Many hockey experts, including Darren Eliot, a former NHL
goaltender, strongly advise parents to have their children participate in
sports other than just hockey.
For the parent who sees real hockey potential in his or her
child, this might sound counterintuitive, but it’s really not. Children can
develop other skills through other sports, skills they don’t learn as well
through hockey but that can still be used to help them in the game.
While participating in any other sport is good, just for the
diversity it offers young players, participating in so-called “invasion sports”
can be especially beneficial.
In case you’re not familiar with the term, invasion sports
are sports that utilize many of the same tactics and basic game play as hockey.
Good examples are sports like:
l Lacrosse
l Field
Hockey
l Soccer
l Floorball
Through these sports, young players can learn strategies and
concepts that will definitely help them in hockey and can also gain athleticism
and other important traits, like good sportsmanship. Even if they’re already
learning basic values on their hockey team, there’s certainly nothing wrong
with instilling those values again and again. In fact, that’s more likely to
make them stick!
In fact, the aforementioned Darren Eliot is a perfect
example of how beneficial invasion sports can be. He grew up playing both
lacrosse and hockey, which afforded him lots of fun and eventually led to a
very successful professional career.
Just a few of the thing Eliot and others who participate in
invasion sports have learned are:
l How
to stay in control of a puck or ball
l How
to cover a space
l How
to cover a player
l How
to avoid defenders
l How
to predict what an opponent will do net
l How
to create space
l How
to attack the goal
l How
to regain possessions
In addition to gaining all of these physical skills, playing
a different sport can also help young athletes to keep from getting burnt-out
on hockey, making it more fun when they do play and increasing the chance that,
like Eliot, they’ll stay with it for the long haul.
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