Jake Gardiner working on backward crossovers
Last Updated on Thursday, 09 July 2015 09:52
By Diane Ness
What a great time of year right now for development and improvement. When I work with the pros in the summer, there is so much attention to detail while working on skating. If younger skaters were able to learn and understand this concept, they would make great strides throughout the year. Granted, we are working on skating and skating-specific drills in the summer, but the general idea always applies. Practice makes permanent, practice how you play and make sure you focus on details each and every practice.
In all reality there are thousands of skaters beyond college that play at the next level. There are so many pro leagues and there are so many good players. What are some of the traits that make the top players the top players?
First, work ethic is a foregone conclusion. Everybody works hard. When doing the skating sessions in New Jersey for the summer development camp, everyone has an incredible work ethic. There are over 50 draft picks and free agents that attend these camps each summer and every NHL team has one. When players show up, they tend to find out quick there are tons of guys in their very same position. Everyone works hard.
The difference when we look at skating is the player’s ability to have what I like to call “uberfocus.” The guys that understand and process what is being taught and are able to put it into action. It goes from their brain to their feet and they are able to execute the skating skill fluidly.
When looking at youth levels, there can tend to be a “good enough” aspect to skating skills. Drills may be done, but are they done well? Are drills used as fillers or with a purpose? The biggest key when looking at drills is that there is an enormous difference between doing a skill and doing a skill well. Players can do skating skills, but can they focus on the details of every skill to make improvements? Details are what separates the great skaters from the good skaters. It is what allows skaters to make improvements as well as form good habits.
Kurtis Gabriel working a power turn
While working with the top level skaters during the summer, an hour is 60 minutes of work. There is no wasted time. Every minute counts, and it is how much energy and effort that is put into the specific time frame. It really comes down to what results come out of each and every session. Sixty-or 90-minute sessions are really just an arbitrary number. A wasted session is a wasted session regardless of time. When working with NHL skaters, their time is at a premium, so we better get the results we want out of the session.
Finally, results are results. Things today have definitely changed. Sometimes we feel as if we need to “wow” kids with drills when really sometimes good, old “keeping it simple” is the key. I do like being creative, always trying to come up with new drills and different ways to teach the same skill. It is what keeps things fresh for coach and skater alike. With that said, always coming back to the basics seem to work the best.
Two years ago New Jersey Devils captain Bryce Salvador came to Minnesota to skate the entire spring. He was coming off a season in which he had a bad concussion and basically had to start from square one again. The first day he made a comment how he is an older veteran player that just needs basic skating and doesn’t need exotic drills. He just wanted to keep it simple and do a lot of repetition on the basics and try to get better each day. Each session was filled with drills that may become monotonous to some skaters, but not to him. He made huge improvements in a three-month span. That very next season he had an outstanding run to the Stanley Cup Final and signed a new three-year contract worth $9.5 million. Not bad for a guy that just a short year before that was working on one-foot glides.
Diane Ness has been a full-time professional skating coach for over 35 years. She has coached both figure skaters and hockey players alike and is a former U.S. gold medalist in figure skating. She is the Director for the Pro Edge Power hockey camps and the Learn to Skate program at Highland Park Arena. Ness is the skating coach for the New Jersey Devils, the University of Minnesota men’s and women’s hockey teams and the U.S. Women’s Olympic Hockey Team. She has trained players in the NHL, AHL, NCAA, USHL and NAHL.
