Minor Hockey Talks - Hockey Forum

Guest wrote: ↑Thu Jun 26, 2025 9:41 am so what's better for your kid?

Playing 8 minutes a game, no special teams, on the third line of a winning team or playing 20 minutes a game, 1st PP, 1st PK and end of game situations on a mid-pack team?

I can see the merits of both.

I have always heard that kids learn much more from practices than games. Play with the best players you can on the best team you can. For most players this will still mean playing for mid pack teams because they can't make top teams and thats ok you do what you can. There are definitely no top players in our league who choose to play for mid pack teams so I'm sure everyone knows this already. But for the exceptional players learning how to play with other top players and being exposed to winning culture is extremely valuable. It's no secret that the top teams also have the best coaching so that is also huge for development. If your kid plays on a mid pack team where he is the best or one of the better players and can do whatever he wants and learns to expect the puck at all times then those kids often get lost and confused when they do get the chance to play with equal or better players.

Coaching is most important ice time is second most

that is a good point anyone who saw AC JH MS CN from JRC play at the throne last year knows they completely sucked ass. got hidden by playing around other good players on jrc

Guest wrote: ↑Thu Jun 26, 2025 9:54 am Coaching is most important ice time is second most

I agree that coaching is the most important thing for kids and their development.

I have coached kids in the past that excelled, made higher level teams and struggled because their new coach couldn't tap in to what made them successful under me.

Next for me would be practice. How you practice is how you play and again it does go back to coaching. Having good practices helps players in games. My philosophy is that in warm ups, you work on your skills (skating, shooting, passing, etc) and then your drills should be set up so that they mimic what kids would see in a game. I have found this to be very successful. So many times, I see coaches running 3 on 0 drills, or 5 on 0 drills and it's just so unrealistic that those drills will help these players in a game situation.

Third for me would be ice time. I do believe in development and that you need to be on the ice to get better. You try to get all your lines to play in all situations but at a certain point (normally mid way through 3rd) you have to go with who's rolling or who's better in those situations. Playing a kid 1 shift a period is not going to get him better and he's not going to be prepared for playing late in the 3rd if they haven't seen that situation before.