Tag: youth sports

Posted Glen MulcahyPosted in Athlete, Coach, Officials, Organization Executive, Parents

One of the 5 takeaways I share in every talk, workshop or clinic is the importance for coaches to make the environment for their players safe, as the hockey world has recently coming to terms with the Kyle Beech tragedy and the dominoes that are falling, it is just another painful and emotional reminder why we need to make it safe from all forms of harassment that I wrote on in 2017.

The other area that I have been advocating for years is the importance for coaches to make it safe to fail, unlike the coaches and parents that are highlighted time and time again in social media for their outbursts towards kids as players, officials, I have always been a believe thanks to the coaches that I had growing up to encourage to make mistakes in practices and even in games and have fun when they do so.

WHAT ?

Recommend they make mistakes, the uglier the better … what if they coughed up the puck that lead to a goal, fumbled the ball that lead to a touchdown by opposing teams, missed that free throw or field goal that could have won the game and son on.

Hmmm … there have been just a few players that were pretty good that made a ton of mistakes, but had they not done so, never would have achieved their milestones and become some of the best ever to play their respective sports.

 

Reggie Jackson/Babe Ruth

Reggie Jackson holds the record to this day of the most strikeouts of any player in MLB history (2597) but was touted year over year in his Hall of Fame Career as Mr. October where his bat would hit many out of the park, much like Babe Ruth who did the same decades back.

 

 

 

Another recent example is Mason Crosby missing 3 field goals in regulation but made the 4th to win the game in overtime for the Cheeseheads (Green Bay Packers) against the Cincinatti Bengals (whose kicker also missed 2 field goal attempts in the same game)

This was a complete surprise for all those that watched as Mason had only missed 2 field goals in the last 2 seasons combined !

Why was he to make the 4th field goal?  Because he had the support of their teammates, coaches, managers who recognized that mistakes would happen and once they did, were history, was time to move on to the next play.  This is in a league that is focused on winning, the top sport in the world in terms of revenue with millions of dollars in player salaries, billions of dollars in TV and merchandising revenue NOT community youth sports.

Sadly in today’s era of youth sports where it has become adultified, where adults are competing with other adults thru their kids, gone are the days where kids play without fear of failure which was prevalent in free play (i.e. pond hockey, pickup basketball, sandlot baseball) where there were no adults present (no coaches, parents or officials), it has lead to increasing attrition rates as a result.

In lieu of focusing on the results, wins/losses, goals/assists, focus on the process of development, ensure that kids are having fun and winning will be the byproduct vs. the focus.

Growth Mindset

One of my top recommendations for books for coaches, parents and youth sports leaders I the book Mindset by Carol Dweck who shares the differences between the fixed and growth mindset.

Those with a fixed mindset believe that their skills are fixed due to DNA, they don’t believe in working to improve, and fear failure so would focus on simpler tasks.  Those with the growth mindset however, believe they are not that good YET, and will put in the effort to improve and recognize making mistakes is part of the process.

A perfect example of a coach that has incorporated the growth mindset with their team is Karch Karaly, voted best men’s volleyball player in sand and courts of all time, in 2012 he became the head coach of the US Women’s Volleyball team soon after he read Carol’s book and as I have shared in past their team white board encourages the players to make UGLY mistakes so they develop.

He has lead the team to their first gold medal at an international event in 2013, and medaled at the three Olympic games under his watch, including Gold at this years summer games in Korea.

In order for us to reverse the negative trends we have seen in youth sports for over a decade, we need to create an environment for not only for our players where it is safe for them to fail, but also for the young officials.

Sadly, we lose 50% of young officials in many sports (especially what I refer to as the money sports, Hockey, Baseball, Football, Basketball and Soccer) in their FIRST YEAR.

Why?

The #1 reason is due to the abuse they are taking from the adults in the stands or along the sidelines.

We subsequently lose 30% on average every year so we are literally are constantly recruiting and not allowing time to mentor and train these young officials so they can hone their craft which just creates this vicious circle.

To give you some numbers, in Canada, we have approximately 30,000 officials registered across Canada to ref minor hockey games, and every year we lose over 10,000!!!

This is not a recent trend, this has been the case since I started running Hockey Clinics over a decade ago.

It is the reason why Hockey Canada and USA Hockey came up with the campaign “Relax it’s just a game” in 2007 … 14 years ago

 

The focus was more on parents who are coaching or critiquing their kids, but I have also seen my share of coaches do the same towards players and officials.

Ironically, during a recent clinic that I was running, at the lunch break just before we all shut down out audio/video a coach shared with me and those that were still in the room (we have shifted to online virtual clinics in part due to COVID, in part due to efficiencies) and he shared that two parents were fighting in the stands at a U11 minor hockey game and the Police had been called in.

This was not a the zone or academy level where parental expectations are even higher (due largely due to the costs financially and time).

Time after time each time I run a clinic coaches share similar analogies how other coaches are running short benches to win games, parents are screaming from the stands or in parking lots,  the ride home (or to) games/practices.

The saddest analogy and driving reason for me to continue running clinics to shift the needle is when a coach stood up to introduce himself in a in person clinic and said the reason he started to coach is his 8 year old daughter shared with him why she wanted to quit Hockey at the end of the season.

He said, with emotion in voice and tears in his eyes which made the rest of us in the room do the same (including yours truly)….

“My daughter told me that she was going to quit because she was scared of making mistakes.”

Until we make youth sports safe to fail again like it was in prior generations, we will continue to experience high rates of attrition, so if you are an adult involved in youth sports (parent, coach, administrator) please provide the players under your watch that opportunity to do so.

PS Tagline - Dont be a kids last coach

The Reality of Youth Sports

Posted Glen MulcahyPosted in Coach, Organization Executive, Parents

It is about ½ way through this year’s hockey clinic season and like last year, I have been running virtual online clinics every weekend and will until the end of November.

Each clinic, there are another group of 40’sh coaches in the various levels of the Hockey Canada NCCP program that are starting their coaching journies and literally every clinic the same issue comes to light with the high expectations that parents have for their kids.

Ironically, before the clinic season wrapped up I made a road trip to the Kootenays where my in-laws have a mobile home we have visited for many years in the spring/summer for some R&R. We always take a day to walk “the town” and visit local used bookstores and every time we do so I find a book that I then read while there for a few days.

This past trip, I came across one of the best reads I have found to date that will be one of my top 10 book recommendations for coaches, players and athletes written by Gary Mack, former acclaimed Sport Psychologist in the USA that worked with hundreds of high-profile athletes and teams in a plethora of sports called “Mind Gym – An Athlete’s Guide to Inner Excellence”.

There are many great nuggets and quotes in his book that I will reference in future in terms of tips for coaches, parents and athletes.

The book was released in 2001, ironically the same year of one of the worst tragedies the world has ever faced, 911, but also the same year of the launch of the iPod and iTunes, as well as Microsoft’s first Xbox. Since that time iPod morphed into the Touch and then the “World’s first smartphone according to Apple iPhone (which is not the case, it was the Blackberry)” and the world as we know changed where now these smartphones can cost in excess of $2K. My son shared with me the other day that one of his good friends just both the new Xbox 5 for close to the same although the go to street price is supposed to be 499.99 due to bent up demand due to COVID impacting production

What I found fascinating about Gary’s book was the fact that one of the last chapters of the book “The Well-Played Game” he talks about the various issues revolving around youth sports that was pushing kids out of the game in his experience in the USA.

THIS WAS 20 YEARS AGO!!!

I started down this path initially to become a Hockey Canada NCCP instructor over a decade ago as I also saw many of the trends that are still commonplace today not only in the USA, but have become global issues

• Exceedingly high and unrealistic parent expectations for their kids to get a NCAA Div 1 Full Ride Scholarship

The Reality is international tuition for the schools that do offer athletic scholarships can be over $40K USD per year (approx. 55K CDN based on current exchange) and if athletes do get a scholarship, more often than not is a partial in the area of 8K so that still means parents will be out of pocket over 30K year or approx. 150K CDN over the course of 4 years.

As I have shared with every parent over the years, if this is what you are aspiring for, in lieu you should start a RESP when they are young and by the time they are old enough for university you would have saved enough

• Aspiring for their kids to play professionally in the money sports like NHL, NBA, NFL, MLB

The Reality – only .03% of kids will reach this level from minor sports and other than Tennis, Golf that have developed their female professional programs, female professional sports are really difficult to make a living at playing professionally, many have to have full time jobs and play the sports due to the disparity for men’s vs. women’s professional sports (which I wish the other pro sports would take the lead the WNBA has but that is another issue for a future post)

• Fast tracking their development by having them specialize in a sport year-round to chase the 10,000-hour rule that was made famous by Malcolm Gladwell in his book Outliers in 2008

This has been argued by yours truly and many others since is wrong, including two amazing well researched books written by David Epstein “The Sports Gene” (2013) and “Range” (2019) among many others in recent years. Below is an interview panel that Malcolm did with David highlighting key takeaways from his book Range, highlighting why being a generalist first, then specializing later is the better path

• The focus that parents, coaches and even athletes have at the recreational level (the majority) looking at the professional level focusing on winning at all costs when even those playing and coaching at that level focus on the process of development, loving the game, where winning is not the focus, it is the by product

The fact that Gary highlighted issues that are still relevant, in many cases, worse than they were 2 decades back sadly for me was painful reminder that we still have so much work ahead of us to bring the game back to the kids BUT fortunately I am seeing a positive shift in interactions with adults involved in youth sports in recent years than when I first started seeing these trends start coming to fruition en masse. Many recognize we need to make organized sports more positive, focus on fun, as well as the importance of unstructured free play but as the cliché goes, it takes a village for us to get there.

As I share with all the coaches that ask how they can deal with parents that have unrealistic expectations, the more education we can provide to all the adults that are involved in youth sports, the sooner we will continue to see the needle move back where kids play the games they love again without the pressures and fear of making mistakes or working the sport that is leading to such early attrition rates.

Although we have made headway, last year just before COVID, Project Play published data that 62% of kids in the USA are quitting organized sports by the age of 11, after only playing organized sports for 3 years.

This is a video that was produced called “Don’t Retire Kid”

We never will get back to the pre-internet era where kids played for hours on end without coaches, parents, officials like our past generation did, but we need to find the happy medium where kids do just that … PLAY without fear of making mistakes and ultimately come back year after year to various organized sports with big smiles on their faces.

Let’s all work together to bring the game back to the kids.

PS Tagline - Dont be a kids last coach

Wear your parent hat at home, coach hat at the rink/field.

Posted Glen MulcahyPosted in Coach, Organization Executive, Parents

Years back I started a tradition with my family as I was traveling extensively for my day job then and when traveling in lieu of buying various touristy items for my kids I opted to buying the latest movie that we would watch when I returned home.

Although my kids have now become adults, as they are still going to college/university, they still reside at home (much like every other 20 something in the lower mainland of Vancouver due to the high costs of housing) and last night we decided to watch “Antwone Fisher” based on a young man who lost his father when he was 2 months old and was given up for adoption by his mother and had an abusive foster family environment until he entered the Navy.

Due to various emotional issues, particularly anger the led to him getting into numerous fights, he was ordered to see the Navy Psychiatrist brilliantly portrayed by Denzel Washington who helped Antwone overcome the various emotional struggles he experienced from losing both his father, turned over to what was an abusive foster care environment by his birth mother and then he lost his best friend in his late teens.

You’re probably wondering why I am sharing this, but the reason I am doing so is that I can relate to Antwone’s journey on a few fronts which is why I get very emotional when I watch the movie.

#1 – Like Antwone, I lost my father when I was very young, at 8 years old and as a result of his work we had had moved 8 times already to be close to the buildings he managed (so can relate to all the military brats out there), but also how disappointed I was that he was unable to honour his promise to coach my baseball team as he died half way thru the season.

My favorite picture of my Dad that I actually took when we were on the train heading from Montreal to our new home in Vancouver when I was 7 years old

#2 – Like many youth without a father, I ended up hanging out with a group of misfits, my non-sport “friends” in my teen years but also continued to play various sports, in particular contact sports hockey, football and rugby as I too had issues with my temper from not having a Dad to turn to but the team mates in sports and coaches I had help me keep it in check, would say to me all the time to use my temper in a positive fashion by being tough to play against.

One of the main reasons that I am so passionate about sports and kids is all the amazing coaches that I had and team mates who helped steer me down the right path vs. “my friends” that went down the wrong path (many of which did not graduate high school, were imprisoned for various reasons so who knows where I would have ended up)

#3 – Although playing contact sports did keep my temper in check at times, one that I did not try and several said should have was boxing as I did in more than my fair share of bar brawls over the years into my mid  20’s until I lost my “first and last fight” (to that point I had lost a fight in any of the brawls I had been in) and was beaten up so bad that I made the original Rocky pic of Sly look like like he only had a couple of love taps that lead to me recovering from a concussion for several months and ended my collegiate rugby career and chance to represent Canada Nationally as I had been invited to attend the national camp later that year.

All of that is water under the bridge now, as I transitioned to working a day job to coach after I completed my post secondary education at night/weekends  and when I became a parent I made a promise to myself having lost my father so early that I would be there for my kids, be their coach like he couldn’t and support them to the best of my ability.

This Saturday I did a presentation of my core talk “Don’t be a Kid’s Last Coach” for Ontario Lacrosse virtual 4 day conference and shared a couple of tips for the coaches as majority of youth sports are parent coaches;

Tip #1 – When you are a parent coach, ensure you wear your parent hat at home/in the car and when get to the rink/field/court put your coach hat on and vice versa

When I shared that analogy to coincide with a video on the ride home that I have shared for a hockey clinic, one of the coaches came up to me during the break and was in tears and I asked him if he was ok and he said he never thought about it, but his 10 year old son shared with him that he was going to quit hockey as was not having fun that he was wearing his coach hat all the time.

He coached him at home, at the dinner, breakfast tables, in the car to and from the practices and games and shared with me that he will take my advice and only coach at the rink.

The clinic was in November, in March I received an email from the coach later that season sharing how appreciative he was of the advice and the relationship between him and his son was so much stronger and happier,  and his son was looking forward to playing soccer in the off season and told his dad thanks for being his coach and was looking forward to next season in hockey.

Tip #2 – Treat your son or daughter the same as all the other players and ensure they call you Coach when you have your coach hat on and Mom/Dad when you have your parent hat on.

Two things can happen when coaching your kids, you can either make them one of your favorites and give them more playing time, top lines, positions (which is the big reason why competitive hockey now has tried to go the non parent route but at huge cost for honorariums for coaches) OR you can be too hard on them.

The latter is one that I saw in my third year coaching minor hockey,, one of the coaches of the U8 team that shared ice with for practices would constantly scream at his son for making mistakes, although he was an early bloomer and one of the top players in our age group, I could tell every time his Dad did so he lost a little more of the joy he had for the game.  Although I would talk to his Dad numerous times when he beraded his son reminding him he was just a kid, game should be fun, treat him the same as others it went on deaf ears.

I heard the following year that his son had quit hockey and all other sports, his Dad also was not invited to come back to coach again as a result.

I know all too well how hard it can be as a parent coach to ensure you are not biased either way,  I also know how big of a time commitment it can be for all of us that juggle many things including work, perhaps other children, perhaps coaching multiple teams and sports as a result.

Although I know I made my mistakes as well, probably the greatest reward I received was when my son was 19 and was asked to play on a Junior Ball Hockey Team that several of his team mates and he had talked and asked if I would help coach the team as the head coach merely put up his hand as they were having a tough time finding coaches.

To which I humbly said, yes, I would be glad to help out and had a blast coaching my son and many of his friends who he grew up with playing a myriad of sports.

Sadly I don’t get to watch him or my daughter play youth sports any more, but I can look back with a big smile on my face how much I loved watching them and all their friends (part of my extended family) play the sports they loved and continue to be active in their adulthood.

At the end of the day, that is all we can ask for as parents and as coaches, if they play at a high level beyond their high school years that is just cherry on the cake.

PS Tagline - Dont be a kids last coach

 

How BC is returning to Sport – Phase III

Posted Glen MulcahyPosted in Athlete, Coach, COVID-19, Officials, Organization Executive, Parents

Since we entered the COVID-19 Era, I have had a number of conversations with various youth sports groups regarding the confusion regarding all of the return to play protocols as various provinces go thru their various stages of returning to play.

Our home province, British Columbia, has recently announced that we are now in Phase III thanks to the amazing work that our PHO and Dr. Bonnie Henry have done since COVID-19 lead to shutting down Sports and numerous other sectors.

Although I am excited that we will see sports ramping up this fall, based on recent conversations since I have had with a few user groups I felt best to share what the phase means in terms of returning back to Sport as some are inferring that it literally is GAME ON, meaning, we are good to return back to pre-COVID era and we are still a ways from that being the case.

Below is a summary of all phases of the proposed return to sport plan as a summary for user groups to reference;

What has not changed from prior phases is;

 

  1. Personal Hygiene – washing hands regularly and using disinfectant
  2. Social Distancing required in common areas like benches, dugouts, dressing rooms, lobbies and entrances (masks in those areas is also recommended)
  3. Maximum gatherings of 50 to include spectators
  4. Symptom Screening before every activity
  5. Contact/Participant tracking

What has been eased up in terms of restrictions;

  1. Cohort groups identified by risk of sports can be anywhere from 10-100
  2. Contact within those cohort groups is now permitted
  3. Competition or games can now be played (adhering to revised protocols)
  4. High Performance training with limited travel

In terms of the actual sizes of cohort groups, as this will vary across a myriad of over 70 sports in BC alone, confirm with your PSO and refer to updated return to play quidelines, a recent example included Basketball BC’s HERE

 

  1. Lowest risk of Contact – i.e. Archery, Tennis, skiing, golf – Up to 100
  2. Higher risk of contact – Baseball, Cricket, Soccer – Up to 50
  3. Frequent/Sustained Contact Sports – Football, Rugby, Hockey – Up to 50
  4. Combative Sports – Martial Arts, Boxing – Max 10 per cohort

NOTE: Cohort groups includes spectators which are immediate family members only to be considered part of the cohort. Coaches and officials can be counted outside the total cohort number IF they are able to maintain physical distancing at all times.

To determine where your sport falls in terms of the size of cohort groups permitted, reach out to your PSO/RSO for confirmation as it is not a one size fits all approach, each sport will have different guidelines based on their evolving return to play plan and facilities being used.

A couple of examples that I can share with you how user groups implemented to limit COVID-19 exposure and reduce risk to participants (players, coaches and others)

My niece recently flew to Montreal for her first year to play for McGill’s Women’s Varsity Hockey Team.  She will be staying in dorm rooms in a converted hotel that McGill purchased and renovated for dorm housing with her own bathroom and common areas for kitchen for cohorts to use only.  Similar to the NHL bubble, they will not interact with others out of their cohorts

Her season will start with skills development sessions only, and will find out this week as Quebec enters into their next phase and she shared the original plan for competitive games is for McGill to play Concordia and Ottawa’s USports teams to be within a short travel distance but no travel will be permitted to USA or other provinces until a later date.

Although she will be able to be part of the team for various activities, all of her courses, like all the other students will be done online until further notice, like most other universities at least for this fall.

The second would be easing of instructions for minor hockey associations, the first of which that re-opened its doors with strict COVID-19 protocols was Burnaby Winter Club BWC) in May which we shared Returning Back to Play – Phase II where they took the biggest risk as the first out of the gate but to date no positive COVID-19 cases have been reported months later.

Now all other minor hockey associations in the lower mainland are slowly but surely returning back to the ice with various camps, skills sessions with limited number of skaters and coaches on the ice and aspire to return back to 5 on 5 hockey this coming season.

Ironically in July I had a coach who attended many of the workshops that I ran last year for one of those associations reached out to me if I felt it would be safe for him and his son to return to play and I shared all the work that was being done to ensure that it would be safe, but it would be different at least in the immediate short term.

When ViaSport and our provincial health authority announced that we would be entering phase III, I was excited but at the same time a little weary due to the fact that I have also connected with colleagues in the US, Europe and Australia who have shared how far out they are from returning to sport.

One recent example was a conversation that I had with one of our speakers for our Summer Summit, Rosemary Morris, the first female official of men’s elite basketball in Australia and she stated that they were in full lock-down due to the explosion of COVID-19 cases in recent weeks.

This included;

  • Curfew where all residents had to be in their homes from 8PM to 7AM the following day
  • Only 1 hour of outside time for physical activity, exercises
  • No retail shopping except essential services (grocery, pharmacy and of course alcohol)
  • Full cancellation of all sports programming until further notice
  • Police and Militia enforcement to ensure people follow the lock-down requirements

This right around the time when the Big 10, Pac12, CFL and various other professional, collegiate, school and youth sports cancelled all fall sports programming in Canada, US and abroad to curve the spread of COVID-19.

This is not to say that I am beyond excited that kids in BC, in particular the Vancouver area where I reside, will have the opportunity to return back to playing the sports they love, being with the coaches, team mates and working up a sweat with huge smiles on their faces while they do so.

I just want to make sure that we don’t go to the other extreme as we have seen in many US states who recognized the importance of kids playing youth sports but did not do so in phases adhering to various return to play protocols.

Recently the CDC, like ViaSport has identified various groupings of sport based on risk assessments per the image below

 

Phase III does permit cohort groups of competition within teams in your area but does not permit tournament play requiring travel to other areas.

 

Masks, sanitizer, and ultimately participating outdoors are the main recommendations to flatten the curve of COVID-19

 

 

Sadly COVID-19 has forced our hand to go down the path of implementing cohorts or bubble environments to limit the interaction and potentially the spread of COVID-19 but as the NHL has shown, if bubble is maintained, it does permit sports to be played.

According to ViaSport, the term cohort is “a group of participants who primarily interact with each other within the sport environment over an extended period of time.”

Similar to the Bubble concept that has been implemented by professional sports like the NHL, NBA once kids are identified for their cohorts they are not permitted to interact with ones that are in other cohort groups and same holds true for coaches, officials if they become members of a cohort (exception being if they can maintain physical distancing then could coach other sports with other cohorts)

Sadly COVID-19 has forced our hand to go down the path of implementing cohorts or bubble environments to limit the interaction and potentially the spread of COVID-19 but as the NHL has shown, if bubble is maintained, it does permit sports to be played.

However, as the MLB who has not implemented a bubble model like the NHL/NBA/MLS have has shown, the chances of transmission of COVID-19 is much higher even though baseball is one of the sports identified by youth sports groups as being lower risk as by its natures participants are much farther apart then other team sports.

It also does not help when they had a couple of pitchers on one team that went partying in Chicago increasing their exposure, their team mates and potentially others teams they are playing against … but I digress.

The end result is for the foreseeable future, the cohort and or bubble model is necessary for us until such time that there is a vaccine or other treatment protocols for COVID-19 but by doing so, it will permit kids to play what they love, coaches do what they love to do and all other stakeholders return back to the fields, courts, fields and other playing surfaces so we can “Play for the love of the game”

In addition to the new Phase III guidelines, please ensure that you continue to follow health authority, organization and league safety protocols until such time that we do enter phase IV when large gatherings can take place as they had pre-Covid.

PS Tagline - Dont be a kids last coach

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Will 4 on 4 be the “new” normal?

Posted Glen MulcahyPosted in Athlete, Coach, COVID-19, Parents

It is so exciting to see the globe enter different phases post COVID-19 quarantine period start put all sports on hold mid March as well as other sectors coming back.

I think one of the biggest milestones for yours truly was when I finally was able to get my hair cut again, normally I do so every month, and the last appointment I had pre Covid just before quarantine period was on March 9th so come June 19th when I got to see my “stylist” of 25+ years was just one of many examples how we are returning back.

I recently read another great article that JJ Adams wrote for the Vancouver Sun and Province newspapers “Rec hockey overhauled to keep it fun, less risky”

The online version of the same article in the Sun Newspaper (yes, there are still people that read the paper, yours truly is one as my first “job” was carrier for the Sun for 8 years) starts with the quote that I shared in our newsletter …..

 

One of the main contributors to the article that JJ talked to was the CEO of Canlan Ice Sports, who run 3 multi sheet ice rinks in the Vancouver and 12 others in Canada and Illinois.

He shared how they have reinvented the format for both their adult and youth recreational leagues which I am very familiar with, having coached in all of the facilities for years and then when my son’s minor hockey “career” was over, in lieu of pursuing the junior hockey path he found very frustrating (as did I), he accepted an invitation to play for an adult team playing in ASHL tier 1 even though he was 18 at the time.

He was able to play 2 seasons with that team but like all others, his season ended March 13th, 2020 and I know he is itching to return to play once a week with his buds as his hockey bag still sits fully packed in our garage.

I shared the highlights of the article at one of our many home cooked dinners we have had the last few months and he shared one of his fondest memories playing hockey growing up we not the 5 on 5 recreational or competitive teams he played for, but was the spring 3 on 3 on smaller ice surfaces or 3 on 3 , 4 on 4 on full ice with modified rules.

For me as well, that was some of my fondest memories, going back to watching him play with the “big boys” when he was invited to play 3 on 3 with his counterparts who were all a year older for his first spring “season” of 12 games from end of March to mid June once a week.

We played in a faculty that had 3 smaller ice surfaces that became a go to for many associations in the winter for practices, small area games and then a natural fit for cross ice hockey (ice sheets are approx. 45% smaller than a full sheet)

3 on 3 had rules to keep the flow going of the game including floating blue line (once entered the offensive zone the red line then became the blue line to keep the puck moving), changing on the fly (vs .buzzers that were being used from H1-4 when we did play full ice) and no penalties, only penalty shots.  No body checking for all age groups also.

Each year thereafter he would ask me to put a team together as he had so much fun so we did and many of the original players and goalies returned year after year as they had so much fun.

Even coaches had fun, as did parents who watched many of the games from the pub (many of which would sure one of their counterparts would be the DD)

When the boys got into their teens, one of the players grandparents was the head skills developer for one of the Canlan sheets near us and asked us if they boys would like to try full ice 4 on 4 or 3 on 3 which is what really kept the bug going for my son and all of his friends.

THEY Loved both options, and although scores were kept, it was literally watching pond hockey and although I was their coach, I encouraged them all the time to just go out there and have fun, they already had their winter seasons with plenty of competitive games and practices, this was just an opportunity to keep their skate legs going once a week in the offseason.

My daughter also played one season of “fun hockey” with one of her softball counterparts, even though she could barely skate at the time, so Canlan and the other private facilities do have several fun progams and youth and adults to consider (although I am not a fan of the competitive spring hockey model that has evolved as have have shared for years)

So when I saw how Canlan was improvising so kids and adults could return back to play I same some of the similar rules we had played with as well as new ones so they could ensure that those that returned back to play could do so safely.

Canlan, like many other multi-sheet corporations like Planet Ice are privately held and run, and their recreational leagues do not fall under the umbrella of Hockey Canada.

The upside for them (and for all the hockey keeners from youth to adults) is they can run programs year round but the cons are the coaches or officials do not have to be Hockey Canada certified, nor do they qualify for Hockey Canada’s insurance program which Tom Renney et al have announced the contagious disclaimer is going to remain unchanged until 2024 to permit local hockey associations to return to play in the fall.

 

 

Some of the things that Canlan is doing to permit their leagues to start up again when physical distancing permits

#1 – In lieu of 5 on 5 (with goalie), they will be 4 on 4 (with a goalie) for cohort groups of 10 per bench (8 skaters, one goalie, one coach)

This will permit more space between the players during game play and comply with current PHO cohort guidelines

#2 – NO penalties, in lieu penalty shots (think basketball free throw)

The difference with the way penalty shots will be done Post COVID-19 is those that are awarded the penalty shot in lieu of puck being placed on the centre ice face-off dot and player skating in on a breakaway, the puck will be place in between the hashmarks and players will have to shoot for there to try and score.

OK potentially for adults, teenage players who will have the physical strength to do so, not so much for players U12 but that will adhere to the LTAD models that are restricting competitive games

# 3 – Face masks – Canlan is also working with Bauer for various of masks that players can use while playing, as well as ones for coaches, administrators, on ice officials and even parents/fans

 

#4 – No Face-offs – Ensures Physical Distancing is adhered to with two 10 minute running time periods (vs. 3 15-20 minute stop time)

#5 – Refs will have electronic whistles (pushing a button vs. blowing thru)

#6 – Social Distancing Dots on the bench (for 4 additional players to sit and coach to stand)

#7 – Water Bottle Shield on the bench

** Pre-Covid, it was amazing how few players brought water bottles to practices when I was doing coach evaluations … I suspect that the awareness created with COVID that will no longer need a reminder

#8 – Pregame questionnaire and “zone control attendant” to ensure adhere to social distancing when come to the facility, will be escorted to their dressing rooms that has been marked to ensure players/goals get dressed 6’ or more apart

#9 – No Showers (yikes, that could lead to some stinky drives home)

#10 – No dilly dallying in the dressing rooms post game

Translation – NO BEER for the ASHL players and one of the best part of playing adult recreation team sports, the post-game rituals and conversations in the dressing room, dugout or benches so in lieu this means they will have to improvise, adapt and overcome (i.e. head to a pub or an empty parking lot and park all their cars and open bumpers, doors to permit social distancing and ensure can answer the first question everyone will have) …..

WHO HAS THE BEER (cooler, water etc)? (The Snack)

Before the last words everyone will say as they are closing their doors to head home

WHEN DO WE PLAY AGAIN?

Kudos to Canlan, Bauer and other organizations that are working on the ways so that can all return to play the games we love to play, coach, ref and watch as safely as possible.