Gap control is one of the most important skills\/concepts for defensemen to learn. Simply stated, a defenseman’s gap is the distance between the puck carrying forward and the defender.\u00a0 Making a play at the right time, and knowing how and when to make the commitment can be the difference between a defender making a great play or getting beat.\u00a0 The basics to setting a proper gap can be broken down into three main points:<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Required Skating Skills<\/strong><\/p>\n In order for a defensive player to set a good gap, he\/she must first be proficient in several aspects of skating.\u00a0 The first thing a player must be able to do is accelerate quickly from a dead stop.\u00a0 Most full-ice rushes will begin with defending players standing relatively still on the point in their offensive zone.\u00a0 As soon as the puck is turned over and the opposing team begins to head up ice, a defender must be able to quickly accelerate to almost match the speed of the forward.\u00a0 As the defender accelerates, it’s important to note that he\/she should begin by taking away the middle of the ice – or accelerating toward the middle of the ice initially.\u00a0 This simple step forces the forward to stay to the outside of the ice where he\/she is less of a scoring threat.\u00a0 Much time and effort should be spent working on the proper techniques for backward quick-starts.\u00a0 Inexperienced players are often forced to skate forward to initially accelerate, then turn backwards due to deficiencies in this area.\u00a0 Players should always be facing the play, and must learn how to accelerate backwards efficiently.\u00a0 Laura Stamm’s Power Skating book does a fantastic job of describing the techniques for both the straight backward start and cross-over backward start.<\/p>\n Ability to React to the Rush<\/strong><\/p>\n Once a defender has accelerated backwards, it’s important for them to be able to react efficiently to the rush.\u00a0 Rushes don’t always come straight down the ice, instead they shift directions and pace frequently.\u00a0 Lateral skating skills and the ability to change skating speed (shift gears) are essential elements of a strong defenseman’s game.\u00a0 As the play heads down ice anything from a backchecker to an official can cause the forward to change directions.\u00a0 If the puck carrier moves laterally and the defender continues heading quickly down ice, the distance between the two (or the gap) will continue to increase.\u00a0 Defensemen must be able to move laterally to “buy time” and keep the proper gap as the direction of play changes.\u00a0 In addition, forwards consistently (and intentionally) change the pace of their skating to attempt to throw the defender off rhythm.\u00a0 Minor lateral movement and\/or the ability to match the forward’s pace play a huge role in being able to keep a proper gap.<\/p>\n Rules of Thumb<\/strong><\/p>\n A simple rule of thumb for proper gap distances is 3 stick-lengths away from the puck carrier at the defender’s offensive blue line, 2 stick-lengths at the red line, and 1 stick-length\/body contact made at the defending blue line (see diagram below).\u00a0 The three neutral zone lines also present unique opportunities to make plays.\u00a0 At the offensive blue line, if the defenseman is able to make a play, he\/she can keep the puck in the zone to sustain the offensive pressure, however a miss at this location can result in a very long breakaway or odd-man rush.\u00a0 When a defender makes a play in this area, it is usually referred to as a “pinch.”\u00a0 The center red line gives defenders an opportunity to force the play before the puck carrier is able to legally dump the puck into the attacking zone.\u00a0 Many coaches will allow their defensemen to step up and attempt to force the play at the red line if they have proper backchecking support in place on the rush.\u00a0 Finally, the puck carrier’s offensive blue line is arguably the best place for a defender to step up and make a play.\u00a0 If the defender has played his\/her gap properly, they should be within one stick length of the puck carrier by the time they reach this area.\u00a0 Forcing a play at this blue line – either by body contact, poke check, or angling – often times forces the puck carrier’s line-mates to go offside.\u00a0 Defensemen often mistakenly think they need to make a big hit at the blue line in order to be effective, however the truth is even forcing the puck carrier to change directions and delay slightly can be enough to stop the rush.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Gap control is one of the most important skills\/concepts for defensemen to learn. Simply stated, a defenseman’s gap is the distance between the puck carrying forward and the defender. Making a play at the right time, and knowing how and when to make the commitment can be the difference between a defender making a great play or getting beat.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[52,83],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.hockeyshare.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.hockeyshare.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.hockeyshare.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.hockeyshare.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.hockeyshare.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.hockeyshare.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.hockeyshare.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.hockeyshare.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.hockeyshare.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}