Summer Skills Series Kicks Off This Week!

Week 1 of the Elite Development Program's Summer 2022 Skills Series starts this week and we are starting with a bang!

Tuesday night, the U14 and high school groups get it going with coaches Danny Greiner, Will Rhymer, and Michael Birch leading the way on a session on “Puck Snatches.” Why puck snatches? Because elite players are thieves and we know from advanced analytics that counter attacks and rushes off of turnovers actually have a higher success rate in becoming goals than sustained possession in the offensive zone. This session will put that to practice as the foundational bases to focus on training the forwards and defense to use more efficient hand and arm positioning tactics and dynamic skating mobility (stickhandling outside the skate base and utilizing correct edges) to execute more of these puck snatches and turn them into goals.

On Thursday, our U10s and U12s get underway with coaches Mitchell Goodin, Michael Birch, and Will Rhymer in the lead, with assistants Gracie Travers, Jackson Kyler, and Ethan Brehm providing support. The theme of the week for U10s and U12s will be "Skating for Speed and Agility: Getting Rid of Frame Skating and Other Common Mistakes.” If you can't skate well, you won't be a good hockey player. It's that simple. Many youth players suffer from the same developmental shortcomings in their stride and skating. This session will work on setting a foundation for better skating, improving the efficiency and skating fundamentals vital to make your player an elite skater, and to start to correct frequent mistakes so the players can better position themselves to dominate.

For goalies, coach Josh Chmielewski will be working at all sessions this week. The theme for goalies is “Strelow Skating” and the focus will be on goalie specific skating drills explicitly based on the developmental teachings of USA Hockey goaltending coaching legend Warren Strelow, a system used by modern NHL goalies and goalie coaches.

Reminder: all sessions will take place at Chiller North.

It's going to be a fun week!