While sports can build leadership, resilience, discipline, and confidence, they can also create emotional anxiety that many athletes struggle to talk about openly. The reality is that athletes do not stop being human when they step onto the court. Human first athlete second.
Supporting athlete mental health means creating safe environments, both at home and on the court where athletes feel safe, supported, and valued beyond performance.
Supporting Athletes On The Court
Young athletes are constantly learning, and with learning comes failure and hard moments. When athletes fear disappointing others every time they make a mistake, sports can quickly shift from something they love to something they fear. Athletes perform best when they know mistakes are allowed.
The environment surrounding an athlete has a major impact on their confidence and emotional well-being. Coaches, teammates, and parents all contribute to the emotional culture athletes experience during practices and games.
Supporting athletes on the court can look like:
- Encouraging effort and growth over perfection.
- Helping athletes respond to mistakes with a positive perspective.
- Celebrating character, teamwork, and leadership alongside performance.
- Creating spaces where athletes feel comfortable and safe communicating honestly through big and small problems that may arise.
- Recognizing signs of burnout, anxiety, or emotional exhaustion.
Positive statements to help athletes after a game or practice can sound like:
- “One game does not define you.”
- “You are allowed to have hard days.”
- “I care about you beyond your skills.”
- “I always love watching you play.”
- “Today was a game where you learned a lot.”
Athletes often remember how the people around them made them feel, rather than what the score was or even if they won or lost a game. Our goal is to always make them feel seen, heard, and safe.
Supporting Athletes At Home
Home should be a place where athletes can take a breath from the pressures they may feel in sports.
Many athletes already place enormous pressure on themselves internally. They replay mistakes, compare themselves to teammates, worry about expectations, and fear failure more than adults may realize. Because of this, the conversations at home matter deeply.
Parent/caregiver support at home can look like:
-Listening without immediately trying to fix everything. Young athletes may just need someone to listen to think things through before they are told how to handle a situation. And this is how they learn. If we try to fix things for them at any opportunity, then their problem solving skills are only going to be hindered as they get older.
-Avoiding constant post-game analysis. I know, you just sat in the stands or even coached your child through the entire game. And now you may want to to tell them everything they need to continue to work on. But, the time is not now for this to happen. Be patient and wait for them to speak up. This may happen in a few hours or even in a couple days. But, let them think things through on their own before the analysis begins.
-Asking questions beyond sports. Make connections with your child outside of sports. They may not want to talk about sports all the time and that is okay. Talk about other interests they may have, school activities, or make family plans outside of sports. We need to also place importance with our athletes on who they are outside of their sport. We need to teach them that beyond sports, they are great people.
-Encouraging balance and rest. Just as we need a lot of rest and sometimes need to reset, as do our athletes. Teach them how you wind down from the day. Or what makes you feel best after a really hard day. These important tools will be carried with them for the rest of their life.
-Watching for emotional changes like withdrawal, frustration, or loss of confidence. The mental health of our athletes at a young age is critical. Talk about mental health within your home. This can be related to sports or not. Create an atmosphere of honesty and vulnerability that they feel safe coming to anyone in the home if they are having confusing or difficult feelings.
Positive conversations to help athletes at home can sound like:
- “How are you feeling lately?”
- “Sometimes I feel anxious or stressed with things at work. Do you have any of those feelings when you are playing?”
- “I am so proud of all the hard work that you have been putting into your game. But, what are you proud of ?”
- “What are you proud of outside of your sport?”
- “How can I best support you, so you feel confident on and off the court?”
The Main Goal: Creating a Healthier Sports Culture for our Young Athletes:
The goal is not raising perfect athletes. The goal is raising healthy, confident, resilient young people who know their worth extends far beyond their skills as a player.
Because long after seasons end, athletes may not remember every win or loss, but they will remember the environments, conversations, and people who helped them feel seen, supported, and valued along the way.
We need to learn how to be these people for our athletes.
