Last month I had the sad experience of watching my Auburn Tigers lose to the very strong Florida State Seminoles for the football national championship game. 
It was very well played, a tight game. I had gone into the game thinking that FSU would win, but hopefully we would keep it close. Instead, Auburn took a strong lead in the first half, and then still made it close and tight in the second half. As most will know, FSU only took the lead in the very last seconds.
In the aftermath of the game, many commentators spoke about FSU’s great execution in the fourth quarter that led to victory. Other’s mentioned the gutsy call at the end of the second quarter to risk a fake punt; the play worked and some think that fully changed the momentum.
Instead, Auburn lost the game in the first quarter. If you think back to their first drive, Auburn quarterback Nick Marshall under threw a wide-open receiver who would have walked in for an easy touchdown. FSU’s defense got caught and confused; fortunately for them, that wasn’t a touchdown. Add those seven points to the missed field goal and the halftime score should have been 31-10. If the rest of the game stayed the same—and I know from history that it probably would have changed but just work with me on this—Auburn would have won the game as FSU tried valiantly to score at the end and maybe get an onside kickoff.
For most people, we notice what happens at the end of game—we remember the interference call at the end that gave FSU the ball on the 1 yard line, or we think about the super run (or missed tackle) by the FSU wide receiver to get the offense down the field. And if someone misses a critical free throw or strikes out with runners on or fumbles late…that’s what we think about relative to why that team lost.
What is lost in that thinking is that the early part of the game is just as critical as the later parts of the game. If Auburn scores that easy touchdown, the game is radically different. This idea of valuing the first part of the game holds true all around you. We just started our new term of classes. Every semester, at the end of the term, I will hear from some student who is just now noticing that their grade in the class may be in peril. They reach out with some fear or comment about how they need this class to graduate or need a certain grade to get or keep their scholarship.
My question to them is often the same—“where was this concern in the first few weeks of the term.” In other words, they lost the game in the first quarter, not at the end. They will sometimes hope that they can get more time or extra moments…as if Auburn could somehow get an extra free 5 minutes added to the clock to change the outcome. We know that isn’t the way life works. They missed the assignments, they dropped the easy pass that would have produced points and now, well, the clock has run out.
This concept holds true in other areas of life. If I don’t pay attention to the “first quarter” in the raising of my children, if I only think I should try to guide them in right and wrong when they are teens (in the second half of childrearing), then I am in danger of losing the game.
In the pursuit of jobs, many interview experts will tell you that interviews are lost in the first few minutes, even first few seconds of the candidate walking in the room. We may feel it vastly unfair, but if the deciding group thinks the candidate didn’t dress the part, or (as I have read from examples) that their shoes are not shined and nice….well, that’s the way they made the final determination.
Look, errors early or moments when you dropped the ball at the start of the game can be overcome. Auburn could have still won the game, even on the last play (happily, Alabama learned that lesson with Auburn losing on the last second of the Iron Bowl). You can become a better parent. You can decide to change your eating habits. You can put in extra time in the class (assuming you ask the professor early enough).
However, if you do NOT drop the ball…winning the game becomes much easier. The Championship game could have even become a blowout had Auburn scored those 10 points. Maybe FSU would have taken greater risks due to being behind more and then who knows. But Auburn didn’t do that. They under threw that wide-open player. They missed the very easy short field goal kick. They lost the game in the first quarter, not really the fourth.
Make sure in your life you realize that every moment in your life, in “the game” matters. Take the first quarter, the first seconds are as vital, perhaps even more so, than what happens in the last moments.