Pre-Game Anxiety: A Coach's Guide

You can see it before the game even starts.

The quiet player in the corner of the locker room who's usually the loudest. The one bouncing their leg so fast it shakes the bench. The athlete who suddenly needs to go to the bathroom for the third time. The starter who asks a question about the game plan that was answered an hour ago — they weren't listening because their mind was somewhere else entirely.

Pre-game anxiety is one of the most common experiences in high school athletics. Research suggests that 50-70% of high school athletes experience significant anxiety before competition. Most never talk about it. Many don't even recognize it for what it is.

As a coach, you can't eliminate pre-game nerves. But you can transform them from a performance killer into a performance advantage. Here's how.

Recognizing the Signs

Pre-game anxiety doesn't always look like what you'd expect. Some athletes look nervous. Others mask it in ways that are easy to misread:

Obvious signs:

• Restlessness, fidgeting, pacing
• Nausea, stomach issues, frequent bathroom trips
• Difficulty focusing during pre-game instructions
• Unusual quietness or withdrawal

• Overconfidence or excessive talking (masking nerves with bravado)
• Irritability or snapping at teammates
• Going through warm-up mechanically — body present, mind absent
• Asking repetitive questions about the game plan
• Changing routines (different warm-up, different music, different gear) in search of comfort

The Reframe: Anxiety as Activation

Here's the most important thing to understand about pre-game anxiety: the physiological response is almost identical to excitement.

Racing heart. Sweaty palms. Butterflies in the stomach. Heightened alertness. These symptoms are the body's preparation for high performance. The sympathetic nervous system is activating, flooding the body with adrenaline and cortisol, increasing blood flow to muscles, sharpening focus.

This is literally the body getting ready to compete. It's a feature, not a bug.

The problem isn't the physical response. The problem is how the athlete interprets it. When an athlete thinks "I'm so nervous, something's wrong," the anxiety spirals. When an athlete thinks "My body is getting ready to compete," the same physical sensations become fuel.

Research by Alison Wood Brooks at Harvard Business School found that simply reframing anxiety as excitement — saying "I'm excited" instead of "I'm calm" — significantly improved performance under pressure. The physiology didn't change. The interpretation did. And that made all the difference.

What to tell your athletes: "Those butterflies in your stomach? That's your body warming up for you. That's adrenaline doing its job. The athletes who don't feel anything before a big game are the ones you should worry about."

Building a Pre-Game Framework

Instead of leaving pre-game preparation to chance — or to a motivational speech you have to improvise every time — build a consistent framework that your athletes follow before every competition.

Phase 1: Controlled Arrival (60-90 Minutes Before)

Set expectations for how athletes arrive and prepare. Consistency reduces anxiety because the brain craves predictability under stress.

• Routine tasks: Get dressed, tape, stretch — in the same order every time
• Music: Let athletes use personal playlists through headphones. Music is one of the most effective anxiety regulators available
• Limit phone use during final 30 minutes: Social media and texting pull attention outward and increase self-consciousness

Phase 2: Physical Activation (30-45 Minutes Before)

Moderate physical activity is one of the best anxiety reducers because it metabolizes the stress hormones already in the system.

• Dynamic warm-up that gets the heart rate up
• Sport-specific movement drills
• The goal: break a sweat and get out of your head

Phase 3: Mental Focus (10-15 Minutes Before)

This is where most pre-game routines are weakest. Athletes finish warming up and then sit in the locker room marinating in their thoughts. That's the danger zone.

Give them something specific to do:

• 3-Minute Visualization: Eyes closed. Visualize yourself executing your specific role in tonight's game. Not the outcome — the process. See yourself making the plays you've practiced all week.
• Cue Word Selection: Pick one word that captures how you want to play tonight. "Aggressive." "Smooth." "Relentless." Write it on your wrist tape. That's your anchor for the game.
• Breathing Reset: Four counts in, four counts hold, four counts out. Three cycles. This activates the parasympathetic nervous system and brings arousal levels into the optimal range — energized but controlled.

Phase 4: The Transition (Final 5 Minutes)

The last thing before taking the field or court should be active, not passive. Standing in a circle listening to a speech is passive. The brain needs engagement.

• Brief team huddle with a specific, tactical focus: "First five minutes — we're pressing. Set the tone."
• Physical activation — jumping, clapping, a team chant
• Walk out with energy and intention

Common Mistakes Coaches Make

The Fear-Based Speech. "If we don't win tonight, our season is over." This is technically true in an elimination game, but it frames the competition as a threat rather than an opportunity. Threat framing triggers anxiety. Opportunity framing triggers motivation.

Try instead: "This is the stage we've been working for. Everything we've done has prepared us for tonight. Let's go show them what we've built."

Ignoring Individual Differences. Some athletes need firing up. Others need calming down. A one-size-fits-all rah-rah speech will over-activate athletes who are already running hot and potentially under-activate athletes who are too relaxed.

Try instead: Know your players. Have a quick individual check-in with athletes you know struggle with anxiety. A calm word from a coach they trust is more powerful than any speech.

Over-Coaching Before the Game. Installing new wrinkles, changing the game plan last minute, or overloading athletes with tactical information in the final hour dramatically increases cognitive load and anxiety. If it wasn't practiced during the week, it shouldn't be introduced before the game.

Try instead: Simplify. "Here are three things we're focused on tonight." That's enough.

When Anxiety Becomes a Bigger Problem

Pre-game nerves are normal. But for some athletes, anxiety crosses the line from "butterflies" into something more debilitating: panic attacks, inability to eat or sleep before games, or avoidance behaviors (mysterious injuries that appear before big games and disappear after).

These athletes need more than a reframe. They may benefit from structured mental skills training, and in some cases, a conversation with a school counselor or mental health professional.

Your role as a coach: normalize the conversation. When athletes hear their coach talk openly about managing nerves, it gives them permission to seek help instead of suffering silently.

Make It Systematic

Pre-game anxiety is too important to address with occasional pep talks. Athletes need consistent tools they practice daily — not just on game day — so that managing their mental state becomes as automatic as their warm-up routine.

My Mental Gym builds these skills progressively over a 24-week curriculum. Athletes practice visualization, breathing techniques, arousal management, and pre-performance routines daily in 5-10 minutes through the app. By game day, the tools are automatic — not something they're trying for the first time under pressure.

Because the goal isn't to eliminate nerves. It's to train athletes who know exactly what to do with them.