Is it possible to transition your floor hockey skills to the ice?

[Rapsfan]

My cousin is 11 and he wants to play at a decent rep level for hockey when he's ~15. I saw him in a gym playing floor hockey. He could score, pass, deke and even defend significantly better than most players in that community center league. Unfortunately, he has never laced up skates. Assuming he works really hard to catch up to 11 year olds who played hockey most of their life, how different is floor hockey to ice hockey? Besides a different surface.

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[Filthy Dangles]

Short answer: No
Longer answer: Hell No...

Rec. floor hockey isn't going to translate at all to competitive ice hockey against kids skating their whole lives. Might as well ask if Water Polo will transfer, honestly.

Your cousin will need to get on the ice ASAP, it's gonna be like learning to walk again having to learn to skate and then learn all the skills of stickhandling, passing, and shooting with a puck while ice skating vs with a ball in shoes.

Then not to mention learning how to actually play the game in terms of position and what not.

 

[puckpilot]

My cousin is 11 and he wants to play at a decent rep level for hockey when he's ~15. I saw him in a gym playing floor hockey. He could score, pass, deke and even defend significantly better than most players in that community center league. Unfortunately, he has never laced up skates. Assuming he works really hard to catch up to 11 year olds who played hockey most of their life, how different is floor hockey to ice hockey? Besides a different surface.

If he's never skated, it's going to be tough catching up if he wants to get to rep level. At that level, most kids have been skating at least since they were 6. Often it's even younger 3 or 4. So just for skating, you're asking him to make up for 5-8 years of experience. That's just the start.

Then there's the difference between the weight of the puck vs the weight of the ball. A puck is significantly heavier. The difference between shooting a puck and a ball is night and day. With a light ball you can muscle your shots more, and because of the shape, you can get under the ball to lift it. With a puck, you have to know proper shot technique, otherwise you're just shuffling it around. Again, 5-8 years of difference training with the heavier puck.

Then then there's the hockey and being able to put skating and puckhandling together in a game situation. Assuming the kids started organized hockey at age 6, they've been practising around twice a week on top of a game for 5 years. This is not including anything they do outside of their team training.

Then there's the level of competition. Players in rep are constantly going against other players that are as good if not better than they are, in games and in tryouts. Rep A players are trying to make the Rep AA teams and the Rep AA players are trying to get up to Rep AAA. If everyone is less skilled than you, it's going to be a lot easier to do what you want when you want in a game. If your cousin hasn't played against players that are at his skill level, how can you truly judge how good he is? Big fish, little pond vs Big fish in an ocean of Big fish.

Now, this doesn't mean he shouldn't try, but set your expectations to a reasonable level. If he surprises, then great. He can be one of those heartwarming against-all-odds stories we love to hear about, but to do anything else is to set him up for a hard fall.

Here's a video of Atom rep A players. That's the age group right below what your cousin would be in now at age 11. Do you think he can make up the difference? And remember there are levels above this.

 

[jackflash]

Why not? If the kid wants it badly enough and has talent, anything is possible.
He should be able to start out with a nice set of hands!

 

[CharasLazyWrister]

He’s not going to be able to compete with elite kids his age any time soon, but the gap may not be as big as some think.

I skated when I was a kid. Never got particularly good. Then I laced up skates again in college and was stunned by how easy it was to develop skills and technique just because I was so much stronger once I was older. I had some very basic instincts from when I was young but within a year or so, I felt like I could skate with most amateur players.

 

[Yukon Joe]

So there's two different aspects to this question.

First part is - how easy is it to translate from ball hockey to ice hockey? And that part is certainly possible. One of the guys I play rec hockey with came to us from several years of ball hockey. I don't know if he'd never skated before, but he'd never played organized ice hockey. And he's doing great. Positioning, hand-eye co-ordination in using your stick all tracks from one to the other. Obviously learning how to skate is a whole different challenge, but from what I've been told in some ways once you learn how to skate ice hockey becomes a bit easier since you can glide - ball hockey is 100% running. The kid can probably go from 0 to 80% skating ability really quite quickly.

Second part though which hasn't been addressed - can someone who is really good at community league sports go on to compete at rep level? There can be a pretty big difference in competition level. My kid playing U13AA is typically on the ice 4-5 times per week, with an hour of off the ice per week thrown in as well. Our equivalents to community league is maybe 2 hour per week.

So if you combine them - can someone both transition to a new(ish) sport and then expect to compete at a really high level in 4 years? I mean - I wouldn't bet money on it. But why not give it a shot if that's what the kid really wants to do? Why tell an 11 year old kid they can't do something?

My other son's best friend is playing ice hockey for the very first time this year. He's 10. In addition to his dad I took him out skating with my own kids a couple of times. He's skating was really rough, but he's improved a lot and is really enjoying being able to play hockey. Now I doubt very much this kid is playing AA hockey in four years, but he is definitely holding his own out there at our equivalent to community league.

 

[tarheelhockey]

At the end of the day, all he can do is get into some skates and practice like crazy to try and catch up. His athleticism and his level of determination will be the main factors which decide how far he goes. If he's willing to practice every single day in skates, he'll have a shot.

But I wouldn't take an 11 year old's word for how interested they'll be in daily hockey practice 3 years from now. It's a "seeing is believing" situation.

 

[Mr Jiggyfly]

My cousin is 11 and he wants to play at a decent rep level for hockey when he's ~15. I saw him in a gym playing floor hockey. He could score, pass, deke and even defend significantly better than most players in that community center league. Unfortunately, he has never laced up skates. Assuming he works really hard to catch up to 11 year olds who played hockey most of their life, how different is floor hockey to ice hockey? Besides a different surface.

Stickhandling on ice is an an entirely different beast than land. Puck moves differently on ice, almost like trying to stickhandle an air hockey puck when the air is on (ice) vs it being off (land).

It takes much softer/faster hands to handle a puck gliding on ice. Just getting proficient at it will take hundreds of hours, triple that for being able to handle the puck at high speeds in traffic.

My daughter is 11 and started skating at 4… she’s put in thousands of hours at developing her skating at a AA level.

Then there are the AAA kids who will dunk all over AA kids with their skating.

If you put a good AA player into a game with AAA players, he/she can have the sickest hands, but he/she won’t be able to do much unless he/she is an elite skater.

Even at single A, these kids all backcheck their asses off.

My daughter has to beat not only AA blue liners, but she constantly has backcheckers on her ass - and she can motor and really handle the puck, but it’s a slog for her and other kids at this level to show off their skill because everyone can skate and is coming for you shift after shift.

This is what your cousin is up agt, and while he’s learning the basics, these kids are putting in countless hours to master advanced skating techniques.

These kids aren’t going to suddenly stop learning while your cousin catches up. That’s the rub right there.

If he starts now he can still become a hell of a good player when he hits his late teens and early 20s and I’ll bet he will never regret it.

But when I say hell of a player, I mean compared to the avg beer leaguer and such.

 

[DingerMcSlapshot]

Big no. But hockey to ball hockey is an easy switch. Ice hockey players...play ball hockey a lot growing up.

 

[MDCSL]

People are being negative here, 11 is still so young. I played a fair bit overseas, lots and lots of guys there grew up only playing ball hockey/roller hockey and while they were never the greatest skaters were still incredible and managed to play in the same league as us.

Also just an anecdotal story about 1 kid, but when I was about 14 we had a guy who had never played any form of hockey before go from learning to play community league to barely making C division the next year not even knowing how to skate backwards, being our best defenseman by the end of the year and playing defence AA the next year. He’s definitely an exceptional case, but if you’ve got the natural talent and the drive to practice it’s definitely possible.

Didn’t Ferland not play ice hockey until he was 15, or am I making that up?

 

[DingerMcSlapshot]

People are being negative here, 11 is still so young. I played a fair bit overseas, lots and lots of guys there grew up only playing ball hockey/roller hockey and while they were never the greatest skaters were still incredible and managed to play in the same league as us.

Also just an anecdotal story about 1 kid, but when I was about 14 we had a guy who had never played any form of hockey before go from learning to play community league to barely making C division the next year not even knowing how to skate backwards, being our best defenseman by the end of the year and playing defence AA the next year. He’s definitely an exceptional case, but if you’ve got the natural talent and the drive to practice it’s definitely possible.

Didn’t Ferland not play ice hockey until he was 15, or am I making that up?

Michael Ferland played ice hockey as a youngster. Started ice hockey no older than 8.

 

[Sky04]

Sorry to say but If he's never skated none of those skills will transfer, he would need to go out and skate as much as possible. Without being able to skate he won't be able to make plays and be in the right areas even if he has the hockey sense, passing and shooting are also harder if you aren't balanced properly and your shooting mechanics get lazy with a ball.

 

[Sky04]

People are being negative here, 11 is still so young. I played a fair bit overseas, lots and lots of guys there grew up only playing ball hockey/roller hockey and while they were never the greatest skaters were still incredible and managed to play in the same league as us.

Also just an anecdotal story about 1 kid, but when I was about 14 we had a guy who had never played any form of hockey before go from learning to play community league to barely making C division the next year not even knowing how to skate backwards, being our best defenseman by the end of the year and playing defence AA the next year. He’s definitely an exceptional case, but if you’ve got the natural talent and the drive to practice it’s definitely possible.

Didn’t Ferland not play ice hockey until he was 15, or am I making that up?

No... he was on the ice religiously since he was 8 and made a AAA team at 15 off a tryout. Basically, he caught up with kids his age who had 3-4 years on him while playing in more competitive environments.

 

[Yukon Joe]

Sorry to say but If he's never skated none of those skills will transfer, he would need to go out and skate as much as possible. Without being able to skate he won't be able to make plays and be in the right areas even if he has the hockey sense, passing and shooting are also harder if you aren't balanced properly and your shooting mechanics get lazy with a ball.

This is too negative of a take. Obviously the skating is going to be the biggest barrier, but good hockey sense and skills with a stick are going to go a fair ways.

I mentioned one guy on my rec team who only played ball hockey till this year and is doing well. Now let me tell you about another guy - he was a figure skater when he was younger (probably 20+ years ago) so he knows how to skate, but he's never played any kind of hockey before. (it's an interesting group of guys)

They're both great teammates, but I'd much rather be on the ice with the former ball hockey player than the former figure skater.

 

[Sky04]

This is too negative of a take. Obviously the skating is going to be the biggest barrier, but good hockey sense and skills with a stick are going to go a fair ways.

I mentioned one guy on my rec team who only played ball hockey till this year and is doing well. Now let me tell you about another guy - he was a figure skater when he was younger (probably 20+ years ago) so he knows how to skate, but he's never played any kind of hockey before. (it's an interesting group of guys)

They're both great teammates, but I'd much rather be on the ice with the former ball hockey player than the former figure skater.

I highly doubt he's "doing well" for someone who's never skated and picking it up this year - that's bs he's probably skated in the past. If you've "never laced it up before" like the OP mentioned you're going to struggle immensely regardless of hockey sense or stick work, what good are hands if you can't stay balanced or skate? one tiny shove and the guys off the puck and out of the play.

 

[Yukon Joe]

I highly doubt he's "doing well" for someone who's never skated and picking it up this year - that's bs he's probably skated in the past. If you've "never laced it up before" like the OP mentioned you're going to struggle immensely regardless of hockey sense or stick work, what good are hands if you can't stay balanced or skate? one tiny shove and the guys off the puck and out of the play.

Just to show you this is a real guy and I'm not making him up - I don't actually know when he started skating - if it was just this past summer, or if he has some history skating. I just play hockey with the guy, not grilled him on his hockey resume. All I know if that he was worried about his skating when he started, and he'd never played ice hockey before. And I can say he's an ok but not great skater.


In particular as a kid you can go from 0 to 80% fairly quickly in skating. If you set your mind to it you can be stable on your feet, make confident stops, and skate backwards in a few months. It's the last 10-20% that's going to be the much much bigger challenge. But no kid should think that at the age of ELEVEN that they're too old to start playing ice hockey.

 

[Toonces]

People are being negative here, 11 is still so young. I played a fair bit overseas, lots and lots of guys there grew up only playing ball hockey/roller hockey and while they were never the greatest skaters were still incredible and managed to play in the same league as us.

Also just an anecdotal story about 1 kid, but when I was about 14 we had a guy who had never played any form of hockey before go from learning to play community league to barely making C division the next year not even knowing how to skate backwards, being our best defenseman by the end of the year and playing defence AA the next year. He’s definitely an exceptional case, but if you’ve got the natural talent and the drive to practice it’s definitely possible.

Didn’t Ferland not play ice hockey until he was 15, or am I making that up?

It's going to be very hard though, and I think people are just saying keep his expectations in check. I started around then, and tried to skate almost every day I could, but it still took a long time to "catch up", and I'm a very athletic guy. I got to the point where I could play high-school hockey by my junior year, but I was playing 3rd or 4th line because I wasn't a good a skater. I didn't really "catch up" until I was in my early 20's, which worked out because by my mid 20's I was back in school and able to play ACHA D2. Skating was never my strong point, and I still only played 3rd or 4th line with some occasional power play time, but it was the most fun time I ever had playing hockey.

I say go for it, but you can't set a goal of being able to do "X" by any specific age. He should start playing with the goal to play house league, and see where it goes from there. If his passion is hockey, like it was mine from the day I first started playing, it won't matter to him what level he plays at.

Get on the ice, get skating lessons, and when he's ready, join a house league.

 

[MDCSL]

It's going to be very hard though, and I think people are just saying keep his expectations in check. I started around then, and tried to skate almost every day I could, but it still took a long time to "catch up", and I'm a very athletic guy. I got to the point where I could play high-school hockey by my junior year, but I was playing 3rd or 4th line because I wasn't a good a skater. I didn't really "catch up" until I was in my early 20's, which worked out because by my mid 20's I was back in school and able to play ACHA D2. Skating was never my strong point, and I still only played 3rd or 4th line with some occasional power play time, but it was the most fun time I ever had playing hockey.

I say go for it, but you can't set a goal of being able to do "X" by any specific age. He should start playing with the goal to play house league, and see where it goes from there. If his passion is hockey, like it was mine from the day I first started playing, it won't matter to him what level he plays at.

Get on the ice, get skating lessons, and when he's ready, join a house league.

That is all totally fair, and I like that you said join a house league - I don’t think op’s asking what are his odds of playing juniors or making the nhl, just asking is it too late to learn and will his skills translate. To which I say throw him on some skates and let him rip, the whole point of the game of hockey is to have fun

 

[puckpilot]

That is all totally fair, and I like that you said join a house league - I don’t think op’s asking what are his odds of playing juniors or making the nhl, just asking is it too late to learn and will his skills translate. To which I say throw him on some skates and let him rip, the whole point of the game of hockey is to have fun

I think there maybe some bits getting lost in translation here. The OP asked if his cousin could play at a "decent rep level". Rep hockey is a slightly different animal than house league, with different expectations.

 

[Alexander the Gr8]

Big no. But hockey to ball hockey is an easy switch. Ice hockey players...play ball hockey a lot growing up.

You’d think so, but every ice player who comes to my league is completely out of gas after the end of the 2nd period.

The cardio required for ball hockey is much greater than ice hockey. You can’t glide around, it’s nonstop running.

 

[Mr Jiggyfly]

You’d think so, but every ice player who comes to my league is completely out of gas after the end of the 2nd period.

The cardio required for ball hockey is much greater than ice hockey. You can’t glide around, it’s nonstop running.

Must be some out of shape beer leaguers then.

If you are running 3-4 lines like we did for dek, you won’t get very tired. I spent more time being annoyed that guys wouldn’t come off so I could get on, than wanting to get off from fatigue.

It’s a pretty slow game compared to ice to be honest.

When I was in my teens and 20s my legs would burn after a 40-50s shift on ice and on a dek I could be out there on a shift as long as I wanted to without getting winded.

I usually came off because I didn’t want to be ‘that guy’, and could easily spend several minutes out there. I felt that way until the final buzzer.

 

[Alexander the Gr8]

Must be some out of shape beer leaguers then.

If you are running 3-4 lines like we did for dek, you won’t get very tired. I spent more time being annoyed that guys wouldn’t come off so I could get on, than wanting to get off from fatigue.

It’s a pretty slow game compared to ice to be honest.

When I was in my teens and 20s my legs would burn after a 40-50s shift on ice and on a dek I could be out there on a shift as long as I wanted to without getting winded.

I usually came off because I didn’t want to be ‘that guy’, and could easily spend several minutes out there. I felt that way until the final buzzer.

We usually have only 2 lines, 3 at most. On a full size NHL rink, it gets tiring to forecheck and back check every other shift, especially as a center.

On the ice, I feel like I only use energy in very short bursts.

You seem to be in much better shape than average players, so it probably makes no difference to you.

 

[beakerboy]

Ed jovanovski didn’t start playing hockey until he was 11.

 

[Mr Jiggyfly]

We usually have only 2 lines, 3 at most. On a full size NHL rink, it gets tiring to forecheck and back check every other shift, especially as a center.

On the ice, I feel like I only use energy in very short bursts.

You seem to be in much better shape than average players, so it probably makes no difference to you.

I’m not now, at least how I was in my 20s. I’d probably die now playing any competitive dek. I only play for fun on skates these days roller/ice. Basically retired from any type of foot hockey.

Back in the day I did hill sprints and flat sprinting, so ya I was in really good shape. But most guys I played ice with did to, so I wasn’t some exceptional case.

It just took way more effort to backcheck and fight for pucks on ice, but I guess everyone’s mileage will vary.

 

[puckpilot]

Ed jovanovski didn’t start playing hockey until he was 11.

But he knew how to skate, which is the biggest obstacle.