt normal because everybody else was in the same boat. — Bob Cousy

'Family Ties' was a very successful situation comedy. And, in almost every respect, it functioned on a day to day basis like a well-run, well conditioned basketball team. The show was performed live each week in front of a studio audience on Friday night. — Gary David Goldberg

In the next 15 or 20 years, I hope I'll be the richest man in the world. That's one of my goals. I want to be a billionaire. I want to get to a position where generation on generation don't have to worry about nothing. I don't want family members from my kids to my son's kids to never have to worry. And I can't do that now just playing basketball. — LeBron James

And the plunder was not just of Prince alone. Think of all the love poured into him. Think of the tuitions for Montessori and music lessons. Think of the gasoline expended, the treads worn carting him to football games, basketball tournaments, and Little League ... Think of soccer balls, science kits, chemistry set, racetracks, and model trains. Think of all the embraces, all the private jokes, customs, greetings, names, dreams, all the shared knowledge and capacity of a black family injected into that vessel of flesh and bone. And think of how that vessel was taken, shattered on the concrete, and all its holy contents, all that had gone into him, sent flowing back to the earth. — Ta-Nehisi Coates

Finally, the last point that can kill your spark is Isolation. As you grow older you will realize you are unique. When you are little, all kids want Ice cream and Spiderman. As you grow older to college, you still are a lot like your friends. But ten years later and you realize you are unique. What you want, what you believe in, what makes you feel, may be different from even the people closest to you. This can create conflict as your goals may not match with others. And you may drop some of them. Basketball captains in college invariably stop playing basketball by the time they have their second child. They give up something that meant so much to them. They do it for their family. But in doing that, the spark dies. Never, ever make that compromise. Love yourself first, and then others. — Chetan Bhagat

I'm conservative with my money. I'm the one who's got a family and I can't be playing basketball forever, so when I retire, I want to live on what I've made. — Moses Malone

My mom is real passionate and a family-first woman. She always told me that just because I can shoot a basketball better than someone else, I shouldn't think that I'm better than them. I know if I change, my friends and family would lay me down. She just wants to see her kids do right. — Derrick Rose

I'm a Christian first. I'm a family guy second. As much as I like coaching, as much as I like basketball, it's third, fourth, or fifth down the line. — Steve Alford

Racing is not football or baseball or basketball where you can do it yourself. If you're good in high school, you just shine. (But in racing) you have to have a family behind you. — Trevor Bayne

The gym teacher's name was Mr. Caruso. Mr. Caruso did
not speak English. He spoke 'Gym.' One day I was playing
basketball and Mr. Caruso told me I would have to get
an athletic supporter. He didn't express himself exactly
that way, though. He said, 'Hey, you, one day you're gonna
go up for a rebound and the family jewels aren't gonna
go with ya.' I had no idea what he was talking about.
Next day I showed up for practice without my watch and
my mezuzah. He said, 'Did ya take care of the family jewels?'
I said, 'I left 'em in my locker.' Took us a half hour to
revive Mr. Caruso. — Tommy Lasorda

People that don't know me think that basketball is my life 24/7. Trust me, there is much more to my life. My number one priority in my life is my family. — Dick Vitale

Every time I was playing basketball, I felt sick to my stomach. I didn't realize that feeling was having to leave my family - having to leave my sister, who can't even communicate with me when I'm gone. — Elena Delle Donne

My family didn't have very much money, so ballet wasn't even on my radar; I just found it randomly when I was 13 at a Boys & Girls Club. We were practicing in a basketball court in gym clothes with some old socks on. Even though it terrified me at first, I found that I really liked it. — Misty Copeland

If a farmer and his family can get up at 5:30 every morning to milk cows, surly we can get up at that time to practice basketball. — Don Meyer

Why would I want to help them (the T -Wolves) win a title? They're not doing anything for me. I'm at risk. I have a lot of risk here. I got my family to feed. — Latrell Sprewell

I tried to teach them [his sons] that about the importance of self-discipline, and that the culture of yes is built on a foundation of no. — Bill Walton

Spend time with your family and try to spend time doing things that you enjoy doing other than basketball. — Elena Delle Donne

There's more to life than basketball. The most important thing is your family and taking care of each other and loving each other no matter what. — Stephen Curry

My spiritual journey really started when I was a sophomore in High School. I came home from basketball practice one rainy evening and a friend of the family was waiting in the living room for me. He said he just wanted to talk to me for a minute or two. We went down stairs and he posed this question to me; "Michael, If you were to die tonight and to stand before God, why should He let you into heaven? — Michael Richard Stosic

The NBA is a big family, and I think of all these rookies as my brothers. I still believe I am blue collar among the All-Stars. — Yao Ming

Basketball is my passion, I love it. But my family and friends mean everything to me. That's what's important. I need my phone so I can keep in contact with them at all times. — LeBron James

People really don't care, in some ways, that you have a family. With a high profile job like I have, they just want you to win basketball games. You can do that and still keep your family together. I try the best I can to be at the basketball practices or tennis practices or recitals. In my first year at Dallas my (then 11-year old) son Avery Jr., said, "You know daddy, you're still the best coach in the NBA." I was like, "But I haven't won a playoff game yet." And he said, "That's okay. You're still my daddy." That makes you feel good. — Avery Johnson

The problem with kids these days is they don't have enough fun stuff to do. When I was stationed with my family in Germany, youth basketball programs gave me something to strive to do my best at. — Shaquille O'Neal