Question for all of you:

I really like the idea of using games and competition to accelerate learning, and I'm constantly learning from this discussion board. If I have 90 minutes of ice for my team of 30, how would you recommend using the time?

10 min warm-up
10 minute individual skill drills
5 minutes instruction / demo
10 minutes team play drills (2v1, 3v2, etc) using above skills
45 minutes of cross-ice / small area games / transition games / team play to emphasize above skills
10 minutes cool down / fun competition

Does this follow the ABC method? Is anything out of order or balance? Thanks in advance for the feedback.

DMan

30 Players, that is a lot. Tough to keep everyone involved all the time. My teams are typically 17 players, 2G, 6D and 9 F. I suggest that you have at least 4 coaches on the ice to keep things moving and if possable, break the ice into 2 zones and do 2 different drills at a time, this way the kids do not get bored waiting there turn.

Dman, that is how I have my material organized and I like to do the individual skills required before the team play. The start of practice always has individual offensive skills but I do rotate between the 4 game playing role themes.

It also depends on the time of the season. The team I am coaching right now has good skills, they all played university hockey either in Canada or the NCAA, so a lot of the ind. offensive things are for warm up and not for teaching. I may encourage them to shoot while they are moving and follow the rebound, but I don't spend time teaching them how to shoot like I do with the skill classes in the morning with jr. high kid's.

Right now we are in training camp but only practice twice a week so I am focusing putting our systems in place. We have done dzone, the forecheck and on Monday will do the power play. We spend about 30 min. on each. I have sent them pdf's on the various things. I will attach the one I sent yesterday on the pp we will do.

It was a lot easier to go thru everything when I coached college and we practiced 4 times a week or in Austria when we practiced 2 mornings and 4 afternoons plus 2 games a week.

On another note I have suggested to the web developer Dwight that we charge a $10 fee for downloading from this site. There is only about 1 donation for site upkeep every 3 months and it costs Dwight money for space and it costs me money for the site registration. He is the computer guy and knows how to do it through Paypal. It is about 7 Euro's.

Dman,
A couple things I would add, a bit more on the practice philosophy side though,. First I don't like to call the first part of ice-time warmup. Its go-time right from the start. Set the expectations high no matter the drill. Three things to see in every practice, urgency, tempo, and discipline. Players competing while paying attention to the details builds over achievers. Even when switching groups while playing games - hustle in hustle out. Snow piled up from the guys having to stop because they are coming out of the drill at high speed is a sign of effort. Players have to learn that every moment counts. Second, 27-33 skaters (not counting goalies) is not a problem it just takes a little more organization and strong assistants. Start and finish drills with an extra play away from the net. this adds a dimension to the drill, uses underutilized sections of ice, and gives a coach the chance to make sure players finish drills as strong as they start them. If you are working a SAG then as soon as a player or group exits they have to perform a task in an open area. Third, I don't use cool downs or specific 'fun" drills because players love competition so you can have guys really compete right to the end. Line change drills work great they are fun, competitive, and teach the game. Just a few thoughts, have a great day an good luck. Steve

Hi Tom, I don't have PayPal and don't even know what that is, is there any other way to donate? I love this site even though I got to visit only every now and then, and usually with my poor english...

Hey all,

Can someone post the N. American age groups and their ages. or sould we just generally use U17, U10 here because this is international forum (at least i don't really know what age are midgets or PeeWees etc.)

Kai

Line change drill -
This one is called Exchange. We use it to meet different goals - how to change, how to defend the redline, long pass breakouts are a few but the guys love it when we just keep score and teh first to ten wins. The game is simple. Players on the bench and two opposing lines line up at center ice. When you gain the red put it deep and change lines. A good change is one point. The teams learn to read opponents dump-ins and how to breakout away from the benches. The goalie and defense learn to communicate etc...

Steve