Davidson coach: Just across Putin’s Russian border I see a reason to hope

A 45-minute drive from Vladimir Putin’s brutal autocracy is proof of real leadership.

Jouni Eho lives across the Russian border, in Finland. During the same year that Putin invaded and annexed Crimea from Ukraine — a bloody prelude to today, Finland’s Minister of Social Affairs awarded Eho father-of-the-year honors for his advocacy for family-friendly workplaces as CEO of a consulting company focused on regional development.

That was 2014. Putin spent the following years poisoning political opponents and squashing dissent in the media. He also propped up a puppet regime in Ukraine that ordered troops to fire on their own people.

Eho devoted that time to local industrial growth, working to build entrepreneurial and innovative ecosystems. He helped a startup accelerator, boosted student entrepreneurship and, in September 2018, was selected by the municipal council of Pyhtää to serve as mayor. That civil service post guides the administration with a mission to help Pyhtää prosper.

I draw this comparison for two reasons. First, Jouni played basketball at Davidson College, where I coach, from 2000 to 2004 and embodies the kind of leadership that we hope to cultivate in our scholar-athletes.

Second, I want you to know that there remain good, decent leaders in our world, even right next to the worst.

I want you to know there is hope.

You’re right that Jouni’s impact on families, on businesses trying to launch and on a small town competing with the brain drain of big cities is tiny compared to the upheaval and tragedy that Putin has wrought. The forces, however, producing the Jounis of the world are vast and resilient.

Jouni graduated from a college that thrives on the strength of its community. Davidson’s president, Carol Quillen, often has said that, when someone asks how you’re doing, they actually want to know. We lean on each other, together regrouping from a defeat or exulting in a triumph. Our foundational commitments are to the dignity and worth of every human being.

Our basketball teams are all about courage and winning. That drive, though, comes from a mantra of TCC: Trust, Care, Commitment. That’s nowhere in the lexicon of a Putin or even those closer to home who look only to divide us with fear and hatred.

Our players operate on the idea that if you help someone, you help yourself. On the court, that might mean that if you set a screen, then you put yourself in a position to score.

During the few past seasons, Davidson players who worked hard and pursued teamwork and excellence throughout a practice were given a penny. They would drop the penny in a large glass jar that stood like a shrine in the locker room. The message: When you add a little to a little (a penny to a penny), soon the little becomes a lot.

It was fascinating to witness an individual player’s frustration when he fell short of being rewarded with a penny. They embraced the lesson that as the pennies piled up. Team progress and growth became clearly visible on the court.

In the world outside basketball arenas, helping one person strengthens your community. Their education and gainful employment means a stable family and money spent in local businesses — the building blocks of stabilizing and muscling up the community where you live.

That’s just the beginning. One penny or one person at a time the kid you help gets a post-secondary degree, starts a business, or gathers the skills to fill the jobs that don’t exist today. He sees the connections between unrelated problems and starts to nudge — even if it’s only a corner of the world — to a better place.

There’s inspiring leadership close to Putin’s frightening version. And the demise of the latter also is not far away.

This story was originally published April 9, 2022 at 4:30 AM.