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April 10, 2005
STATE OF THE GAMENot Your Father's Hockey School
By Lyle Phair | From 
As the hockey season begins to come to a close,
most parents start thinking about getting ready for next season.
For some that involves choosing and registering for a hockey school
during the summer months when their child is out of school. It can
be a daunting task because the choices are almost endless. How things
have changed.
Not that many years ago, in the 1970’s and
1980’s, there weren’t that many choices of hockey schools,
mainly because there were not that many rinks that were open during
the summer or for part of the summer.
Back then, arenas shut down once the weather turned
warm in April and opened back up again in September or October.
Very few would keep their ice in year-round, or even put it in for
a week or two during July or August.
Additionally, the game was not that sophisticated
in terms of coaching and instruction. Players went out and played.
Coaches told them to work hard and play their position … and
not much more. The hockey schools that existed in the summer months
were typically operated by professional hockey players – usually
NHL players who had a well-recognized name – in an effort
to supplement their income, which at the time was rather meager
compared to the salaries of today.
I attended my first hockey school in 1974 at the
age of 13 and I can remember it like it was yesterday. The Dunc
McCallum Hockey School, was of course run by Dunc McCallum, who
had played for the Houston Aeros of the World Hockey Association
and was at the time the coach of the Brandon Wheat Kings of the
Western Hockey League. Prominent instructors included Jiha Widing,
who played for the Los Angeles Kings, and Bryan Hextall, who played
for the New York Rangers and several other NHL teams. Additional
instructors were members of the Wheat Kings junior team.
It was a weeklong resident camp and we checked
into the dormitory of a nearby college on a Sunday evening after
registering at the rink and going for a brief twirl on the ice.
I had paid for the camp by saving money from my jobs delivering
papers and pumping gas, and remember that it cost about $325 for
the week (at the time a ton of money, even if it included a room
and food for the week).
As it was billed to be, the camp was a blast with
non-stop activity from the time we woke up at 6:00 a.m. until we
literally collapsed at 9:00 p.m. We skated twice, sometimes three
times, a day, sandwiched around meals and some off-ice activities,
including, swimming, soccer, speedball and lacrosse. Friday night
kicked off the grand end-of-week activities with a barbeque and
baseball game, and then Saturday was the day we had all waited for,
game day. Following the scrimmage, awards were handed out for MVP,
Most Improved Player, Hardest Worker and each of us received a report
card completed and signed by the instructors.
My most vivid memories of the week were the feeling
of independence that I had in being “on my own” with
a few of my friends, meeting other players – many whom I played
against in the following years – getting to skate on the same
ice where my heroes, the Wheat Kings played, and watching a shooting
demonstration by Hextall (who hit the crossbar five times in a row).
One thing I know he never did was tell us how
to he did it. The fact is, we never were really taught much at all
in terms of individual skating and puck skills or concepts and strategies
of the game. And our report card was really not much of a report
card at all, as much as it was a “keep your head up”
or “keep your stick on the ice” comment accompanied
by the instructor’s signature.
But at the time, at least in my recollection,
that was as sophisticated as the game was. No one had dissected
the art of skating and the term “power skating” was
not yet utilized on a regular basis. Stickhandling instruction was
as simple as “keep your head up” and passing was “aim
for the target” when making a pass and “keep your stick
on the ice and let it give when the puck hits it” when receiving
a pass.
Hockey schools of today are much, much different.
First of all, not many NHL hockey players teach at hockey schools.
Supplementing their incomes is not required these days (except maybe
this summer).
Head instructors today are more likely minor league
professional players, college coaches, and in many instances, former
players or coaches who played at the college, junior or pro level.
While some hockey schools are owned and operated by the arenas they
are held at, others are owned by outside groups contracted to rent
the ice and provide the instruction.
In any event, the hockey schools today are much
more structured both on the ice and off. Power skating has become
a science, with each aspect of skating technique broken down to
the finest detail and then re-formatted in the hope of making players
quicker, faster, stronger on their skates, more powerful and more
efficient. Puckhandling has become an art with schools dedicating
days, and sometimes a whole week to teaching moves. Unlike my experience
with shooting, players are actually taught proper shooting technique,
not just given an impressive demonstration on what a pro player
can do.
While hockey schools have come a long way, former
NHL goaltender and GM Ken Dryden, who is undoubtedly one of the
most intelligent and most respected players to ever play the game
(in fact he was probably too smart to be a hockey player), has written
in his books and been quoted as saying that hockey schools are one
of the reasons that players today lack creativity and individuality.
While I’m not sure that’s the case
(I don’t believe a week or two a year at a school is going
to have that dramatic of an impact on a player), I do agree with
the premise of his statement. Hockey players are not robots and
there is more than one way to accomplish the same thing. Each player
is unique and has his or her own strengths or weaknesses and should
have the opportunity to express their individuality, to do what
they do best. On the flip side, if a hockey school can assist them
in improving their weaknesses, while assisting them in building
upon what they do, well then it’s certainly worthwhile.
But at the end of the day, one of the most important
aspects a hockey school has to offer is fostering a passion for
the game, no differently than it did for me 30 years ago.
Lyle Phair can be reached at feedback@hockeyjournal.com.
This article appears in the April issue of
New England Hockey Journal. Click here
to subscribe to the magazine.
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