Top 117 Quotes & Sayings by Jeff Van Gundy

Every team has leadership. The leadership is the best players. But there's positive leadership, and there's negative leadership.

I was asked to do something and represent my country. That's a great honor. This isn't about what it could do for me but what I could do for U.S.A. Basketball.

Life sort of works out the way it works out.

People talk about Kobe's 81-point game, the second-highest scoring game in NBA history. I saw the game. I don't care if it was 79, 81 - I just remember the game. I remember the moves. I remember the shots. I remember the beauty of it. The numbers? What he shot from the field? I don't care.

Providence had a graduate assistant job opening. They asked me if I wanted to apply, and I applied. That break right there put me in position to learn from great coaches. It really jump-started every other good break I ever had in coaching.

I think anybody confusing a system with a reason for success is making a huge mistake. Systems don't win games. Players do.

My intensity is my greatest strength. It's also my greatest weakness.

I love Joe Ingles. I think Joe Ingles is a tremendous glue player, terrific shooter, passer, defender.

Goaltending was brought in because of Mikan and Chamberlain. So rules do change for specific players, in concert with a need to stay up to date on how coaches are taking advantage of the rules.

It can get good quickly in this league, and it can get bad quickly.

I quit the Knicks, so I know what quitting is. I did. I quit. And it's something I regret to this day. I live with it every day, and I regret it. And I let my emotions come into it. And I was just emotionally spent. I made a bad decision, and I quit.

Among the hardest-working players I've ever been associated, Yao stands at the very top of the list. Beyond that, though, here's what truly separated him from everyone else: His ability to enjoy other people's successes.

If sports science really has a beat on what's healthy for the players, then they need to tell the league how many games that is healthy for players to play and then only play that many games.

If you coach, and coach every day, you should be getting better if you're self-evaluating and you've got people around you telling you the truth.

Whenever you are coaching, you are trying to get the most balanced team that you can: balance between defense, offense, and rebounding.

The beauty of growing up in a coaching family, particularly one that isn't at the very highest level, is that you get to be in the gym - that's where you grow up.

Are you playing for your teammates and coaches? That's how it should be.

Only once did someone talking about my appearance bother me.

Players and coaches alike, you sign up for 82 games. You get paid for 82.

Stop the nonsense about 'student-athlete.'

I'm not a positive guy.

Everyone's system in the NBA makes sense. It all comes down to the quality of player and the quality of execution.

There is a goodness about Yao that is unique, that never left him through all the pain and injuries and disappointments that accompanied his unprecedented accomplishments and successes.

I think fans oftentimes get an inferior product on back-to-back games, and I think that has to be the number one thing that gets addressed for the fans and for the players - the elimination or the drastic reduction of back-to-back games.

As great of a player as Yao was, he was kind and patient with everybody. He wasn't trying to feed an image or cultivate a brand or manipulate a public persona.

Everyone wants to focus on what Ben Simmons can't do, which is shoot and try to rush him into being a range shooter. I think Simmons in Philadelphia has done a good job in focusing what he does great versus what he doesn't do as well.

One of my college roommates was into The Police, and I got to like them. But I hear one of the guys left the band.

All the fascination with numbers conspires to make you forget the beauty of the game sometimes.

In one era, it's hard enough to compare people. But comparing people of different eras... that's next to impossible.

You have to be careful as a news organization that you don't fall into voluntary censorship, that you worry about offending your 'league partner.' I never worried about that. I worry about fans listening.

I don't ever remember wanting to do anything but coach. My dad obviously influenced me. But it wasn't because he sat there and drilled coaching stuff into our heads. We were on the bench keeping the scorebook and traveling with the team on weekends. It was such a great upbringing.

I don't know about any others, but coaching basketball is the only thing I can do.

While a guy may not be totally happy, he can be effective and do well for the team.

I don't like comparing people or teams.

My father and mother have given me so much love, so much support, that it would trivialize their parenthood if I would reduce it just to basketball. But my dad does call me before and after every game. And when we lost a game we shouldn't have, he told me it wasn't my fault. And I appreciated that, because he was trying to pick me up.

To me, it doesn't matter who's out there: NBA basketball is great - if teams are putting out their best players and they're competing to win.

My one suggestion going forward is, any felony committed against a woman should be a full-season suspension.

I had a great job with the Knicks.

Manu Ginobili - I like to watch him. I would pay to watch him play the game. He will try things that will drive a coach crazy, like a full-court bounce pass, but he has such a flair for the game. I love his energy and his spirit and his unpredictability.

There are a lot of young teams that all they are is young. That doesn't mean they have a chance to be good.

There are certain aspects that I miss of coaching. But you can't just pick out the good parts. You've got to be all-in and understand there's some negatives, too.

Systems are overrated; players are underrated.

It's hard enough to coach in this league when you're doing what you believe in. But when you have to try to coach something you may not be sold on, it becomes even more of a challenge. It's really hard.

As far as LeBron James, to me, he's on his way to carving out the very best career that's ever happened in the NBA.

I grew up dreaming about being an Olympic basketball player: Doug Collins getting smashed into the stanchion, making two free throws. Phil Ford and Mike O'Koren in 1976.

The public Yao was the private Yao: To his core, there was an unmistakable peace to him.

I think the beautiful part about Yao is that his main legacy won't be about the game. His legacy will be about helping people. His legacy will be taking on important world causes to better his world.

I think everyone talks about talent. It's really one of the most overused terms. It comes down to, do you play, and do you win? Talent is one factor, but certainly not the only one.

I enjoy watching Gregg Popovich-coached teams.

You start comparing people, and ultimately, somebody feels diminished.

I have known Marbury since he was in seventh grade, and I have always felt he is a hell of an NBA player.

You don't know a player until you coach him.

There are franchise players to build around that have championship-level talent, skill, basketball IQ, and character - it's hard to find those guys. Those guys are rare.

There have been people who said I was a Pat Riley clone. But I don't think that's true. While I did learn a lot from him, I could never be him. I mean, we even dress so differently.

If your best offensive players go down, all you can do is hang on.

To be successful in anything, you have to have a passion for it, and that leads to being enthusiastic and demanding. I didn't have it for history. So I wouldn't have been a good teacher in that area. But I had it for basketball. And that's what coaching is at every level: it's about teaching.

Why is UCLA and Georgia Tech in China to play a basketball game? Missing all that school, and then force-feeding their fans the idea of 'student-athletes.'

You can't hold up in a FIBA game if you don't have great competitive spirit.

I miss coaching - certain elements of coaching.

I like to watch anyone who has great competitive spirit and will: passionate teams.