Registration

Syllabus

We're going to move things around a little but this is what we'll cover and the general order.

Goal: Hold your own as a team member.

• Quick review from last week: rules, safety, basic puck skills.

• Basic game strategy

• zones

• see http://www.sfuwh.org/uwh-beginner-guide/zones

• summary:

• close to our goal: take the puck to the wall, and never off the wall

• close to their goal: take the puck off the wall, to the center (it’s reversed)

• position: forwards, back, left/center (mid)/right

• see http://www.sfuwh.org/uwh-beginner-guide/positions

• 3-3 formation: 3 forwards, 3 backs

• Left, Center, Right

• We call the person on the same side as the puck the "strong side" and the opposite the "weak side".
  

• forwards as one horizontal line: left, right, center

• within one pass of each other
• Backs form a line from puck to goal with strong side at front and weak side at back
• Q: do backs stay in our half?
  • everyone plays relative to the puck. all forwards move over when the puck is on the wall. all backs move up when into their half

• History with Joey:

• started in Britain in the 50s as “Octopush”

• conquered Canada and Australia/NZ in the 60s

• started in 70s in SF. You'd call Rich White to find out what pool he'd found

• 1980: first World Championship

• at MLK since 2008: good pool (not sloped), good relation with staff (mellow)

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underwater_hockey#History

• In-water skills:

• Clearing the snorkel while surfacing, as seen during regular games. Practice with BOGDATs (Breath Once Go Down And Touch)

• Curl

• good defensive maneuver, but slow, and static

• hips should graze bottom of pool

• kick through the entire curl

• forward curl, reverse curl

• Flick

• comes from the wrist

• keep forearm bent

• takes practice

Week 3, Sept 23

• Advantage puck, when one team commits a foul, takes puck out
  

• puck is placed at point of foul, at least 2m from side and 3m from end
  
• Fouling team stays back 3 meters (a bit more than 1 swim lane) from puck
• Team with advantage have forwards and strong back among other team, center back with puck, weak back behind puck towards goal
• As soon as puck is moved fouling team can move forward and game resumes
• Equal puck, when ref isn't sure. We often use this for out-of-bounds
• everyone stays on surface with snorkel out of water, in area of pool behind the puck
  
• center forward of each team is just behind the puck
  
• someone shouts "ready, go!"
• center forwards kelp dive quickly and push the puck back to their team
• Next we tried a team drill, which in hindsight was way to complicated for this course: Carolyn's team Zdrill 3-3.
  Set up: Start on the 5 and 2 on right side. Line up in the 3-3 “7” formation.
  

  Rtfwd (on wall 7M), Cfwd (2M line),Lffwd (5M off the wall), --in a line

  Rtback (has puck on 5 and 2), Cback (off his/her hip to left), LFback (diagonal to them to goal 3M back).

  Walk through this on deck first, then in the water.

  Rtback has puck, passes forward to Rtfwd (who is on the wall), Cfwd swims near wall (about on what would be the 1M line) 45 in front of Rtfwd to accept a pass and turns (using a move to protect puck from defender) to left perpendicular to wall and passes to the Lffwd in a 45 back pass, Lffwd turns and passes back to Cback who is facing 45 degrees to left from the start. Cback swims directly toward left wall and passes to  back Lfback, who then passes forward (or a bit to the left and forward) to the Lffwd who has taken one breath and re-positions. The passing is reversed now with Cfwd swimming in front of Lffwd and turning in to right to pass to Rtfwd in a bit of a back pass to Cback who then passes to Rtback who then passes to Rtfwd to repeat from the start. This cycle continues until Center Forward can score a goal with 2 kicks or less. If that happens, Left Forward and Right Forward seal goals, strong side back moves up on their side of center forward and center back takes the other side. Last man back covers for defense. 

  ALL PASSES MUST BE GIVEN AFTER 2 kicks and only 2 kick

  s: If the pass is not given at the correct time the team goes back to the start.  If the receiver is not in the right place, they go back to start. All passes must land on the stick of the receiver, if that doesn’t occur, the team goes back to the beginning.

  Aim for teammates to practice passing to each other. Back passes must land on the stick of the person behind you. Start slow and then speed up the drill. Goals of drill is for teammates to learn body language of TIMING. Aim for really good passes, turns and speed.

  If the team will talk about it, they can give pointers as to how a pass would work better, positioning. This is not a play one would actually do in a game, but the ideas are there for parts of what will help score a goal in the end.

Week 4, Sept 30

• Clearing snorkel, BOGDATs (breath once, go down and touch)
• When clearing snorkel look up at the surface, exhale starting about 2 feet from surface and turn head down when mask is at surface. Et voilà, your snorkel is clear.
• Kick from the hips, legs straight, knees almost locked.
  
• 2 v 1
• Tool box of puck handling moves
  

Week 5, Oct 7

On the deck:

• Making gear: gloves and sticks are made by us for the perfect fit and the fun of making stuff with friends.
  
• Worlds: Brigit told us a bit about world level competition. She and Amy just returned from a world competition in Hungary. The USA Women team was selected in early 2013 after the candidates met for some weekends of womens hockey. Criteria include puck handling, team play and fitness. Going to Worlds is pretty expensive, much self-financed with some money from the USA UWH organization. The Olympic committee recognizes UWH as a sport but there needs to be a national competition in at least 30(?) countries before they'll consider it, and they have to remove a sport to add a new one.
• Subbing: make a hand-signal underwater when you are swimming out and an identical response and eye contact from the fresh player in the box. Normally we use terms far (open hand), middle/center (two fingers) and near (fist) rather than left and right. See also subbing out.
  
• In the water: split into three teams, each with a mix of newer and older players, and take turns playing scrimmages and practicing skills.
• Picture: