Heisman winner, ex-Knicks guard's advice to kids: 'Run your own race'
BOSTON – There were so many opportunities for Charlie Ward, as he grew into who he is today, to look around and take in everything.
There was Charlie Sr., the high school football coach who was a father figure to his players to the point where he washed their clothes.
There was College Football Hall of Famer Bobby Bowden, who would empower his assistant coaches with a task, then allow them to be themselves and coach Florida State’s players.
And as Ward moved to professional basketball, first as a player and then a coach, he watched Jeff Van Gundy and Gregg Popovich, the last two head coaches in a New York Knicks-San Antonio Spurs NBA Finals.
Van Gundy offered to stay late to rebound as a Knicks assistant coach and pored over film to help put together a detailed game plan. Later as a part of Van Gundy’s staff with the Houston Rockets, Ward was the one who did scouting reports and worked out with the younger guys on the roster.
Popovich, for whom Ward played in 2003-04, challenged the top and bottom players on the roster with equal fervor.
“All those things started to formulate into what I currently do,” says Ward, now 55.
San Antonio hosted Game 1 of the NBA Finals as Knicks fans made their presence felt on the road.
See the familiar faces supporting New York during the opening game of the series.
Above, American actor and comedian Ben Stiller reacts during Game 1 of the 2026 NBA Finals between the San Antonio Spurs and the New York Knicks at Frost Bank Center on June 03, 2026, in San Antonio, Texas.
San Antonio hosted Game 1 of the NBA Finals as Knicks fans made their presence felt on the road.
See the familiar faces supporting New York during the opening game of the series.
Above, American actor and comedian Ben Stiller reacts during Game 1 of the 2026 NBA Finals between the San Antonio Spurs and the New York Knicks at Frost Bank Center on June 03, 2026, in San Antonio, Texas.
Actor Tracy Morgan in the first half during Game 1 of the 2026 NBA Finals at Frost Bank Center.
Former New York Knicks Patrick Ewing reacts before Game 1 of the 2026 NBA Finals at Frost Bank Center.
Former NBA player, Shaquille O’Neal enters the arena for Game 1 of the 2026 NBA Finals at Frost Bank Center.
American actor and comedian Ben Stiller reacts during Game 1 of the 2026 NBA Finals between the San Antonio Spurs and the New York Knicks at Frost Bank Center on June 03, 2026, in San Antonio, Texas.
Spike Lee participates in the ESPN pre-game show before Game 1 of the 2026 NBA Finals at Frost Bank Center on June 03, 2026, in San Antonio, Texas.
American comedian and actor Tracy Morgan participates in the ESPN pre-game show before Game 1 of the 2026 NBA Finals between the San Antonio Spurs and the New York Knicks at Frost Bank Center on June 3, 2026, in San Antonio, Texas.
Through all these interactions, he was creating the narrative of his life. Ward, who won a national title as Florida State’s quarterback, also became the only Heisman Trophy winner to play in the NBA (for 11 seasons as a guard).
Then he went on to become a high school and college basketball coach.
“I’ve been under a lot of different types of coaching, and I’ve learned from each one of them something to do and something not to do. Because that’s very important,” he told the audience at last month’s Project Play Summit in Boston. “And at the end of the day, one of the things I also have learned is that every child that you coach is different. And we have to find the style to be the help to support them be the best that they can be.”
Ward, who led Florida State University High School in Tallahassee to a state boys basketball title in 2022, just finished his first season as the men’s basketball coach at Florida A&M. He extolls the values sports brought to him as much as his accolades, and plans to participate in a new initiative with Heisman and the Aspen Institute to develop high school captains into civic leaders.
“You teach life through sports because there’s a choice to be made, and there’s an outcome,” he tells USA TODAY Sports. “There’s a consequence. And there are opportunities. Sometimes we take advantage of them, sometimes we don’t. And regardless of what the outcome is, we all have to learn from those outcomes.”
Ward, a father of three, spoke with us about how his remarkable story can help young athletes and their parents navigate their own journeys.
Ward’s father, Charlie Sr., was a highly successful football player at Florida A&M and then threw himself into his role as a high school football coach in Georgia. He gave his players rides, took them out to eat, even gave them money if they needed it. Young Charlie went to work with him.
His parents held him out of organized sports until fifth or sixth grade, when he played baseball (Ward was drafted in the 18th round by the New York Yankees out of Florida State despite not playing baseball at FSU).
The reason, he says, is they didn’t want him to get burned out by high school. He admits they didn’t have the intel parents have today, and there weren’t good developmental sports around yet like flag football.
Ward had superior hand-eye coordination, and a lot of sports came easy to him. But he also loved them deeply, and, looking back, doesn’t think he would have grown tired of them at an early age. He went on to play four years on Florida State’s basketball team, helping to lead it to a Sweet 16 and Elite 8 in back-to-back years.
“The reason why I chose to play two sports in college was because I enjoyed it, regardless of how physically demanding it was, time consuming,” he says.
But he didn’t force sports on his three kids: Caleb, 26; Hope, 22; and Joshua, 17.
“My whole mission as a father was to make sure that I didn’t push my kids to do something that they didn’t want to do,” he says.
Sports came easily for Ward because he didn’t see them as a chore. No one had to tell him to go shoot baskets during football season.
When he coached in high school, he encouraged his guys to play multiple sports because it gave them opportunities to see if there was something else they wanted to do and to interact with physical and mental toughness through a different lens.
When he played basketball, Ward says, he would run through people with a football mentality.
“I tell our guys, ‘Get in that weight room, put on that muscle (so) you don’t mind running into people. It doesn’t hurt. It’s like a bump,’ ” he says. “That’s kind of what you look for, the mindset (more) than anything else.”
But Ward doesn’t even hold the basketball players he recruits today to his own standard of being multisport athletes. He understands the physical demands of it and that we are in an era of specialization.
“What it requires if you play multiple sports is you have to do extra,” Ward says. “And so if you’re not willing to do extra, then you’re not a good candidate.”
His son, Caleb, had a stint as football a player at Florida State, but his father says if he and his siblings were interested in doing extra work with sports, they had to come to him.
“If they didn’t have the desire to want to get up and go out and improve, I wasn’t gonna be that driving force to make them do it,” Charlie Ward says. “Because at some point you’re making people do things, it’s only gonna go so far and then there’s gonna be some regret on their part. And then I had a double whammy because of the accolades I was able to achieve, I got that from the family naturally, they didn’t want to walk in those footsteps.
“Even though I didn’t say anything, I didn’t push it, that was just that pressure and expectation on them to be like their dad or your brother, whomever it may be. And so my whole thought process around that is just, ‘If you’re gonna do it, you’re gonna do it.’ ”
Our impulse as sports parents is to put our children in the best situation to improve. We see constant upheaval on youth teams. A transfer portal in college sports where players switch teams annually only confirms our anxiety.
But to Ward, and to youth coaches, you will find that loyalty matters. In today’s flighty college sports landscape, he looks for transfers who have been to one, or possibly two, schools, “because they at least show some form of loyalty.
“I’m not saying they won’t move again but if you can stay somewhere in this day and age longer than one year, to me, that’s loyalty,” he says. “I know that they’re gonna be there for the long term. And that doesn’t mean three years, four years, because there are a lot of opportunities that may arise.”
The best coaches, youth and otherwise, will see the big picture and understand what the best chances are for your kid. Don’t be afraid to talk to them about fresh opportunities.
If they react harshly, they might be showing you their hand as someone you don’t want to be with your child several times per week.
“If another great opportunity arises, then I’m here for it,” Ward says. “Because that’s what life is. But we also want you to be loyal through the process when you’re there. Be present. Do the best you can do to help us be successful because at the end, we’re all successful if everyone gets an opportunity outside to move on, to do something different. So the goal is everyone be on the same page, believe in one another and all those things will definitely pay off in the end…
“The biggest attitude that we’re looking for is an attitude of work ethic: The mindset that I’ll do whatever. Not the entitlement mindset where I gotta play here.”
You might not remember that Ward started off as a punter at Florida State. He didn’t want to be one, but he had to wait to play quarterback, and it’s what the team needed. He punted 35 times as a freshman in 1989 and didn’t become the starter at quarterback until 1992.
In the meantime, he developed his skills at basketball, which ultimately turned out to be his lifetime sport.
Young athletes, no matter what they hear from the commotion at games, have the power to choose their own path. It isn’t always smooth.
“You gotta run your own race,” says Ward, who is on the advisory committee for AAU sports. “If I start looking at my neighbor, my neighbor’s son, my son, when they grew up together playing, and he goes off and he’s playing on one other team that may be a higher level, you think about, ‘How can I get to that level?’ (But) he may go up there and not get an opportunity to play.”
“We just have to run our own race and get to the place where we’re trying to get to about forcing ourselves to overspend or whatever to try to get there. A lot of parents, I think, they’re seeing who they want their child (to be), and then they’re willing to do whatever it takes to get there. And then they’re like $5,000 in the hole doing it.
“They’re spending a lot of money to get to these places and they’re spending for quite some time. And if that is what you feel is good for your child, to be able to get to wherever it is, if that’s your race, be fine with it. No complaining about, ‘Aw, this is $5,000.’ You have a choice where you want to put your child.”
Ward looks for players, he says, who “like to do whatever it takes. And that might not be long term, but in the short term, ‘If that’s what the team needs, I’ll do it.’ ”
“I tell my guys all the time, ‘People are willing to help you. But you gotta help yourself,’ ” he says. “You can’t just sit back in a corner (where) everybody’s coming to feed you. At some point, you’ve got to get up and start navigating your way because people are gonna stop feeding you, and you’re gonna be sitting there. … It could be very minimal. People just want to see you putting forth the effort to make it happen.”
He describes himself as an introvert. He would rather be at home than out in public.
“I got thrown into the fire as a quarterback of being in front of the media, being out in front, and that wasn’t my desire,” he says. “But I was a quarterback. And so I had to learn that part of it. I’m not always talking. I’m reserved, but I listen a lot. Sometimes I don’t respond but I hear. It drives my wife crazy because I hear her, but sometimes I don’t respond. So I’ve learned to have that happy medium … but that’s just been my nature.”
Ward and his wife, Tonja, are starting Champions Ranch in Tallahassee as a nonprofit to support youth and families. It will serve ages “99 to 1”, Ward says, from senior programming down to day care, offering sports, education and wellness such as doctor visits, a counseling center and a therapy clinic. On over 112 acres, it’s in the style of a college campus.
“The goal (is) to have this facility where you can get your tutoring, go to the doctor. You have sports training, you have needs,” Ward says. “Everything will be one-stop, as opposed to basketball practice over here in one spot, having to drop them off across town, then you’re going to a tutoring session over here.”
Youth sports is the catalyst. There will be fields, batting cages and an indoor turf barn, and the Wards are looking to build facilities for basketball and volleyball.
Ward believes, like many former professional athletes, that if you’re good enough to play professionally, you will be seen.
He spoke at the Project Play Summit in Boston as one of hundreds of coaches who extolled the values of playing sports for themselves, regardless of your end goal.
“It provides discipline,” he says. “It gives you a better understanding of how to prepare for whatever. It is an accountability measure. It teaches about commitment, because if you’re gonna good, you’ve gotta be committed to the process of being good. You gotta be consistent (and) have great effort. But then it also teaches you about how to execute. Because everything in life, you might have all the wisdom and knowledge to do something, but now you gotta go and execute it.
“And it teaches about relationships. How to be a good teammate. Because, in everything we do, we’re gonna be a part of a team.”
Borelli, aka Coach Steve, has been an editor and writer with USA TODAY since 1999. He spent 10 years coaching his two sons’ baseball and basketball teams. He and his wife, Colleen, are now sports parents for two high schoolers. His Coach Steve column is posted weekly. For his past columns, click here.
Got a question for Coach Steve you want answered in a column? Email him at sborelli@usatoday.com
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY Sports: Heisman winner, ex-Knick Charlie Ward to kids: ‘Run your own race’
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