National Championship Quotes

We won the national championship. We went 40-0 – the first men’s or women’s team in history to ever do that.

Sure, the Super Bowl is the greatest prize in our sport. But winning a national championship. That’s pretty darn great.

When I was young, I never dreamed about winning a national championship. I didn’t even play basketball. But I was tall. And long. And had large hands. I was made for the game. It found me later in life, compared to most collegiate athletes.

The one I was driving for at the time, Nissan, they pulled out after they won the championship, because it was costing millions of pounds to do a national championship and ok, that might be ok when you’re doing an international championship, but not for a national one.

I think when you have a National Championship Game, a Super Bowl, a Final Four, a World Series, I don’t see why there is any reason to pick out one individual as the MVP because it is about a team winning a championship. Maybe that best explains what I believe in at the core in my work as a broadcaster.

Once you win a National Championship, how do you do that again? How do you get the passion to do that again? We won it again right away, the next year. A lot of it had to do with the fact that I didn’t give myself an opportunity to enjoy the first one.

When I went to Baylor on a basketball scholarship – and when I thought about the future as a freshman – one achievement I wanted more than any individual award was a national championship.

There’s three banners I want to hang – ACC regular championship, ACC tournament championship, and, of course, the national championship.

We just want to win the natty – the national championship – and that’s starts with a team, not just one person.

To win a national championship, you’ve got to be a little lucky.

There’s no greater feeling, I would imagine, than winning a national championship in that one year and then hopefully going to the NBA.

Not many people do what Jameis Winston did: first year as a starter winning a national championship, only one loss in his two years as a starter. He’s got great charisma. He’s polarizing for some people, but he’s a rare talent.

I wanted to win an SEC championship and a national championship. Those are the main goals.

I’ve always won. I’ve won the state championship, national championship, all that stuff.

Seattle is very similar to Minneapolis. I like the culture; I like the people. I raced a bike and won a national championship on Lake Washington in 1977, so I’ve had a connection there for a long time.

Of course my goal at Duke was to win the national championship, but we were shorthanded, and lost one of our big guys that was very important to the team. By the end of the season we only played about six guys. But we tried our hardest and did our best and overall had a successful season.

Somebody asked me – you know, how come it took you so long to win a national championship? And I said, ‘I’m a slow learner; but you notice when I learn something, I have it down pretty good.’

When I talk about a successful program, define that. It’s not just winning the national championship every year because nobody can do that.

Our goal is to win the conference championship and go to the playoff and win the national championship and we recruit with that attitude.

When you start using terms like national championship and playoffs, that’s very rare air.

If you win a National Championship, or you win two, people think you have not only seen the Holy Grail, but you’ve embraced it. Basically, I do what a lot of people do, but I’ve been able to win.

I think Jarrett Lee is much better than people give him credit for. I think he’s good enough to lead this team to a national championship.

Sometimes fans… they want more and more and more, and they think you win a national championship every year. It doesn’t work that way.

My defense is a criticism, but we won a national championship at Duke, so it wasn’t that bad.

There are a lot of great players that never got a chance to play for a national championship. And I got a chance to play for two.

During my 40-year coaching career at West Point, Indiana and Texas Tech, my teams reached the Final Four on five occasions, winning the national championship three times.

The national championship for Syracuse in 2003 will always be the high-water mark for me. That was my alma mater, my team, my players, our fans. That remains the top experience of my basketball life.

A lot of people talk about the Fab Five, and they were wonderful, one of the best teams you’ll ever see in college basketball. But the ’89 team is the best one to ever play at Michigan in my opinion because they won the national championship. Winning a championship is winning a championship.

I feel like I’ve always been doubted or slighted. Let’s be honest. When you’re a walk-on, you don’t start for a No. 1 team, a national championship contender. You just don’t. A walk-on is a guy who plays scout team, who’s just happy to be on the team.

When your are playing for the national championship, it’s not a matter of life or death. It’s more important than that.

I got everything I wanted out of Texas. Obviously, you’d love to win more. You’d love to win a national championship and compete at that level. But as far as relationships and development, I couldn’t be happier.

Honestly, the Carolina games I played in every year were more intense than the national championship games I played in – they had a better environment.

I want to win a national championship; that’s been my dream since I was a child.

There are some real memorable highlights in my history that, in my mind, are such milestones. Winning a national championship in college and being on the Olympic platform getting a gold medal. Visiting the Hall of Fame and going into the Hall of Fame.

They said ‘the SEC this, the SEC that.’ I said, ‘You talk like all 14 teams are this, that and the other thing.’ I said, ‘You have to give credit to the first one or two that have won the national championship, but don’t act like they’re all doing that.’

I got to a point where I was doing county-level shows, but it was dressage that I really loved where, effectively, the horses are dancing. At one point, I was a groom for Hannah Esberger, who has competed for Great Britain and has seven national championship titles.

I might not have a conference championship or a national championship as a head coach, but I had the recruiting factor.

I only won one national championship.

I’ve dreamed of winning a national championship and I’ve dreamed of being an Olympian.

My biggest frustration with the Heisman is it’s become the MVP of the national champion, or a team going to the National Championship game. That’s what it’s turned into. If you’re not undefeated, you’re out of the running.