The relationship between coaches and student-athletes is a vital, often life-changing one. Student-athletes look to their coaches for guidance, skill development, and avenues for growth. But it’s easy to forget that coaches are people, too—with ongoing goals, struggles, and stories. Coaches, don’t forget that offering who you are as a person is just as important as your knowledge in a sport. Supporting student-athlete mental health begins here.


There are many resources that detail how coaches can support student-athlete mental health and well-being. For example, here are a few great ones to look through:



To complement these, we’ll explore foundational layers of the relationship between student-athletes and coaches that aren’t as frequently discussed in conversation with mental health.


1. Build a foundation of trust by embodying your values beneath & beyond sport.

Student-athletes are unfortunately known for their ability to hide their mental health struggles, especially from their coaches. There’s a power dynamic built into sports; coaches have authority over playing time, for example. Student-athletes may be wondering if you suspect they're struggling, because they’re afraid of an imagined (or witnessed) consequence if you do. In this pre-existing but malleable system, who you offer them—as a coach and as a person—can shape how they feel about hiding their mental health.


The way you speak to young athletes is crucial. They know the difference between being told what to do versus being coached. They sense the difference between open dialogue and hierarchy—between communication and lecturing. Offering the rich wisdom and knowledge you have, instead of forcing it, creates a sense that you’re not the only voice on the field. Communicate with athletes, instead of at them. Ask what they see when practice isn’t going well. Empower them by ensuring that they feel sturdy on the same ground as you, not beneath you. Redistributing and sharing power shows that you respect and value your athletes. Ultimately, these intentional practices are a reflection of who you are, not the sport. Sport is the vehicle. For example, if you identify as a man coaching young women or nonbinary student-athletes, this approach shows that you don’t vibe with patriarchal norms. Student-athletes will feel safer talking to you off the court about who they are—including their mental health—because you’re enacting values with them beyond sports.


Mental health doesn’t exist in a vaccuum—it is deeply tied to identity, society, and politics. Student-athletes want to feel seen as a whole person, not in part. It often feels supportive to acknowledge, with the whole team, things happening in the community—locally or globally—that may be impacting your and their mental health. If you see them wholly, it invites them to see you wholly, initiating a positive feedback loop.


Another pillar of trust through embodying your values is a willingness to be wrong, acknowledging that apologies aren’t for the apologizer. If you get riled up in practice or shout unnecessarily, it’s okay. Truly, it is—you’re human and you have emotions that no one—no matter how ‘cool and collected’—is immune to. But how will you speak about it afterwards? Will you own it? Or say that you feel sorry that your student-athletes ‘misinterpreted’ your anger. In a similar vein, it almost always takes two to tango. For every competition or training session that doesn’t go the way we’d like, ask yourself what your role is in how it went. Offer your thoughts to your student-athletes. Build an open line of accountability-based communication that coexists with praise and gratitude, instead of cancelling them out. Growth and learning are an evolving conversation that necessitates many voices. This mindset applies as much to sports as it does to mental health. And it’s contagious! If it’s held and embodied in one setting, it can be more easily applied in another. But both require courage; more specifically, vulnerability.


2. Student-athletes and coaches alike sometimes forget that courage requires vulnerability.

They’re seemingly opposite terms: courage is seen as bold and brave whereas vulnerability is seen as weak and timid. But this simply isn’t true. Asking for help is one of the most courageous things we can do. It is also one of the most vulnerable. And it doesn’t happen without both attributes.


With this in mind, language choices matter. Don’t be afraid to use the word ‘vulnerability,’ and other words like it. Deciding to take a game winning shot—planned or unplanned—is courageous. It’s also terrifying, and its true emotional impact isn’t always discussed. Ask about it! The same is true of choosing to defend a player further along in their skill development. After that moment or play, ask how your student-athlete is feeling mentally/emotionally. Acknowledge the vulnerability it takes to do something—on display for friends, parents, guardians, and fans—that they’re not only afraid of trying but afraid of fumbling. This sounds a lot like speaking up about mental health!


Similarly, there are other words to reconsider, such as failure. Failing isn’t an endstop—it means something brave happened and can happen again. Student-athletes know that their needs, goals, hopes, and potential can’t be reached without support and speaking up, but what we’re discussing here is how to open the door for them. And although it seems like these changes aren’t “mental health” in the clinical or medical sense, they’re the doorway to going there if/when needed.


Building a team vocabulary of mental health, such as using the term “mental health” often, will also help when you have concerns. You may not be a student-athlete’s go-to person for support, but you may be able to help them connect with that person if they feel safe sharing with you; and if you feel you can ask them. For example, there are periods of higher stress than others for student-athletes, such as during exams, playoffs/competitions, or application season. Ask them how their mental health is feeling a bit more frequently during these times. If a behaviour or trend is worrying you, find a time to gently ask if everything is okay. Offer what you can—a day off from practice to catch up on sleep or schoolwork, connections to professional support, or simply an adult to talk to. It’s okay to be uncomfortable—this doesn’t indicate you’re unable to have these conversations. It actually means you care, deeply. It’s okay to say you’re uncomfortable, too. Chances are, student-athletes also feel a bit uneasy about mental health conversations. Remember, if you’ve built a foundation of trust already, you’re better able to meet them where they are—and it’s easier for them to see that you have.


3. Ensure that your student-athletes don’t feel like their sport is the be-all-end-all. Prioritize rest for both coaches and student-athletes.

As energized and invested as student-athletes and coaches are in a sport, it’s important to share something that feels counterintuitive: sports and their associated performance success are not the most important variable in life.


Do your student-athletes know that if they were to stop playing (or take a longer break), that you’d still care about them and their life? That if you met them in another setting you’d appreciate what makes them valuable as humans? If someone were to ask you to describe them, pretending for a moment that they were never an athlete, could you?


Young student-athletes don’t always separate their inherent value from their performance or athletic identity. And, perhaps most importantly, they feel it would be shameful or a failure if they were to choose not to continue playing.


Consider a student-athlete who is expected to compete at the collegiate level. Maybe they love and enjoy their sport, but collegiate or professional sports aren’t what they envision for their lives. As their high school coach, you wouldn’t shame them or drop the relationship because it no longer has a performance purpose. You would want to know more about what they have in mind for the next phase of their life.


Every player longs to hear this from their coach—that their worth is not based on their skills or whether they reach an expected potential imposed upon them. Even if it's implied, perhaps we underestimate how needed it is to have these words spoken to us.


Part of this mindset also includes prioritizing rest, and checking in about when it’s needed for you and your student-athletes. It’s always needed, but sometimes more than others. Rest needs will fluctuate for the whole team, such as after a particularly dense competition schedule, or individually, when one of your student-athletes is experiencing something personal. We’re also seeing a rise of facism, human rights violations, climate destruction, and rising living costs. Everyone will respond to these growing uncertainties and violence differently, depending on their identities and communities. You and your student-athletes may need more rest at different times. Talk about this as a team—where do some need more rest than others and how can those with greater privilege or capacity offer more support when they can? You don’t have to know everything going on in each others’ lives, but collective care is the mental health care of a community.


Coaches, you can support student-athlete mental health and wellness best when embodying your values, embedding a mental health vocabulary, and prioritizing rest. Mentally healthy environments ensure that student-athletes feel that they’re competing because they want to, not because they have to. If they feel this level of belief in them, they will believe in you, too.