How to Bounce Back From a Bad Game

Have you ever left a game feeling disappointed, frustrated, and as though your confidence has completely been destroyed?

I get it. Bad games happen, right? They happen to every single athlete, no matter their level.

By the end of this article, you’re going to have a clear strategy that you can use to bounce back from bad games and begin your next game with confidence.

Step One: Give Yourself Time to Feel Disappointed

Step number one is you want to give yourself some time to feel disappointed.

This might sound weird because the whole point of this article is to get you to work through those feelings of disappointment.

But we also have to understand that you train so much for your sport, you put so much time into it, that it is normal and natural to feel disappointed and frustrated after a bad game.

So, you want to give yourself some time.

A Real-Life Example

An example of this comes from a young athlete I worked with who was dealing with a lot of anger and frustration during games, but especially after games.

If it didn’t go exactly the way she wanted it to, she would beat herself up and feel angry at herself for how she did. This did nothing but hurt her confidence going into the next game.

In the beginning of our coaching, we talked about a better way to respond — a better way to think after these bad games. My approach always, and something you’ll learn toward the end of this article, is that we want to have a better way of evaluating the game.

We don’t want to beat ourselves up or look at it from an emotional standpoint. We want to be more objective. But for her, like for many athletes, it’s difficult to take that objective view immediately after the game.

What she and I discussed was giving herself some time after the game to feel the natural emotions, but then also to try to distance herself from the game.

This means giving yourself a timeline or a deadline where you say, “I’m going to give myself this amount of time to feel upset.”

It might be an hour or two after the game before you start taking these next steps. Or it might be the next day — “I’m going to give myself today to feel upset, but then tomorrow morning I’m going to work on moving past this.”

Taking Your Mind Off the Game

Not only do you want to give yourself time to feel those natural feelings of disappointment, but you also want to give yourself time to not even think about the game.

What she found the most success with was taking her mind off the game completely. I talked to her parents, and we agreed that after games, we wouldn’t immediately talk about the game. Instead, they’d go out to dinner, watch a movie, or talk about anything and everything besides the game.

So, the first step is to accept that the feelings are normal, give yourself some time to feel them, and take your mind off the game before moving forward.

Step Two: Analyze Instead of Criticize

The main reason we see confidence go downhill is because of the criticism we give ourselves.

The truth is, the criticism might be warranted. You might have played poorly, made mistakes, or even feel like you were the reason your team lost.

But from a productive standpoint, criticism isn’t helpful unless it genuinely motivates you to work harder. And I’m going to guess that if you’re here wanting to learn how to bounce back, that criticism is only hurting you.

So, instead of criticizing, we want to analyze.

Analyzing means we look back and evaluate the game with an eye focused on improving. This can be done by asking yourself (or having someone else ask you) three key questions after your initial emotional cooldown period.

1. What Did I Do Well?

This might seem impossible after a bad game, but no matter how bad the performance was, there are always some positives.

The reason to start with positives is that it puts you in a better mindset to then evaluate the negatives. Plus, over time, if you only focus on the negatives, you’ll grow to fear them — which leads to timid play and underperformance.

Positives could include:

• Talking to teammates and picking them up

• Responding better to mistakes than usual

• Small things you did well that were overshadowed by bigger mistakes

2. What Can I Learn From My Mistakes?

Ask yourself what lessons can be gained from the bad game.

Maybe you need to practice something more, or maybe you need to approach the game with a different mindset. When you learn from bad games, they stop being just a source of frustration and start becoming opportunities for improvement.

3. What’s One Thing I’ll Focus On Next Time?

Identify one specific thing you want to work on in your next practice or game to apply what you learned.

This could be a skill adjustment, a mindset change, or a specific approach. The application of the lesson is what turns a bad game into a stepping stone for growth.

Step Three: Build Confidence for the Next Game

We don’t want one bad game to snowball into a slump or poor season because of our emotional reaction.

To prevent this, figure out what you need to do to build confidence before your next game.

This might include:

• Self-talk to reframe negative thinking

• Visualization to see success instead of failure

• Practice adjustments to regain confidence in your skills

The key is to have a plan in place to actively boost your confidence.

Step Four: Set Process Goals

For the next game, focus on setting process goals — targets that are 100% within your control.

I was talking to an athlete in my one-on-one coaching program about this recently. She had been focusing too much on the outcome, setting her goal as “I have to perform perfectly” — but she didn’t have confidence in that because of her recent struggles.

However, she did have confidence in the controllable parts of her game. So, we set her goal to only focus on those process parts, because that’s what actually leads to good performance.

Ask yourself:

• “How do I achieve the result I want?”

• “What controllable actions will help me get a good outcome?”

Focusing on controllables makes it easier to have confidence in yourself, even after a rough stretch of games.

Final Thoughts

To bounce back from a bad game and go into your next one with confidence:

1. Give yourself time to feel natural disappointment and take your mind off the game.

2. Analyze instead of criticize by identifying what you did well, what you can learn, and one thing to focus on next time.

3. Build confidence using self-talk, visualization, or targeted practice.

4. Set process goals that focus on controllables rather than just the outcome.

If you’re interested in one-on-one coaching, click here to schedule a free introductory coaching call.

I’ve also created two online courses:

• The Confident Competitor Academy
• The Mentally Tough Kid

And if you’re more of a reader, check out my books:

• Mind Games
• Athlete Mental Training

Thank you for reading and I wish you the best of success in all that you do.