State of the Game

If you were to look up the definition of the word “skill” in the dictionary, you would see it is “the ability to use one's knowledge effectively and readily in execution or performance” and also “dexterity or coordination especially in the execution of learned physical tasks.”

The word “skill” gets used a great deal in any discussion of any sport. Skills are important and debates rage endlessly about which sports have the best athletes and which require the most skill. Depending on your viewpoint, a pretty strong case could be made for players in any team sports like football, basketball, baseball and soccer. And being an Olympic year, we certainly have to marvel at the athleticism and skills of the world’s best in track, gymnastics, swimming, diving, cycling, wrestling and so on. Which athletes are the best, the most skilled?

Ask ten people and you just might get ten different answers. But to me, there is one element that separates the wheat from the chaff pretty quickly. Skating. Except for swimming, most other sports don’t require a player to learn a completely new set of skills just to be able to move. That doesn’t mean that hockey players are necessarily the best athletes, because no doubt there are many athletes who excel at other sports who would be excellent hockey players if they had chosen to play. But in my opinion it is the sport that requires the most skill to be able to play.

Hockey has it all. Speed? Absolutely. No other sport has sustained high-speed action like hockey, and obviously skating is a big part of that. Skill? No doubt about it. No other sport requires you to be able to manipulate an object, the puck, with another object, the stick, while skating. Smarts? Definitely. Knowing where to go and having the skating ability to get there at the right time in relation to the puck, the players on your own team and the players on the opposing team. Strength? Certainly. The physical element of the game plays a huge role, with the ability to use your body effectively in battling for positioning and the puck.

And like most sports, in hockey the skills are the skills. At every level of the game, from the most inexperienced beginners to the most seasoned and highly-skilled professionals. It all boils down to the basic fundamental skills; skating, stickhandling, passing, shooting and checking. That’s it. Nothing less. Nothing more.

Go to a practice at any level of the game and you will see the players working on those same things - skating, stickhandling, passing, shooting and checking -in varying degrees of refinement. National Hockey League players work on their skills as part of every practice every day. Eight and under Mite teams work on the very same skills, obviously not at the same speed or with the same precision, but the same skills nonetheless.

No skill ever gets completely learned or mastered. There is always room for improvement. It can always be done better and faster. Some players do things fast, but don’t do them correctly. Others do things correctly but not fast. If you want to get better you have to have both elements. Then you have to worry about someone trying to take the puck away from you while you are doing it.

By far, skating is the most important, although you don’t have to be a great skater to be a great player and being a great skater doesn’t necessarily make you a great player.
An average skater with exceptional smarts and puck skills can be a great player. And there are plenty of great skaters who might look really good on the ice, but have no idea where to be and when to be there to get anything done.

The better a player skates, the quicker he or she will be able to develop the other necessary skills. Weaker skaters will have a much harder time improving their other skills because their lack of skating ability, balance, agility and mobility limits what they can do in terms of stickhandling, passing, shooting or stick or body checking.

As the most important skill, skating involves a number of different areas that are all very important to playing the game effectively, including forward and backward striding, stopping and starting, turning, forward crossovers and backward crossunders, pivoting and transitional skating. And all of the areas can be improved no matter what the level of skater. Nobody is a perfect skater. Everybody has deficiencies.

The same holds true for stickhandling. It’s one thing to be able to stickhandle the puck standing still in open ice, yet completely different at full speed, in traffic and with other players trying to knock you off the puck.

There are a multitude of different ways that players need to be able to pass the puck and receive passes, forehand, backhand, from the front, from the side, with their skates, at full speed, in traffic, at the right time, under pressure and on target.

Same for shooting, quick release, accurately and with some mustard on it, on the move or off of a pass. Checking is a completely different skill set, whether it is having a quick and strong stick in poke checking, sweep checking or stick lifting, or the timing, positioning and body control involved in body checking.

Obviously hockey involves a lot of skills to become proficient at and it doesn’t happen all at one time. It takes years and years and thousands and thousands of repetitions, with correct technique and faster and faster. And then it can still be improved. It is never good enough.

So where do you begin? What are the most important skills at each age?

At 8 & under it is all about skating and stickhandling. Proper skating fundamentals that emphasize knee bend, balance and edge control are crucial. Stickhandling essentials include handling the puck with the head up, making sure the hands are placed correctly on the stick, and using the wrists to stickhandle the puck instead of pushing it along.

At 9 and 10, players have a better sense of their teammates and interacting with them so passing and receiving should become more of a focus along with effective use of the stick for checking. More work on edges, foot quickness and crossovers can enhance agility and mobility.
The game changes dramatically at the Pee Wee level and if players haven’t learned to play with their head up, they soon will as body checking is introduced.

The pace of the play quickens and the ability to move the puck quickly with adept passing and receiving skills, and scoring skills become even more important. Strength on skates becomes a factor along with quickness and balance for evasive skating skills.

In Bantams players are really able to start to comprehend the game and the situations they are presented with. Playing without the puck becomes more of a focus. Reading the play and understanding situations, timing and positioning all play more prominent roles in the game.Transitional skating skills, speed and power become all that more important for players to be able to get to the right place at the right time.

Up to that point and at every step of the way thereafter, it all goes back to the skill set of the players and what they can do and what they can’t do.

The skills are still the skills. Coaches just need to be able to present them in a different way.

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The Skills are the Skills