Beginner Line Change Confusion

[speedcraft 0]

OK, I spent half an hour searching at MSH and with Google (don’t tell my boss), but couldn’t find what I’m looking for. I play on a beginner (Bronze) league adult team, with the majority of our team straight out of this summer’s learn-to-play-hockey class.

Last night we were short a forward so we had 12 players assigned as follows (2 defensive pairings, 2 forward lines, a third center, and a “floating†winger). We ended up with a great deal of confusion amongst our forwards about when and who was supposed to change.

Is there a good (standard?) way to organize line / player changes when you don’t have three complete lines? Perhaps assigning particular wingers to change for each other, or some other way the bench / line changes are typically organized?

[Miike 1]

If possible, you could make your "third" center a winger, and have your "floating" winger stay as a winger, then you have 3 sets of wingers, and 2 centres. You could just rotate the centers. By that i mean just keep the lines rolling, but when the 2 wingers are up, just send the center whos off with them and so on. This could be done fairly easily i would assume.

[ViperJQ 0]

This happens to my team alot. We just number the wingers so they know what order they go out in. say there are 5 wingers.

1&2 first line

3&4 second line

5&1 third line

2&3 fourth..

and so on.

[KYHockey3 0]

on our team, to aviod confusion, sometimes we have winger pairs and centers.

thsi may work for u all depending on how many people play d.

i mean you could have 3 winger pairs, 2centers and 4 d's

this way, the 3 winger pairs could switch off and the 2 centers would play every other line.

[Hooah4 12]

this happens almost every week in our season. We usually try to help out the centers first since they have the hustle back job w/D. We've also done 3 sets wings w/2 centers, etc...

Depends on how much playing time everyone wants/needs.

[Chadd 916]

We have found that two centers and three pair of wingers works best for us in those circumstances. Wingers need to be more aggressive on the forcheck and backcheck than usual and they should change together regardless of when the center changes. We also usually use wingers on the PK to get the centers a little rest and even out the ice time. The nice thing about that is it reduces confusion. Centers change for each other and the wingers always change for the same guys. Wingers A are followed by wingers B, followed by wingers C. We also usually nominate the centers to make any decisions on the bench, if there is a problem with rotations or PKs. Someone has to step up and make decisions or it gets really messy.

[Storm 0]

I agree with the above.

Diagram of what was said in case it's not clear.

Just to recap: 5 wingers and 3 centers.

a = 1st center

b = 2nd center

1,2,3 = wingers

first shift: 1 a 1

second shift: 2 b 2

third shift: 3 a 3

fourth shift: 1 b 1

and so on.

If a center gets tired he can change places with the third center who has been playing winger so far.

[Chadd 916]

If a center gets tired he can change places with the third center who has been playing winger so far.

Centers really have to focus on short shifts and picking their spots to be really aggressive.

[mack 44]

We'd try the same routine Chadd posted but it really got gummed up if/when someone got hurt. I remember one game I didn't leave the ice and for a good period + I think I only went over the redline twice.

[Chadd 916]

We'd try the same routine Chadd posted but it really got gummed up if/when someone got hurt.  I remember one game I didn't leave the ice and for a good period + I think I only went over the redline twice.

If we lose one guy, it becomes three centers and two pair of wingers. The real key is someone on the bench making decisions.

[sonsplayhockey 0]

LOL!

I lived with this all last winter.

I joined a team of 2nd season begginers.

I even took a dry ice board and wrote the lines down. They could not handle rotating and not having consistant lines to save their life.

Simple is best for these folks. The big thing is its not easy to get perfect equal ice time. Just tell the team to not worry about perfect equal ice time.

Best skaters on D

10 skaters (2 lines each)

11 skaters (2 lines plus experianced floater).

Here is one variation:

Set up your first line a little stronger than your second.

Make your floater the most versitile guy who is aware of what is going on (maybe you). Floater will start with line two and sit the first shift. Next shift, he tells LW to sit and he goes in, next shift, he tells Center to sit and he goes in, next shift he tells RW to sit and he goes in. keep rotating. 2nd Period floater is on line 1. 3rd period floater is on line 2 again.

11 skaters (2 linesD, 2 lines Forwards, 1 floater)

First period, floater is with the Left wingers. rotate 3 LW guys, Center and RW will stay as a pair. LW guys just worry about who he/she follows, not the rest of the line. 2nd period, floater is a Center, 3rd period floater is a RW.

12 skaters (2 lines D, 3 lines wingers, 2 rotating centers)

Wingers stick together, Centers just rotate. Centers are the 2 better players in the bunch preferably the 2 guys in best "hockey shape"

For our team, we actually have 5 D rotating when we have 11 players because our D can handle the confusion. We do this because typically we have 12-13 skaters show up and it allows the forwards to get more ice with a 2 line rotation.

Different people do different things. You can do all kinds of stuff.

Complicated rotations depend on bench management and people listening or people leading. If you have someone leading the situation your cool. You have to get people used to talking to each other on the bench so that they know who's going in.

The worse part of any situation is PK. Everything goes to pot for Beginners on a PK. Try to get 1 weak and 1 stronger person paired together. If people can't handle working things out, then someone usually looses a shift. That's the price beginners pay for not learning fast enough.

[freq019 0]

We'd try the same routine Chadd posted but it really got gummed up if/when someone got hurt.  I remember one game I didn't leave the ice and for a good period + I think I only went over the redline twice.

If we lose one guy, it becomes three centers and two pair of wingers. The real key is someone on the bench making decisions.

I think we dropped a guy back and went with 5d and 2 lines up front, depending on if the team you're playing is really fast it helps keep the d fresh.

[mack 44]

I'm definitely glad that I'm a part-timer this season because the 10-11pm start times just eat the hell out of you as the season goes down. Plus I don't want to be out there at 1AM having to scrape windows off to get home.

[Eazy_b97 1]

If we lose one guy, it becomes three centers and two pair of wingers. The real key is someone on the bench making decisions.

We'll rotate the extra guy through the lines in this scenario. Extra guy will sit the first shift for line #1, then play LW on it next shift, then C, then Rw, then sit out a shift. Then start the same process through line #2, etc..

[Chadd 916]

If we lose one guy, it becomes three centers and two pair of wingers. The real key is someone on the bench making decisions.

We'll rotate the extra guy through the lines in this scenario. Extra guy will sit the first shift for line #1, then play LW on it next shift, then C, then Rw, then sit out a shift. Then start the same process through line #2, etc..

The biggest problem with that is we really lose any chemistry with a rotator.

[RadioGaGa 162]

I play with a couple guys that want to do that in PICK-UP on the odd night that we have 4 Forwards on the bench...(the guys that run the groups I play in try to have 20 skaters so both teams have 2 full lines for the hour)

Christ. I usually lobby for the "Change as they come" approach...but they go on and on about, "We need to keep the lines together..."

...when they do it, It turns into "Who sat last?" "weren't you just on?"...I just sit there and go "tell me when, and I'm over the boards"

Did I mention this is PICKUP. Nothing organized...no refs, no whistles....change every couple minutes.

It's very frustrating. Especially since we've got every skill/experience level playing with us.

[Chadd 916]

Pickup is always first in/first out around here. We only get that anal about games. It's more about hiding our weak players or getting our better skaters on the ice as much as possible.

[RadioGaGa 162]

Pickup is always first in/first out around here. We only get that anal about games. It's more about hiding our weak players or getting our better skaters on the ice as much as possible.

I understand, and If we were in a league I'd be that guy (weaker skater). That's the reason I'm playing pickup...to get as much ice as I can for my 12 bucks.

[Chadd 916]

We're playing in a lower league than I would like and it's pretty frustrating right now. Add in the fact that our goalie is running the team now and has something like 24 guys on the roster and we've had up to 15 on any given night, I'm sure you can understand.

[speedcraft 0]

Thanks to everyone for sharing your insights and experience. I think we’ll keep it simple and go with the 3 sets of wingers and 2 centers approach.

[chippa13 1844]

We're playing in a lower league than I would like and it's pretty frustrating right now. Add in the fact that our goalie is running the team now and has something like 24 guys on the roster and we've had up to 15 on any given night, I'm sure you can understand.

That's brutal. Anything more than 10 for men's league is too much. We'll do three lines for tournies but for leagues its always 2.