First let's go back to your stick length suggestion. It overlooks the "lie" of a stick and the relationship of "lie", length of a stick to how a player skates. The distance between the blades. Upright, hunched or normal. Vast majority of coaches overlook these details.
Also a comment about composite sticks. They break. Watch enough NHL games and count the number of scoring chances that are wasted because the composite just explodes.
Yes indeed they do. Reliability has always been an issue with Composites & their failure to perform as they should at the most inopportune moments.... Just why it is that Coaches are not more proactive in dealing with kids one on one when it comes to proper stick selection & "fit" (if you will) I have no idea however its not new, something thats been going on since the introduction of the curved & Banana Blades, the entry into the market mid-to-late 60's early 70's & the proliferation of foreign & domestic brands. Much wider variety. Inconsistent lies from one brand to another which isnt good, though what was/is good variations in flex, blades, weight's etc.
Before the introduction of aluminum, fiberglass & composites, if you made a mistake it wasnt terribly costly, annoying, but at least you werent out $75~$300 or more on a single stick. Before the explosion of Big Box retailers, usually the retailer, mainly independents with a small staff, owner-operated, a kid comes in looking for a stick they'd take the time to help him get "fitted out" properly with the right stick. Ask questions; what position do you play, whats your skating posture & then recommend Lie & blade, models in each brand they carry best suited. Thereafter, the player knows what he should be using & can tweak that to his hearts content as he matures as a skater, player.
But if shopping Big Box, unlikely they get that advice, opt for the sexiest model, the one their favorite player uses if available, no attention to lie, length or flex, blade, just BAM $300 & thats that. Kids got the wrong tool. Ill fitting. Slows down the pilgrims progress, learning curve & because its ill suited, leans into it in ways he shouldnt & it breaks, and there goes another 70, 90, 175 or 300 bucks. Insane. Reminds me of the time Lange ski boots had a major recall on their top of the line boots, $800+ per pair because they were "exploding" on people while in use... tearing up a slope at a buck eighty & the boots integrity, the plastic & fiberglass used became compromised in slightly colder temperatures than the norm, any pressure to the bottom plate, front cuff, they'd implode. Using defective materials, not deliberate but an interesting, intriguing parallel. Comparison.
Of course, back in the day we had comparable to Big Box, namely shopping for a stick at a Department Store like the old Simpsons & Eatons chain's here in Canada that like todays Big Boxes carried copies of for eg Bobby Hull's Northland, with the Banana Blade, same Lie, same everything and ya, they flew off the racks and at a premium price. Kids 8-10-12yrs old buying them including Defencemen. A really useless stick for Defenceman or Centers to be using to put it mildly. Totally useless for any 8-14yr old unless he was already shaving & like 5'10, 165ibs and a Winger. Not too many 14yr olds around like that. Eatons/Simpsons had it all figured out. No "stick pro" on staff. No one to tell little Bobby who played Defence that "look kid, you cant control the puck properly on your backhand etc etc etc using this stick". Its a "novelty item" for Wingers & only a small % thereof.
Manufacturers have just gotta love this, todays situation. Instead of making a $10 or $20 "mistake" in suiting up little Johnny, people making $75~$300 "mistakes" for something that costs them a fraction of that to manufacture & distribute. Improper sizing = built-in guaranteed premature breakage. Kids buying it blind at P.O.S., neither Coach nor Parent correcting the mistake. Not in every case of course but I do believe in the majority & that its the rule rather than the exception. Commercialization, consumerism,
brand identification & status (off-ice, it was during this period as well that Adidas & Puma rose to prominence, brand status not exclusive to just the ice but everywhere & rising fast), in hockey, amp'd up big time mid to late 60's on. Today, we see the results of all of that with $300 sticks, $1300 skates.