DFW Hockey Families,

Hopefully everyone is staying safe during these crazy times. We know it has been a challenge trying to keep the kids active and we have heard from many families who are looking for ways to help their players to make good use of this break. We would like to help everyone turn this downtime into a positive situation for the players. 

From a long-term athlete development perspective, players making good use of their time away from hockey can be just as important as the time on ice during the season. History shows that as a player gets to 16,17,18 yrs old when opportunities in hockey start to become a reality, it is usually the best athletes that are the most successful. Skills like hand eye coordination, foot eye coordination, balance, agility, spatial awareness, etc., are key components to being a high level hockey player. Young players who spend 12 months a year doing hockey specific training while ignoring other sports and athletic skills may have an advantage at 10U and 12U, but usually get passed by the more well rounded athletes as the players get older. 

With the current COVID-19 situation, the reality is once we are cleared to return to the ice it will likely be summer camp and then straight into the season. We are looking at a long time without a break once we get started. We have seen so many things out there about how the players should be using this time away from hockey to shoot pucks, stickhandle, roller blade, and do other hockey specific training. While all of those things are great, and should be part of a players routine away from the rink most of the year, we do not believe now is the time for that. Now is the time to take a break from hockey. Let's put the sticks, pucks, roller blades, and other hockey related things away and focus on being the best athlete we can be. It is time to work on muscles and skills that are not specific to hockey, but will ultimately develop better athletes and players in the long run. We understand that it is not possible to go play other organized sports right now; however, organized sports are not needed to make yourself a more well rounded athlete. 

We have come up with a contest that will not only be fun, but will be a great way to help the players improve their athleticism while on this break. It will require a lot of practice while forcing them to be self motivated and creative. Here are the details: 

Dallas Penguins Athlete of the Week Competition Rules
This competition is open to ALL 2002-2011 hockey players in DFW only. Players upload a video of themselves performing some sort of athletic skill that is NOT hockey related (post videos to social media and tag Dallas Penguins, DM through social media or email the videos to socialmedia@dallaspenguins.org). Players can submit a different video every day, but cannot post/email more than 1 video per day. Our staff will review the videos as they come in and every Friday.   We will select 2 winning videos for that week. Weekly winners will receive a $25 Hockey Monkey gift card and qualify for our grand prize at the end of the spring. At the end of the 4 weeks, we will post all 8 winning videos and will open a poll, where people can vote to select the Athlete of the Spring. The winner will receive any new hockey stick of their choice from Hockey Monkey!!

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Here is a video link with kids performing some athletic skills:

Amazing Talented Kids Compilation | People Are Awesome

Good Luck & Get Moving!
Go Pens!