I had an interesting conversation with the Headmaster of the high school that I work at a couple of months ago. We were talking about blogging as he has been writing a weekly blog for many school about education and our school community. He said to me that if anyone ever asks where he stands on education he can simply point them to his blog to learn everything they need to know.
I feel the same way about my blog. As I near my 100th blog post I too feel that, if you want to know where I stand on coaching hockey, my blog is a great place to start. Writing each week has allowed me to think about and focus in on what I believe to be the cornerstones of coaching the game. In fact, there may be no better form of professional and personal development than committing to writing about your subject. Each week I think all week about what I will write about on Saturday morning and as such, a lot of my time driving in the car, mowing the lawn, vacuuming the house, is also spent thinking about hockey and how best to coach the game.
So here is where I sit with regards to my coaching philosophy on August 20, 2016. We need to stop making our players think about X’s and O’s and get them to be better at reading and reacting. We need to get our players to do things like finding open ice, being available for a pass, looking to create offensive chances at the net, pressuring the puck on defence, thinking man before zone when defending, and skating like the wind every time they are on the ice.
Mike Coldham has started a new website that strives to “provide teaching and coaching resources for competitive hockey players and coaches”. Frankly, I am a little jealous of his web address www.thinklessplayfaster.com. His site has a subtitle “Playing with Pressure”. I think that about says it all when it comes to playing successful hockey.
As many of you will know, I am speaking at the 2016 International Coaching Symposium next week. This is a rather unique online conference that attendees can view presentations online but also access them afterwards if any are missed. You can learn more about the symposium by clicking here.
The symposium is being facilitated by Jeremy Weiss who runs one of the top online hockey coaching resources. The registration for the symposium also gives you access to his drill bank of over 5000 drills. It is an outstanding bank of drills and a great add on to a symposium that will feature the top online writers and coaches in today’s game. What really impresses me is that all of the presenters truly understand the nature of coaching hockey and will bring truly awesome insight into their presentations.
I will be speaking on “Teaching the Torpedo System”. I am one of the first speakers of the symposium but I will introduce the concept of trying to get our players to think less, play faster and have an offence first mindset. Knowing the others who will be speaking, I will bet that most will take a “think less, play faster” approach to their subjects. A list of speakers and presentation topics can be found by clicking here.
Registration for the symposium closes at the end of the day today. I hope you are as interesting in attending as I am looking forward to presenting next week. I know it will be a worthwhile spend of both your time and money. Truly, there may be no better way than to kick start your season planning than with a terrific hockey conference - and you can attend this one from the comfort of your own home.