Originally published January 2024
Yesterday I wrote a tweet which got a lot more engagement than I initially expected.
The initial conversation was about the gap in shooting percentage between men’s and women’s professional hockey. Having worked on both sides in the past decade, I’ve consistently seen lower shooting percentage in the women’s game. The reason is not complicated: most girls grow up using the wrong equipment and compensate with suboptimal shooting mechanics, whether in isolation or off a catch.
The biggest impediment used to be stick selection. A decade ago it was near-impossible to find a junior stick flexible enough for a smaller young girl, or an intermediate stick long enough for a taller adult woman.
Fortunately this appears to be changing.
Mainstream brands such as CCM now market junior flexes as low as 30 (suitable for kids weighing between 50 and 70 pounds) and 55 flex intermediate sticks that are 57 inches long (for full-grown women who’d like more whip on their shots).
I predict that most of the shooting gap between elite men and women will close within the next decade, as girls grow up playing with the right sticks for their frames.
And then there are the pucks.
There is no reason to be macho about how much the puck ought to weigh.
Everyone should play with lighter pucks sometimes.
Aside from a too-stiff stick, the biggest material obstacle between a young player and a powerful, reliable shot is consistently training with pucks that are too heavy.
The screencap above is a sign that your child should be practicing with a lighter puck:
Head overly tilted toward the net
Puck way back in the stance
Top hand close to the body
A long, sweeping motion with an exaggerated follow-through
With time and practice, a player can learn to shoot with power, accuracy and deception with this technique, but not at the same time. Which means they have a shot that is not projectable to a higher level of competition.
Meanwhile, PWHL forward Brit Howard shows perfect high-level fundamentals:
Head neutral & eyes up
Puck no further back than the heel of the skate
Good downforce to load the stick
Short, explosive motion (watch the video by clicking on the image)
The way to get your body moving like Brit’s is to try a lighter puck, or even a pingpong ball.
An extremely light projectile punishes excess upper-body movement while allowing the hands to be quick and snappy.
The protocol is not complex, either:
Shoot a few normal 6oz pucks in a normal way
Shoot a couple of lighter pucks or balls, focusing on keeping your motion extremely short (both the backswing and the follow-through)
(Optional) Shoot one heavy 10oz orange puck, making sure to contract your abs and drop your entire bodyweight down into the ice
Reflect on what you felt and what the puck did
Repeat the cycle
Film your reps if you have the equipment
Now you’re on your way to implementing overload/underload training, the same type of training that MLB pitchers and Olympic sprinters use to increase their performance.