How to Build Better Hockey Practices: Chris Howard of Ice Hockey Systems on Player Development

Better Hockey Practices Start With Intention, Not More Drills

Every hockey coach has drills.

There are skating drills, passing drills, shooting drills, breakout drills, small-area games, battle drills, edge-work exercises, and thousands more available with a few clicks online.

But having more drills does not automatically create a better practice.

The real question is much more important:

Does the practice actually help players become better hockey players?

On this episode of Our Girls Play Hockey, Lee Elias, Mike Bonelli, and Olympic gold medalist Hayley Scamurra sit down with Chris Howard of Ice Hockey Systems to explore what separates practices that simply occupy ice time from practices that genuinely develop players.

The conversation offers important lessons for coaches, players, and parents throughout girls hockey. From creating clear objectives to embracing competition, encouraging mistakes, understanding player motivation, and helping parents see development differently, one message runs through the entire discussion:

Great practices are intentional.

Start With the Objective, Not the Drill

One of the easiest traps for coaches is beginning practice planning by asking:

“What drills should we run?”

Chris Howard suggests starting somewhere else.

Ask what your players actually need to improve.

Maybe your team is struggling to break the puck out of the defensive zone. The immediate reaction could be to run breakout drills for an entire practice.

But what if the real issue isn’t the breakout system?

Maybe the players struggle to receive passes in motion.

Maybe they aren't scanning before the puck arrives.

Maybe they have difficulty making accurate passes under pressure.

Maybe they don't know how to support the puck along the wall.

Suddenly, “we need a better breakout” becomes a much more specific development problem.

That distinction matters.

An effective coach works backward from the desired outcome and identifies the skills and decisions players need before building the practice around them.

Instead of assembling five unrelated drills because they look interesting, coaches can ask:

• What does our team need today?

• Which skills support that objective?

• How will those skills appear in a game?

• How can each activity connect to the next?

That creates a practice with purpose.

Don't Try to Coach Everything at Once

Hockey is complicated.

Players are skating, reading pressure, controlling the puck, communicating, defending, passing, shooting, supporting teammates, and making decisions in fractions of a second.

That doesn't mean coaches should try to teach every part of the game during every practice.

In fact, doing too much may make development harder.

A valuable idea discussed during the episode is limiting the primary teaching focus to roughly two or three objectives.

If the theme is passing, for example, the coaching points could be:

• Receiving the puck on the backhand

• Making passes while moving

• Improving passing accuracy

Other mistakes will happen during practice.

A player might take a poor shot. Another player might make an imperfect turn. Someone may miss a defensive read.

Those moments don't always need to become additional coaching lessons.

If today's focus is passing, keep bringing the players back to passing.

Young athletes can only process so much information at once. A clear focus gives them something they can understand, remember, and intentionally work toward.

Great Practices Don't Have to Look Perfect

One of the most important messages for hockey parents—and even for coaches—is that productive learning can sometimes look messy.

Hockey itself is messy.

Players don't receive perfect passes every shift. Opponents don't skate predictable routes. Pucks bounce. Pressure arrives unexpectedly. Teammates make mistakes.

The game contains constant uncertainty.

That is why more hockey development programs have incorporated small-area games, competition, constraints, decision-making, and game-like situations into practices.

From the stands, however, these activities can sometimes look chaotic.

A traditional drill with players moving neatly through cones may appear highly organized. A competitive game where players are reading pressure, adjusting routes, fighting for possession, and making decisions may appear less structured.

But appearance isn't the goal.

Learning is.

Chris offers a useful way to think about drills: the drill is the vehicle; connection to the game is the destination.

A drill doesn't need to look impressive.

It needs to help the player solve problems she will encounter when the puck drops.

Repetition Still Matters

Embracing game-like learning doesn't mean abandoning repetition.

There is room for both.

Certain skills require players to perform the same movement again and again. Passing mechanics, puck protection, wall play, shooting techniques, skating movements, and other fundamentals benefit tremendously from focused repetitions.

Hayley Scamurra shared that even at the professional level, practices can include incredibly simple activities.

A player might repeatedly retrieve a rimmed puck from the wall, bring it toward the net, and finish with a shot.

That's it.

Nothing revolutionary.

But that simple skill appears constantly in games.

Players often assume professional hockey practices must contain extraordinarily complicated drills. In reality, elite players have spent years developing fundamentals precisely because those fundamentals continue to matter at every level.

The lesson for youth coaches is important:

Simple does not mean ineffective.

If players need more repetitions of an important skill, give them those repetitions.

Then create opportunities for them to use that skill in more unpredictable situations.

Competition Can Change the Energy of Practice

Imagine two different starts to a youth hockey practice.

In the first, players line up on the goal line and immediately begin skating back and forth.

In the second, players step onto the ice and are quickly placed into a competitive game.

Which environment immediately gets players engaged?

Chris discussed the benefits of beginning practices with competition, particularly when it fits the age and needs of the team.

Competition can increase focus, raise energy, and create excitement.

It can also provide coaches with an opportunity to introduce the day's objective inside a game before teaching specific skills and then revisit the same game later.

For example:

1. Begin with a competitive game.

2. Let players experience the problem.

3. Introduce skills or concepts that help solve it.

4. Return to the game.

5. See whether players apply what they learned.

Now the athletes understand why they practiced the skill.

They've felt the problem before receiving the solution.

That creates connection.

Know Your Players Before Copying Someone Else's Practice

There is no universally perfect hockey practice.

An activity that works beautifully with one U12 team may fail with another.

A competitive game that energizes eight-year-olds may frustrate a professional team that prefers a familiar warm-up routine.

That is why coaches must know their group.

Hayley reflected on how practices changed throughout her career—from youth hockey with her father as a coach, through college hockey, Team USA, and professional hockey.

At younger ages, competition and games helped build engagement and development.

College practices followed more structured weekly rhythms.

Professional practices changed depending on the schedule, workload, and needs of the team.

The underlying lesson is simple:

Coach the players in front of you.

Don't copy a professional practice simply because professionals use it.

Don't automatically adopt a drill because another successful coach posted it online.

Borrow ideas. Learn from others. Experiment.

Then adjust those ideas to your team's age, skill level, schedule, goals, and personality.

Preparation Gives Coaches More Time to Actually Coach

Ice time is expensive.

And usually limited.

Many youth teams may only have around 50 usable minutes during a practice.

Losing several minutes because coaches are explaining complicated drills, searching for pucks, moving equipment, or figuring out what comes next can significantly reduce development time over the course of a season.

Preparation helps prevent that.

But there is another advantage to organized practices that is easy to overlook.

When assistant coaches understand the practice and can confidently manage stations or activities, the head coach becomes free to coach people.

Instead of spending the entire session moving cones and explaining drills, the coach can observe.

She can talk individually with a player.

She can notice which athletes need encouragement.

She can recognize who is struggling.

She can watch how teammates communicate.

She can build relationships.

Organization doesn't remove coaching.

It creates more opportunities for it.

Players Can Have Their Own Practice Within the Team Practice

Coaches aren't the only people responsible for creating productive practices.

Players have a role too.

Chris describes the idea that two practices can happen simultaneously: the team's planned practice and the individual player's personal practice.

One athlete may simply follow the drill exactly the same way every time.

Another may intentionally challenge herself.

She might:

• Receive the puck differently on each repetition

• Experiment with deception

• Change the release on her shot

• Practice scanning before receiving a pass

• Attempt a skill she isn't comfortable using yet

• Compete against a teammate

• Encourage another player after a strong play

Those small decisions can dramatically change what a player gains from the same practice.

Hayley explained that she became increasingly intentional about this as she matured as a player.

She became more curious.

She asked more questions.

She deliberately practiced small elements of her game.

Most importantly, she became comfortable trying skills that might not immediately look good.

That mindset is incredibly valuable for young girls playing hockey.

Players Need Permission to Fail

Trying something new often means failing first.

A player experimenting with a new move may lose the puck.

A different shooting technique might produce an ugly shot.

A player working on deception might fall.

That is not failure in the traditional sense.

That is learning.

If athletes believe every mistake will result in embarrassment, criticism, lost ice time, or yelling, they will naturally become more conservative.

Instead of experimenting, they will choose the safest possible option.

Development requires an environment where players are encouraged to stretch themselves.

Coaches can create that environment by praising effort, curiosity, intelligent attempts, good habits, and small details—not just goals.

Teammates can contribute too.

Simple comments such as “great pass,” “nice stick,” or “great effort” can completely change the emotional environment of a practice.

Positive communication becomes contagious.

And when players feel supported, coaches can challenge them even more.

What Should Parents Watch During Practice?

Parents watching from the stands understandably want to know whether their child is developing.

But evaluating practice only by how hard the players are skating can be misleading.

Instead, Chris offers parents a different question:

How does your child feel about going to practice?

Is she excited to get to the rink?

Does she enjoy seeing her teammates?

Does she come home energized?

Does she feel connected to her coaches?

Is she learning?

Those indicators can reveal far more about the quality of a development environment than whether a particular drill looked impressive from the stands.

Parents should also understand that activities may have developmental value even when they don't look like traditional hockey.

Games such as tag or soccer can teach skating edges, awareness, stopping, turning, competing, reacting, and movement.

That is why communication between coaches and parents matters.

When parents understand the why, they're much more likely to support the process.

Coaches Should Set Expectations Early

Good communication doesn't begin after a problem occurs.

It begins before the season.

Coaches should explain their philosophy early.

If practices will include unusual games, say why.

If development matters more than short-term winning, explain it.

If the team believes in equal ice time, establish that expectation before an important game tests the philosophy.

Parents don't need to understand every detail of every drill.

But they should understand what the program values.

Clear expectations create trust.

And trust gives coaches more freedom to develop players thoughtfully throughout a season.

Technology Can Help Coaches Turn Ideas Into Better Practices

Ice Hockey Systems has become a major resource for coaches looking to organize ideas, find drills, continue their education, and share practices more effectively.

Chris explained that the platform allows coaches to search activities based on age level and development category, build practice plans, view video demonstrations, add their own ideas, and share practices with assistant coaches or older players.

That last point is particularly useful.

A diagram filled with arrows and lines might make perfect sense to the coach who created it but be nearly impossible for another person to understand.

Video creates clarity.

And when coaches arrive at the rink already knowing the practice, more of the available ice time can be spent learning rather than explaining.

The goal isn't to remove creativity from coaching.

It's to give coaches more tools and ideas they can adapt to the players in front of them.

The Goal Isn't a Perfect Practice

There will never be a practice where every player performs perfectly.

There probably shouldn't be.

Development includes mistakes.

It includes experimentation.

It includes competition.

It includes repetition.

It includes moments that look messy.

The responsibility of a coach is not to manufacture perfection.

It is to create an environment where players can learn.

For coaches, that means arriving prepared with a clear objective.

For players, it means competing, experimenting, and becoming intentional with every repetition.

For parents, it means appreciating development over immediate results and paying attention to their child's relationship with the game.

When all three groups understand their roles, practice becomes much more than an hour of ice time.

It becomes one of the most powerful development tools hockey has.

And for the girls growing up in the game today, creating those environments isn't just about developing stronger hockey players.

It's about helping them become confident, curious athletes who continue wanting to walk through the rink doors tomorrow.

🎧 Listen to the full episode of Our Girls Play Hockey to hear Chris Howard, Hayley Scamurra, Mike Bonelli, and Lee Elias break down how coaches, players, and parents can work together to create better practices and better development experiences.

Then share the episode with a coach, teammate, or hockey parent who wants to make every minute at the rink count.

Keep learning, keep competing, and most importantly, keep creating hockey environments where girls are excited to come back to the rink.