Teaching Creativity

I'm not talking being more creative with uniforms. This team has more than covered that area. I'm talking about the question of it being possible to train players to be more creative, or is it, as some have suggested, a genetic gift ? From my perspective, like all skills we learn, both takes are factored in. However, the prejudice of genetics being a the largest determining factor in learning this part of the game, not learned skills, many coaches fail to believe they can improve players significantly in this area. This post is an attempt to convince you creative players can be built a lot easier than many believe.

For players the starting point is to study creative players. Try to notice the subtleties that make these players successful and then work at adding a skill set to pull these types of plays off. Next, experiment using them and with the help of your coach add them to your game play. Be proactive and share your ideas with your teammates and help them understand how and why adding creativity to their play can pay big dividends

For coaches, first of all, you must be committed to ingraining this into their player's training sessions. A determining factor here though, is that a coach lacking creativity in his or her view of the game will most likely not have the ability to effectively design sessions that will help players in this area. If that is a shortcoming, you'll need to reach out to others that have success in this area. They're usually not that hard to spot and most are more than willing to share their ideas. Second, coaches need to allow players the room to experiment with their creative play and make sure they reinforce a player when they have found a creative solution to a problem. Players also need to be taught where and when a creative play might be appropriate.

At the youth levels, creative play must play a huge role in player development and coaches should allow for a much larger latitude with allowing players to make mistakes with this skill development. Games at these levels should be used with a focus on development in all areas, rather being overly concerned with winning. Sure winning plays a role in player growth and being more aggressive to win critical games for your team has it's place, but if winning is your sole measuring gauge for success, players will be held back with long term development.

There are many training methods coaches can use to incorporate creativity into their sessions. Starting with having players adding to their skill sets both on and off the ice, drills that encourage creative play and ultimately implementing Tactical Awareness Games (TAGs) training to allow players to discover tactics that can be effective in zones all over the ice. A coach that is able to define numerous creative options that players might have in different situations and pointing these out with-in the TAGs environments can be very effective in shaping players to view the game with a much larger set of options. Coaches can also use video sessions of creative plays by professional, junior and college players to not only educate players, but hopefully create a higher enthusiasm level for implementing them. All these tools and many others are needed to build creativity, as team's defensive play has continued to play a larger and larger role in game results. Also, do not misinterpret training in this area as one that only looks to educate players on highlight reel type plays. There's also a need to focus on creative plays in high traffic areas, like the front of the goal or in the corners where aggressive one on one play often determines positive outcomes. However, educating players the need to widen their view of the ice and increase their awareness of what support players can add to effective play is critical. Increasing this awareness in many ways the single biggest factor why TAGs training can be so effective, both for individual and multi-player tactics. Again, the coach can play a significant role here if they can step in at critical moments of success or failure to break down where great or poor choices were made and why they worked or failed.

Needless to say, I do believe in a big way that creative players can be built and have had great success training players as numerous ages and abilities to add to their creative play. I also believe that using the TAGs model that breaks games down into situational play for specific tactics like cycling, breakouts, regroups dzone etc. is a critical piece. In all my practice sessions TAGs made up at least 50% of every practice. My teams might not of won a championship every year, but everyone of my teams had improved dramatically. If you empower your players with the freedom to experiment in these tactical games, players will make evolve into making better and better decisions. They also learn by having numerous repetitions of a specific tactic, and are allowed to watch numerous great and poor decisions, due to the nature of this environment. This is the fast-track to learn what does and doesn't work. To learn more about the TAGs model talked about above, take a look at an earlier post titled Tactical Awareness Games, Taking a Closer Look.