You know, every now and then, a name from the past just pops into your head. For me, recently, it’s been Dylan Silverstein. Not a pro, not famous, just a kid I coached in hockey a few years back. And boy, was that an experience.
So, I’d decided to give back a bit, signed up to coach the local Peewee team. Thought it’d be straightforward, teach ’em some drills, run a few plays. Then I got the roster. Most names were just names, but Dylan Silverstein… he was something else from day one.
He wasn’t the biggest kid, not the loudest either. Kind of kept to himself. But put him on the ice, and he had this one move. A slick little deke he’d do. Problem was, that’s all he’d do. Game situation, practice, didn’t matter. He’d get the puck, try the deke, lose the puck. Over and over. It drove me nuts.
My Coaching Struggle
I spent weeks trying to get through to him. I’d pull him aside, explain about passing, about teamwork. We ran drills specifically to encourage moving the puck. Nothing. He’d just nod, then go right back to his one-trick pony show. I even tried benching him for a bit. He just sat there, quiet as a mouse, then went back and did the same thing. I was about ready to tear my hair out. Some days I’d go home thinking, ‘What am I even doing here?’
Then one practice, completely by accident, I saw him after everyone else had left, just skating by himself. And he wasn’t just doing the deke. He was trying all sorts of things. Turns out, he was terrified of messing up in front of the other kids and the parents. That one deke was his comfort zone, the one thing he felt he could do okay. It hit me like a ton of bricks. I wasn’t dealing with a stubborn kid; I was dealing with a scared one.
So, I changed my whole approach. Started working with him one-on-one before practices, just focusing on simple, fun stuff, building his confidence. We’d just mess around with the puck. No pressure. Slowly, real slowly, he started trying new things in drills, then in scrimmages. He never became a star player, not by a long shot. But he started passing. He started smiling more. He even scored a couple of goals that season, and not with ‘the deke’.
- That whole thing with Dylan, it taught me a lot.
- Mostly that coaching, or teaching anything really, isn’t just about drills and tactics.
- Sometimes you gotta dig a bit deeper to see what’s really going on with someone.
- You think you’re there to teach them hockey, but sometimes they teach you a thing or two about patience and understanding.
Yeah, Dylan Silverstein. Just a kid on a Peewee team, but he definitely left a mark on my coaching playbook, that’s for sure.
