Drills to Build Competitive Instincts

My team is eleven games into our season and I haven’t been happy with our competitive instincts. I feel we are not winning enough 50/50 pucks and not winning enough loose pucks. Over the past few weeks I’ve started running drills in practice specifically designed to work on these skills and as of today, I’m happy with the results I see from the players. All of these drills can be considered Small Area Games and I will post them in that section of the site for future reference.

Crease Challenge

The team really gets competitive with this drill. I split the team into two groups and they compete against each other. The action gets pretty intense at times and really teaches the players how to win puck battles.

2v2 Below Goal Line

I picked this one up off the Coach Chris Hall site and it is intense. The players have to work in very tight areas and compete along the walls.

1v1 Battle

This drill is the typical corner battle. Using it causes the players to work on the physical part of the game as well as tight area puck protection.
 

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Robert Morris Head Coach @DerekSchooley – Canadian Reverse 1v1

Coach Schooley brings us another drill designed to work on breakout passing and 1 on 1 play.
Drill runs from both ends at the same time. Make sure that the defensemen work the reverse pass at game speed and are positionally sound. D2 should hold the front of the net with his skates up ice until the reverse pass is made and then he should sprint to the puck, get his head up and make the breakout pass.

Coach Schooley is the head coach at Division 1 Robert Morris University and his Colonial team is the defending Atlantic Hockey Champions. If you are interested in more information on Coach Schooley, you can visit the RMU Athletics page or follow him on Twitter at @DerekSchooley .

Canadians Reverse 1on1

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Coach Schooley has a terrific DVD to help develop defensemen. Every coach should have a copy of this DVD, it is really well designed and thought out. I have a copy of it myself and use many of the drills with my defensemen every year.

Click to Purchase DVD

Robert Morris Head Coach @DerekSchooley – Reese 2v1

Coach Schooley brings us another drill today. This one works on the breakout, regroup and 2v1 play.
The drill runs from both ends at the same time. To avoid some confusion in the diagram of the drill, we only show one side skating the pattern, but both are going together. I think the attached video shows the drill in action pretty clearly.

RMU Reese 2v1

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Note: Some readers have asked me about using the PlayManager animation software over the past few days. I’ve been a big fan of this product for years, but the developers stopped working on it over two years ago. Now they give it away for free. The above video took me less than 20 minutes to create, but I have been using the software a long time and have a pretty good feel for how it works. The guys over at www.HockeyShare.com now have an animation feature to their product that works really well, but it is a paid service. Both products do the job, but I think the HockeyShare product is easier to use.

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Robert Morris Head Coach @DerekSchooley – Chip Breakout

Robert Morris University Head Coach Derek Schooley gives us this drill today. The drill is designed to work on the breakout pass from the D to Forward down low, followed by the all important second pass to get your team out of the zone. For this drill, the second pass is a chip off the wall to F2 coming through the neutral zone with speed. This is a simple drill in design, but a skill that many players have trouble executing. The ability to chip a puck off the wall, behind a pinching D, into an area of the ice that allows a forward to pick the puck up in stride with speed, is a very important offensive skill to develop in your players.

On the initial pass from the D, the puck can be wrapped to the Forward on the wall, or a direct pass. It’s good to practice both so the F can become comfortable with catching the pass and transitioning up ice.

Chip Breakout

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Click to Download the Drill

Double D Retrieval 2v1 / 3v2

This drill is brought to us by Peter Russo, who is an assistant coach at The Brooks Prep School in North Andover MA. Peter also runs a website where he shares his ideas about all things hockey. You can visit his site at www.coachprusso.com .

In Peter’s own words “The main focus is D1 retrieving pucks quickly and efficiently and learning how to jump into a rush”.

Double D Retrieval 2v1 / 3v2

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Click to Download the Drill

Hockey Canada – D Agility Transition

Got this drill from my friends at Hockey Canada. Worked it at practice last night and it looked good once we got the hang of it. The drill works on supporting the puck with the weakside D as well as transitioning to offense using the forward cutting through the middle. Make sure your D concentrate on the D2D pass as well as the initial transition pass to the forward. You can add a D at the other end to make the drill a 2v1 if you prefer.

Defense Agility Transition

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Click to Download the Drill

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Advanced Hockey Drills – 101 drill collection

Hockey drills are the backbone of a good practice. Coaches are always scouring for new drills to try to teach a certain point, or help their players develop and enhance their skills. There are a lot of drill resources out there, however most free sources lack organization and experience. By experience I mean a coach that has actually tried the drill, modified it, tried it again, etc.

Coach Jeremy Weiss has created a great collection of 101 advanced hockey drills

Coach Weiss runs Weiss Tech Hockey which is a blog dedicated to coaching hockey and hockey drills. In this e-book he shares his collection of his 101 favourite advanced hockey drills. The categories in the book include

• Agility drills
• Angling drills
• Competition / Competitive drills
• Goalie drills
• Passing drills
• Small area games
• Shooting drills
• Skating drills
• Station drills
• Warm-up drills

Some sample drills

Here is one of the many drills from the competition section. I love competitive drills as the players almost always give 100% effort in these types of drills. I like this one as it’s an upgrade from a similar drill I already know and love. I could easily run the drill I normally run first, and then run this one next in the sequence.

This is a good on ice agility drill to get the kids skating and performing a number of moves. You can always modify the drill by asking the players to perform reverse pivots, mohawks / spread eagle, 360 turn, etc

How much is the Advanced Hockey Drill Book?

The e-book is only $9.99 and you can also buy the Weiss Tech systems book which I highly recommend if you are interested in choosing and developing a system to run. You can download the e-book immediately after purchasing and then have a copy on your computer, tablet, and phone so it’s always available!

How to use the Drills

This sounds silly, but having the drills alone is not enough to run a good practice. I wanted to take a few seconds to re-iterate the coaches job.

• Challenge
• Motivate
• Inspire
• Provide feedback

A good coach will run drills based on what the team needs to work on. Pay attention in practice and use drills that will challenge your players and help improve their weaknesses and their strengths. While running the drills provide a lot of feedback. Have the assistant coaches work the whistle sometimes while you encourage and correct the players.

That’s all for now, check out the drill book, and I strongly recommend Coach Weiss’s hockey systems book which you can also find through the links provided above.

Advanced Hockey Drills – 101 drill collection

Hockey drills are the backbone of a good practice. Coaches are always scouring for new drills to try to teach a certain point, or help their players develop and enhance their skills. There are a lot of drill resources out there, however most free sources lack organization and experience. By experience I mean a coach that has actually tried the drill, modified it, tried it again, etc.

Coach Jeremy Weiss has created a great collection of 101 advanced hockey drills

Coach Weiss runs Weiss Tech Hockey which is a blog dedicated to coaching hockey and hockey drills. In this e-book he shares his collection of his 101 favourite advanced hockey drills. The categories in the book include

• Agility drills
• Angling drills
• Competition / Competitive drills
• Goalie drills
• Passing drills
• Small area games
• Shooting drills
• Skating drills
• Station drills
• Warm-up drills

Some sample drills

Here is one of the many drills from the competition section. I love competitive drills as the players almost always give 100% effort in these types of drills. I like this one as it’s an upgrade from a similar drill I already know and love. I could easily run the drill I normally run first, and then run this one next in the sequence.

This is a good on ice agility drill to get the kids skating and performing a number of moves. You can always modify the drill by asking the players to perform reverse pivots, mohawks / spread eagle, 360 turn, etc

How much is the Advanced Hockey Drill Book?

The e-book is only $9.99 and you can also buy the Weiss Tech systems book which I highly recommend if you are interested in choosing and developing a system to run. You can download the e-book immediately after purchasing and then have a copy on your computer, tablet, and phone so it’s always available!

How to use the Drills

This sounds silly, but having the drills alone is not enough to run a good practice. I wanted to take a few seconds to re-iterate the coaches job.

• Challenge
• Motivate
• Inspire
• Provide feedback

A good coach will run drills based on what the team needs to work on. Pay attention in practice and use drills that will challenge your players and help improve their weaknesses and their strengths. While running the drills provide a lot of feedback. Have the assistant coaches work the whistle sometimes while you encourage and correct the players.

That’s all for now, check out the drill book, and I strongly recommend Coach Weiss’s hockey systems book which you can also find through the links provided above.

Cornerstone Skating Drill for D

I’ve used this drill for years to help develop the skating skills of my defensemen. It works many of the fundamental skills a good defenseman needs to play at a high level. If you have the ability to split your ice to work with the defenseman, this is a great drill to add to your practice plan. Be sure to run it on both sides of the ice.

Cornerstone

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