When it comes to practice design, if you ain’t stealing, you ain’t trying.
At least, that’s how hockey coaches tend to operate.
A month ago I see Director of Hockey Development Adam Nicholas take Montreal Canadiens prospects through two interesting drills at Habs rookie camp.
Yesterday, I get on the ice with head coach Tim Archambault to try them out with his CEGEP St-Laurent Patriots. With 90 minutes of team practice time at our disposal, we work these new drills into a list of eight.
We don’t recreate Adam’s drills perfectly and run into a few problems along the way, but in the end we are able to find solutions.
Here’s what happened.
Drill 2: Box Warmup
MTL’s Setup:
Coach draws a large box in the neutral zone using a wide permanent marker
Skaters line up in two groups at opposite corners of the NZ
Both groups leave in waves of four, who stickhandle with their head up in the NZ as to avoid collisions
As soon as a skater leaves the box to take a shot on net, the next in line enters the box as to always maintain eight active players
Our Execution:
Instead of having two groups, we split skaters into four groups, one at each corner of the NZ
We start the drill with waves of three (3x4 = 12 skaters active), but it is too many at a time for both goaltenders to handle, so we dial it back to 2x4
Instruction for player inside the box: skate directly at another player as to attack them face-to-face, do it a second time, leave the box and delay if needed before taking a shot on a ready goaltender
Positives:
Skaters are quick to understand the basic premise of the drill (constant scanning, changes of direction, reading space, anticipating movement)
Goalies hone their scanning and threat management skills, switching off skaters who delay and locking onto those committed to shooting
No fatal collisions
Negatives:
Starting the drill 3x4 creates pacing issues for goalies, who have far too little time to reset between shots
Most skaters expose the puck the puck in front of them and overuse their inside edges - this can become an area of focus for coaches in future sessions
Drill 5: 3v3+1 NZ Delay
MTL’s Setup:
Coach spots puck into the corner, Red (breakout) & White (forecheck) play 3v3 in-zone
Red breaks out by making a stretch pass to Red 4 in the NZ, who must touch the puck in transition but must also be the last player to enter the OZ
This forces R4 to delay and carry east-west across the NZ as teammates sprint north-south
Red has a 4v3 advantage in the OZ, with R4 arriving late and unmarked through the middle
Our Execution:
3x Blue on breakout, 3x Black on forecheck
We eventually add a Black player in the NZ, as to force Blue 4 to move laterally with the catch and escape pressure instead of simply bumping the puck to a teammate
After regaining possession in its zone, Black can counter-attack 4v4
Positives:
Immediate understanding that the NZ player is a stretch & delay option
Good awareness for offensive players to fill lanes and to use east-west passing to create space
Comment from one player: “I love this drill!”
Negative:
Offensive teams tend to be over-aggressive off the entry and regularly gave up 1v0 or even 2-0 breakaways to the defending team, which reveals an opportunity to improve spacing & reload habits in the OZ
Understand NHL tactics to create more game-like drills
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