About the Book

A leadership book, a book that offers tips on how to run a sports program from kindergarten through high school, an inspirational underdog story—The Best-Laid Plans of a High School Basketball CEO is all of the above and more. Here's a sample:

Matt Kramer's boys' basketball team from Navarre Fairless High School was perhaps the worst in the Canton (Ohio) area, finishing 3-19 in 2004; in 2005, he was sitting on a coaching “hot seat” at 0-12 in the middle of January. His program and his career were left for dead...

...Twenty-six months later, Coach Kramer was standing on a ladder in the Canton Memorial Field House cutting down the nets after his Fairless team won the prestigious Canton Division-II District Championship Game in overtime and earned a spot in Ohio's Division-II “Sweet-16”.

Miracle? No, it happened with hard work, a little luck, and the mentoring of a legendary 500-win coach, Randy Montgomery—ideas that are now shared here in The Best-Laid Plans of a High School Basketball CEO.

How credible are the plans offered in the book? Try the names John Wooden and Bob Huggins. That's right. Many of the ideas were guided by UCLA's legendary “Wizard of Westwood” and the current, ultra-successful, West Virginia University Head Men's Basketball Coach in conversations and professional dealings with Randy Montgomery. Other parts were developed through indirect contact with some of the best college and professional coaches in the country. And another aspect came from some of the best high school coaches in the State of Ohio. But the final product—the methods, suggestions, stories and ideas shared in the book—evolved out of the discussions Randy Montgomery had as a mentor to Matt Kramer, and the results the ideas from those discussion have produced to this point in their accomplished careers.

The fact is, the ideas offered in The Best Laid Plans would be invaluable to any coach or leader, but it is the human element evident in the stories that go with the ideas—true tales of inspiring successes and gut-wrenching disappointment—that set this book apart from the average “how-to” manual and make it a compelling read for a much wider audience.

From basketball coaches to coaches of other sports, leaders of youth organizations, parents and the casual fan, The Best-Laid Plans of a High School Basketball CEO offers a locker room pass into one of the world's most misunderstood professions.