Here is a list of the best basketball quotes of all time.
Some are from former NBA players (e.g. Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant); some are from current players (e.g. Steph Curry, Derrick Rose); and some are from legendary coaches (e.g. Phil Jackson, Mike Krzyzewski).
There’s a bit of everything:
- Motivational / Inspirational quotes
- Coaching quotes
- Funny quotes
- and more…
At the bottom of this post is a complete list of over 100 quotes that you can search and filter through.
Enjoy!
Motivational Basketball Quotes
Here are 5 of the best basketball quotes to get you motivated or inspired to improve your game and/or life.
There are a ton more quotes at the bottom of the page.
“You can’t get much done in life if you only work on the days when you feel good. “
Jerry West
“You must expect great things of yourself before you can do them.”
Michael Jordan
“Hard work beats talent when talent fails to work hard.”
Kevin Durant, quoting Tim Notke
“Success is not an accident, success is actually a choice.”
Steph Curry
“I’m still waiting for perfection. In the meantime, I’ll settle for persistence”
Bo Ryan
Basketball Coach Quotes
Here are five of the best quotes from famous basketball coaches like Phil Jackson, Gregg Popovich, and John Wooden.
“A coach is someone who can give correction without causing resentment.”
John Wooden
“Some say you have to use your five best players, but I found out you win with the five that fit together best as a team.”
Red Auerbach
“We believe in people executing their role and caring about the team more than anything individually”
Gregg Popovich
“Winning teams at the NBA level, the college level, and the high school level all play team basketball. Championship teams have five players on the same page at all times.”
Hubie Brown
“The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team.”
Phil Jackson
Best Michael Jordan Quotes
Michael Jordan is widely considered the G.O.A.T (Greatest of All Time). He also seems to have the greatest quotes of any player. Here are three of my favorites:
“I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.”
Michael Jordan
“The game is my wife. It demands loyalty and responsibility, and it gives me back fulfillment and peace.”
Michael Jordan
“If you do the work, you get rewarded. There are no shortcuts in life.”
Michael Jordan
Funny Basketball Quotes
Here are five of the funniest basketball quotes of all time.
“You got to believe in yourself. Hell, I believe I’m the best-looking guy in the world, and I might be right.”
Charles Barkley
“Winning is like deodorant – it comes up, and a lot of things don’t stink.”
Doc Rivers
“The more Final Fours you go to, the more cousins you find you have who need tickets.”
Mike Krzyzewski
“If you see me in a fight with a bear, pray for the bear.”
Kobe Bryant
“I want us to play mother-in-law defense: constant nagging and harassment.”
Rick Pitino
Ultimate List of Basketball Quotes (100+)
Here is a huge list of basketball quotes that I have compiled. There are currently 189 quotes from various players, coaches, and other basketball figures. They are categorized by:
- Motivational / Inspirational: Quotes that motivate you to work harder or inspire you to be a better person
- Coaching: Quotes from coaches, or about coaching a team
- Teamwork: Quotes about the importance teamwork (sort of overlaps with coaching)
- Funny: Quotes that will make you laugh
- Mindset: Quotes about having the correct mindset to be successful
- Other: Quotes that don’t really fit into the above 5 categories
I will continue adding to this list as I come across more quotes.
You can search and filter through the table. Enjoy!
| Quote | Person | Type |
|---|---|---|
| “You must expect great things of yourself before you can do them.” | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “You got to believe in yourself. Hell, I believe I’m the best-looking guy in the world, and I might be right.“ | Charles Barkley | Funny |
| “You can't get much done in life if you only work on the days when you feel good. “ | Jerry West | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “You can say something to popes, presidents and kings, but you can’t talk to officials. In the next war, they ought to give everyone a whistle.“ | Abe Lemmons | Funny |
| “Winning is like deodorant – it comes up, and a lot of things don’t stink.“ | Doc Rivers | Funny |
| “What's better? Dogs or broomsticks? I mean, will the world ever really know?“ | Larry Bird | Funny |
| “We have a great bunch of outside shooters. Unfortunately, all our games are played indoors. “ | Weldon Drew | Funny |
| “This year, we plan to run and shoot. Next season we hope to run and score. “ | Billy Tubbs | Funny |
| “This is basketball, not figure skating. You don’t get extra points for the degree of difficulty.“ | Bobby Hurley | Funny |
| “They shot the ball well early. What comes out of the microwave hot doesn’t always stay hot. I know because I eat bagels in the morning.“ | Shaquille O'Neal | Funny |
| “There are really only two plays: Romeo and Juliet, and put the darn ball in the basket.“ | Abe Lemmons | Funny |
| “The only difference between a good shot and a bad shot is if it goes in or not.“ | Charles Barkley | Funny |
| “The more Final Fours you go to, the more cousins you find you have who need tickets.“ | Mike Krzyzewski | Funny |
| “The invention of basketball was not an accident. It was developed to meet a need. Those boys simply would not play "Drop the Handkerchief." “ | James Naismith | Funny |
| “The idea is not to block every shot. The idea is to make your opponent believe that you might block every shot.“ | Bill Russell | Mindset |
| “Talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence wins championships. “ | Michael Jordan | Teamwork |
| “Scoring 100 points is a lot, but I could've scored 140 if they had played straight-up basketball.“ | Wilt Chamberlain | Funny |
| “Push yourself again and again. Don't give an inch until the final buzzer sounds. “ | Larry Bird | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Once you are labeled the best you want to stay up there, and you can't do it by loafing around. If I don't keep changing, I'm history. “ | Larry Bird | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “My greatest gift that I have in life is basketball. “ | Isiah Thomas | Other |
| “Me shooting 40% at the foul line is just God's way to say nobody's perfect. “ | Shaquille O'Neal | Funny |
| “Love never fails. Character never quits. And with patience and persistence, dreams do come true. “ | Pete Maravich | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “LeBron James still gets criticism. Jesus still gets criticized.“ | D’Angelo Russell | Funny |
| “In my prime, I could’ve handled Michael Jordan. Of course, he would have only been 12 years old.“ | Jerry Sloan | Funny |
| “If you want consistency, then you perform. This is a performance job. You get paid to perform. Your money is guaranteed, but your minutes are not. “ | Isiah Thomas | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “If you see me in a fight with a bear, pray for the bear." | Kobe Bryant | Funny |
| “If you meet the Buddha in the lane, feed him the ball.“ | Phil Jackson | Funny |
| “If you look up the definition of greatness in the dictionary, it will say Michael Jordan. “ | Elgin Baylor | Other |
| “If you don't do what's best for your body, you're the one who comes up on the short end. “ | Julius Irving | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “If you don't believe in yourself, nobody else will."“ | Kobe Bryant | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “If you are afraid of failure you don't deserve to be successful! “ | Charles Barkley | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “If it turns out that my best wasn’t good enough, at least I wont look back and say that I was afraid to try”“ | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “If I weren't earning $3 million a year to dunk a basketball, most people on the street would run in the other direction if they saw me coming.“ | Charles Barkley | Funny |
| “I've had enough success for two lifetimes, my success is talent put together with hard work and luck. “ | Kareem Abdul-Jabbar | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “I would tell players to relax and never think about what's at stake. Just think about the basketball game. If you start to think about who is going to win the championship, you've lost your focus. “ | Michael Jordan | Mindset |
| “I want us to play mother-in-law defense: constant nagging and harassment.“ | Rick Pitino | Funny |
| “I think someone should explain to the child that it's ok to make mistakes. That's how we learn. When we compete, we make mistakes. “ | Kareem Abdul-Jabbar | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “I really don't like talking about money. All I can say is that the Good Lord must have wanted me to have it. “ | Larry Bird | Funny |
| “I couldn't care less if the guy I'm guarding has HIV. I'm going to slam him anyway.“ | Dennis Rodman | Funny |
| “I believe you win games by what you do from your first practice until your first game.“ | Dr. Jack Ramsay | Coaching |
| “I always laugh when people ask me about rebounding techniques. I’ve got a technique. It’s called just go get the damn ball.“ | Charles Barkley | Funny |
| “Hard work beats talent when talent fails to work hard.“ | Kevin Durant, Tim Notke | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Great players are willing to give up their own personal achievement for the achievement of the group. It enhances everybody. “ | Kareem Abdul-Jabbar | Teamwork |
| “Everybody pulls for David, nobody roots for Goliath. “ | Wilt Chamberlain | Funny |
| “Every time I’m on the court, every time a fan cheers for me, I just want to go out and make a play for them to cheer even more.”“ | Joel Embiid | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Even when I'm old and grey, I won't be able to play it, but I'll still love the game. “ | Michael Jordan | Other |
| “Coaching is easy. Winning is the hard part. “ | Elgin Baylor | Coaching |
| “Being a professional is doing the things you love to do, on the days you don't feel like doing them.“ | Julius Irving | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “As far as playing, I didn't care who guarded me - red, yellow, black. I just didn't want a white guy guarding me, because it's disrespect to my game.“ | Larry Bird | Funny |
| “A lot of late nights in the gym, a lot of early mornings, especially when your friends are going out, you're going to the gym, those are the sacrifices that you have to make if you want to be an NBA basketball player. “ | Jason Kidd | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Young men need more models, not critics” | John Wooden | Other |
| “You must expect great things of yourself before you can do them.” | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “You have to go through good times and bad times to get where you’re trying to go.” | Allen Iverson | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “You have to earn your right to win the game with effort and togetherness” | Brad Stevens | Coaching |
| “You have to challenge yourself to get better. Good enough isn’t ‘good enough’” | Steph Curry | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “You have no choices about how you lose, but you do have a choice about how you come back and prepare to win again.” | Pat Riley | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “You don’t play against opponents, you play against the game of basketball.” | Bob Knight | Coaching |
| “You don’t have to be Magic to be special. You’re already special, you’re you.” | Magic Johnson | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “You can’t stop people from trying to limit your dreams, but you can stop it from becoming a reality. Your dreams are up to you. I encourage you to always be curious, always seek out things you love and always work hard once you find it.” | Kobe Bryant | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “You can’t always be the most talented or gifted person in the room, but you can be the most competitive.“ | Pat Summit | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “You are responsible for how people remember you—or don’t. So don’t take it lightly.” | Kobe Bryant | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Winning teams at the NBA level, the college level, and the high school level all play team basketball. Championship teams have five players on the same page at all times.“ | Hubie Brown | Coaching |
| “When a gifted team dedicates itself to unselfish trust and combines instinct with boldness and effort–it is ready to climb“ | Pat Riley | Teamwork |
| “Whatever your goal is: dedicate yourself to it. And it’s going to be a lot of sacrifice, but if you love what you want to do, it shouldn’t be a problem.” | Derrick Rose | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Whatever I try to do, I always try to give it my best and try to be a killer because, at the end of the day, if you don’t work hard, you are not going to get food on your table.” | Giannis Antetokoumbo | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “What you are as a person is far more important that what you are as a basketball player” | John Wooden | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “We’re shooting 100 percent — 60 percent from the field and 40 percent from the free-throw line.” | Norm Stewart | Funny |
| “We talkin’ about practice?...” | Allen Iverson | Funny |
| “We believe in people executing their role and caring about the team more than anything individually” | Gregg Popovich | Coaching |
| “Trust the process.” | Joel Embiid | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “To be successful you have to be selfish, or else you never achieve. And once you get to your highest level, then you have to be unselfish. Stay reachable. Stay in touch. Don't isolate.” | Michael Jordan | Mindset |
| “Those to whom defense is not important will have the best seat in the game” | Rick Majerus | Funny |
| “They say that nobody is perfect. Then they tell you practice makes perfect. I wish they'd make up their minds.” | Wilt Chamberlain | Funny |
| “These young guys are playing checkers. I’m out there playing chess.” | Kobe Bryant | Funny |
| “There’s no reason to hold yourself back and say you can’t do something in life unless you go for it and try to do it.” | Russell Westbrook | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “There is a lot of pressure put on me, but I don’t put a lot of pressure on myself. I feel if I play my game, it will take care of itself.” | Lebron James | Mindset |
| “There are going to be a number of people all of the time telling you that you’re too small. They still tell me that, but I just make them eat their words.” | Isaiah Thomas | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team.” | Phil Jackson | Teamwork |
| “The most important measure of how good a game I played was how much better I’d made my teammates play.” | Bill Russell | Teamwork |
| “The key to success is failure.” | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “The key is not the ‘will to win’… everybody has that. It is the will to prepare to win that is important” | Bob Knight | Coaching |
| “The greatness of Michael Jordan is his competitive drive. The weakness of Michael Jordan is his competitive drive” | Phil Jackson | Other |
| “The game is my wife. It demands loyalty and responsibility, and it gives me back fulfillment and peace.“ | Michael Jordan | Mindset |
| “Teamwork is the beauty of our sport, where you have five acting as one” | Mike Krzyzewski | Teamwork |
| “Success is not an accident, success is actually a choice.” | Steph Curry | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Sometimes a player’s greatest challenge is coming to grips with his role on the team.” | Scottie Pippen | Mindset |
| “Someone created the box score, and he should be shot.” | Daryl Morey | Funny |
| “Some say you have to use your five best players, but I found out you win with the five that fit together best as a team.” | Red Auerbach | Coaching |
| “So many people doubted me. They motivated me every single day to be who I am.” | Kevin Durant | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Shooting percentage is just as much about decision making as it is about technique” | Jeff Van Gundy | Coaching |
| “Remember that basketball is a game of habits. If you make the other guy deviate from his habits, you’ve got him” | Bill Russell | Coaching |
| “Play like you’re in first. Train like you’re in second.” | Steph Curry | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “People ask me if I could fly, I said, ‘yeah... for a little while.’” | Michael Jordan | Funny |
| “Our offense is like the Pythagorean Theorem. There is no answer.” | Shaquille O'Neal | Funny |
| “One man can be a crucial ingredient on a team, but one man cannot make a team.” | Kareem Abdul-Jabbar | Teamwork |
| “Once you know what failure feels like, determination chases success.” | Kobe Bryant | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Nothing is given; nothing is handed to you. You have to take what you deserve.” | Marcus Keene | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Not only is there more to life than basketball, there’s a lot more to basketball than basketball” | Phil Jackson | Other |
| “No one knows how big your potential is, how big your heart is, when you start.” | Mugsy Bogues | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “No one is bigger than the team. If you can’t do things our way, you’re not getting time here, and we don’t care who you are.” | Gregg Popovich | Coaching |
| “My goal is to win the next game one possession at a time. That’s it. I don’t have any other goals” | Brad Stevens | Coaching |
| “Michael Jordan may have been the best basketball player in history, but he couldn’t have won six NBA titles without a team.” | Mark E. Hyman | Teamwork |
| “Making the big shot wouldn’t feel so good if missing it didn’t feel so awful.” | Paul Pierce | Funny |
| “Leadership is diving for a loose ball, getting the crowd involved, getting other players involved. It’s about being able to take it as well as dish it out. That’s the only way you’re going to get respect from other players.” | Larry Bird | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Keep practicing. Never let someone tell you you’re too small or too slow.” | Chris Paul | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “It’s OK to make mistakes. That’s how we learn. When we compete, we make mistakes.” | Kareem Abdul-Jabbar | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “In developing teams, I don’t believe in rules. I believe in standards. Rules don’t promote teamwork, standards do” | Mike Krzyzewski | Coaching |
| “If you’re not talking, you’re not playing defense” | Doc Rivers | Coaching |
| “If you’re going to have to beg them to play, it’s not going to work.” | Chuck Daly | Coaching |
| “If you love the game and you love playing, just have fun and enjoy it. Work hard and don’t get bogged down by it.” | Blake Griffin | Mindset |
| “If you do the work, you get rewarded. There are no shortcuts in life.” | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “If you are afraid of failure you don’t deserve to be successful!“ | Charles Barkley | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “If nobody will help you, do it alone.” | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “If all I’m remembered for is being a good basketball player, then I’ve done a bad job with the rest of my life.” | Isiah Thomas | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.“ | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “I’ve got a theory that if you give 100 percent all of the time, somehow things will work out in the end.“ | Larry Bird | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “I’m still waiting for perfection. In the meantime, I’ll settle for persistence” | Bo Ryan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “I’d rather have more heart than talent any day.” | Allen Iverson | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed." | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “I will not let anything get in the way of me and my competitive enthusiasm to win.“ | Michael Jordan | Mindset |
| “I treated it like every day was my last day with a basketball.” | LeBron James | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “I think, team first. It allows me to succeed, it allows my team to succeed.“ | Lebron James | Teamwork |
| “I play to win, whether during practice or a real game. And I will not let anything get in the way of me and my competitive enthusiasm to win.” | Michael Jordan | Mindset |
| “I never looked at the consequences of missing a big shot. When you think about the consequences you always think of a negative result.” | Michael Jordan | Mindset |
| “I might go my whole life stealing money. I got paid to play basketball, which is a scam. I get paid to watch basketball, which is a scam.” | Charles Barkley | Funny |
| “I know that I’m never as good or bad as any single performance. I’ve never believed my critics or my worshippers, and I’ve always been able to leave the game at the arena” | Charles Barkley | Mindset |
| “I know fear is an obstacle for some people, but it is an illusion to me. Failure always made me try harder next time.” | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “I have a plan of action, but the game is a game of adjustments” | Mike Krzyzewski | Coaching |
| “I don’t know if I practiced more than anybody, but I sure practiced enough. I still wonder if somebody – somewhere – was practicing more than me” | Larry Bird | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “I don’t complain about playing time. My job is to play so well that my coach can’t sit me.” | Shane Battier | Mindset |
| “I can’t stand a ballplayer who plays in fear. Any fellow who has a good shot has got to take it and keep taking it. So he misses – so what?” | Red Auerbach | Mindset |
| “I can’t relate to lazy people. We don’t speak the same language. I don’t understand you. I don’t want to understand you.” | Kobe Bryant | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “I can do all things.” | Steph Curry | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “He who expects not to achieve will never do so.” | Caron Butler | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Haters are a good problem to have. Nobody hates the good ones. They hate the great ones.” | Kobe Bryant | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Hard work isn’t enough. You gotta believe.” | Derrick Rose | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Good, better, best. Never let it rest. Until your good is better and your better is best.“ | Tim Duncan | Mindset |
| “Good thing in this business is that you just have to make one big shot and that’s enough to make you forget 9 other shots that you missed.” | Guy Zucker | Funny |
| “Good teams become great ones when the members trust each other enough to surrender the Me for the We.” | Phil Jackson | Teamwork |
| “Get the fundamentals down and the level of everything you do will rise” | Michael Jordan | Mindset |
| “For me, when I get knocked down, I really try to get back up and go at it again. I don’t like to give up.” | Jeremy Lin | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Excellence is a habit. You are what you repeatedly do.” | Shaquille O'Neal | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Everything negative — pressure, challenges — are all an opportunity for me to rise.“ | Kobe Bryant | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Everything is habit-forming, so make sure what you do is what you want to be doing. | Wilt Chamberlain | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Everyone is born with a certain potential. You may never achieve your full potential, but how close you come depends on how much you want to pay the price.“ | Red Auerbach | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Every time you compete, try harder to improve on your last performance. Give nothing short of your very best effort.” | Elgin Baylor | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Don’t let winning make you soft. Don’t let losing make you quit. Don’t let your teammates down in any situation.” | Larry Bird | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Don’t let what other people think decide who you are.” | Dennis Rodman | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Don't mistake activity with achievement.” | John Wooden | Coaching |
| “Create unselfishness as the most important team attribute.” | Bill Russell | Teamwork |
| “Confidence is everything in this game, if you don’t think you can, you won’t.” | Jerry West | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Coaches shouldn’t have to push you to work hard. You should push yourself because you want to be a great player.” | Bob Knight | Coaching |
| “But that's the thing about basketball: you don't play games on paper.” | Bill Simmons | Funny |
| “Bottom line, you’re either a risk taker, or your not, and if you don’t take risks, you’ll never win big.” | Geno Auriemma | Coaching |
| “Be strong in body, clean in mind, lofty in ideals.” | James Naismith | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Be led by your dreams not by your problems.” | Roy Williams | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Basketball isn’t just a sport. It is an art, one that must be mastered to succeed.” | Steph Curry | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Basketball is a team game. But that doesn’t mean all five players should have the same amount of shots.” | Dean Smith | Coaching |
| “Basketball doesn’t build character, it reveals it.” | James Naismith | Other |
| “Bad shooters are always open” | Pete Carril | Funny |
| “Ask not what your teammates can do for you. Ask what you can do for your teammates.“ | Magic Johnson | Teamwork |
| “All the successful teams I’ve ever seen have three characteristics: They play unselfish, they play together, and they play hard.“ | Larry Brown | Coaching |
| “All dreams are crazy. Until they come true.” | Dirk Nowitzki | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Admit to and make yourself accountable for mistakes. How can you improve if you’re never wrong?” | Pat Summitt | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “Ability may get you to the top, but it takes character to keep you there.” | John Wooden | Coaching |
| “A winner is someone who recognizes his God-given talents, works his tail off to develop them into skills, and uses these skills to accomplish his goals.” | Larry Bird | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “A lot of people told me I couldn’t do it because of my size. I was determined to prove those people wrong.” | Ben Wallace | Motivational / Inspirational |
| “A key basketball skill is imagery. The best players “see” situations before they happen so they can be prepared” | Dr. Jack Ramsay | Coaching |
| “A coach is someone who can give correction without causing resentment.” | John Wooden | Coaching |
| “A basketball team is like the five fingers on your hand. If you can get them all together, you have a fist. That’s how I want you to play.” | Mike Krzyzewski | Coaching |
| "To be the best, you have to work the hardest. You have to chase what seems impossible over and over and over again, because giving up is not an option, and when you feel like you've reached your limit, it's only the beginning, that's when it's time to dig deep, to find the courage to push some more." | LeBron James | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "The secret is to have eight great players and four others who will cheer like crazy." | Jerry Tarkanian | Coaching |
| "The only person who can really motivate you is you." | Shaquille O'Neal | Mindset |
| "Some people want it to happen, some wish it would happen, others make it happen." | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "Poise and confidence are not possible unless you have prepared correctly. Failing to prepare is preparing to fail. Poise and confidence are a natural result of proper preparation." | John Wooden | Coaching |
| "Never say never, because limits, like fears, are often just an illusion." | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "Its better to shoot and miss, then to let time run out and wonder what if." | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "It doesn't matter if you fall down, it's whether you get back up." | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "If you're afraid to fail, then you're probably going to fail." | Kobe Bryant | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "If you run into a wall, don't turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it." | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "If you don't fall how are you going to know what getting up is like." | Steph Curry | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "I've always believed that if you put in the work, the results will come." | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "I never tried to prove anything to someone else. I wanted to prove something to myself." | Kobe Bryant | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "I have nothing in common with lazy people who blame others for their lack of success." | Kobe Bryant | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "I can accept failure, everyone fails at something. But I can't accept not trying." | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "Each moment of my life I was dreaming of how great I could be, and continued working hard. Each time I closed my eyes I could see me shining bright like a sun." | Kobe Bryant | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "Don't be afraid to fail. Be afraid not to try." | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
| "Another day, another opportunity to prove everyone who doubts you wrong." | Michael Jordan | Motivational / Inspirational |
Did I miss anything?
Which of these is your favourite basketball quote?
Did I miss any goods on my list?
Let me know in the comments below!
