Knute Quotes & Sayings

When you were riding on the crest of a wave, youwere most likely to be missing out on something. — Knute Rockne

If the coach insists upon hard play, but clean play, the team will do likewise. — Knute Rockne

Vicksburg lies on top of a bluff on the east side of a large tongue of land jutting out into the Mississippi. — Knute Nelson

The secret is to work less as individuals and more as a team. As a coach, I play not my eleven best, but my best eleven. — Knute Rockne

I enjoy talking to my football men and my chemistry classes and I feel sure that they are quite interested in what I have to say. — Knute Rockne

One man practicing sportsmanship is far better than a hundred teaching it. — Knute Rockne

Drink the first. Sip the second slowly. Skip the third. — Knute Rockne

It is with this as with religion: one usually believes what he has been taught. — Knute Nelson

I've found that prayers work best when you have big players. — Knute Rockne

Mess is fairly good. It is like what is found in American hotels except for cake and pie. — Knute Nelson

On the road we're somebody else's guests and we play in a way that they're
not going to forget we visited them. — Knute Rockne

The best thing I ever learned in life was that things have to be worked for. A lot of people seem to think there is some sort of magic in making a winning football team. There isn't, but there's plenty of work. — Knute Rockne

Yes, I now that you feel you are not strong enough. That's what the enemy thinks too. But we're gonna fool them. — Knute Rockne

One loss is good for the soul, Too many losses is not good for the coach. — Knute Rockne

What is best and most necessary usually happens. — Knute Nelson

Four years of football are calculated to breed in the average man more of the ingredients of success in life than almost any academic course he takes.
-Knute Rockne — Knute Rockne

In the midst of these hard times it is our good health and good sleep that are enjoyable. — Knute Nelson

Build up your weaknesses until they become your strong points. — Knute Rockne

We set the town on fire and burned down every house as a warning to other small towns along the river. — Knute Nelson

There is not economy in getting cheap service or equipment. Buy the best and cry only once. — Knute Rockne

As a journalist, I can also now understand his (Patrick O'Brian's)idea that the Q&A is not particularly civilized - let alone a sports media press scrum. The formats don't necessarily further understanding between two people. It is not always true conversation - a discussion that unearths nuggets of insight. It too often seems like interviewers are running through a pre-fab checklist, looking for a Tweetable quote, trolling for a gaffe, or ticking off pre-conceived points like those on a medical checklist at the doctor's office. It can feel invasive, like a trip to the proctologist - in front of an audience. — Knute Berger

You know, I've been attending so many banquets that I know what they're going to serve before I get there. — Knute Rockne

Courage means being afraid to do something, but still doing it. — Knute Rockne

Football is a game played with arms, legs and shoulders but mostly from the neck up. — Knute Rockne

I'm getting sick and tired of doing anything half-way. — Knute Rockne

That death was near, I suppose I believed, but I saw it only as a rest after the day's work. — Knute Nelson

Now I'm going to tell you something I've kept to myself for years. None of you ever knew George Gipp. He was long before your time, but you all know what a tradition he is at Notre Dame. And the last thing he said to me, "Rock," he said, "sometime when the team is up against it and the breaks are beating the boys, tell them to go out there with all they've got and win just one for the Gipper. I don't know where I'll be then, Rock," he said, "but I'll know about it and I'll be happy."
— Knute Rockne

I don't like to lose, and that isn't so much because it is just a football game, but because defeat means the failure to reach your objective. I don't want a football player who doesn't take defeat to heart, who laughs it off with the thought, "Oh, well, there's another Saturday." The trouble in American life today, in business as well as in sports, is that too many people are afraid of competition. The result is that in some circles people have come to sneer at success if it costs hard work and training and sacrifice. — Knute Rockne

We count on winning. And if we lose, don't beef. And the best way to prevent beefing is - don't lose. — Knute Rockne

The secret of winning is working more as a team, less as individuals. — Knute Rockne

An automobile goes nowhere efficiently unless it has a quick, hot spark to ignite things, to set the cogs of the machine in motion. So I try to make every player on my team feel he's the spark keeping our machine in motion. — Knute Rockne

Never tell 'em how many lettermen you've got coming back. Tell 'em how many you lost. — Knute Rockne

Winning to often is as disastrous as losing too often. Both get the same results, the falling off of the public's enthusiasm. — Knute Rockne

Show me a gracious loser and I'll show you a failure. — Knute Rockne

You must not forget that you have been given worldly means to use and employ against human arrogance and wrong. — Knute Nelson

The scene was not a happy one yet we looked upon it in the cold stoical spirit of a soldier; a slight chilling pang and then a return soul and body to the enemy before us. — Knute Nelson

Providence has given the United States the duty of extending Christian civilization. We come as ministering angels, not despots. — Knute Nelson

The morning we left South Bend, every student and professor was out of bed long before breakfast and marched downtown accompanying the team to the railroad station. It was the first time I'd seen anything like this mass hysteria generated on the Notre Dame campus over a football game. — Knute Rockne

Gen. Banks has issued an order for the instruction of Negro children. Schoolhouses are to be built or rented and Teachers hired for this purpose, and the farmers and planters are to pay the Taxes in support of this. — Knute Nelson

You say that your hope is in God, and he will, I am sure, stand by you. But you must not forget that you have been given worldly means to use and employ against human arrogance and wrong; it is necessary to see such things with a broad mind in order to oppose them. — Knute Nelson

Play like you're positive on the victory, even though they're leading big now. — Knute Rockne

It isn't necessary to see a good tackle. You can hear it. — Knute Rockne

A coach's greatest asset is his sense of responsibility - the reliance placed on him by his players. — Knute Rockne

Make the present good, and the past will take care of itself. — Knute Rockne

Win or lose, do it fairly. — Knute Rockne

If winning isn't everything why bother to keep the score? — Knute Rockne

The only qualifications for a lineman are to be big and dumb. To be a back, you only have to be dumb. — Knute Rockne

Man is remembered by his deeds. — Knute Nelson

I have no desire at all to become the winningest coach at Notre Dame. The record belongs to Knute Rockne or some other coach in the future. — Lou Holtz

At home we're the hosts, and I never liked the idea of being embarrased in front of our friends. — Knute Rockne

Win one for the Gipper. — Knute Rockne

No star playing, just football. — Knute Rockne

If we're a hit, let 'em say anything they want. — Knute Rockne

Generalities don't count and won't help you in football. — Knute Rockne

I would prefer being in a hard battle; however, I will be satisfied with whatever happens to me in this war, if only the country comes out of this peril safe and to the satisfaction of the finest and best government on earth. — Knute Nelson

Let's win one for the Gipper. — Knute Rockne

The essence of football was blocking, tackling, and execution based on timing, rhythm and deception. — Knute Rockne

There is no need for me continuing unless I'm able to improve. — Knute Rockne

It is in Virginia and Georgia that the war now rages and where it will continue; for at these points - Richmond and Atlanta - the enemy's main strength is concentrated. — Knute Nelson

But it is neither cannon nor bayonet that will do the worst damage to this city. No, this place will remember the war against our government just as long as there are inhabitants here. — Knute Nelson

I know that money speaks more loudly than need. — Knute Nelson

Leaders are like eagles ... they don't flock. You'll find them one at a time. — Knute Rockne

Show me a good and gracious loser and I will show you a failure. — Knute Rockne