25 goals for hockey players: skating, shooting, game habits and the season

Skating goals for hockey players

Skating goals come first, because every other skill rides on your edges. Edge control is also what a skier works on, which is why skiing goals read alike.

• Do 10 minutes of edge work at every practice for a month.
• Do crossovers at full speed in both directions.
• Stop hard on both sides, 10 times each, at every practice.
• Skate backward from one blue line to the other without losing speed.
• Get 20 extra ice sessions this season.

Shooting and puck handling goals

Shooting goals count pucks, and they are the one hockey goal you can work on with no ice at all. The tee work in baseball goals follows the same idea.

• Shoot 100 pucks a day for 30 days.
• Shoot 5,000 pucks in an off season. That is 50 a day for 100 days.
• Hit each corner of the net 6 times out of 10.
• Stickhandle for 15 minutes a day for 30 days.
• Shoot 50 backhands a day for 2 weeks.

Game habit goals

Game habits are process goals you can check on video after every game.

• Keep every shift under 45 seconds for a full game.
• Backcheck hard after every turnover for a full game.
• Stop at the net on every rush, with no skating past it.
• Look up before every pass for a full period.
• Talk on every breakout for a full game.

Off ice training goals

Off ice goals are built in the summer and counted in sessions.

• Do the off ice programme 3 times a week all summer.
• Lift 2 times a week from June to September.
• Do 10 hill sprints once a week for 8 weeks.
• Stretch your hips for 10 minutes a day for 30 days.
• Add 5 cm to your vertical jump in 12 weeks.

Short term and long term season goals

Season goals mix counts you control with one result you are aiming at.

• Attend every practice this month.
• Watch video of your shifts after every game this season.
• Take fewer than 5 minor penalties all season.
• Score 20 points this season.
• Make the team, or move up a line.

What are good goals for hockey players?

Good goals for hockey players are about what you do on your own shifts and in your own driveway. A review of 27 studies of goal setting in sport found that process goals, the ones about how you carry out a skill, had the largest effect on performance (1.36). Goals about your own results came next (0.44). Goals about winning had almost none (0.09).

So "score 20 points" can stay on the sheet as the target, but the work is in the habits under it: short shifts, hard backchecks, 100 pucks a day. Those are the goals you tick off.

Repetitions only count if they are good ones. A review of sports studies found that deliberate practice explained 18 percent of the differences in performance. Aim at a corner on every one of those 100 pucks.

A SMART goal for a hockey player

A SMART goal has a number and a date. "Get a better shot" becomes "Shoot 100 pucks a day, 5 days a week, from 1 June to 1 September." That is about 6,500 pucks, and you know every day if you are on track. The method is explained in our guide to SMART goals.

A review of 35 years of goal research found that specific, hard goals lead to higher performance than being told to do your best.

How to track hockey goals

Write the count down the day you do it. A review of 138 studies found that people who monitored their progress reached their goals more often, and that recording it beat keeping it in your head.

Pucks are an amount that adds up. Practices and off ice sessions are a day count, the same shape as most fitness challenge ideas.

A summer of shooting has no scoreboard. A picture that fills up 100 pucks at a time is the scoreboard.

Frequently asked questions

What are SMART goals for hockey players?

Goals with a number and a date. For example: shoot 100 pucks a day, 5 days a week, from 1 June to 1 September. Or: keep every shift under 45 seconds for the next 10 games.

What are short term goals for hockey players?

Goals for this week or this month: attend every practice, do 10 minutes of edge work at each one, shoot 500 pucks this week. Short goals show quickly if the plan is working.

What are long term goals for hockey players?

Goals for a season or more: make the team, move up a line, shoot 5,000 pucks over a summer. Write each one with the monthly counts that lead to it.