How NHL Pros Develop (And What That Means for Youth Players) with Flyers' Director Riley Armstrong

Hello, hockey friends and families around the world, and welcome to another episode

of Our Kids Play Hockey. I'm  Lee Elias, joined as always by Christie Casciano-Burns and

Mike Bonelli. You know, we talk about hockey development a lot on the show. It

feels like every episode we're saying hockey development. We always talk about how

it's got to be fun, but you can't get away from hockey development. So today, we

thought we'd bring in an NHL director of player development to help us discuss what

this looks like at the pro level. That's what we brought in for you today. We're

thrilled to welcome Riley Armstrong, Director of Player Development for the

Philadelphia Flyers, who is personally recommended to us by Flyers GM Danny Breyer.

That's not something you get to say every day. Riley's path from undrafted pro to

bench boss to leading prospect development offers a master class and how players

actually grow. So we're going to dig into his journey, why he chose coaching and

what really moves the needle for youth players, parents, and coaches, which is our

primary audience, which is awesome. Riley, welcome to our kids play hockey. Awesome.

Thanks for having me, guys. Great intro, too. I love that. Thank you, brother. I

take a lot of pride in those. We try and do a good job. I know the audience

appreciates it, too. They want to know who we're talking to, right? Me too, me too,

so I always appreciate that. Yeah, this is like Mike's alarm clock on Monday

morning. Who are we talking to?

Riley, before we dive into everything you do in the NHL, let's just talk about your

hockey journey and maybe the short version from your playing days to the moment you

knew, you know what, I'm a coach, I'm a teacher, and that's the direction I'm going

to go on. What pulled you from the bench door to the whiteboard?

I don't know. I think growing up, my mom was, my dad played like senior hockey in

Saskatchewan and bounced around a little bit in that. And my mom's been,

my mom still is a figure skating coach and power skating coach since she was 18.

So going on, you know, 50 years. And my brother, my sister and I,

we just lived at the rink. whether we were all figure skating, we're all at our

hockey skates on and gear. But I think it's kind of my mom that most definitely

kind of led me into that coaching path with everything that she's done. You know,

and I go to the rink, her office, and she's coaching,

she's teaching kids, she's doing figure skating, power skating. She's running camps in

the summertime for kids to teach them how to skate. And that's what I saw.

I just see it constantly of like coaching, teaching, and then on the other side of

it, just kids learning, parents learning. And I think that's what kind of drove me

a little bit into that, you know, coaching area after I was done playing. Riley,

you're probably still in the error and it sounds like your mom too of you know

that that back in the day like that figure skating piece was such a huge portion

of learning how to skate i think i think right now we get you know i work i do

a lot of work with the n hl and they're learning to play program and sometimes we

just get kids like we call them flippers and floppers right that they don't really

have a core skating dynamic in place before they get the hockey stuff on so can

you just talk a little bit about like for a parent that's coming on new i remember

like when i i was i grew up in a figure skating environment right so i i grew up

with coaches that taught moves in the field that was like moves in the field the

very that was pre -power skating that was how to use an outside edge how to hold

an inside edge you know turn your body and hold your weight and you know it was

really a figure skating piece but you talk a little bit about the influence of your

mother and the figure skating community on on kind of, you know,

building that base of skating because of the focus on your blades? Yeah.

For myself, you know, I think it's hard for a boy, I would go,

a boy who's playing hockey to legit put on figure skates, wear the tight pants

with, you know, maybe some sparkles on them with like a shirt and i i did that i

did that from grade three to probably uh grade 10 is when i quit maybe right

around grade nine grade 10ish area and but i did like i was doing the the

competitions um i was traveling all over western canada competing against other kids

my age or older um and And I think that takes a lot to do.

Number one, kids are making fun of you, like pretty standard. You walk in a locker

room. You know, that's going to happen. But when you're really diving into like the

skating part and understanding it, there's so many of these coaches now that they're

skills coaches. They teach you out of shoot. Another guy teaches you how to stick

handle. And parents get so drawn to that side of it that they don't go to the

figure skating people in their youth area or their local area at the figure skating

rink and say, I want to work with that coach to work on my skating to understand

everything, Mike, that you were talking about, the outside edge, the inside edge, how

to forward skate, transition to backward skating, how to have your shoulders level as

you're skating. A lot of kids fall down when they turn, and it's not their skates

aren't sharp and it's because their upper body isn't held in a proper way so they

fall down and then you see their parents at the sparks machine after hit and play

thinking it's their skates you know so there's like there's so many things that the

skating part of it leads to like the the stick handling the shooting like if if

you can't skate in general then your your child's dream or aspirations of,

you know, playing junior hockey or college hockey or whatever it may be, you know,

go down quite a bit if you don't have that skating base within your game. Right.

And that's a great point. A lot of parents are quick to blame the skates, the

blades, rather than the skill. But I encourage any parent, if you have any doubt,

just sit there and watch kids skating. And you can pick out the kids who've spent

time honing their skills, their edges, their strides.

You can see the difference. So getting that basic skating, learning that basic

skating, great point, Riley, essential. Yes. The other part that drives me up the

wall a little bit, and I think it's fun. I think it's fun for the kids. You see

all those summer tournaments, right? And like every weekend of family is going out

and they're spending. I don't know how much money it is to go to Toronto, Boston,

St. Louis, Las Vegas, hotels, food for your family. Like, personally,

I would rather take all that money and I would go invest it if I would,

like, I would call it an investment. I would invest it into my kid and pay for

power skating lessons over traveling i think it's a great experience you know if you

want to do a family vacation to los vegas while you know you're two kids playing

in a tournament there that's cool but i see a lot of families they're doing it

almost every weekend and um you know number one i think it's good for a kid to

have a break and also the mom and dad to have a break away from the rink but

number two You're putting so much of money out there and it's kind of going into

the wrong bucket that I would probably call it instead of, you know, invest in it

in different areas. Riley, you know, you're talking about this all the time. It

sounds like, you know, we could play this over and over. But can you maybe talk a

little bit about like you're, so you're working with pro athletes in the same time,

right? Like this is like we're talking about youth players and I think you met, you

know, and we fall to like, oh, it's money. If I took that $1 ,500 I spent on last

weekend's tournament and put it towards my kids, but I think at the pro level, it's

really not about money. It's unlimited money. They can pay whatever they want. So we

just say that for a parent to look at it as, like you're saying, an investment of

their time. Like there's only so much time you have. If you give up, like I always

use the example, like if the kid's going on a tournament and I'm training him. I'm

probably losing Thursday training, probably losing Friday training. I'm losing Saturday

training, Sunday training, and Monday they're exhausted. So when are you training?

Like when are you getting back to go play 12 minutes of hockey somewhere in a

different state? But instead of the time. And again, it's because I'm in Fairfield

County, Connecticut. I mean, we're in the North Carolina. For a lot of hockey

families, money is not the issue but it has to be time like when do you get your

development so you could talk about you talk about a little bit like when you have

a pro come to you obviously you know there's financial pieces but you're trained

players with limited windows of time you just talk about how important it is for a

youth hockey player to use that time on their skating yeah um like you said right

there you explained it like like perfect. So pretty much they get to the rink

Tuesday and Wednesday, then they're back out traveling again on Thursday to get to

their next tournament. So I think when the kids start coming up,

you'll experience burnout for the most part from kids, but also parents.

I think it's crazy throughout the course of a season at the youth level when I'm

coaching my son's team. You'll see parents start to fight in the crowd. And I don't

think it's necessarily like, oh, the ref had a bad call or this team's winning or

that. I think the parent is so frustrated and tired that they need a breather.

And I think that stems to like all the yelling and the fighting. If the parents

had like a two -week break where the parents shut down and they got kind of

refreshed, caught up on some sleep, you would probably see a better parent at the

rink as well um but we at the pro level i talk about the window of opportunity so

when a player signs an entry level contract they essentially have three years to

chase that dream and over the course of those three years there's three more drafts

there's 21 new draft picks more guys are coming up and now they're coming to take

your job So your window of opportunity of your development, you have like two

summers, essentially, to say, hey, this is what I got. And the summertime is where

you make your biggest gains, whether it's in the gym, right? You're training, you're

looking to put on 10 pounds or 5 pounds, or you're looking to get more explosive

or stronger or work on your skating to get you to that next level. And then you

have those three seasons to kind of showcase yourself do you get another contract or

does the new player move in and take your spot and that's where we always call it

you got to invest in yourself even as a pro you got to take the time in the

summertime to really dive into it and do it but i think it stems at at the same

at the youth level too um if you just floor it all the time in hockey and you

don't play lacrosse soccer basketball, flag football, whatever it may be, you're

losing out on so many little development pieces that maybe your kid's not a hockey

player. Maybe he joins basketball and he's like an unbelievable basketball player or

a baseball player. But it's good for kids to kind of figure it out. But then so

many different tools come with it, hand -eye coordination, your footwork in or

basketball, swing in a golf club.

That's why probably so many hockey players are good at golf. Danny, who mentioned

me, Danny's a phenomenal golfer. But a lot of it, like, it goes in with what

you're doing. So I think it's really important of that piece for kids at the youth

level and parents, but also at the pro level, is we want them to do so many

different things. I think the coolest part when I walk in the gym in the summertime

and I see pros training like our guys and they're doing like somersaults.

They're doing all these different things of how to move their body. If they fall

down, how to protect themselves as they hit the boards and another 210 pound guys

falling on them. All that like little things that I think a lot of people don't

realize that they do. like you're looking over there like this guy's doing a

somersault on a mat but they're working at different areas of their body so it's

pretty fun to watch right i got to share a story because this just happened my

girlfriend her son nine years old all in hockey this family is all about hockey so

his friend invited him out to the golf course hey donato come with me hit a couple

of golf balls. I've got a pro is working nine years old, and there's a pro is

teaching the kids. Donato picked up the golf club. He hits the ball.

He got a hole in one. No way. He needs to stop playing golf right now,

Christy. He made the paper, okay? Because no one could believe this little hockey

kid on his first try, something golfers have dreamed about all their lives,

right? And he's like, yeah, so what's next? So yes, parents,

get your kids out there. They do make great golf players. But try something else.

It might surprise you. Might even make the local press. I'll tell you what's next,

Christy, is he's going to be chasing that whole on one for the rest of his natural

life to try and do it again at that age. But Listen, this is one of the funny

things I like to talk about on our show is just logic and how there's an absence

of logic in our sports sometimes logic that Riley just brought up playing multiple

sports. I think there's anything we've talked about ad nauseum on this show from a

development standpoint. It's you have got to let your kids play other sports. And I

actually think that message is being heard because I hear from people, if we let

them play baseball, we let them try track and field. That's number one. I think

this is also an apt time. I love that you come on here to talk about figure

skating and all these things and invest money in that because people go, really?

This guy has an NHL resume. His family has an NHL resume, right?

He's got games on his resume and he does this for a living at the top level. So

yes, if he says to do it, it's probably something you should do. You know,

I also wrote on here too that I'm heavily involved in youth hockey now, right? I've

kind of turned my coaching to that more than the high levels. The best skaters that

I see from, we'll just say, 8 to 15, almost all have done figure skating at some

point, at some point, even if it was just a little bit. You just can't replicate

that in only hockey. The other thing, too, I wrote this down. Because people always

ask me about private lessons, especially at the young work, can I get private

lessons? I say find a figure skating coach and work on your skating. Because this

is the truth, parents. And Riley, I want you to comment on this.

You know, the hard skills in hockey, skating, shooting, passing, hockey IQ. Skating

is really the only one. I know rollerblades exist, but there's really nothing like

being on the ice and understanding that. That's why that, if you're going to invest

time, is the most important thing. You can work on your hands off.

but Riley, that wasn't a question, but if you want to comment on that, I'd love to

hear about it. Well, not only myself, but my brother as well,

who I think he almost got 500 games. Yeah. He figure skated too growing up.

It was kind of like if you lived in the house, you were doing both, figure

skating, doing that. But I think when you look at the terms of like development, I

think you look at at the way that Colby and I grew up and Colby was more of like

the natural gifted hockey player. You know, he did all the things. He's skating with

my mom. He's doing this. He's doing that. But he gets drafted to the Western Hockey

League.

And then he goes on. He's playing. I was never drafted. So I think right there are

so many people value getting drafted now that the college landscape has changed they

get they put all the value into getting drafted into maker junior and then the

following year is like the ush -l draft and then they value all that and they put

all their eggs in that basket like i got to get drafted i want to post it on

social media that's like number one thing that goes through i think everyone's head

so i i was never drafted to the w hl um so At the time,

I'm like, I think maybe college is my route. So I go to some WHL camps.

I get cut. I'm playing AAA midget up in Saskatchewan. And I sign on with the team

in the BC Junior League. And as I'm driving out there, I stop in to the Kootenai,

who are now the Wenatchee Wild. They've moved a couple of times now. But I stop in

for training camp and I made the team. So then I have to make a decision. Am I

going to stay at the Western Hockey League at the age of 18, which is pretty old

going into junior leagues? Or am I going to go to the BC Junior League and then

go on to college? And just having like, being from Western Canada,

I grew up watching the Saskatoon Blades. I was like, oh, I want to stay. I want

to stay. So I stayed. And it was like a, I think a risky move because at 18,

you know, that's essentially my NHL draft year coming out of, you know, my first

time playing junior hockey. And so I now, since I quit figure skating,

I played two years or three years of hockey, like full time, committed. And then I

played for the Cooney Ice, got traded in the expansion draft to the Everett Silver

Tips.

And I played two years of junior hockey and then undrafted to the NHL and signed

with San Jose. So I think a lot of people put so much value into getting drafted

and all this stuff. And you never want to be, you know, essentially the best 10

-year -old or the best 12 -year -old. There's so many guys that were drafted out of

Saskatoon or Western Canada in my WHL draft, that didn't even play in the league,

but they were drafted. And that's where a lot of guys, look, I always look at,

like, on elite prospects, you can go look at drafts. And as you go, like, the

first round, a lot of kids play. The second round, it kind of varies a little bit.

You have the hits and the misses in the third round, and it slowly goes. And I

always look back, and I feel proud that I beat out so many kids, even to play two

NHL games of guys that were drafted but never played a game. And your path might

wind and grow up and down and everything, but, you know, the kids that continue to

develop in the summertime, and my dad would always preach that to me, like the

summertime,

like you got to work in the summertime. And that's kind of where I made my games

and my strides to be able to go and pass, you know, kids that are essentially

developed or matured quicker than I did. I love this story, Riley. And I'll tell

you, the other thing we say a lot on the show is there is no one path, right?

And I think a lot of people get the gold in their eyes of, like you're saying,

the draft and getting drafted. And that is a path. But if you put all of your

eggs into that, which is really when you think about it, the most unlikely path for

most players, right? I know what happens. There are many paths to getting there. And

a lot of it comes down to great determination and the work that you put in. I do

want to turn our story. In reading about you and researching you, it seems like

there was a pretty big moments or maybe a series of moments where you realize, hey,

I'm a coach. Like, I'm going to be a coach. Can you talk about that as a player

as you transition into a coach? And maybe the moment or moments that you realize

that's the direction I need to go in. I think after I would have been,

well, I started to get old. The hockey's a young, hockey's a young person's game.

So when I got to be about 26, 27, and I started going over. Very old. I'm just

teasing. Very old. Yeah. I kind of thought after all of my experiences of playing

in Germany, playing in Russia, playing in Finland, Sweden.

Every league has a different style and coaches coach different in all these different

leagues. And so I came back to the U .S. in my final year, I was playing for the

Redding Royals. And I was already making phone calls to GMs around the league

saying, hey, I want to be a coach. I think I have these values of,

you know, I've grinded in the ECHL, the American League, played in the NHL,

I've played over in Europe. I know all these leagues.

And I got a phone call from Mark Recky with the Penguins after I quit playing and

asked if I would be interested in coaching the Wheeling Naylars. And so it kind of

went from me playing to instantly stepping in and like being able to coach. And I

thought I was like never heard of wheeling before, like in wanting to live there.

I went there to play but never to want to live. And it ended up being a great

experience for my family and I made some like lifelong friends there. But I think

it kind of goes for my mom. It was like I always had that coaching in my mind of

like, you know, running youth camps and running hockey skill camps and all this.

Like I find value in that. You see kids getting better, but it also teaches me on

how to break a skill down. If I get on the ice with Tyson Forster and Bobby Brink

and I'm like, hey, guys, we're going to come in and we're just going to do this,

you know, little stick -hound thing and then we're going to shoot. like they'll pick

it up after like four or five reps but when you're talking to a nine 10 13 year

old you have to break the skill down to like where your hands are on your stick

how your wrist moves how much pressure you put on the puck um how your feet should

be moving your heads up your hips go like this so it it makes you break the skill

down that even talking to guys at the NHL level with those guys, it allows you to

kind of like have those open discussions about hey, how come I'm like when I'm

shooting? I don't feel like I'm getting it here. It's like, well, you're not moving

your like hip or you got to bring the puck in close to your body and your feet

have to move in to this position to be able to do that. And then they're like,

oh, and then you have that communication. A lot of, I think a lot of people that

watch an NHL player, they love to talk about the skill. like they want to sit

there and like talk and break it down and then their brain starts to move a little

bit more and they're like oh yeah oh okay I understand that oh I'm feeling it and

then they start to feel it a little bit more and realistically when you're playing

the game it's all about feel and touch and understanding how your body's moving do

you think a lot of youth hockey coaches don't recognize that they kind of loss over

those finer points, you know, they'll get kids up. Here's the drill.

Here's how you do it. And that's it. Without breaking it down. Yeah. That would

make a huge difference. It does. It does make a huge difference. I think like the

biggest part for me was even, you know, my son, it was out in Mike development.

And the coaches are there at all the stations around the rank. And, You know,

they're going out and they're just ripping through these cones and then flicking the

puck in the net. I was a big believer. So as my mom was creating good habits.

So if you're not the fastest skater, speed will come. But when you turn and you

only turn with one foot on the ice because you can't get on your outside edge on

your front foot as you're turning, that's going to hurt you as you get older. So I

was a big believer in like, I don't care how fast you're going. I want you to be

able to turn the proper way. I want you to be out of your body in a proper way.

And if you're the slowest guy on the ice because you're six, that's cool. I'm

totally fine with that. But if you can't turn and as your speed then picks up when

you hit 12, 13, 14, how are you going to turn if you couldn't turn when you were

going slow at six. So those are like the areas that you got to really fine tune

and break down and stay on top of. You know, that's a funny story here, Riley.

Mike, you'll love this too. So again, I'm very blessed to coach a wide variety of

teams. And one of them I get to coach is an elementary school team. And just for

the audience, this is kindergarten through fourth grade. So that is a massive gap of

age and ability. And so one of the things you have to balance is you have, you

have six, seven -year -olds really are learning to skate against potentially, you know,

double A, triple A, third graders, fourth graders. And so one of the things we do

is we talk about how they have to teach each other, right? And that that's part of

the leadership. And we really, we really encourage the older kids to do this, but

they can get restless. So last practice, about skating. It was mostly skating

practice, kind of practicing what I preach. And so we did this four -on -four game.

No sticks, just a gigantic kind of ball that I brought out. And it's funny how

hard they skate when you don't put a stick in their hand. And you just tell them

to pass this ball. And again, our audience will laugh at this because my pet peeve

is young kids skating directly at a defenseman with their stick on the ice and the

puck in the puck in front of them without protecting the puck and you know it's

funny they had the ball and none of them did that none of them you don't you

didn't skate straight at the guy with the ball you get all these amazing skating

moves and one of the kids came up to be kind of smiling he goes hey when do we

play in real hockey I said you just did you just did you know you know so I also

think that to your question Christy like part of the inception of skating is is to

try it in different ways sometimes putting a stick the hands actually can be a

hindrance yeah um and that when you focus on just the skating all the skating

drills i did at the start no sticks but you know i told them i said i want you

to act like there's a stick in your hand it changed the whole dynamic of edge work

and stride work and understanding the mechanics suddenly there's no there's no tripod

to rely on so yeah i think that uh you know riley too to your point like just

being a little creative um with these kids can really change it. And I also say,

too, Riley, I love that you said this. It's not about doing it as fast as you

can. It's about doing it the right way as fast as you can, right? And sometimes

that means going really slow just to get the mechanic down and then speeding up. So

many kids want to be at the full 100 % right away. And I said, we got to explain

to them. You can do this slowly and build up. You don't go from A to Z overnight.

It takes time. It takes a long time to cook a hockey player. So turning this into

a question. Sorry, I'm on a pedestal again. I have too much coffee in the morning.

Riley, you talk about the minutia at the NHL level, right? And then also the macro

at the youth level. You mentioned communication. Can you talk about maybe both pro

and youth, how you communicate to a pro athlete, the smallest of things.

I read another great article about you about not even just on the ice, but skate

size, lacing the skate, these little minute differences that players have,

how do you, A, communicate those? Do players give you any pushback, right? Are they

like, my skate's fine? Or is it kind of like everyone wants to learn and find a

way forward? I think some guys, like at the NHL level, they've been doing a certain

thing for a certain years. And they're like, no, it works for me. I'm going to

stick with it. Some guys are open to trying new things. On my son's team with the

Lee I Valley Phantom's 2015 team, everybody ties their skates a little bit

differently. And that's just for me watching them skate.

I find skates, so at the youth level, parents go out, they're like, my kid's going

to wear the fly light. Well, I think what a lot of things that parents don't

realize is that the fly light's a very stiff skate. So if your son is 60 pounds,

he's not even bending the skate. He's essentially like not even getting ankle flexion

or anything like that to become a good skater.

So for myself, I bought all of my son skates at Played Against Sports. And the

reason why I did that was, number one, cheaper. And number two, the skate was

already broken in. So when he wore it, you could actually see him bending his

ankle, bending his knees, bending his hips. When the skate is so stiff, you can't

do it. Then you go to the NHL level. Now you're watching guys skate. And I don't

know what they did growing up. Did they work with a figure skating coach do they

have a power skating like where are they at so now i'm i'm watching them skate and

i'm like man that like that guy could be a really good skater but he doesn't even

bend his ankle so then i'm like i go look at his skate he has the laces cranked

all the way together that's as tight as possible it's like he's in a cast and um

and then i'm like hey you should try like loosening your skate, lowering an eyelid,

or like moving an eyelid, skipping an eyelid. And like, let's see how much more

ankle mobility you have. I laugh about this a ton with Danny because when Danny

played, Danny would take tape and he would wrap it around his ankles.

And he would pull the stalk over top of the tape. And he's like,

I'm like, I have no clue how you skated like that. Like Like, it was like, he's

like, yeah, felt like I was in a ski boot. But it worked for him, right? If I

would have went to Danny. Hey, take all that tape off and do this. He was like,

but my ankles were weak. Like, I needed that support. But, like,

that's different. I don't think a lot of players even do that now. I've never,

through my years of coaching all these levels, I've never seen a guy do what Danny

did, like wrapping tape around the ankles i think that was like a thing back in

the day um so like now now you're getting like all these different like little fine

details of of all this different stuff so i think it varies um it's it's always

nice to talk there's some there's some kids on on my son's team where like oh that

doesn't feel right you know but after they try it and they kind of stick with it

all of a sudden they're like oh it's starting to feel better You know, they got to

get used to it. And I think that's the same thing when you look at an NHL player.

They got to like, you just can't go and try it for 10 minutes and then go, oh,

no, I don't like it. Like you got to give it some time and let your body and

your brain kind of work through it a little bit. I think at the youth level, too,

Riley, is like this is such a great opportunity for coaching players,

especially in everybody that kind of accepted the station -based type of format for

the little kids. And, you know, and as I'm hearing you, I'm hoping the coaches are

like, wow, you know, I could run a station with just, you know, I'm a big, like,

I'm always, I'm always trying to as the builder of skill, right? Because momentum

hides a lot of increases in a player, right? If they can get momentum and they're

doing their seat cuts and they're going to, I guess, it's just the men's body

that's really carrying them, not their, not their edge ability, right? So now I'm

thinking about, you know, you're running your station, you got your nine -year -olds

and 10 -year -olds, and you could do more, you know, I know, in USA hockey,

it's like a forbidden like block drills. It's like, oh, my God, you can't do block

drills. Like, it's, the kids should just be playing and free play. But technique,

we can't teach power. We We can't teach all the little nuances of certainly can't

grab a kid and say, hey, listen, do me a favor. Mom, go retie your skate this

way, come back out again for the next part of the drill, see what you feel like.

Like we have such a great opportunity because of the way we're structuring our

practices now to take that little block of five kids, bring them all out, retie

their skates, bring them back in and give experiment. Instead of just saying, hey, I

don't know, the kid doesn't know. But to Christy's point, 98 % of youth hockey

coaches don't know that. They don't know how to look. Listen, I watch the play

programs where a kid is where a coach is watching a player with the wrong curve

stick for three weeks. Do you not see the kid? Do you not see the kids holding

the stick in the wrong hand? Oh, I don't know. I'm just running into the drills,

right? Because that's really what we're conditioned. We're just running them through

drills. But to your point, Riley, I mean, it's really a great opportunity for us to

step back, look at a drill designed for this. Well, this drill is designed to see

where your ankle flexion is, where your edges are, where your knee bend is, and

we're specifically telling you we're doing it. And what a great opportunity to react

to that and say, wow, and then look down the bench and every single kid has a

different, you know, a different lace job, which I guess is hard, but it's a right

thing to do. Yeah. I think the crazy part, too, is like with all these new skate

sharpening machines coming out that, like, people can buy, you can, I had a kid out

at my camp this past summer, and when I was watching him glide, it looked like he

was, like, falling backwards. So I went and grabbed his skate. And the profile of

his skate, the toe of his blade was thicker than the heel.

So he was essentially like skating on his heels like backwards like this.

But he was like trying to force himself forwards, which is like you're fighting

against like your skate, which a kid can't do that. Right. So I now,

I snap his blade out of his skate. I take it over. I go to the guy at the rink

and I'm like, profile it on your machine to like this number on the profile.

Nice. And he does that. The kid puts it on and he like looks over at me like I

was like, like I just walked on water. A wizard. Yeah. You know? And but it's like

people don't look at that. The kids mom and dad are coming over to to me going

like, oh, my, like, this is crazy. Like, we're always like, what's wrong with your

skates? You're falling down. But it's like you pull the skate out of the box. You

put it on and you go and skate. And you go take it in. They sharpen the skates.

But, like, there's so much stuff that goes into it that, like, even, I didn't even

look at it. I was just looking at his body and how he was skating. And I was

like, ah, there's, like, a bunch of red flags are going off. I'm like, if my mom

was here, she'd be going nuts right now.

I tell kids all the time, if you're walking to a pro shop where you're sharpening,

take him and say yes, run away. Grab the skates and run as fast as you get. Yeah,

I could sharpen them. No problem. But these are like the little things that people

just don't, we don't educate and communicate to our youth hockey coaches and our

players because they just very I don't know power sent me a pair of skates that go

out of box I sharpen them and aren't they sharp well yeah but your kid is he

weighs you know maybe maybe that hollow is not a great olive or him or yeah what's

crazy you know that's the beauty about these sparks machines and the and the

automated machines right you can you can you can experiment all you want and it's

not hard to educate yourself like we're talking about the educate like and again

look let's just give a real big shout out to all the volunteer coaches real quick

it sounds like we're kind of pooing on you we're not your volunteers this is not

your life right this is not what you spend at home but you're not schmucks like us

where we sit home and read about this all day right but but i will say this too

uh because i can hear the audience well where do i get this education it's not

that far i mean you can go online and research this sparks does a great job of

explaining everything that the Sparks Machine does. I will tell everybody, too, and

Sparks is not a sponsor, but I am a fan, that, you know, if you have three or

four skaters in your house, it's worth looking into something like a Sparks. You'll

actually end up saving money. And the consistency of the sharpening is what I love

about it. And again, there's other options out there. I don't want to only speak

for Sparks, but I'm just saying that I love the consistency. Let's get pro -sharp a

little shout out. There we go. Whoever you want. And I love your local pro -shops.

I got to give up. Riley, especially he's a European guy. So he would know, like in

Europe, it's like crazy. Like that's, you know, how attune they are to, like,

they were way ahead of us on profiling and, and, you know, consistent. And the

education around that. And I would say another place she could probably go to as a

good podcast to find out about those things too. Right. And your local pro shop. I

got to give them a shout out because my kids got to know the skate sharpening guy.

And he knew exactly how to cut their, they didn't have to say anything because they

knew exactly what cut work for them. And take time to learn about it. They love

educating parents about the stage. I talked about logic. I talked about logic you

wouldn't drive your car with bigger wheels in the front than the back you wouldn't

drive your car with lopsided tire tires you go to someone and say hey this doesn't

feel right but sometimes logic goes out the window but but riley you're just making

fantastic points about recognizing that and then mike you made a fantastic point

about at the youth level is the time to check it out right and and mike i love

that suggestion about, especially in the small area, of there should be a skating

area where maybe you're not working just on skating, but let's look at your ankle

flexion. Let's look at your, you're just stance and let's work on slow strides. We

do this all the time where we want to expose something, whether it's skating,

whether it's the way you're shooting, whether it's where your hands are. If you

could take that with a 10 -year -old, we even do it 15, 16 -year -olds, if I'm in a

station and I have like four or five kids, it's so much easier for me to teach

that if I'm just Ryan McDuff.

or youth hockey, in your opinion, bring that joy to this aspect. Because here's the

deal. If it's not fun, it's not going to last, right? The hockey has to be fun.

Games are fun, everything. Talk about the competitive level of knowledge from a pro

athlete and then how we can apply that to youth athlete.

Yeah, so the biggest thing is, is the pro athlete understands what he needs to work

on. And there might be one or two things. I always like using like Bobby Brink and

Tyson Forcer as like examples because those are guys that I had come in when I was

coaching the phantoms. And their number one thing when they came in was when Tyson

was drafted was that he wasn't that good of a skater. When Bobby Brink came in, I

don't know, he's not that good of a skater. And I kind of took that on as like

my mission. I'm like, I'm going to help these kids become better skaters because I'm

often to play for the Flyers one day. And over that time, just going in the

summertime, working with Brinker and working with Tyson on their skating, their edge

work. But then they start to realize I'm getting better. Like they start to feel

it. They're like, oh man, when I cut back on that guy, just understanding his edges

and how his body works, he's like, I didn't fall down. I had my feet under me. I

got away from them. I, like, exploded out with speed. So then, then they want more.

They're like, hey, can we do that? What we did? Can we do that again? And now

every day there, I'm like, back on the ice with them, back on the ice, continuing

to do that. And now, did Tyson, if you had Tyson on here and you asked Tyson,

hey, Tyson, did you work on your skating when you were 10 and 11? Maybe he didn't.

But now he's starting to realize, you know, all the skills got into a certain

point, but what was going to take him further to, you know, score back -to -back 20

goals seasons right now for the flyers? And I'm hoping more. Maybe he gets 30,

35, I'm pushing for it. But like, the skating's going to allow him to do that.

Right.

Bobby Brink, being a smaller player, he has to be a good skater. He has to be

able to get in and out of the corners quick so the big D man don't wrap him up

and hit him against the boards. Your body can't take that wear and tear at his

size. So he has to be good on his edges. You see Bob, he does a lot of the 10

and 2 as he goes around the rink to try and maneuver his body away from getting

hit all the time. And he's very good at it. Some people can't do it. He's really

good at Well, just to me, explain what that is for the audience real quick, because

they might not be familiar with that term of 10. Yeah, just when your heels go

together and then you're just working on your inside edges as you're pushing around

the rink and your chest and your face is open to the middle of the rink. So you

can see the whole play. A lot of people call it the Crosby. So I think he did

that against Ottawa in 2006, maybe or something like that. but like i think that's

kind of where it stems from but bob bob's really really good at it he does it at

time he does it on zone entries he does it coming out of corners all that type of

stuff um and then and then when you i think when they they want it and they see

it work they come back and they're like hey i want to work on that more right um

now for a kid who goes out there even my son where my focus is skating,

my mom's focus is skating. And he's like, talk about the ultimate eye roll is

coming from him. So what I did was there's this program in figure skating. It's

called Annie's Edges. And Annie's Edges is a beat.

And it starts off with like, boom, boom, boom,

or, you know, however it may go. I should bring it up on my phone so you guys

could hear it. But so I do, when I figure skated, my mom would always have us do

crossovers. So you do crossovers and every single time the beat hits, that's your

stride count. So it teaches you how to hold your glide and then push.

So you're pushing, gliding, pushing but then the beats get quicker and that's where

the kids get it right they're like ah they're like kind of running on the ice and

then they fall down you know and whatever then they get up and then the beat

starts over again so now something that they're like oh my god we're skating again

now i have music playing so now music takes that boredom away from them so a lot

of times out at my son's practices um i always play music music's on all like at

a low level but it kind of like they hear a song you can see them dancing in the

line a little bit you know and like it keeps them engaged in that way i think a

lot of parents and i have a hard time processing it too is like these kids go to

school from like eight till four o 'clock and then they ride home and then they get

home and they have to do some homework and then doing this and then we practice at

645 so we get out of there at 815 now a lot of kids they're like at 730 they're

like they're cooked like yeah take me in the rapper i'm ready for bed and that's

where you know that music kind of keeps them engaged a little bit and right even i

see some of our parents they're always dancing in the crowd too if you get a lot

going on so but that's But that's kind of what I try and encourage the kids is

like that music aspect of it to hear the beat, the rhythm, and all that type of

stuff. Yeah. I'm a great fan. Yeah, if you come to my practices, you'll see that

all the time. We talk about, you know, rhythm. It's all about hitting. Like, it's

just dancing. All you're doing is ballet on ice, right? And I think the more the

kids stop thinking, you've got to do an inside edge and you've got to hold your

weight. If you're just dancing and you're and you find the right meat for a kid,

there's so many cool things you can do because like in hockey, it's all cadence.

It's all, it does, you know, this, when you go this way, you have to go this way

and then you have to go this way, be able to turn, pivot. And when you're doing

it in a dance and you're getting letting the kids just have fun and being able to

rhythm really changes the way they learn because they're they're taken away from the

instructional piece and more into like the free skate piece that's why you start

that's why you start seeing like i watch kids all the time that are that play for

me at the youth level and i watch them like a free disco night or or the friday

night skate and i'm like god that kids a good skater like i never see that like

where's that skating in our game because it's just it's just freedom of skating and

the rhythm of the music it becomes play one of my favorite videos online from like

it was last year was uh it was a hockey game and ymca is playing between stoppages

and even the ref like it was a fun moment they all started doing the ymca before

the face off they even held the face off off for a second and everyone had a good

time i i love the idea of playing music you know again back to the elementary team

we practice at 4 p .m. on a Friday and we get it's like why aren't they paying

attention because it's 4 p .m. on a Friday all right and they've been through school

you've got to make those practices a little more fun but you also have to have a

plan again going back to the the handball game I've never seen the kids skate so

hard it's because now it's not instructional so much it's play right and look it's

got to be a balance it's got to be a balance and i think that that not every

drill is going to be super fun and and not every drill um is going to be super

hard right it's you just got to find that balance in between um rather just because

we're getting short on time here i do want to ask this question i always love to

give actionable items we all do to the audience right we talked before about how

there is no path you talked about a lot of the positives of that path. I'm

wondering if you could talk about maybe some of the red flags that you see really

of kids trying to make the next level, whether that's the AA, AAA, NCAA,

Junior Hockey. In your journey, you said it, you've seen a lot of different hockey

players. Are there things that you've picked out of, oh, that's going to kill your

career, that's going to kill your love for the game? Yeah, I would say seeing it

more now at the 10 -year -old, 11 -year -old level is players chasing or I don't know

if the player or the parent so much is like chasing the my hockey rankings. Oh,

man. This team is in the top 10. I have to go play on that team. You know, like

if I went and got all the best players from around the area and I put a team

together. Like, I could have my daughter, who doesn't like hockey at all, probably

coached the team. Like, they're all the best 10 -year -olds, so they're probably going

to win. Now, if what I think they should chase,

though, is the coaching. If your team isn't that good, you don't win every game.

And I tell a lot to the parents on the kids that I coach here is I don't care

if we win and I don't care if we lose. My main goal is to, like, work on

skating, work on your stick handling, work on your shooting, learn how to play the

game of hockey, learn how to do a breakout, learn how to forecheck, learn how to

transition the puck and pass it.

And when I'm done coaching your child and wherever they go to play next and the

coach talks about a forecheck, at least in their brain they'll be like oh i know

this or i'm going to back check through the middle of the rink not along the

boards or i'm going to go d to d on a transition i have options like then then

all of a sudden like the coach who's now coaching your child because i'm not going

to coach them forever they're they're going to be like wow look at this kid he he

actually understands how to play the game of hockey. He just doesn't take it end to

end every time. He moves the puck. And that's something I preach a ton of is the

puck moves faster than anybody that's skating. So we have to move it and move it

and move it. But I think the biggest red flag is the kid, when you look at their

thing growing up, lead prospects or whatever, and they're on a team and then on a

new team, and then they're on a new team. and they're constantly going it just

shows they have no um i guess uh idea of like what it is to be dedicated to a

team or show commitment to to a team they're always just searching and looking for

the next best thing and eventually uh i think when scouts go out and watch even at

the pro levels or colleges that's a red flag yeah When they look and you've been

on a new team or a new program eight years in a row, like that's a big red flag.

You know, so what are they going to do when they go to college? They're just going

to one year as soon as something goes bad, they hit the portal. I'm out of here.

And then I'm out of here. And then I'm out of here. Like, no, you got to stay in

there. You got to like, if you're on the fourth line, then work. Work more. It's a

double -edged sword, right? Yeah. You want the best player, but the best players

sometimes went in seven different programs. You're like, and it's talking like, well,

I'm the one that's going to change it. Like, I'm the one that's going to establish

that. So it's really not, it's just, I think the problem it's endemic in our hockey

society right now, that, you know, back the day when we moved teams, it's kind of

like a red, a really red flag. Like, it was kind of like a badge of honor. If

you could be able to program for seven, They're like, oh my God, you know, that

player hasn't, you know, he's still got the same helmet that he had. When he was

14 years old, he had that same helmet and shoulder, same uniform. But I think

nowadays, like, these kids don't get that adversity piece. So unless you're the best

of them, unless you're somebody who is uncutable, like, then that's most of the best

of us. Then you get, and I risk taking this player that may or may not be here

for the next eight months. Look, I got to say it to, Mike. I got to throw this

in there, too. And, Riley, you said this at the start of this question.

Parents, they ask all three of us all the time, what team should I look at? What

should I do? Look for the best coach. For the best coaching. I recommend it all

the time. I think it's safe to drop down a level if you know there's going to be

a great coach at that level obviously it's all situational you know where you're at

your hockey journey matters on that one all right but if you told me there's a

triple a team that's playing everybody in across the country or there's a double a

team or a b team that has an insanely good coach i'm going to actually recommend

you probably go to that coach right again not every time but most times right um

we talk about this whole shows about hockey development someone who's going to help

you develop. Go ahead, Kistee. Wins and losses aren't always reflective of what's

going on. I'm going to tell a secret. Nobody cares. Nobody, nobody cares.

I don't think there's ever a pro meeting or a high -level meeting. It's like, oh,

your team won 27 games last year. You're on the team. You've made it. Like, no one

does that. And talk to the parents and say, my kid is such a better skater,

such a better hockey player after having been coached by, you know, so and so.

So, you know, do your homework, do your research and chances are don't always look

at what the scoreboard says because you've got to take a deeper dive and find out

more about the coaching when you're picking out a team. I have a question for you,

Riley, about slumps because I just got this question from a hockey mom who's a

little skittish about this season because they did so poorly last season.

Her kid was in a slump, the team was in a slump. So she's a little apprehensive

about this new season starting. And it's a fresh season. I try to tell her that.

Anything can happen. So how do you maintain positivity during slumps and how do you

get the kids to keep their energy level up when it seems like all the odds are

stacked against them. Yeah, I think, well, you have slumps in two different ways,

I guess, looking at this question is you'd have a slump at the youth hockey level

where I think if you establish off of the start that I don't care how many points

you get, I don't care how many wins or losses you have, we're going to focus on

just becoming a better hockey player. Then the pressure of, I need to score a goal

today. And then you don't score. And then also you're like, oh, man, I haven't

scored. And then, oh, we haven't won. But if you take that out of it and you're

like, hey, look at this. You did a really good job on the forecheck today. Or look

how hard you back checked. That was really good. And you focus on little positives

like that not like oh you should have scored there oh if you passed it to the kid

over here and if he would have scored you would have had an assist and then that

kid's like oh if goes to his buddy the next day if you would have scored I would

have gotten an assist you know and then you create that instead of just being like

hey when like when you don't have the puck what are you doing to get the puck

back look at you here you did a great job tracking you lifted a stick you got the

puck this is awesome next clip or next little video thing that you're looking at

with your child now at the pro level when you're you're in a slump players coming

in he hasn't scored a goal in five games when when a player's shooting a puck or

making plays the they start to get their target starts to go smaller and smaller

and smaller when they're when you're on fire, you shoot the puck, it might hit the

goalie and bounce in the net. And you're like, everything's going in. Right. But now

you shoot it and then you're like picking this little corner. Then the corner gets

smaller. And now you're missing the net, missing the net. And the biggest thing

talking to the player is like, I want you to just shoot the puck. And every time

you shoot it, you're going to hit the net. And eventually it's like a rebound pops

off. You get the rebound you score. the rebound pops off your buddy puts it in all

of a sudden you get an assist even or a goal your confidence just goes through the

roof instantly like it's like you you watch any player a player who scores a goal

or gets something in the first shift watching the rest of the game they're high

stepping everywhere they're puck's through their feet they're doing this doing that

things that you would never see but it's just it just kind of flows right to your

game. The hockey gods are on their side. I'll say to this too real quick. When I

coach coaches, and I want to make sure people understand, I'm talking about youth

sports right now, not pro sports. When I coach coaches, I always remind them you

can define winning in a hundred different ways. If it's only the scoreboard, I think

you're making a mistake. All right, especially in youth sports, winning is

development. Riley, as you said, you accomplished something. You made a great play.

You're learning. At the pro level, wins and losses do matter. Okay? But you can

find a lot of different wins there, too. But I'm not going to sugarcoat it. Like,

you've got to win at the top level. The other thing I wanted to say, just kind of

in closing, right, that you brought up to all my youth coaches out there, right?

Remember, you're not just coaching this year's team or this year's player. You're

coaching who they're going to become next year and the year later. Riley talked

about it so wonderfully with Bobby Brink and Forrester about, about, oh, this season

and next season and the season after that. And I know as youth coaches, we don't

always seem to have everyone for four or five years at a time, but you still need

to coach them for the future, right? And I love telling the story about the team I

coached last year, double A team. We didn't win a lot of games. These kids work so

hard, and they're all succeeding this season, and I'm not coaching any of them. And

I love that for them, right? Because we really put an emphasis on we're really

coaching these squirts to be great peewees next year. You got to have that macro

view as a coach. If it's only about wins and losses at youth sports, any sport,

I'm telling you you're doing a disservice to those kids. All right. Winning is

great. Winning is awesome in terms of championships. But the is those kids getting

better, all right? This is not campy to me. I take this really seriously, all

right? And Riley gets paid to do it, all right? The highest level. Riley, this has

been a fantastic episode. We really, you're a busy man. For those who are you

listening, the NHL season starts a couple days from when we're recording this. And

Riley took some time out from his busy schedule to be here today. So we really

appreciate you coming on, man. Yeah, no problem. I appreciate it, guys. Thanks for

doing the podcast. I think it's great for, you know, new families joining the sport.

Always trying to grow the game as much as possible. So thanks for doing this. I

think it's well -known out there now. I've heard a lot about you guys, especially on

the East Coast here and one growing. So I think it's great.

And we need more of it. We kids to sign up and keep playing the game. Well,

Riley, tell your friends. Tell your friends to come on the show. You've got powerful

friends. All right, that's going to do it for this edition of Our Kids Play Hockey.

Riley Armstrong, fantastic guest for Christy Cash, Annaborns, for Mike Benelli. I'm

Lee Elias. Remember, email us team at Our Kids Playhockey .com. You have any

questions about your coaching development, your development. Hockey in general will

take them or click the link accompanying this episode in the show notes. and you

can text us directly anything you want to hear about. All right. Have a great one,

everybody skate on. Have fun, and we'll see you in the next Our Kids Play Hockey.

We hope you enjoyed this edition of Our Kids Play Hockey. Make sure to like and

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