As many clubs enter the most stressful time of the year – tryouts – I wanted to share a few thoughts on factors coaches consider when making decisions. The talent aspect is obvious – talented players are what coaches look for on the ice when it comes to performance, but there are other aspects coaches use to make their final decisions.
As many teams begin prepping for tryouts, I wanted to share some of the content we’ve posted in the past regarding the topic. Tryouts are…
A recent article from Minnesota Hockey outlines some of the key qualities scouts and coaches look for when they’re evaluating hockey players.
In part 3 of 3, we cover tips for coaches during tryouts. It’s no secret tryouts can be one of the most stressful points of the season. With a few well-planned parts to your sessions, you can eliminate a lot of the difficulty typically associated with this time of year.
This post is part 2 of a three-part series revolving around tryouts. These posts will cover tryout tips for players, parents, and coaches. This focus is on tips/thoughts for parents. Parents have one of the most difficult parts of the process – they’re utterly helpless, everything is in the hands of the player and coaches.
During the tryout times, I get a lot of players who ask me about the tryout process. Over the past year or so, I’ve written several pieces about tryouts, but I wanted to give players (hopefully some of my own trying out as well) a couple quick tips for entering tryouts.
As I sit in the lobby observing about a hundred kids coming in (some I’ve coached, some I’ve coached against), one thing is very apparent….everyone is on pins & needles. This is the final tryout camp for one of the teams in the North American Hockey League. Players enter with the hopes of making a high-level US-based junior team. Parents wait nervously in the stands and lobby, sometimes pacing back and forth, chain smoking, or just sitting there fidgeting. It’s fun hockey to watch because every player on the ice is competing.
So, now you have taken the time to properly plan out your tryout sessions, and now find yourself with an evaluation sheet in hand. Many coaches get overwhelmed during this process – after all, there is a lot to watch. Assuming you’re breaking your tryout into three distinct drill categories – skill, competitive, scrimmage – we will take a look at what skills and subtleties to watch for in each of these three areas.
Every year I get countless questions about what I look for during tryouts. I thought I’d summarize some of my thoughts on tryouts for everyone.…