How you win even when you don’t is a story about my husband’s college football coach, Carm Cozza, the winningest coach in Ivy League football history. At the end of his career, Carm re-learned one of the most important lessons of his life. It’s a lesson most leaders know, but forget when they’re under pressure to meet the numbers, to win. The pressure rarely lets up.
Carm died in January 2018. On November 10, 2018 at a tribute in his honor, players shared stories about the coach, the leader, the human being. Here are just a few snippets.
I woke up from surgery after a terrible car accident the day before a big game, and there was Coach Cozza sitting by my side. He was the first person I saw and he showed every day until I left the hospital.
At age 60 I had hip surgery. When I was in the recovery room one of the nurse’s said, “Somebody called for you during the surgery. He wanted to know how you were doing. He said his name was Carm Cozza.”
My father died on a Friday. The funeral was Sunday. Carm got on a plane immediately after Saturday’s game to be there with me.
I never heard him get angry, shout or swear at one his players.
Fierce Competitor
Unmatched Integrity
Loved his players
Carm had opportunities to coach the Big 10 but chose to stay at Yale for over 30 years. He believed in the dual mission of developing student athletes. He loved his Yale family.
Carm Cozza Learns How You Win Even When You Don’t, by Don Granger
Introduction
Don Granger grew up in New Haven and on Yale football. He eventually played for Yale under Coach Cozza. By 1998 Don was a Hollywood executive who had the opportunity to make a film about his former coach.
Don’s story
It was the summer of 1998. I settled back into my chair as an executive of Paramount Pictures, ready to hear a promised “terrific football pitch” from screenwriter Doug Magee. He wanted to write the quintessential film about an American college football coach who shaped young men’s lives over the course of several generations.
I presumed Doug’s agents thought I’d be easy pickings, because I played college football.
“What’s the guy’s name? Where did he coach?”
“You’ve never heard of him, but I swear you have to hear his story. His name is Carm Cozza and he coached Yale for 32 years. He just retired a couple of years ago.”
“Yeah. . . I know who Carm Cozza is.”
Doug’s eyes lit up. He was preaching to the converted. Although I had not read Carm’s book, “True Blue: The Carm Cozza Story”, I bought the rights sight unseen. I made a deal for Carm’s life rights and for Doug to write the screenplay.
As with the vast majority of Hollywood projects, this one unfortunately never got made. But I had a great time talking with Carm about the story we’d chosen to tell.
A Tribute to Carm
Fast forward to 2018. A tribute to Carm is being planned for the weekend of the Yale Princeton game. As invitations and players’ storied memories fill my inbox, I take out the 1998 screenplay and read it again for the first time in 20 years. I’m surprised by how well it holds up.
It follows Carm during the last two weeks of his last season, leading up to the 1996 Princeton and Harvard games. He is a man consumed with desire to win these final games. Carm is embittered at his upcoming retirement, given Yale’s recent record as compared to his previous decades as coach. He’s unable to escape the media coverage and alumni crush about the end of his career. He’s overwhelmingly concerned, deep competitor that he is, about losing these final games as Yale’s head coach.
Yale loses to Princeton. During the countdown to the Harvard game, Carm presses the team and himself harder and harder. He flashes back to key memories, relationships, and star players he helped grow throughout his career.
Yale loses to Harvard, and Carm too is at a loss. These final two defeats feel like a blemish on his record, which, in fact, has contained more losses than wins for the past decade. He’s a loser in his mind’s eye and has little interest in attending the final post season gala in his honor. During the hours before the dinner Carm goes to the deserted Bowl alone. He sits in the gloomy stands and looks around at the 80,000 empty seats. The man, the coach and leader, is sad and angry that it all ends this way.
Then, a few players start to take the field. They’re alumni dressed for Carm’s dinner who snuck into the Bowl to play some touch. More former players join the scene. The group includes men in their 50s, 40s, 30s, 20s, and seniors who just played their final season. As they horse around in the wet and cold, Carm watches from the shadows.
Unseen, Carm returns home. He’s pensive as Jean and his daughters share a more positive perspective on his career. His driver for the evening does likewise. He tells Carm about the effect he had on a young man, the driver’s son, who did not go to Yale, but worked at the Bowl. Carm remains downhearted.
As he enters the building, Carm hears the buzz of the crowd in the banquet hall. He prepares to enter. Jean leans in and whispers, “Quite a family, huh, Carm? Three daughters, two thousand sons.”
Carm opens the doors, gazes into the room and realizes what everyone’s been trying to tell him. His record is not Wins and Losses according to numbers on a score board, Ivy League Titles, Harvard victories, or NFL draftees.
His record is us. For we are all his sons. The number is 2000.
Don Granger ‘85
Tell Me Dear Leader
Who will you be to the 10, 20, 50, 100, 1000, 5000 or more lives you touch?
And what must you do to be that leader, that human being?