Timberwolves drill is a model for all team sports

Article from: www.letsplayhockey.com
Exact Link: http://www.letsplayhockey.com/959blatherwick.html 

By Jack Blatherwick

Let’s Play Hockey Columnist

In preparation for the opening NBA game, Coach Randy Williams of the Timberwolves ran a competitive ball-control drill for 90-second intervals — a drill that serves as a great model for conditioning hockey teams — or for that matter, teams in every sport. Only the skills and intervals must be adjusted to the needs of another sport.

Jerry Zgoda reported in the Oct. 4 Minneapolis Star Tribune about the 5-on-5 “man drill” that left Wolves players exhausted. However, “exhausted” is not the most constructive, exemplary characteristic of the drill. It’s that Coach Williams “gets it.” He’s using logic, experience, and the gut feelings of a former player rather than buying into the propaganda we’ve been fed for years by experts.

Commonly, and unwisely, each “outside expert” advocates his own pet little piece of the training puzzle be separated from the game of basketball or hockey. Strength coaches prefer too many workouts in the weight room. Ivory tower professors like long, slow distances, or “aerobic training,” for the cardiovascular and respiratory benefits. Others see a vigorous anaerobic component in hockey and basketball. Still others train for speed, quickness, agility, coordination, balance and other aspects of athleticism we see in those Michael Jordans of every sport.

None of this is wrong, but when isolated from the game in every workout, they have limited value. There’s that critical element of skill — without which nothing else matters in a hockey or basketball game.

Furthermore, skill must be maintained at a super-high level, and at high speed, until the end of the game.

Most importantly, an athlete must maintain competitiveness, rink sense, court awareness, creativity and toughness the entire game.

So…what’s so great about Williams’ ball-control drill? It defies the traditional advice to compartmentalize the conditioning. Experts have encouraged us to separate strength from skills and speed — separate anaerobic training, quickness and agility from aerobic training — separate rink sense (court awareness) from “conditioning drills.” But, the game requires that these are all fit together, not separated.

Why was Michael Jordan the best ever? Skill? Athleticism? Endurance? Court awareness? Was he the best at any one of these elements of the game? No. It’s that he put them together in one package.

Conditioning a team means just that — putting it all together in one package — and pushing the limits of endurance, so these elements can be maintained for a whole game. That’s what happened in Coach Williams’ drill. That’s also how Herb Brooks prepared the 1980 Olympic team to defeat the Soviets. It wasn’t the sluggish, extended skating drills he used for disciplinary reasons — misrepresented in the movie as conditioning.

No hard skating drill — or wind sprints — or 10 minutes of drudgery — can possibly prepare a team to compete with world-class skill, at high speed, while making quick decisions — for a game against opponents like Michael Jordan — or the Soviet hockey team. Conditioning must fit the challenges of the game. Conditioning must be fast, skillful, tough, creative and competitive.

Traditional wind sprints fail this test. They are not just a waste of time. They are counterproductive, because they promote slowness and brain-dead execution.

Consider the logical alternative created by a basketball coach who asks, “What do I mean when I say my team is well-conditioned or prepared to win a long, tough game against a skillful opponent?”

By the way, recent objective research is finding Williams’ approach (competitive game-like drills) much more effective than compartmentalizing the endurance training.

Zgoda’s article describes a drill in which Williams rigged the rules so that players had to compete with an artifically elevated level of skill and creativity, and keep it up for 90 seconds. By not allowing players to dribble, they were forced to pass the ball immediately. But more importantly, for those without the ball, they had to anticipate, move quickly and support the ball-carrier. Read the article and apply your own principles to hockey.

Think! Forget the experts and their Latin words. For example, “new rules” for a competitive drill (small  area game) might require the puck carrier to pass the puck within two seconds. This, in turn, forces teammates to move creatively and quickly without the puck.

How is this tied to endurance training? First of all, endurance is a function of what you do for the entire practice, not one single drill. This is obvious, because endurance in a game is not a one-shift deal. Nor is it addressed with 10 minutes of wind sprints. Games last two hours, not 10 minutes.

Endurance training must fit the challenge. Your entire (endurance) practice must be (a) fast, (b) skillful, (c) competitive and (d) creative — or at least, it must include those elements at various times. And if — at the end of practice — you want to overload the requirements for toughness and endurance, include a drill like the following:

One group of five adds an extra player and plays offense, 6-on-5 in one zone for 30 seconds against a group that is practicing to defend a lead at the end of a game (D-zone coverage on steroids). Defenders can control the puck along the wall, skate it out or chip the puck out on the glass, but not ice it. When they get it out of the zone, the coach immediately gives another puck to the offensive group of six.

After 30 seconds, the offensive group (minus the extra player) sprints to the other end and defends against a fresh group of six who are trying to score. Thirty-second intervals are maintained, meaning each group plays defense when they are slightly tired. That builds toughness and discipline. Defenders must control the puck when they get it, not simply ice it (push-ups at the end for each penalty, and for each time the puck is iced or turned over). Good decisions are critical. D-zone systems and tough defense are a must.

Offensive players are rewarded for goals, shots, puck control and avoiding turnovers.

Nothing special about this particular drill. It’s just an example of incorporating — not compartmentalizing – endurance into the skill, speed, competitiveness and mental challenges of a game. This was Coach Williams’ intent, and it is superior to traditional “running the lines” by every objective criterion.

Jack Blatherwick, Ph.D., is a physiologist for the Washington Capitals.