This warm up drill focuses on cradling and ball control, and will get the kids warm in early practice
Set Up
Set up a designated area on the field using cones or lines. In this case, we are using the center circle, which is a good space for the size of this group. Every player will have a ball and will run/cradle through the area. They need to keep their HEAD UP while they are running so they dont run into a teammate. You can see in the video, players are naturally also getting some escape work in when they need to change direction to not hit a teammate!
- Progression 1 – After they have been running for 15-20 seconds, coach will blow a whistle and every player will stop, bounce away a little bit, and get their hands up like they want to make a pass. Have them hold position for a few seconds
- Progression 2 – Once coach blows the whistle, they must find a teammate and exchange balls with, by rolling it out for a ground ball (Communicate!)
Coaching Points and Principles
Progressions
- Instead of a ground ball, pass to a teammate to make it more challenging
- Make the space smaller and more challenging, or larger for less experienced players
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- Run and cradle with your stick protected, close to your shoulders
- HEAD UP! Dont look down, keep your eyes up so you are running into space that doesn’t have another player
- Look for natural escapes like Jabs, splits, etc.. and reinforce great job to the kids
- Communicate – When you get to the ground ball progression, communicate with teammate so you both expect the same thing
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A foundational drill to dodging, as It’s important we start building IQ at the younger levels, and keeping it more simple than complex. Here we are emphasizing on an easy way to attack a defender, which is simply dodging past their butt end.
Set Up
Put players in groups of 5 on the sideline with a coach about 5-8 yards away. Coach will stand square to them, with their stick on their hips. We want the players to pick up a ball dodge past the butt end, and carry the ball back in line. Coach should be changing hands for every player, so they have to be a DECISION MAKER.
Coaching Points and Principles
Progressions
- Play tougher defense so they don’t hang stick, light checks
- Make them pass back to their teammate in line
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- No specific dodge, but we want the player to change speed and ACCELERATE past coach
- Recognize the butt end, and let players naturally feel/see that
- Force them to think about what kind of movement they need to do two protect stick, while dodging
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For young players, this is a good drill to work on understanding body position when dodging toward the goal
Set Up
Put an offense and defense player in play. They start with the offense shielding stick with body, leaning into the defender. The defense leans back with hands/stick on hip on opponent. On whistle, the offense player attacks the goal, and does so by feeling the weight/positon of the defender, and attacking the opposite.
Coaching Points & Principles
Progressions
Have players start with small separation, so the defense must approach. |
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- Stick Protection!
- Use Body to feel the pressure angle from defender.. roll dodges and top side drives will work but find the natural escape
- Defense work on recovery angles
- Do this drill from all areas of the field
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This is a fun game to get the kids warmed up and competing!
SET UP
Create a small field using cones and put all the players shoulder to shoulder about 8 yards away from the game area. Coach will place as many balls -1 in the game area, than there are players. You have 8 players, use 7 balls. On the whistle, each player must go get a ball, and bring it back to the start line. The 8th player who doesn’t win a ball, can play defense and try to steal until everyone has returned back to the start point. Continue this progression until its 2v1 and you can declare a winner!
PRINCIPLES AND COACHING POINTS
PROGRESSIONS
- Use less balls to make game go faster (8 players 6 balls, then 6 players 4 Balls…
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- Ground Balls, Competing, Hustle, hav fun!
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