Resilience Isn’t Something You’re Born With — It’s Something You Build with Topher “Toph” Scott

This is Sharpening youg Edge with Chuck and Eric.

In this episode, we'll be talking with Topher Scott.

Topher's passion is in bringing people together

and making the hockey world a better place.

Growing up and playing youth hockey outside of Chicago, Topher moved through the ranks playing junior hockey for the USHL's Chicago Steel before enrolling at at Cornell University.

Hello, and welcome to another episode of Sharpening youg Edge, presented by CB3 Hockey Development.

I'm Chuck Verdolino, along with my co host, Eric Malanson.

And today we have the pleasure of having on a former D1 player, D1 coach, hockey director, among many other things, co host of one of the most popular hockey podcasts out there today, the Hockey Think Tank.

We'd like to welcome to the show Topher Scott.

Welcome.

Thanks for having me, guys.

Pumped to be here.

Let's do it.

Hey, Toph, I appreciate you making some time.

I know you're a busy man.

We got a lot going on with the coaching, mentorship group, plus the pod, plus all the other things, and we'll just.

We'll jump right into it so we can hit a lot of goodness, but awesome.

Yeah, thanks again.

And so grew up in the Chicago area.

Pretty awesome area.

Been there a couple times for hockey.

Now, how did you fall in love with hockey?

Like, at what point was it that you went from, like, playing, growing up, learning to play to when you really fell in love with it?

Or was it.

Did it happen at the same time and you never looked back?

Yeah.

So I come from two hockey families, so my mom's side is a hockey family and my dad's side is a hockey family on both of their sides.

My parents had me pretty young.

I was the first grandson on both sides of the family.

And so I. I kind of joke.

I came out with skates on kind of thing, and.

And so.

But it was love at first sight for me.

My parents tell stories of me walking around the house with these little tyke and asking at like, 2 years old to, hey, mom, dad, can you put the skates on and just walk around the house type stuff.

And so, for whatever reason, just kind of fell in love with it early and continued to fall in love with it every step of the way.

Not gonna say that I've been in love with the game every second of every day.

There's certainly been some harder moments through my journey, but it was.

It was certainly something that.

That I caught the bug really early on in my life, even before I knew what I was doing.

And then As I continued to play and as I continued to kind of go along, my Jo for it just continued to grow.

Yeah.

I think it's extremely important to mention that it's not all like sunshine and rainbows, that there are those hard days, but really it's continuing to look at it as every day an opportunity and how to just push through those bad days, because it's doing what you love.

And I know that's something that I preach to my kids anytime that they're in a spot where they're struggling.

Yeah, the tough ones, the tough parts are necessary parts.

You have to have them.

You have to have the tough stuff.

And I get the opportunity to speak to a lot of youth athletes and particularly hockey players.

And one of the biggest messages that I hope resonate is how important resilience is and how whenever anything happens, the way that we choose to see and the way that we choose to respond to that thing is ultimately what's going to get us to where we want to go.

And if we choose to be a victim and we choose to point fingers and make excuses and blame other people, you don't get very far.

And you're not going to be a very happy person when, you know, the fingers are pointed out and the thumbs aren't pointed in.

And the people who choose to see the tough stuff as an opportunity.

Right.

An opportunity to grow, to challenge yourself, to learn something, those are the ones, the people that I know that have gone on to do some pretty awesome things, whether it's in the hockey world or out.

Being resilient is a huge part of their DNA.

And that is not something you're born with.

That is something that you build.

It's like a muscle.

And in the way that you choose to respond to the adversity that comes your way.

And so.

Totally agree.

I think we need to talk about that stuff more.

I think more athletes need to talk about their struggles and how they got through them, because ultimately everybody's going to go through it.

And especially when you have big hopes and dreams.

That's not easy, to say the least.

And so being able to talk about that stuff is really important.

Amen.

I mean, it's like, that's music to my ears.

I mean, I love the mental resiliency.

If I could go back and redo my undergrad and graduate school, I'd go for mental performance in sports psychology, because that stuff is fascinating to me and resilience and teaching all that mindset stuff, and I think it's gaining traction more in the game.

And I really hope that we take advantage of the, all the resources that are out there and start to implement it a little bit more at the youth level.

I was going to say, especially nowadays with youth hockey, the way it's changed over the years, just the outside factors and the pressures that these youth hockey players are facing at early ages, like 8, 10 years old, it's crazy.

So the resiliency is a huge thing.

Totally.

I mean, hey, one of the things that I've been really thinking about and talking about a lot is just like, everything's a choice.

Everything is a choice.

It's not the things that happen to us are the most important.

It's the way that we choose to respond to them.

And sometimes the choice is a lot harder than others.

Sometimes the adversity is a lot bigger than others.

But at the same time, I think when we take ownership and accountability for everything that we do, the good, the bad and the ugly, and most, the most successful people I know, they look in the mirror, they look in the mirror and ask themselves what they can do to better their situations.

And it's a big part of developing that resilience.

And especially mentioned it, like, these are things that we could be teaching our kids at the youngest of ages, and these are things that we have to be teaching our kids at the youngest of ages with the pressures that are being put on them at such a young age.

And I think it starts with the adults, it starts with the coaches, and it starts with the parents being resilient themselves and not being finger pointers.

Because Vex and I say it all the time on our podcast, like, lessons are caught, not taught.

And what you do speaks so much louder than anything that you say.

And so if, you know, we're in the car, ride home as a parent and we're a finger pointer and we're an excuse maker, well, then our kid's gonna be the same way.

If we're in the car and we're taking accountability for things, or we're at home and we mess up and we're up, you know, to be better today.

Like, that's what our kids are going to see and that's ultimately what they're going to emulate.

And so it's up to us to really teach them.

We have to.

And we got to teach them from a young age.

And my kids are young.

I got an 8 year old, a 6 year old and a 4 year old.

This is something my wife and I talk about a lot.

The world that they're growing up in is very different than the world that we grew up in.

That's a lot more structured.

There's a lot more pressure.

It's a little bit crazier maybe, but at the end of the day, that's just the way that the world is nowadays.

And so we have to adapt and we have to teach them.

And the best way we can teach them is by just doing it ourselves.

Yeah, I'm a huge believer in the cot, not Todd Princip.

I love it, and I think it.

I see it all the time in coaching, and I see it a lot in parenting as well, so I think it's great.

You briefly mentioned how things are different.

How does youth hockey, back when you played compare to what kids experience now?

Oh, wow.

That's a great question.

And there's obviously some similarities, but there's certainly a lot of differences, too.

I think one is the narrowing of the talent pyramid is way younger nowadays than it was when we were growing up.

And I'm 40 for the people that are listening.

So this is 35, 30 years ago.

We didn't have eight UAA.

We didn't have super teams in the spring and the summer.

We didn't have ID skates and ID camps and stuff like that.

At that age, it was just playing hockey.

And most of us grew up starting off in the house league.

Most of us grew up in a little bit a saner environment, I would say, where there wasn't an Internet and you couldn't see rankings or stats or standings and things like that.

You had to.

There were no stats, but maybe there was like, standings in the newspaper, if there was a hockey newspaper in your town.

But, like, really, like now, there's just so much information and so much comparison out there, even at the youngest of ages.

And I think that's the biggest difference is just, like, the narrowing and the professionalization.

It's gotten a lot younger.

It's gotten a lot younger, which carries a lot of problems and is hard for kids.

It's hard for parents.

And I think one of the biggest byproducts of that is rather than kids falling in love with the game for the right reasons and they're just playing to play now.

There's like an agenda attached to it, honestly.

And there's so much focus on the path and there's so much focus on making it, even at those youngest of ages.

And we know, and I know from being a college coach and doing what we do at the hockey think tank, being very involved with some USA hockey stuff and understanding some of the statistics of things that are going on.

It's very hard for families to not just focus on the things that we can control.

There's so much information out there.

There's so many external pressures that it's hard to kind of turn that faucet off.

And I think that's the biggest difference on it.

It's like the early professionalization, the early narrowing of the talent pyramid, and that is not conducive to.

People fall in love with the game.

It's for people.

It's conducive to people leaving our game, which is the really unfortunate part.

Yeah, I mean, I think.

Absolutely.

I mean, we've had quite a few guests on now at this point that have grown up playing nothing more than house league up to the AA level and the tier 2 double A level.

And then when they were 16, started playing juniors and then walked on to Clarkson like our guest Chase did.

And just.

It's.

Everybody's got their own path.

And I think that gets lost a lot in today's youth environment, that just because you're not on an 8U AAA elite team that your hopes and dreams of NHL a windfall are gone.

And yeah, it's.

We gotta do better.

Yep, 100%.

And with a lot of that comes that fear of missing out.

I think that's one of the other biggest byproducts of it is, oh, man, like, if we don't jump in head first or we don't do X, Y and Z because everybody else is doing X, Y and Z or my kid is going to get left behind.

And so people do it for noble reasons.

I think majority, if not close to all hockey parents are great.

I know hockey parents get a bad rap.

It's usually like the vocal majority who are really causing all the problems.

But there's youth sports isn't just a youth hockey problem.

Youth sports, it's just changing so much and it's changing at such a rapid rate with how much money there is to be made and the type of technology that we can use to expedite different things.

And so a lot of parents feel pressure.

We all.

And I learned this more now that I am a parent myself.

Like, we love our kids.

We want to give our kids every opportunity and we want to do anything that we can to support them in their dreams.

Whether their dream is to be a ballerina, whether it's to be the president of the United States, whether it's to play in the NHL or maybe it's just to be an awesome teacher.

Maybe it's to be, which is just as noble of a profession as anything else.

And in sports and youth sports, it's man, if like parents feel a lot of that pressure and parents feel that fear of missing out and it drives them to do things that in their gut they know is not what right, what's right for their kid, but everybody else is doing it.

And this is what everybody's telling them to do because they're probably making some money from it too.

And so I, I give a lot more grace to parents than most people.

And I think that's because a lot of times when they're making decisions, it's for the right reasons.

They're trying to do what's best for their kid and they'll go to the end of the earth to do that.

For them, it's just an endless amount of information that they're getting and they don't know where to turn.

Absolutely.

So I wanted to kind of shift a little bit now to your playing career at Cornell.

You're a two year captain there.

Leadership for me, something I'm extremely passionate about.

It was a huge part of my job for a long time.

And a lot of these young players think that leadership is just who's being the loudest in the locker room or on the ice.

And that may not even be always a good thing.

It could be a negative loud.

Right.

Discouraging loud to you.

What does real leadership look like in that team environment?

And what are some habits that young players can start to try to work on now so that when they get the opportunity to be a captain, they'll

be successful for sure.

So I'd love to hear your thoughts too, because I know you're very passionate about this.

But for me, leadership is not the same for everybody.

I think that's the most important thing, is that leaders come in all different shapes and sizes.

And the worst kind of leaders are the ones that are trying to play a role.

The ones that are trying to play an angle, the ones that are trying to curry favor or whatever it may be instead of being themselves.

For me, the best leaders are authentic.

The best leaders are the ones that bring their authentic strengths to their team and lead from example through that.

That could be somebody who's able to get up in front of the room and put people in their place.

That could be somebody who just doesn't like to talk but is always first on the ice for practice every day and is the hardest worker consistently.

All the.

It could be somebody that just brings infectious positive energy.

And rather than Being hard on their teammates when they make mistakes, they're the person that's going to take them out to lunch the next day to see what's going on.

And so I think the biggest through all of the teams that I've been fortunate enough to coach and play for and I think about the best leaders, there's not, there's no blueprint to it.

Everyone was so incredibly different.

And so I've learned that, that lesson both as a player getting a captaincy and also as a coach.

And when you're trying to be somebody that you're not even, it's the right int intentions.

People are going to see through that right away.

Kids are a lot smarter than we gave them credit for and you'll lose a lot of respect from the people that you're leading if you're inauthentic.

But if you're yourself and you're leading from the front and you're bringing your best energy every day, that to me is true leadership.

So it comes in all different shapes and sizes.

No, I couldn't agree more.

I think there's no scripted version of leadership and there's no book that you can read to that's going to make you this perfect leader.

Is there books out there that you can use to hone your craft and kind of mirror your principles off of?

Sure.

But if you don't really have any principles from the get go, you're already starting from a bad spot.

But yeah, I mean, I could talk an entire hour's podcast on my leadership philosophy, so.

But we'll definitely have a conversation about it maybe during one of the Friday office hours calls.

There you go.

But yeah, I couldn't agree more.

I think it is something that we should really look at the youth level as, even with younger kids, to give them an opportunity to try and do those things.

Right.

I think there's some merit in putting an A or C on somebody's chest at a younger age, but on a rotational basis so that you can help develop some of these leaders and these kids that maybe aren't sure they want to lead, but they're not sure how to.

So having somebody set that example and start running this like, shadow or like, I don't even know what to call it, off the books leadership program while they're coaching would just be phenomenal.

I don't know.

Yeah, I agree with you.

I'm a big believer at the younger ages of rotating it and maybe giving every kid a week to be the captain and they're in charge of Talking to the refs.

They're in charge of leading the stretches.

They're in charge of getting everybody organized and ready before the game and really giving them the opportunity to see what it's like to lead.

And then after everybody's kind of gone through it, maybe you pick a captain or two.

And one of the other things, too, is, like, I am a very big believer that the players should vote for the captains and the coaches should have a vote and maybe make the final decision.

But, like, you gotta vote for it.

Like, the players know the players.

The coach that I played for and worked with at Cornell, his big line was dogs, no dogs.

And you're not a teammate just for the two or three hours that you're at the rink.

You're a teammate 24, 7.

Especially when you're in a college or a junior or pro environment, because you're spending so much time together, things that you do away from the rink very much affect what's going on at the rink.

And so having the ability to give.

Give all the younger kids the.

The opportunity to kind of lead and learn and fail and figure it out and reflect, I think that goes a long way.

And I know coaching at the college level and having a lot of relationships at the highest levels of this game, there's a vacuum for leadership right now.

People are starving for leaders, because any coach will tell you or any boss will tell you in the working world that player leadership is really the thing that takes you where you want to go.

If you don't have good leaders in your locker room from the team, you're not going to win.

Like, you might be good if you're talented, but you're not going to win a championship.

And you have to have great leadership, and we have to do a better job as adults of developing those skills in the kids that we have coming up.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

I think it starts.

The coach sets the tone for that, and the coach leadership sets the tone for that.

And I could go off on a tangent about it, and I'm sure, maybe.

I hope you've watched it.

I know Chuck has.

I thought it was a phenomenal display of, like, what leadership, what right looked like, and they got the job done.

Yeah, it was a phenomenal documentary.

And I think there was one of the.

One of the parts in the documentary where one of the players was like, I was the captain here, this guy was the captain there, this guy was the captain there, this guy was the captain there.

That's not an accident.

They knew it was going to be hard.

They needed people with the life skills to be able to handle the rigors of what Herb Brooks was going to put those guys through and handle the adversity of playing against teams that were much more talented and older than they were.

And it worked out pretty well.

A couple things that you were just speaking about that just want to come full circle here.

My.

My older son played 12U, higher level here in the Philly area, and they did exactly that with the captains.

I thought it was a great idea where each weekend a different kid would be a captain and the assistant captains.

And then after the weekend, the players voted on who they thought could be the captain or assistant captain next weekend.

And they had to give examples to the coach why they thought that person should be the leader for next week.

So I thought that was pretty cool.

Another thing you brought up, leadership by example.

And the wheels started spinning in my head.

We're all around the same age, and back in the day when I played high school back on Long island, when it wasn't really a hockey hotbed, now it is.

We see a lot of NHLers come out of there, but I played high school hockey at St. Anthony's in Huntington with Rob Scuderi, who won a couple Stanley Cups, and Mike Komisarek, who was the seventh overall pick for the Canadiens.

But my senior year, I was actually voted captain by.

By my peers, and that was a big deal to me.

Played the season, was one of the highest scorers, and at the end of the year, we have the awards ceremony, and I could have easily won the MVP award, and it went nothing.

It went to somebody else.

But then the coaches decided, oh, we're going to add another award this year.

And it was a leadership by example award.

And I got it.

That's something that really resonated with me in high school and still does to me today.

And you said it too, like it's something you can apply not only in hockey, but in the real world.

So I still remember that, and it still means a big deal to me.

That's great.

Yeah, very cool.

So shifting over to development and players, so when you evaluate a young player or you look at a young player's potential, what are the traits that matter other than just pure Skill.

Because Eric and I talk all the time on the podcast.

We talk to guests about role players and just not just the goal scorers.

So what are some other things that.

That would stand out to you in potential traits to look at someone as a really skilled player?

So it's a great question.

And I go back to.

I sat in the shoes of being a scout and a recruiter at the college level for quite some time.

And so every year, as a recruiter and as a scout, when you're evaluating talent, you learn a little bit more and you feel a little bit more comfortable with what works.

You see kids that you've recruited, the ones that have come on and done good things, the ones that maybe didn't reach the potential that you thought they were.

And so you're able to get a little bit of a bigger picture view of things.

And so obviously you want hockey sense, you want skill and things like that.

But as far as some of the intangible things that you're talking about, number one is I would never recruit another kid to the college level that didn't have an elite compete level level like an elite compete level.

Because I. I equate competitiveness to passion and a love for the game.

And if I'm building a culture and if I'm building a roster, like, I want an atmosphere around my locker room where people love to be there, they love to compete, they love to work.

Like, they just have a joy for the game of hockey.

Most people who are very competitive love the game of hockey.

So I'll start there.

Competitiveness.

The other one that I don't think it's talked about enough, but I think is one that we should be talking about a lot more, is just flat out coachability.

Is this a person who is coachable?

Because at the end of the day, when we're looking at bringing a kid, whether it's a draft to juniors, the NHL, or recruiting to college, it's a projection.

Like you're projecting what that kid is going to be like in two, three, four, maybe even years.

And so you want to have people in your stable that you are going to put in the work to get better.

I always say the biggest mistakes that we make when we bring a kid to campus is the kid that is the same player as a senior than they were as a freshman.

Those are the worst kind of mistakes because those are culture mistakes, too.

They're not bringing their best in practice.

They're not pushing their teammates to get better.

They're not creating a culture of excellence and so like coachable kids that love the game are at the highest of priorities for me when I think about what I'm looking for in, in a player and there's a lot of scouts that will sit right across from the bench in, in a game and they're going to watch the player as they come back to the bench and then the coach is talking to them.

Are they looking at him in the eye and are they kind of nodding or are they just looking off straight and you can tell that they don't really want to be coached.

I ain't picking that kid like that ever again.

I don't care how talented they are because culture wins championships.

Talent's a part of it for sure.

But like culture wins championships.

And so I think as adults going back to the beginning of the conversation, things that we need to be instilling in our players, a lot of that is the ability to be coachable and the ability to learn, the ability to fail and make mistakes and come back stronger.

Those are so, so big to me.

Just that competitiveness and that joy and the love for the game and the coach ability.

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It's fantastic.

So I mean I am a huge.

That is one thing I stress when to my own kids is to just to be a good person, like to be coachable, be a good person, a good teammate, but just work just.

I try to outwork everybody all the time, right.

Because you're only if you're not, you're not only are you not living up to your potential, you're potentially impacting your teammates ability to rise to their potential as well.

So yeah, I think just compete every day.

Everything's a competition, right?

And I know like Vex preaches it as well.

Like everything's a competition.

You just.

You got to compete.

You got to bring it.

Yeah.

And you gotta be good.

You gotta be a good teammate, gotta be a good person.

Like, I have a person that I know fairly well in the college coaching world.

He's a top assistant at the Division 1 level right now.

I won't say his name just because.

I don't know if you want me to say this, but, like, one of his things is, like, you gotta be a good person.

Because at the end of the day, as a college coach, I'm gonna be around you for four years.

Like, you're gonna be a big part of my life.

And if you're a piece of you know what, then, like, you're not gonna make my life very much better.

So, like, this is.

These are people that I gotta be around every day, and these are people that gotta take my coaching, and these are people that I have to build relationships with and spend a lot of time on.

And I know as a coach, I'm gonna put a lot of effort into you, and if it's not reciprocated the other way and you're not gonna wanna be coached, then, like, you're gonna affect my life in a negative way.

And so he's like, I with kids.

And, no, I can't coach this kid.

They might be talented, but it just.

I don't like them as a person.

And so I won't take them.

And so I think that's just another thing, is just like, being a great teammate.

That's ultimately so important.

I mean, I think it's.

I would pro.

I have to count all of them.

But I think we're probably like 80% of those things that you're looking at are really like, intangibles.

It's like the hockey stuff will speak for itself.

It's 80 intangibles and off ice and just body language and all this other stuff that makes a kid that, like, recruitable kid, right?

Yep.

The best ones, the best scouts that I know are very much into that stuff.

100.

Is that something you have seen at the most successful, like, collegiate levels?

Like, you have the story programs of BU and BC and any hockey's team and then, you know, some of the other programs as well.

Is that something you see that they.

That those scouts are getting it right?

There's those programs successful because of that.

I think as a whole, like, if you're talking macro, yes.

I think there are some programs where the culture and the leadership development is very strong, where they feel a little bit More comfortable bringing a kid that's really talented, that might not be the greatest teammate, might not have the best body language, but we have people in our culture that can beat that out of them or help them to change and learn and grow, because kids can change.

Kids can change and they can learn stuff, and they can be held accountable, things like that.

So if you have a very strong culture and great leadership, I think I've seen some groups that can take some risk on some of the riskier kids.

From a character standpoint, most of the time it ends up not working out well, I would say when that happens.

But there are some programs that they feel comfortable with it, and then they change the kid's life for the better, and they help them to understand that some of the things that they were doing are counterproductive to the team and counterproductive to their own development and their own dreams of where they want to go.

And so I don't.

I don't want to put a blanket answer to that, because when you're.

Every time you're dealing with people, there's always gray area and.

And things like that.

But yes, like, as a whole, if you were put to put a gun in my head and say, yeah, you have to answer this yes or no.

Yes, 100%.

Like, the best programs very much care about people first and what they're bringing into their program.

From that standpoint, that's great.

It was actually kind of a loaded question because I was going to follow it up with.

Because you were part of some of the story programs, and when you were there, do you have a success story where you kind of brought this person in, knowing that we have the culture to be able to take this kid to a level not only on the ice, but off the ice and those intangibles.

Is there somebody that you've had the opportunity to coach that you're like, wow, this kid really turned a corner because of the program.

That's a good question.

Nobody really, like, comes to mind as far as, like, this kid needed a lot of help and had to change.

Left here.

Completely different person.

Because, again, all three of the programs that I worked at, the character piece was huge.

And so not off the top of my head.

There's a lot of kids that have matured.

There's a lot of kids that have grown up.

There's a lot of kids.

When you get to college hockey, every time you achieve the next level, it's because you were one of the best players on your team or because you were one of the best players in your league or whatever it may be.

And so a lot of the growth that happens, I think with the question that you're asking, has to deal with hitting some adversity, maybe for the first time, or hitting a kind of adversity that they hadn't before.

And now they.

They really learn the value of having to earn it.

Some kids can get by on talent.

There's a lot of kids that can get by on talent.

There's a lot of kids who try to get by on talent and don't get anywhere.

But there's.

Those are, like, the true success stories for me are the ones who come in and they have a little bit of an ego, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.

They got a confidence in themselves, and then they get there and it's like, who.

I'm not the best player anymore.

Whoa.

I got to buy into playing a different role.

I'm not going to be on the power play, but how can I help my team win?

And some kids, it takes honestly four years to learn that lesson.

Some kids are negative and they're not great teammates because they're thinking about themselves and not the team, but the ones who come in and truly embrace the role that they have, even if it's.

And especially if it's not the one that they had played before.

And they got to kind of.

Those are the ones that, for me, really jump out.

And those are the ones that I think are going to be really successful dads, going to be really successful husbands, going to be really successful in life after hockey because they've learned the value and the power of being a part of something bigger than you.

And I don't think there's anything more amazing in being a part of a team than a group of players and a group of people that have a common goal and love coming to the rink every day and are pulling on the same rope.

Whatever role they have in pulling that rope, they're committed to it.

And it's about the team.

And so it's hard to think of, like, a person who came in with some red flags and then like, okay, this person changed and for the better.

There certainly are, I'm sure, but I can recount a lot of kids that.

That had to suck up their pride a little bit and figure it out, figure out how to be a part of the lineup, figure out how to be a great teammate, figure out how to be a part of the team.

Those are fun.

Those are hard conversations that you have to have with those kids, but those are Fun.

It's fun to see them when the light switch turns on and they get it.

Yeah, yeah, it's fun to see that and then it's to take it a step further.

It's fun when they start to really take a little leadership, ownership and they start to try to help somebody else.

That's what takes it to the next step for me.

Yeah, totally.

100%.

So kind of touched upon in the beginning of the podcast with hockey becoming so professionalized now and parents wanting to keep doing more and more for their kids and keeping up with the Joneses and they have their kids doing private lessons every single day at 5am and spring leagues and super elite summer tournaments.

So what do you think are some of the biggest mistakes that parents are making today when trying to accelerate their kids development, especially at an early age?

That's a great question and you used a really interesting word in that question and it was accelerate.

There's no such thing as accelerated development.

Development is, it takes time, man.

Like, it's a long, hard, strenuous process.

And for me, like consistency wins out.

At the end of the day.

The ones who love the game are going to be more consistent in their effort to put in, get better in their development.

And I think that we live in a day and age where it's pretty easy to get instant gratification, communication.

It's pretty easy to see results right away.

But that's just not how development works, particularly hockey and athletic development.

It takes time and everybody matures at different rates physically.

Everybody matures at different rates psychologically and emotionally.

And so again, there's no blueprint.

Every path is different, every kid is different.

And so it's funny that you asked the question with that word, accelerate.

I would say that's the problem is we try to accelerate the process instead of letting the process play out.

And there's a term that we use at the higher levels of hockey and that's marriage.

Marinate.

Marinate where you are and be where your feet are.

Be present, be the best you can be at the level that you're at.

And then once you're ready, let's go, let's get to that next level.

Let's continue to put the, the foot on the gas pedal.

But the, yeah, that's the biggest issue I think I see is that everybody's treating this as a race to the wrong finish line.

If you want to be the, if you want your kid to be the best 10 year old, great.

Go nuts, go crazy.

Crazy.

Like go to all the ID camps And put your kid, specialize them and all that kind of stuff.

Well, that's great.

You're going to have the best 10 year old, but you're not going to.

I can pretty much guarantee you're not going to have the best 15 year old.

And I would say that to parents of 15 year olds, you want to do that, you want to make it so professional and put so much pressure on them and things like that.

Great.

You might have the best 15 year old, you're not going to have the best 18 year old.

So what's the finish line that you're racing to?

Is it to be the best tenure year old?

Because it's pretty easy to do that.

It's the best 15 year old.

Or is it the best 18 year old when it really matters?

That's their dream.

Is the 18 year old best kid?

So it takes time.

Don't accelerate it.

Let the kid lead it.

Every kid's different, everybody's got a different path.

And yeah, like I don't know anybody in this game that has achieved the highest levels that have not loved the game.

Like the two consistencies of all the like truly elite.

I know everybody throws that word around like it's nothing but like the truly top of the top of the players that I know, they have two consistencies.

One is they love hockey.

They absolutely love the game.

It's not work to them.

They love coming to the rink, they love the adversity.

Like they love being a part.

Like they just love hockey.

And then the second thing is, we talked about it earlier, it's ownership and accountability.

They take ownership for everything that they do.

Those are the two biggest consistencies that I've seen of the truly successful people in this game, whether that's players or coaches.

And so as we think about it as adults, what kind of environments can we create for our kids that can help them to develop those life skills that are so common and so consistent amongst the truly elite people that I know.

If we can create environments where they're going to love the game, if we can create environments where they're going to look in the mirror and take, take ownership and accountability for what they do.

We're developing rockstar hockey players and we're going to develop rockstar human beings.

God, I love that.

I'm going to like write a lot of that down and quote you from now on for some of that stuff.

But I mean, I think you brought up a lot of fantastic points.

I think you know that.

Yeah, I'm going to write that down.

And use that material a little bit more and hopefully it starts to really hit home and marinate with some people.

Marinate.

There you go.

Good work.

I didn't throw it in there.

And I see it firsthand too.

I have a lot of parents that come to me and say, yeah, well, why my kid, he's playing A or B and his buddies in triple A and this and that.

I said, okay.

Hockey is a slow developing sport, right.

We say it all the time, right?

Eric, on this podcast, it's hockey.

Everyone has their own path.

Path.

Is he coachable?

Is he coming to the rink?

Is he going to have fun?

Is he respectful?

Is he going to work hard?

We all know the best 10 year old isn't going to be the 18 year old that's skating circles around everybody.

So as long as he's coming to the rink or she's coming to the rink and they're having fun and they're working hard and they're coachable and they're listening and they're doing everything they need to do, those are the players that are truly going to develop and love the game.

Not the 10 year old superstar who feels like it's a job more than, than a game.

Right.

He's gonna burn out and he's not gonna play by the time he's 12, 15 years old.

So.

I'm glad you brought that up.

Yeah.

I mean, it's frustrating for me to see because I've seen it firsthand to see that parents are just sucking the life out of some of these kids and they're not gonna have a chance to live up to that potential.

Potential in the sport that they probably love.

The parents who are overshadowing.

It's just sad to watch sometimes.

Yeah.

And for the parents out there that are listening, like every kid's different in the amount that you can push them to.

Like I was a kid that loved the game from diapers and so my parents could push me a little bit, they could maybe put some me in some more stuff and things like that and I would welcome it.

Now I would also say too that like you make the sugar analogy, right?

Like everybody loves sugar, but too much sugar, sugar is going to be detrimental at the end of the day.

It's the same in sports.

Too much of it can lead to burnout mentally and overuse injuries physically.

But I would encourage parents to really ask their kids questions.

Hey, is this too much?

But do we need to pull it back a little bit?

Hey, I see you're really loving this.

Do you want me to put you in more.

And everybody knows their kid better than anybody else does.

And it's important that we have these conversations.

And these conversations are a two way street.

I love the game of hobby hockey.

I absolutely love it.

And there were times where I was like, okay, I want to be a kid, you know, like, hey, I don't want to do this today.

Like I just give me, I need a break, I need.

And that's totally fine.

And my parents were great because they'd be like, okay, perfect.

Love to hear that.

Go be a kid.

Go hang out with your friends and so listen to your kid, ask them questions because you may find something out that can help them or hurt them based on the decisions that you're making.

And so you have to involve your kids in this process.

Even from the youngest of ages.

And every.

My oldest is 8, I can have these conversations with her to a certain extent that she gets it a little bit.

But even you get to know your kid through these kinds of things, then you can have a better.

You have more of a breadth of information that can help you make the best decision of what they want.

Because at the end of the day, they have to want it.

If it's your dream before theirs, they ain't gonna get there.

They're just not.

And you might have a kid that hates you when they're an adult.

I have teammates that hate their parents because of how they treated them in the game of hockey.

And so like just involve the kid in their process and let them lead too.

I think that's something that would be really beneficial for parents as they're supporting their kids.

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yeah, I love that.

I think that make them part of the process is huge.

That's the way I parents and my wife parents, we involve them and we always say that we'll make it.

If we can find a way to make it financially and logistically supportable, we will.

But they got to put the work in and we'll offer it and if they continue to work hard.

But if they come to me and they're like, dad, I want to go do X, Y or Z, they do you think it's okay?

I'm like, yeah, absolutely.

Because that shows that like they understand that this development is a process in one day of going to hang out with a buddy and maybe not do you know their thousand pucks of shooting, it's not going to be overly detrimental to them.

Yeah, and I think that's actually, that's a great point that you raised because, because again, this is kind of goes back to involving your kid in the process.

But I think it's perfectly okay for a parent, especially when it comes to hockey and how expensive and how time consuming hockey is to say, hey, look bud, do you have any idea how much I am sacrificing my time, my, my hard earned money from going to work and my time away from your mom and your other siblings to do this.

This.

I will happily support you if this is your dream, but this is a two way street, pal.

And you got to put in the effort to.

I think that's a perfectly reasonable conversation, especially as you get to like the tier one and it gets really expensive and really time consuming and crazy.

Nothing wrong with having an honest conversation with your kid like that.

Hey, I'm.

I will support you, but like, yeah, this is a two way street and you got to put the effort in.

You got to show me that you care and you got to show me that you're developing and you're falling in love with it.

It.

Because if not, like I, I'm going to support your sister in her ballet or I'm going to support your sister in her hockey.

There's other things that I can be doing with my time and money that'll be a lot more productive.

I think that's a perfectly reasonable conversation to have with your kids as they get older.

That's music's my ears because my two boys are going to absolutely be listening to this podcast and they love to listen to what you say.

So, like, maybe now they'll get it and it'll resonate with them a little more.

So it's.

This is perfect.

I couldn't have set that up any better.

Glad to help.

All right, that's a win.

That's a win.

So you mentioned you several times.

I know, like Chuck and I, you are a member of the Proud Dad Club and Vex 2 recently and you're raising three daughters while you continue to lead in the hockey world.

Right.

And what do you.

I know where you're going to get them and their level of involvement in sports will be however much they want it to as you.

As they progress.

So, like, what do you hope your own kids learn from sports?

Like, and whether they pursue hockey or ballet or gymnastics or soccer, whatever it may be, like, what do you hope they get out of sports in general?

Oh, that's a great question.

It's an interesting one, having daughters.

And I asked a similar question to one of my mentors in the game who actually has three daughters who are grown up now at this point.

And then.

And his answer, like, really?

Especially in today's day and age, it struck a chord with me and I think I might only had one daughter at the time, or maybe two, but it was.

I want them to have body positivity and I want them to be confident in themselves.

And I think that is something that sports can Give, particularly female athletes, is a confidence in their physicality and their confidence in themselves in a world, especially on social media, that isn't real and tells women all their flaws.

And so that was an interesting one.

So that.

That I stole from a guy that I know that I really respect and has and three daughters.

So I want to preface that on that because I thought that was a really interesting one, and I believe that now.

That's awesome.

And I thought that was a really cool answer.

And I think that could be the same for men, too.

What I just said about women can be the same for men.

I think women have different challenges with social media and the way that they're portrayed, but I think that could be same for the med, too.

What do I hope sports gives my kids?

I hope sports gives my kids a passion for something.

Something.

I want kids that find a passion and find something that they love to do, and maybe playing sports shows them that their passion is in something else, and that's totally fine.

Maybe it is in hockey or a different sport that we've put them in, because at this point, they're young and we're trying to put them in everything, and we're trying to see what they fall in love with.

And so I hope they find a passion from it.

And I really hope that they learn the requisite life skills that can help them be.

Be happy, fulfilled human beings.

At the end of the day, that's the number one answer, is I hope sports can teach them the life lessons that can help them to be great people.

It can help them be confident.

It can help them to be resilient.

It can help them to understand the value of being a part of something bigger than themselves and be a part of a team.

Because I think the people that I know in this world and I think of myself and my own fulfillment and happiness, when those things are right, I feel like I'm right in who I am as a person.

And it all comes down to those life skills.

So, yeah, I would say just life skills, confidence.

Those are things that I hope my daughters get from the sports that we put them in.

It's a great answer.

Yeah.

Couldn't agree more.

That's.

I mean, I preach to my boys all the time.

The sport, regardless of what it is or your passion, you got to find your why, right?

And I talk about mine all the time.

My why is my voice right?

Like, that's my why I do everything.

So they've got to find something that they can put passion into.

And if that's hockey, Fantastic.

And we'll make that.

Whatever I can do to help.

If it's playing the flute or the guitar, like, yep, same thing.

We'll pivot.

We were.

I forget what sport we were watching and or may not meet a better sport.

I don't know what it was, but my son, we walked out and he was like, are you glad that I didn't pick that as my passion?

And I was like, dude, if it was your passion, I would have supported it.

But, man, I applied.

But yeah, yeah, I had a really cool moment with my 8 year old daughter this weekend and she, when you ask her kind of what she wants to do when she grows up, she wants to be a cheerleader and she wants to be a hair stylist, which is like, all right.

Like, I.

That's not my thing, but that's great if you did.

And my wife signed us up for like a daddy daughter kind of stunt class.

Cheerleading stunt class.

And it really, for me was really cool because I got to connect and bond with my daughter was something that she loves to do and she so enjoyed her time being with daddy and doing those things.

And because of that, I so enjoyed being with my daughter and doing the thing that she loved to do.

And it was just, it was so cool.

And it made me really think and reflect about my childhood.

And some of my fondest memories are like playing hockey in the basement with my dad.

Dad, My dad was a Division 1 hockey player and loves the game and got me into it.

And, and that was kind of like a, kind of like a synergistic moment where it was like kind of thinking about me as a parent and then me thinking about myself as a kid with my parent.

And like, it's funny, like, I even tell some of the crazy parents, like, if you want your.

If you're a crazy and your goal is to get your kid to the NHL or the PWHL and the women's side, the best thing that you can do to create an elite hockey player is when they're young, go play hockey with them in the basement or go play hockey with them in the driveway and build that love for the game with them and bond over it.

You like that?

Ultimately, I don't know if there's anything better as a parent than to watch your kid and be a part of your kid doing what they love to do.

Like, how cool is that?

And it really came full circle to me this weekend.

So you're catching me at an emotional moment here a bit.

Little bit.

With it being so recently it was very touching to have that experience with my daughter and to see how much she was enjoying it and to see how much that she was enjoying doing it with me and building that bond, man.

Like it was just like a high, an absolute high as a parent being able to do that.

Yeah, that's awesome.

And I relate it to the.

When you see it, when I've seen it a lot lot as a coach where I had a young player and parents that never played the game and then they took, they saw their kids passion for it.

So they took an adult learn to play class.

And then after a year of these two working at their craft themselves, they come together on the ice at like the parent versus kid end of season game where inevitably some adult gets hurt because they're bold.

But you see the joy on the kid's face when they're like out there like toe dragging mom or dad.

And it's so cool to see.

Yeah, totally.

Yeah.

Brings back memories too, right?

Like when I was a kid too, like my dad playing catch with me or shooting pucks outside in the driveway, right.

We all work a lot and at the end of the day, right, we're exhausted.

But when my kid asked me, or even after the long tournament weekend or something, my kid, we come back after driving two plus hours, my kid, kid wants to play mini hockey and I'm exhausted.

I think he wants to play and he's going to remember these things or she's going to remember these things.

So.

So it's really important to me to do that stuff as well.

So I think we're doing well as dads, so.

Yeah.

I mean, my wife reminds me all the time when they ask for certain things.

She's like, hey, they're not going to ask for that forever.

And I'm like, you're right.

Yeah.

So I'm going to, I'm going to do it.

And while they can, you know, being

a parent is the craziest, hardest, most rewarding job any of us will ever have.

It's so cool, man.

We took a pivot to emotional town.

We talked about players and player development.

We talked a little bit about parents.

We also have a lot of coaches that listen as well.

So in your mind, and this is a very broad question, we could probably go on for hours with this question, but in your mind, what makes a group great youth hockey coach?

What makes a great youth hockey coach?

Going back to leadership, they got to be themselves.

There's not one right way to be a great youth hockey coach.

There are all different Types of coaches that I've had and all different types of coaches that I've worked with that were very different but were equally as awesome in my development journey.

So got to be yourself, number one.

Number two is it's about the kids and it's not about them.

I think that's a big part of it.

And it's easy as a coach to get blinded by wins and losses and your own ego and things like that, but really being a player centric coach, where you're putting the needs of the kids first, particularly over your own ego, those to me, are successful youth hockey coaches.

I think this goes for leaders too.

But I think great youth hockey coaches are, are lifelong learners.

The game is always changing.

People are always changing.

So keeping up with those changes and finding better ways to connect with kids, finding better ways to create practice plans to make your kids better.

I think the best coaches are ones that are lifelong learners.

And then I think the best, honestly, like the best youth hockey coaches are the ones who create an environment where the kids fall in love with game.

Honestly, at the end of the day, like, what's the environment where you're creating?

Like, I think that the best coaches are the ones whose kids can't wait to get to the rink and don't want to leave when they get there.

And we should judge our coaches not by wins and losses, by like retention and who wants to come back and play for that coach the next year.

And we should judge the coaches by how much better is the team in March than they were in October?

Not based on a ranking or based on records.

So I gave you a couple different things there, but I think the last one, just creating an environment where kids can fall in love with the game.

To me, like, if you have a kid that loves to come to the rink and that that's ultimately the best thing that we can hope for in a youth coach.

Spot on.

That's great.

I mean, so I guess we've talked a lot about youth hockey in general from like a player's perspective and then from a coach's perspective.

And USA Hockey is doing a lot of good things.

I think I'm seeing a lot of positives.

There's some.

There's positives, right?

There's some questionable head scratchers and then there's some things that maybe they could do better.

So we talked a lot about other things that were like over emphasizing.

What do you think that is one thing we're not or under emphasizing, I

guess under emphasizing as far as just kind of just in the hockey world

in general or in USA Hockey, what would they could do a better job at emphasizing more in the development?

Got it.

Apparent education.

100% parent education.

I think that that is something and that's not just on USA Hockey.

That's on the affiliates of USA Hockey and that's on the clubs themselves that are going to be the ones that are actually doing the talking to the people parents.

Hockey is a different sport and how we deliver it than most other sports.

It's, it's just different in, in so many different ways.

And so we have to do a better job of setting expectations.

We have to do a better job of educating parents of what hockey development looks like.

We have to do a better job of holding parents accountable to, to being nuts and crazy and things like that.

And I know this from what all the youth organizations that we work with.

The more proactive you are in educating the parents parents, the less fires you're going to have to put out in the end.

And so the conventional wisdom of what it used to be is like you're a parent, I'm coach, don't talk to me.

And I'm going to do a stark meeting at the beginning of the year where I'm going to tell you that I'm the boss and I don't want to hear from you.

Those days are gone.

They're absolutely gone.

You have to involve the parents in what you do.

You have to educate the parents.

You have to continuously talk to them and not like crazily.

I'm not saying like every day you have to check in and things like that.

That I mean, but the, the more you invest, I think invest is the right word, the more you invest into parent education, the, the better culture you're going to create for your team and your organization.

The less fires you're going to have to put out and the less angry emails you're going to have to, you're going to have to tend to.

And so what is one thing that I think our sport at, from USA Hockey and Hockey Canada all the way down can do a better job of?

It's, it's parent education.

Do you think that or do you see a scenario where it would be a good idea for some of the younger, mid.

Younger to mid birth years in the youth hierarchy world for when you're doing, you know, say it's at the tier one level or maybe you in the tier two double and you're doing some of these film reviews or if you're a good program, you're doing these Film reviews with your program and your kids, to invite the parents and not to like step on anybody's toes, but to educate them a little bit more and they get a little bit more buy in.

Do you see that as like a.

Would that be a good thing?

Could be, yeah.

It's funny you say that because a really good friend of mine in the game, he's a tier one coach and he kind of went radical with it where he would, like, videotape on a phone, his pregame speeches and send it to the parents.

He would send them a weekly email of all of the practice plans and the themes for the week, and he would cc me on a few of them just so he can show me kind of what he was up to and what he was doing.

And it was amazing the buy in that he got from the parents.

Even when record wise, when in tier one, everybody gets nuts for the rankings and all that kind of stuff.

Like, the parents were like, hey, appreciate all you're doing.

Do it.

Keep it up.

Great job.

And that's not to say I'm sure there were hard moments too, but he was like, so transparent.

Like, I think transparency is a word.

That's another thing we need to be a lot better with is being transparent.

He kind of went that far that way.

And it reaped a lot of rewards because of it, as far as the culture, culture was concerned and putting out fires.

So, yeah, it depends on the coach, obviously, and probably depends on the parent group too.

And it also depends on the kids.

Like, some of the kids are like, I want my parents in here for like, video.

Maybe you invite them in once a month or something like that.

Yeah, yeah, but, yeah, but I do think involving the parents a little bit more and giving them a window into the why of what you're doing, it goes a long way to building that culture, building that trust, and ultimately the less fires I think you'll put put out because of it.

It's awesome.

I love to hear.

So we're coming up on an hour now.

Covered a lot of stuff.

Is there anything that we missed in this podcast that you might want to bring up or touch upon?

Anything missed?

No, it was great.

A lot of great questions, a lot of great conversations.

So I don't think we missed anything.

No.

All right.

I think we missed one important thing, and it's a hot topic right now in the social media podcast world.

How is Vex going to fare in his baseball versus hockey 1v1 that he has coming up?

Is he at risk for injury?

How Are we looking?

I am so excited to see this and I hope because Vax, he loves to talk smack and he's doing a great job of it on social media right now.

And I'm rooting for him.

I'm rooting for him.

For me, it's a win win, because he's either going to kill it and he's going to get a hit or whatever, or it's gonna look really bad and that will be really funny.

And so he texted me, like, as it was starting, and he was like, you got to check out these things that are going on.

And it's been entertaining, man.

Like, it's been really fun to watch.

So hopefully he does well.

But either way, if he falls on his face, that's gonna be funny for me too.

That'll be good entertainment.

Oh, yeah, it's gonna be awesome.

I love his passion.

He.

I mean, he throws it behind everything.

It's so cool to see.

Oh, yeah, yeah, it's going to be awesome.

It'll be one for the record bricks for sure.

No question.

Yeah.

This was great, man.

I really appreciate you jumping on.

I always learn something from you, so that's great.

And hopefully everybody listening out there, they learned something as well.

There is one question we do ask all our guests on the podcast, so we'll close with that, and it's what is your definition of development?

Is it all encompassing?

Do you prioritize one thing over the other?

Or if you had to give a definition of development,

are you a little bit better today than you were yesterday?

Yep.

Right.

When you look at the word development, did you get better?

And we can do a whole podcast on how to do that and what it means and all that kind of stuff, but at the end of the day, it's about getting better.

And you can't get 100% better in a day and get a little bit better.

And the ones that I know, consistency wins out in the end.

Consistency and love for what you do, it wins out in the end.

So if you want to develop, love what you do, and be consistent, disciplined with it and stack those wins, you're not going to see the results right away.

But keep at it.

Keep going.

One foot in front of the other.

Oh, yeah, we talk about it all the time.

1% better.

It's the aggregation of marginal gains by David Brailster.

So, yeah, huge, huge supporter of that.

One more thing I wanted to bring up, Hockey Think Tank.

You got a lot of stuff going on there and with your meeting with organizations and things like that, that Is there something or some place that they can reach out to you for resources?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Feel free to reach out.

Thanks.

Thanks for giving us a platform to do it.

Yeah.

Our website's the Hockey Think Tank.com.

we work with youth organizations in a lot of different capacities.

We've built a community where people can come and kind of share ideas and things like that too.

So our website's the hockey think tank.com social media.

Hockey Think Tank on pretty much every social media platform.

And yeah, our goal is to bring some positivity to the hockey world every day and try to make the hockey world a little bit better every day.

So this was.

This was a lot of fun and a big part of that.

Love having these types of conversations.

And honestly, thank you for all you guys are doing in the hockey world, too, and.

And appreciate you guys having me on here.

This was a lot of fun.

Yeah, absolutely.

I mean, so I know that this.

The coaching, mentorship thing that you're doing with hockey Think Tank was one of the newer things.

Early last or late last year, early this year.

Is there something on the horizon for what's next for you guys that you want to share or just you're kind of figuring it out as you go?

No, as of right now, not really.

We're loving what we're doing with our work with youth organizations.

We're loving what we're doing as far as building a community where people can come and share ideas and provide perspective.

The coach mentorship program that you're a part of, like, that's been so much fun for me to get to know, know, you know, a bunch of really passionate hockey people.

And I've learned a ton from being able to have these conversations and.

And things like that, too.

So, yeah, a day where you learn something is a good day.

And so all of those things have made me better at what I do.

And, yeah, hockey.

It's funny, we were talking the other day.

Do you guys remember back in the day, they had those shirts, they were like, hockey is life.

Do you remember those shirts that used to.

To.

Those were huge back in the day when, like, grade school and stuff.

And I believe it, though.

Like, I think I need to get one of those because hockey has given me everything I have in my life.

I would not be here today.

I would not have the successes, the failures, the family, everything without this amazing sport.

And so if we can do things to.

To make it a little bit better, it's.

It's our way of giving back to the game that's given us everything.

That's awesome.

And from from one dad to another coach doing there.

Like, I appreciate all the things you're doing with your platform to try to change the game, to leave it a little bit better than you found it, and it's awesome.

So I commend you and I think you're doing tremendous work.

Yeah.

Appreciate that you guys too.

Thanks for having me.

Yeah, absolutely.

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