Monday, December 24 2012 @ 07:19 AM GMT (Read 6452 times)
Can you TEACH hustle?
I believe that hustle is the greatest skill any athlete can "learn." It will help endear him to his coaches and teammates. Hustle is also a powerful tie-breaker when coaches evaluate who should get picked for the last spot, or get the lion’s share of the playing time. I’d be willing to bet that the vast majority of coaches will vote on the side of a player who always hustles over a player who may have a bit more talent, but doesn’t give a full effort all the time.
Once your players learn how to hustle, they shouldn’t have any regrets after practices and games. Knowing that they gave it everything they had is an awesome feeling and something to take pride in. The art of hustling will serve them well in every aspect of their life, for the rest of their life.
If your kids are young like mine though, how exactly can you teach them what the word hustle means, BEFORE telling them to hustle. This past season when I was helping coach my 5-year old’s t-ball team, I found myself telling the kids to hustle out to their positions at the start of each inning and back to the dugout at the end of each inning. Most of them didn’t change the pace of their stroll. After a couple innings of this, I finally asked the boys if they knew what hustle meant. Most of them didn’t. So I could have been saying, “Come on boys, doodle bloba-doo!” and it would have meant essentially the same thing to them…nothin’.
In hockey, especially in the 10U ages, we want it to be fun, and postive and enjoyable. We want them passionate about coming back tp the next practce, game and season. Some kids seem to naturally and innately hustle, ALL the time. For others, however, teaching, showing, demanding, finding and instilling the threshold between "having a good time playing hockey with my friends" and coach wants me to work / play / compete "more than I am willing to" seems to be a very tough barrier to crack, control, and maintain.
Fellow coaches - how do you TEACH these young'uns, to leave EVERYTHING they've got on the ice? Sure they all want to win and do their best and contribute, but when their best is outside of their comfort zone.... then what? How do we "raise that bar" without being destructive?
Suggestions? ------------------------------------------------------ 4paw, competitiveness has got to be one of the more difficult things to teach. I think we can encourage it by using a lot of battling situations during practice and focusing on effort when we talk with our players. I know when we drafted our team this year I had my staff identify skating and who was first to the puck. We made a list of these players and then ranked them in order of hockey skill for the draft. Tom
Can you TEACH hustle?
I believe that hustle is the greatest skill any athlete can "learn." It will help endear him to his coaches and teammates. Hustle is also a powerful tie-breaker when coaches evaluate who should get picked for the last spot, or get the lion’s share of the playing time. I’d be willing to bet that the vast majority of coaches will vote on the side of a player who always hustles over a player who may have a bit more talent, but doesn’t give a full effort all the time.
Once your players learn how to hustle, they shouldn’t have any regrets after practices and games. Knowing that they gave it everything they had is an awesome feeling and something to take pride in. The art of hustling will serve them well in every aspect of their life, for the rest of their life.
If your kids are young like mine though, how exactly can you teach them what the word hustle means, BEFORE telling them to hustle. This past season when I was helping coach my 5-year old’s t-ball team, I found myself telling the kids to hustle out to their positions at the start of each inning and back to the dugout at the end of each inning. Most of them didn’t change the pace of their stroll. After a couple innings of this, I finally asked the boys if they knew what hustle meant. Most of them didn’t. So I could have been saying, “Come on boys, doodle bloba-doo!” and it would have meant essentially the same thing to them…nothin’.
In hockey, especially in the 10U ages, we want it to be fun, and postive and enjoyable. We want them passionate about coming back tp the next practce, game and season. Some kids seem to naturally and innately hustle, ALL the time. For others, however, teaching, showing, demanding, finding and instilling the threshold between "having a good time playing hockey with my friends" and coach wants me to work / play / compete "more than I am willing to" seems to be a very tough barrier to crack, control, and maintain.
Fellow coaches - how do you TEACH these young'uns, to leave EVERYTHING they've got on the ice? Sure they all want to win and do their best and contribute, but when their best is outside of their comfort zone.... then what? How do we "raise that bar" without being destructive?
Suggestions?
------------------------------------------------------
4paw, competitiveness has got to be one of the more difficult things to teach. I think we can encourage it by using a lot of battling situations during practice and focusing on effort when we talk with our players. I know when we drafted our team this year I had my staff identify skating and who was first to the puck. We made a list of these players and then ranked them in order of hockey skill for the draft.
Tom