The Pressure Lab | Catch Them Being Good: What Olympic Sports Psychology Teaches Young Athletes About Mental Performance | The Pressure Lab Ep. #9

What does it actually take to build mental toughness in young athletes, and how does the psychology used at the Olympic level translate to a 15-year-old competing on a Saturday morning?

In Episode 9 of The Pressure Lab, Keith Wilford sits down with one of the most accomplished sports psychologists in the world to find out.

Dr. Colleen Hacker has served as a member of the United States coaching staff for six Olympic Games as a Mental Skills Coach and Performance Psychology Specialist, beginning her national team service in 1995 with the U.S. Women's National Soccer Team. During her tenure the team won the first gold medal ever awarded in women's soccer at the 1996 Olympic Games, followed by the dramatic overtime victory over China in the 1999 World Cup. She most recently served on the gold medal staff for USA Ice Hockey at the 2018 Olympic Games in PyeongChang. Across six Olympic Games her teams have won four gold medals and two silver medals. She is also the author of Catch Them Being Good, co-written with champion soccer coach Tony DiCicco, and her most recent book Achieving Excellence. 

This episode is not about elite performance for elite athletes. It is about the mental skills that work at every level, and why the principles Dr. Hacker has applied in Olympic locker rooms are exactly the same ones that can change how a young athlete experiences pressure, failure, and growth.

What does "catch them being good" actually mean in practice for coaches and parents of young athletes?
The title of Dr. Hacker's book is also a philosophy. Most coaching, most parenting, and most self-talk defaults to what went wrong. Dr. Hacker makes the case that the most powerful developmental tool available to any coach or parent is learning to identify and reinforce what is going right, consistently and specifically. This is not about ignoring mistakes. It is about where you direct your attention and what that does to an athlete's confidence over time.

How do the world's best athletes actually think about pressure?
Dr. Hacker has sat in the locker room before World Cup finals and Olympic gold medal matches. She has worked with athletes at the absolute ceiling of human performance under the most extreme pressure imaginable. What does that environment reveal about how the best athletes in the world manage their inner voice, and what does that mean for a youth athlete facing a penalty kick on a Tuesday night?

What is the difference between mental toughness and mental fitness?
Dr. Hacker challenges the way most people talk about the mental side of sport. Mental toughness is often framed as something you either have or you don't. Mental fitness reframes it as a trainable skill, something you build deliberately through practice, just like physical conditioning. This distinction is at the core of HEADFIRST's entire philosophy and Dr. Hacker gives it its most authoritative voice yet on The Pressure Lab.

Why do so many talented athletes stop enjoying their sport, and how do coaches and parents prevent it?
One of the most consistent findings in youth sports psychology is that athletes who tie their identity entirely to performance outcomes are the most vulnerable to burnout, anxiety, and early dropout. Dr. Hacker addresses this directly: what sport should be building in young athletes beyond wins and losses, and how do the adults around them either protect or erode that foundation?

What does peak performance psychology look like for athletes who are not elite?
Dr. Hacker's work spans Olympic gold medalists and youth players. The tools are the same. The language changes. This episode makes those tools accessible for every athlete, coach, and parent regardless of level.

What this episode covers:

• Olympic sports psychology applied to youth athlete mental health
• What "catch them being good" means for coaches and parents of young athletes
• How the world's best athletes think about pressure and failure
• The difference between mental toughness and mental fitness as a trainable skill
• Why athlete identity tied to performance leads to burnout and dropout
• How coaches and parents can reinforce confidence without creating dependency
• Self-talk, visualization, and focus tools used at the Olympic level
• What sustained excellence looks like across a career, not just a single performance
• Why psychological safety is the foundation of athletic development
• What the 1999 World Cup and Olympic gold medal programs built mentally that made them unstoppable

Guest: Dr. Colleen Hacker, Ph.D., Mental Skills Coach, Six-Time Olympic Coaching Staff, USWNT, USA Hockey, Author of Catch Them Being Good and Achieving Excellence, Professor of Kinesiology, Pacific Lutheran University

Host: Keith Wilford

Subscribe to The Pressure Lab on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube. New episodes every week.

What is The Pressure Lab ?

The Pressure Lab is a first-of-its-kind mental fitness podcast built specifically for competitive and youth soccer players navigating the real emotional demands of the game.

This weekly podcast from HEADFIRST, a Philadelphia Union Foundation initiative, is hosted by Keith Wilford who gets into the realities of being a young athlete today. Featuring conversations with pro athletes, coaches, mental health professionals, and youth development experts, each episode is an honest conversations about pressure, identity, confidence, failure, burnout, belonging, and the emotional weight competition can put on you.

No highlight reels. No empty hype. Just real stories, real insight, and practical tools for players and the people around them.
If you’ve ever felt the game get bigger than the field, The Pressure Lab was made for you.

About HeadFirst: HEADFIRST is a mental fitness initiative of the Philadelphia Union Foundation designed to equip young athletes with the tools, language, and mindset to perform under pressure and grow through everything sport puts them through. HEADFIRST is proudly sponsored by Independence Blue Cross and Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine. More information at www.myHEADFIRST.org

About the Philadelphia Union Foundation The Philadelphia Union Foundation is a 501(c)3 nonprofit, dedicated to creating opportunity, building community, and developing the next generation of athletes and leaders through soccer and education-based programming in Chester, Pennsylvania and the surrounding region. More information at www.philadelphiaunionfoundation.org

About Our Host: Keith Wilford is a Mental Health and Wellness Educator at YSC Academy and founder of The Wilford Movement. A Widener University All-American and MA in Counseling Education, Keith has spent his career at the intersection of sport, education, and youth development. He is a national leader in student development and has coached and counseled student athletes at some of the most competitive academic and athletic programs in the country.

Tag In here: https://forms.gle/VLBmyLFjVmbtZxBb6. In a few honest words, tag in with the heart of why you’re here: why you play, why you coach, why you care, why you support someone you love in sport. Share your moment and add your voice to a space that puts every player’s whole self first.

It sounds like a bumper sticker,
but I have the best job in the world.

I have the best job in America,
that's for sure.

Step into the pressure Lab,
brought to you by head First

to Philadelphia Union
Foundation's mental health initiative.

Here.

We believe mental fitness is as important
as physical fitness.

You train your body every day.

This is where you train your mind.

The pressure, the doubt, the setbacks.

They're all part of the game.

But what you do with it, that's the skill.

Today we're joined

by one of the leading voices
in sport and performance psychology.

Doctor hacker has spent decades
helping athletes

train their minds
to perform under pressure.

She has worked with US national teams
across soccer, hockey, lacrosse, served on

six US Olympic coaching staffs, has helped
teams multiple win multiple medals.

World championships in her.

I can't even it's beyond how this great
this list is.

I'm not going to lie like this is amazing.

And it's the US women's national team
throwing its most dominant errors.

I was fortunate to listen to one of
the podcasts she was on just recently,

and the Olympic gold in the 1996 World
Championships in 1999.

Olympic runs

silver 2000.

Bronze 2003 gold 2004.

As a coach U.S. hockey 2014.

Olympic silver medal 2018 gold medal 2022
National Lacrosse Championship team.

What? What, are you kidding me?

So I am blown away.

We have so much to learn.

I think our listeners are so thankful
that you're here.

You know, Doctor Hacker,
before every episode, we really like

to just sort of lean in and just sort of
allow our listeners to be able to tag in.

And so this idea of tagging in

as all of our players, they wear this
sort of bag tag, that sort of leads

them to resources that will hear this
conversation and other conversations.

And so this idea of tagging in
is that we're sort of teammates now.

And I know you're all
about the positive reinforcement.

And so for for me, there's
a level of humility just reading that

I can only imagine the sensations
that maybe go on as you hear

it, as you probably have heard it
a ton of times, but I am blown away.

I approach this conversation
with a ton of humility.

I think some accountability
as a coach, as a father, and as a mentor,

but also some courage
because I think it takes

some courage to enter a room
with someone with such expertise.

So I have so much gratitude
that you're here.

So I give the the floor to you, to tag

you in, to sort of how you want
to approach this conversation.

Yeah. Well, thank you for that.

Yeah.

I think the moment
that introductions get old

or don't have an emotional impact,
it's time to get out.

So you're very right.

It does it does impact me.

It impacts me professionally.

It impacts me emotionally every time.

Keith, I hear you
go through those sort of that 30 year

I've been working at elite sport levels
for a little over

three decades and I

you know, it sounds like a bumper sticker,
but I have the best job in the world.

I have the best job in America,
that's for sure.

I get to work with the world's
best performers at what they do.

I mean, what a gift.

What a blessing.

It doesn't matter the sport.

It doesn't matter
the surface, the field, the ice,

the track, the ballpark,
the American football field.

You know, just people
pursuing excellence in the process.

Yeah.

And I get to to accompany
them on that journey.

How did you get into the work, Doctor
hacker.

It sort of lost in history
because I've spent 30 years

as a certified mental performance coach.

The first, third,
almost half of my career gets dropped off.

And I want to take this moment
because I think

it's been incredibly valuable for me.

And that is I was an intercollegiate coach
for 17 years

prior to everything that you just said.

There's a lot of folks that go to school,
then they go to school again.

Then they get a degree and the next thing
they're working with you,

have they been out there?

There's a ton of former athletes, right?

There's a ton of former athletes
that get into mental skills training.

But have you done
the day to day the work, the

insecurity, the pressure,

the demands that every year
is a different year of coaching?

And it sounds like when I hear you say,
you're a coach, your father, you're

a mentor, you understand exactly what
I'm saying I'm really proud of.

I, I coached Division one
a majority of the time, Division three,

but I was a head coach
and that has informed my practice.

I've lived that.

I've lived that life.

I've occupied that space.

I used to joke that
I wasn't a soccer coach.

I was a coach who worked
with soccer players.

And that might sound like linguistics,
linguistic gymnastics.

But I didn't think of soccer first.

I thought of people first.

So I worked with people who played soccer.

And I was fortunate, Keith, to to coach

five consecutive intercollegiate teams
to a national championship game,

and the first woman in the

United States to coach an intercollegiate
national championship team.

That history matters to me,
the first woman in the United States to

coach intercollegiate.

And we won three national championships.

And so it wasn't just paying the dues or,

you know, in our level, you know, we we

we finished in the national championship
game, winning it three times.

So that that experience

informed my mental skills coaching.

And I think coaches hear that
and recognize that

I know athletes respect it.

I can speak
their language, have been there,

and I just think those that evolution,

I think that evolution really matters.

There's so much power in your voice.

I've, I have read Achieving

Excellence in addition
to just sort of hearing your words and,

and the conviction
that comes behind your words.

You know, I, I,

it reminds me of some Chris Sailor
who's the Hall of Fame coach

at Princeton and,
and I remember the amount of times that

the, the idea that who the amount

of fighting that she had to do to get to
where she was and that prominence.

And I'm I'm curious, like when you first
stepped into this space,

what how hard was it to jump into it.

This idea of sort of breaking ground,

pushing up against the glass ceiling,

but always making sure not my phrase, but

make sure you're throwing down a ladder

so that so that other people can climb up.

That's been wildly important to me.

And I credit my own intercollegiate coach
for instilling that in me.

Her name, Sharon Taylor,
to know whose shoulders I stand

on, who paved the way for me to have

the opportunities that I had.

I'm very, very fortunate in my mentors.

Yes, coaching matters,
but I will tell you, mentorship,

maybe the most valuable partnership

in our personal and professional lives.

From your opinion.

Like what is misunderstood
as we connect emotions to performance?

I think a couple of things.

Yeah, I think there's a prevailing view
that you either have it or you

don't, right? He's competitive.

He's not.

She's focused.

She loses focus.

He handles adversity well. She doesn't.

It doesn't matter.

Mental skills are skills.

They're not genetic.

It's not blue eyes or brown
skin or black hair or brown hair.

Mental skills are skills.

Yeah.

The same way
we get better at physical skills

are the same strategies and techniques
that we get better at.

Mental skills.

Simple to complex, easy to more difficult.

I, I know you'll know the answer.

How long should soccer players
be working on the fundamentals of soccer?

Forever? Correct.

Good answer.

How long should we be working on
mental skills?

What do you think
the answer is? Should be forever.

It should be forever.

So I have written about different people's
changed, changed my framework.

But it's that same framework.

There are four pillars plus one.

So it's soccer. Let's talk soccer.

But this is in any sport four pillars
plus one.

The technical.

We got to pass shoot head controller

work on our first touch.

It's the skills that make a sport
a sport technical tactical.

Are we going to play three in the back,
four in the back.

We're going to play diamond in the middle.

I'm going to play two up front.

Are we going to have a back to pressure.

Are we going to have a slash and burn.

You know what it's it's our team tactics.

And that could be all 11.

Or it could be backs and keeper midfield.

You know you can.

But it's how we want to approach the game.

Third pillar physiological sleep.

Hydration.

Rest. Strength training.

Flexibility. Anaerobic training.

Aerobic training.

Fueling for success.

Fourth pillar.

Like I like to call it job security.

Fourth pillar mental skills.

Things like somatic control.

You know, I'm often quoted as saying you
don't want to get rid of the butterflies.

You want to teach him to fly in formation.

Yeah. I love the butterflies.

If you could feel my hands right
now, truly, they're a little

bit cold, which means I,

I care.

This matters.

It's not just the conversation in my
living room when my new friend Keith.

It's a podcast
for a club, for an organization.

So have a little bit of nerves.

I have a little bit of excitement.

This is our little 45 minute game day.

You want to have nerves?

Yeah, it's a sign of excitement.

It's a sign of investing anyway.

Can you control in my world
called the autonomic nervous system.

But it's a parasympathetic sympathetic
nervous system.

We can teach athletes
to bring that under control.

Confidence imagery 97% of Olympians

use imagery on a consistent basis.

Goal setting.

Focusing, distraction, control,

self-talk. I could go on.

There's about 13 of sort of the
the bread and butter.

So technical,
technical, physical, psychological.

The plus one in our beautiful game
is the team.

Absolutely. Yeah.

So when you when you look at the sort of
the climate now of sort of youth sports,

I obviously you know

coming up it was it was lacrosse,
it was soccer, it was basketball.

And, and I was taught so many things
by playing multiple sports.

And now with this, you know,
I mean, now with this hyper focus on

multiple training sessions
and then another training session,

even to the point where some athletes
that I see that are playing

so many games over a period of time,
how are they able to discern

between even valuing competition
the way that it once was valued?

So I, I may have had practice
twice a week.

I wouldn't say that I was not
by not practicing multiple times.

How was that
affecting sort of our overall culture

or the emotional culture of our athletes
today?

Yeah,
you just hit the nail on the head, Keith.

It has shifted.

I've been at this a
long time and it has shifted.

Let me
start with with facts and then I'll go.

I'll go backwards
with different types of facts.

The American Academy,
the American Academy of Pediatrics,

not sports specific.

No skin in the game.

Financially, entrepreneur wise.

The American Academy of Pediatrics.

Their job is to ensure the health
and well-being of American children.

Full stop.

And the American Academy of Pediatrics

has put out multiple position statements

arguing against single sport competition.

And a story full might drop.

When I say play multiple sports.

And then we were like, I can't even barely
get my kids to soccer every week.

How am I supposed to?

Yeah, nobody's saying that.

It's saying play soccer
for a couple months,

play basketball for a couple months,

rest for a month, swim for two months,

climb trees, go on hikes,

kayak, take yoga, dance.

Yeah. You get what I'm saying?

We need motoring competence.

Motor. Motor is the root word.

We need competence.

I tell the story be because it's true.

It happened to me.

And it really made an impact
at the Olympic Games in in Beijing,

I had the good fortune of working out
at the fitness center with Kobe Bryant.

However young or old you are,

I'll just say Kobe Bryant arguably
is one of the greatest NBA players.

I would agree. In history.

And he he the whole gym cleared out

and because we connected he goes
she can stay.

And I'm like yes she can stay
I'll take that as a win.

So I'm just working out.
I'm like head down.

Don't don't mess up this opportunity
to work out with this guy.

Long story short,
we struck up a conversation

from his mouth to my ears.

He said, you know, he grew up in Italy.

He goes, I grew up playing soccer.
I grew up playing football.

And he was good.

That guy would have been good
at whatever he pursued.

But he was good.

Yeah,
that was his original love was soccer.

And when he was an NBA

great, he actually hired

he didn't hire an NBA guy,

didn't even hire a basketball guy.

He told me
he hired a soccer fitness person

because he thought that soccer, fitness,

footwork, anticipation,

change of direction, body
mechanics would help him in basketball.

I believe in the last year or two,

more than 95%

of the NFL NFL first

round draft picks played multiple sports.

This is not somebody opinion

from medical doctors and American Academy

to proof is in the pudding.

Get that exposure this overuse

injury the burnout the repetitiveness

to only single sport knowledge
I think is holding us all back.

That's my personal opinion.

I think it's holding us all back.

Leaders and participants.

This podcast is powered by headfirst,

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Foundation has built a free toolkit
at my headfirst

with worksheets,
guides, videos, and resources designed

for athletes, parents, and coaches
navigating the mental side of the sport.

And if you want something tangible,
something your athlete can carry with them

to every practice, in every game, request
a headfirst bag tag.

It's a free luggage style
tag that attaches to any soccer bag

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It's a symbol, a reminder, and a connector
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Yours at my headfirst coaches and clubs
reach out to us directly

and we'll send a full
package for your entire team.

How are you

helping today's athlete now
so you have such a I?

You are creating history
even as we speak and now.

Thank you.

And that I do
believe is incredibly powerful.

I am I am always, you know,

being where I'm at in my own career.

I always want to know if what I'm saying

is actually working
and landing on today's athletes.

And so that athlete comes
and walks into your space

or into your just your presence.

How were you supporting that
athlete today?

How are you supporting that parent today?

Yeah, I mean, I hope I hope multiple ways.

You know, I'm hearing your question.

There's the how do I meet athletes
like I do one on one

right now?

I'm in fact,
I don't plan on rejoining a staff again.

I did that for 30 years.

So right now for me
it's all about individual clients.

So the so there's a different answer to
how do I approach individual athletes.

Like I have a client from the South, I
you know, you can't name dropping.

So I'm just going to try to tell you
and listeners as much as I can.

I have a teenage female client
from the South

who has been a consistent member
of the youth national teams. So

how do I approach

my one on one mental skills
coaching with her, for example?

That's one set of answers.

What am I doing
professionally to make a difference?

I hope my answer is, and I'm going to try
to give you some examples.

My entire professional career
has been devoted to that.

Yeah, I speak at national
and international conferences.

I just did two sessions in Philadelphia
at the United Soccer Coaches.

I am a guest on podcast.

I educate coaches and leaders

and and you start hearing them

repeat the facts,
repeat the data, use the language, learn.

So I educate by speaking both nationally
and internationally.

Tuesday this week, this past week
I just or Wednesday I spoke at

She Believes Summit, US soccer's

and Deloitte's partnership here in Seattle

750 participants,

a thousand more participated online.

So I'm trying to make myself available
in public educational forums.

For lack of a better way to say it,
I publish research.

I have two new book chapters
coming out in the top

graduate textbook in sports psychology,
so that helps train

future sports
psychologists and mental skills coaches.

So I speak, I write, I publish.

I hope that's making a difference.

And I've done that for decades
and I'll continue to do that.

This is something that is

meaningful to me, and I hope,
I hope it says to listeners,

I hope, I hope it's taken in the spirit
in which in which I'm offering it.

I am in this June.

In 2026, it will be year 32.

Wow. There's not a lot of things
have been around 32 years.

It'll be year 32

of Colleen hackers, success soccer camp,

32 years of a youth sport
camp for kids ages 6 to 17.

So we break them obviously by age
groups and ability.

And I have a staff of 18.

We have a smaller than 1 to
10 ratio of staff to players.

It's not the

I love it, I love it,
I'm super proud of it.

But this isn't like your hardcore college.

You know, soccer camp
and going to have coaches

sitting on little lawn chairs
all around the field identify.

This is like an up up with children

and up up with kids with soccer balls.

It's about health, teammate, vitality,

the joy of soccer, the fun of soccer,
the teamwork of soccer,

mental skills training.

But they don't know
they're getting mental skills.

I get that. That's meaningful to me.

I have flown home from the Olympic Games
just to not miss a week.

I have flown home, in fact,
from the World Cup.

Who flies home from the World
Cup to be at a little kids camp?

This kid, this kid.

That's how much.

That's how much youth sport means to me.

It's in my DNA.

So I hope I'm making a difference

across domains, across environments.

This has been my lifelong
passion is coaching,

education and education.

I used to be a member of the.

It was out of University of

Rhode Island, the international parent
education network.

So parents, athletes, leaders

and I hope I'll do it
until there's no more

breath in me.

Yeah.

That's powerful.

I'm thankful for those words.

I think that, you know,
and this sort of jumps

into catch them being good.

Thank you, thank you.

There's no student I've had way before.

Tony and I published the book
with that title.

Yeah, for 15 years prior to that.

That's what I used to say
to my undergraduate students.

When you're caught,
how are you usually caught?

You want something wrong?

Doing something bad?

Let's catch them being good.

When you point out what was done right,

what was seen,
that was what needed to be seen,

what words were

said that were the right words
at the right time.

When we catch our children,
when we catch our staff,

when we catch our players being good,

we reward what we want to continue
and we're teaching

everyone who can hear it what to do.

Yeah, and I used to joke like,
you don't want me on your golf team,

but I know a bad golfer
when I see what you might not want me

on your baseball team, but I know a bad
baseball player when I see one.

The reason I'm using
that as an example is pointing out

what's wrong requires no expertise.

I'm dumber than a box of hammers
and a million different sports,

but I know a bad one
when I see one, right?

Can you point out what was right,
what was good?

What was desirable?

What was repeatable?

What was a productive choice
that somebody make

that takes leadership skill?

So I actually want to push leaders
pointing out what's wrong.

Dime a dozen, dime a dozen.

Can you catch them being good
and be very specific about that?

I think it's incredible that you highlight
that from a from a player perspective.

How needed
is it for coaches to receive that as well?

Powerful.

I'm going to I'm going to I'm
going to sort of end

or segue on a very tangible example.

And I know in youth sport
it may not be done that much,

but in my world it is

the dreaded game film session

after the games, the dreaded game.

Okay, here's a clip.

You see this opening over here?

We didn't use it.

You see this?

We didn't have support in the box.

You players dread.

Dread if they're being honest.

Oh, I love it.

I want the feedback.

I'm not talking about what they say.

I know if I'm going to watch post game
film,

it's going to be everything I did wrong.

We need to show game film
and say things like,

what were you thinking
that allowed you to handle the pressure

and still see this opening
run out there on the flank?

What allowed you?

I saw you sort of tense up like you were
just going to, in step, nail that ball.

And then I saw just a brief breath.

And then you just place
that ball in the lower right hand corner,

just a nice little slip shot on goal
rather than master blast.

Like to point out, what were you thinking?

What were you feeling?
What were you seeing?

How were you able to make that decision?
Yeah.

What allowed you to handle
that kind of pressure in your back?

Third,
let's talk about all the development

and awareness that you got writing.

Wow, wow.

Yeah, I can tell you,

Doctor Hacker, if people are not going
through a wall right now.

Then,

you know,
I think we need to check their pulse.

Thank you.

I'll be honest with you.

There are probably 20 other prompts
and questions

that I would love to have and be amazing
to try to do some sort of a part two.

There's so much, so much in your tank

and from your personal story,
how you got there,

and even through this screen,
I think it's it's so

I don't think there's enough words
that sort of

that will really honor who you are

and what you represent to sport.

Thank you. Period.

And so I'm beyond thankful.

That's that's sort of how I will tag out
because, you know, no different than you.

Every time I do these things
I honor my butterflies.

The, you know, the the uncertainty.

But it I cannot thank you enough.

And I assure you

that if there's a way to get a part two,
that every listener on this call

is incredibly
fortunate to have heard your words.

Well thank you.

It matters.

I care deeply about what
I do, I care deeply,

I will tag out using
I love that, by the way.

I think that's like, hang on to that
little diamond of excellence.

I'll tag out with this.

A waterfall begins
with a single drop of water

and look at what comes from that.

So there's no investment
that any of us make that is too small.

Yeah,
because as those water drops accumulate,

they become stunning, powerful waterfalls.

And each of our lives can be that drop
that starts it.

So thank you for having me.

Thank you so much, Doctor Hacker.

Everything we talked about today

is educational,
not professional mental health advice.

If you or someone you know needs real
support right now, call or text 988.

That's the Suicide and Crisis lifeline.

Free and available 24 over seven.