In our endless pursuit of excellence, we are focusing on improving our communication as a club this year. From a player development standpoint, I will be providing a lot more information to our membership this year. My goal is to have everyone on the same page, moving forward and understanding the method behind the madness.
This fall should be fantastic; we've bumped up our training staff, coaching staff and development program. From the newsletters and website, to the Parent Orientation Program (POP) and Coaching seminars, we are taking an extremely professional approach to amateur hockey.
The following is an overview of the four different aspects of our player development program for the travel levels:
.: Skills
Each week, we will rotate through these four training sessions;
- Skating
- Stick-handling
- Passing
- Body contact
Each skill session is broken down into three parts. The first part of each skill session will focus on skating edges and proper technique. The second part will focus on one of the four fundamental skills listed above. The third part will focus on conditioning.
It is well documented with USA Hockey that during a game a player will average 9 minutes of ice, 2 shots on net and have the puck on their sticks for less than 10 seconds.
It is also well documented that one single practice dedicated to individual skills is equal to the development of eleven (11) games.
This is why these sessions are so crucial to a player’s individual development and the team’s overall success.
.: Systems
Each week, we will rotate through these four training sessions;
- Defensive Zone/Backchecking
- Offensive Zone/Neutral Zone
- Breakouts/Forecheck
- Special Teams
Each Systems session is broken down into three parts. The first part of each session is focused on passing drills. The second part will focus on the one of the four topics listed above. The third part will focus on small area games and conditioning.
Systems practices are designed to instill consistent playing principles from team to team and level to level.
There are a thousand different ways to play this great game, having a certain playing system doesn’t win games or championships, having the best execution of your system does.
At the NHL level, it takes years to master a system, practicing 150 to 200 times per year with the top players in the world. We practice about 40 to 50 times a season. Trying to learn and execute a new system each year simply doesn’t work and ends up hurting player development and team success.
My goal is to develop natural tendencies “hockey sense” in our players at get them to a point where they instinctively react to the game instead of thinking where they need to be or what they should be doing.
.: Dry-Land Training
Each week, we will rotate teams through these three training zones;
- Shooting and Stick-handling
- Agility and Explosiveness
- Slideboards
The Dry-land training program will have each team rotate through three specific training zones, each improving agility, balance, power, explosiveness and athleticism.
We have some of the top strength and conditioning professionals in the world involved in our program, setting protocol and training our athletes.
The purpose of this training is threefold;
- To educate players on how to train safely and specifically for hockey;
- To educate players on how they can significantly improve their game away from the rink at little or no cost;
- To compete at the top levels in the State and in the country, we must have the best conditioned athletes.
The current and future elite hockey players are highly conditioned athletes. Talent alone is simply not enough anymore. Everyone has talent at a certain level and knows how to skate, pass and shoot. The players that move up and on are the ones that can play the hardest and for the longest period of time.
This is where dry-land training makes all the difference.
.: Treadmill Training
Each week, our travel teams (Bronze level next year) will rotate through treadmill training sessions. There are two specific treadmills that will be used in this training;
- Hockey Treadmill
- Super running Treadmill
Several professional and college programs have implemented hockey treadmill training into their programs, more are still waiting. There are currently 45 hockey treadmills on the planet, we are fortunate to have two of them in our facility and part of our development program. The reason this patent technology is so valuable is because of the proven results.
Training specific skating muscles cannot be done running, swimming or biking. Having a skating treadmill where you can do sprints and climbs in your skates is truly unmatched. In addition, with full size wall mirrors infront of the athlete, we can clearly break down stride and posture inefficiencies and make immediate and meaningful adjustments.
We also implement the running treadmill (original protocol was designed for knee and leg rehabilitation) for backpedal lunges and sprints, developing the inner and surrounding muscles of the knee and quads.
Strong legs and knees are crucial to hockey and our players will be trained professionally unlike any other amateur program in the world.
The smallest differences typically separate the good players from the great ones. This training is a major advantage for our players at all ages and could prove to be the most important difference moving up to the next level.
For additional information, please visit our Web site: http://www.cycloneshockey.net/traininganddev.html
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Every Cyclone family knows Mike Lopez as the owner of Gear on Ice pro shop at the rink. What many people don’t know is that Mike played goalie through junior college and has run goalie camps and clinics for the past seven years. This year Mike will be heading Cyclones goalie clinics each Friday night.
Attention Graduating Seniors –Check out the web site for an application for the John B. Cannizzo Scholarship 
