Coach Kenzie Krowiorz: STUDENT Athletes
Every coach loves the game that they coach and that is always a common denominator. But if I did not have these great relationships with young men and women, I would not be coaching.
Coach Kenzie Krowiorz is a young, caring, and passionate coach who was been able to quickly move up throughout the levels of basketball. Coach Krowiorz started when he was an undergraduate student at Southwest Minnesota State. At that time, he coached in an extremely competitive youth basketball league.
From there, during his senior year, he helped out with the Women’s Basketball Team at Southwest Minnesota State as an advanced scout. One thing that he quickly learned about coaching during this time was that he cared too much on winning when he coached on the youth level, and not enough on building meaningful relationships.
After graduation, he was at Iowa Lakes Community College as a graduate assistant for a brief period of time. In this experience, he was under an extremely great and influential Head Coach, in Coach Larson. In fact, he was able to get Coach Krowiorz connected with one of his former graduate assistants who was able to get a job at Presentation College. As a result, Coach Krowiorz was able to land his first role as an assistant coach on the college level. He did this for 2 seasons and worked within the admissions during this past school year.
During this past March, coach Krowiorz accepted his first role as a College Head Coach for Hibbing Community College.
Today’s All In Takeaways are around helping student athletes, assistant coaches, and Coach Krowiorz’s keys for building team culture.
All In Takeaway #1: Helping the Student Athletes Grow in EVERY Area
In the college game, we are going to get better as players and get better as young men. So that when we graduate, we are in the best position that we can be in.
This is the mindset that Coach Krowiorz wants his athletes to have. For Coach Krowiorz, working in the admissions throughout the past year has allowed him to help the athletes make an easier transition into college for the first time. For many of the athletes at his program, they are coming in as first-generation college students. Coach Krowiorz is constantly taking advantage of every opportunity that he can to help the athletes grow into a true professional within whatever career they aspire to be in.
All In Takeaway #2: The Assistant Coach to Head Coach/Athletes IDEAL Relationship
Sometimes you will hear guys say that it is the ‘head coach’s staff.’ For me, I do not think of it that way. It is not that a person is working for me, rather, it is that we are working together.
Additionally, Coach Krowiorz explained how the assistant to player relationship has to be a close one. They need to immerse themselves into helping the student athletes. The athletes are going to want to learn as much as they can. It is part of every coach’s role to help them in their process of growth.
All In Takeaway #3: Coach Krowiorz’s 3 Keys for Building Team Culture
According to Coach Krowiorz, the first key is being intentional about touching base with your student athletes. Whether this is meeting in person, a quick phone call, or text message, coaches MUST touch base with their athletes at least once a week in order to build a strong team culture. The second key is emphasizing growth and development in every facet. Whether this is basketball, academically, socially, or another area, there is always a need for growth. In Coach Krowiorz’s situation, a lot of his players are coming from a program where they were the best player on the team, so this is a completely new situation for them.
The last and MOST important key is building meaningful relationships. As coach Krowiorz has moved throughout his coaching career, he has become more and more understanding of the importance of relationships. This helps the growth of the athletes on AND off the court. Coach Krowiorz is BIG ON RELATIONSHIPS.
If you do not have good relationships with people, it will be hard to take constructive criticism and growth from them.
Currently, Coach Krowiorz is preparing for his first season as the Head Coach for the Hibbing Community College’s Men’s Basketball Team. As they have 8 returning players from the previous season, it will be exciting to see where Coach Krowiorz and the Hibbing’s Men’s Basketball Team are able to fair in the 2022-2023 season. Go Hibbing!
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